Gluten-Free Makeovers (5 page)

(High Protein Blend with Chickpea Flour)

2¼ cups chickpea flour (9.5 ounces), quinoa flour (9.1 ounces), or another bean flour

2 cups cornstarch (9.6 ounces) or potato starch (11.2 ounces)

2 cups plus 2 tablespoons tapioca starch/flour (9.3 ounces)

2 cups brown rice flour (8.5 ounces)

½ cup packed light brown sugar (2.8 ounces)

2 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons xanthan gum

3 teaspoon salt

Self-Rising Flour
is used for muffins, quick breads, scones, and biscuits. The baking powder is included as it is called for in nearly all recipes in this category. Baking soda, however, is not a constant, and left to the baker to add as needed. The addition of amaranth and sorghum flour makes for a nutritionally dense, high fiber blend, but don’t let that put you off. This mix produces light, delicate baked goods. The fact that they are a little healthier will be our secret.

SELF-RISING FLOUR

1¼ cups white rice flour (6.5 ounces)

1 cup sweet white sorghum flour (4 ounces)

¾ cup amaranth flour (3 ounces)

¾ cup cornstarch (3.5 ounces) or potato starch (4 ounces)

¼ cup tapioca starch/flour (1.1 ounces)

2 tablespoons baking powder

2 teaspoons xanthan gum

1½ teaspoons salt

Cake and Pastry Flour’s
job is to produce cakes and cupcakes that rise nicely but have a delicate crumb when cut. Less protein and gum are necessary to perform this task. Sorghum flour and cornstarch help promote the light, airy texture.

CAKE AND PASTRY FLOUR

1 cup sweet white sorghum flour (4 ounces)

1 cup white rice flour (5.4 ounces)

¾ cup cornstarch
*
(3.5 ounces)

1½ teaspoons xanthan gum (or guar gum)

½ teaspoon salt

The
Basic Blend
is for many cookie recipes and for those times when an all-purpose blend is called for. This can be replaced by using another all-purpose “white” blend with excellent results. You will need to add gum and salt unless they are already included in the blend.

BASIC BLEND

2¾ cups rice flour (15.4 ounces)

1¼ cups corn or potato starch (8 ounces)

⅓ cup tapioca starch/flour (1.5 ounces)

You can never have too much of a good thing when it comes to having these blends on hand anytime you want to bake. Make up multiple batches. Here’s an easy way:

• To prepare a single batch: weigh out each dry ingredient using a kitchen scale. Weights are provided for a single recipe here.

• The amount of gum, salt, baking powder, and baking soda per single recipe are too small to weigh out. Instead, measure these in teaspoons and tablespoons and add to your blend.

• For larger batches: on a worksheet, multiply each ingredient by the number of recipes you would like to create. (I find that 5 or 10 work well.) Measure out the same multiple for the smaller ingredients like the gum, salt, baking powder, and baking soda, in teaspoons and tablespoons. Weigh this quantity in grams and write down the amount for future use.

• Now you are ready to make a large batch of a blend anytime you wish. Simply weigh ingredients in the multiple you’ve chosen and place the ingredients in a large bowl or plastic container. Mix very well.

To make
Bread Flour #1
from a Commercial Blend: Add 1 cup amaranth or sorghum flour per 3 cups of commercial all-purpose blend. Add 1 teaspoon xanthan gum and ½ teaspoon salt per 1 cup of flour if not already included in the blend. If included, add only 1 teaspoon of additional xanthan gum for 3 cups of flour.

To make
Self-Rising Flour
from a Commercial Blend: Add 2 teaspoons baking powder per 1 cup of commercial blend. Add ¾ teaspoon xanthan gum and ¼ teaspoon salt per 1 cup of flour if not already included in the blend. If included, no other alterations are necessary.

To make
Cake and Pastry Flour
from a Commercial Blend: Add ¼ cup cornstarch per 1 cup of commercial blend. Add ¾ teaspoon xanthan gum and ¼ teaspoon salt per 1 cup of flour if not already included in the blend. If already included, it is not necessary to add additional salt or xanthan gum.

When I was diagnosed with celiac disease, I attended culinary classes, knowing full well I might not be able to eat anything, but certain I could re-create it at home. When I held a recipe, I held its soul. I had the inside track into understanding how it worked, why it worked, and the relationship of wet to dry ingredients.

I pieced together ratios and methods, often examining two or more recipes for the same item to see which parts of it I preferred and cobbling together the parts that suited my taste buds and the specific personality of gluten-free flours. This premise started feeding me.

I studied cookbooks much like others read mystery novels. I uncovered the techniques that make them work—how did the creator give lift to the end product; was the fat added as a solid or a liquid? Then I looked at the end result—was it airy, dense, crumbly, flaky?

This helped determine the best blend of flours and the amount of xanthan or guar gum needed to achieve a gluten-free version.

I looked at the gluten containing ingredients—the quantity of flour needed, for instance helped me determine the extent of the makeover. If the recipe called
for a dusting of flour or a tablespoon or two as in a cheesecake or a flourless cake, the substitution was easy—one kind of flour would work.

If the recipe was more complex, a fancy cake or a yeast bread, then the makeover required a bit more imagination. Doughs that needed elasticity such as piecrust or bread required a blend with a high protein flour and a teaspoon of gum per cup of flour. In a delicate cookie, I did not need something chewy, but rather something that would hold together, but impart a fine crumb. A light mild-tasting flour blend such as one containing white rice and corn or tapioca starch, and a tiny bit of gum would do.

Every recipe has its own personality that comes from the relationship of wet ingredients to dry, the amount of fat and whether it is a solid or a liquid, the quantity of sugar, eggs, and flavoring. These characteristics give a recipe its integrity, complexity, and name. In essence, its DNA.

When I do a recipe makeover, I do not alter those sacrosanct relationships and neither should you. If you change one ingredient, it will be necessary to change the others. To understand this delicate balance you need only imagine the last time you cut a recipe in half. When you did so, you cut every ingredient by the same amount. If you look at recipe makeovers in the same way, you will always have success.

Here’s a recipe we can try together:

My friend Beverly asked me to help her make over a family recipe for Irish Tea Bread. On the surface it looked like a simple task and I was happy to give her a hand. Ironically, what looked so easy took several attempts. It’s a great recipe to help you understand how to convert a mainstream recipe into one that is gluten-free.

First, here’s Beverly’s family recipe. Notice the warning that the dough will be heavy and sticky. Also note the technique: the butter is cut into the dry ingredients until crumbly and the buttermilk and eggs are added later. This tea bread is probably a cross between an Irish Soda Bread and a scone (more scone than soda bread owing to the small amount of baking soda).

Mix together in a large bowl the first five ingredients. Cut in the butter until the mixture is crumbly. Add the raisins. Mix the beaten eggs and buttermilk together in a separate bowl. Make a well in the center of the flour mixture and pour in the wet ingredients. Mix with a wooden spoon until the mixture is moist. This is a very heavy and sticky dough.

Grease and flour a 9-inch pan or a loaf pan. Spoon the batter into the prepared pan and pat lightly into the shape of the pan. Bake at 350°F for 1 hour, or until browned.

NOTE: It is essential to put raisins into the dry ingredients, otherwise they will sink to the bottom of the tea bread.

Here’s how I approached making over the original recipe:

• My first concern was selecting a blend that was light and already contained some “lift.” The self-rising blend fit the bill; it’s also the one I use to make scones. I replaced 3 cups of flour with an equal amount of this blend.

• The original recipe called for 2 teaspoons of baking powder. I needed to find out if 3 cups of my blend would yield 2 teaspoons or more of baking powder. The ratio in my blend is 4 cups of flour for 2 tablespoons of baking powder or 1½ teaspoons per cup—no need to add additional baking powder to my makeover but a bit extra won’t hurt in this dense batter.

• My self-rising blend does not contain baking soda because it is not always an ingredient in quick breads and muffins. I added baking soda to this recipe, but remembering that the dough would be dense, I added a bit more than the original recipe called for.

• The first time I made this recipe, I had made my own buttermilk, combining vinegar and milk. I used commercial buttermilk the next time and the recipe did not work. I tried again and again before realizing the combination
of baking soda and cider vinegar was critical in producing a delicate sconelike texture in this recipe. I went back to using a mixture of milk and cider vinegar. (I use that combo in several recipes in this book.)

• Adding raisins with the dry ingredients didn’t seem like a good idea. I feared they would turn to mush when I cut in the butter or blended the liquids with a wooden spoon. Dusting the raisins with the flour blend and folding them in at the end prevented them from sinking to the bottom during baking.

• For a dairy-free version, I substituted soy milk for cow’s milk and in place of butter, I used non-dairy spread. The spread is softer than butter, so I cut it into pieces and froze them briefly before cutting them into the flour. This created the same texture that cold butter produces as it begins to bake.

• I made no other changes to ingredients or amounts.

Here’s the gluten-free version:

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Lightly oil or grease a 9-inch springform pan.