Saturday, December 18, 2010

Gluten Free Sugar Cookies


These turned out great!  A nice cake-like sugar cookie.  They had a good strength and took gobs of icing without buckling under the weight.   These make for a great afternoon with the kids, or in my case, an entertaining evening with my spouses inner child.

I started tinkering with two different childhood recipes and adjusting for gluten free.  The resulting recipe will be my "go to" recipe for all holiday or themed sugar cookies from now on.

Ingredients

1 cup Arrowroot flour
1 cup finely ground Sweet Rice Flour
1 and 1/2 cup Potato Starch (not potato flour)
1 and 1/2 cup Tapioca Flour
2 and 1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup Quinoa flour
4 eggs
1 and 1/2 cup unsalted sweet cream butter (3 sticks)
3 teaspoons Xanthan Gum
1 teaspoon sea salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Begin by cutting the butter into chunks and setting it out to soften.

Whisk all the flours, the xanthan gum, salt, and baking powder together in a separate bowl and set aside.

In your stand mixer, cream together the butter and the sugar.

Add the egg and the vanilla and blend thoroughly.

Add the flour mixture in 1/3 at a time and mix thoroughly after each addition.

Turn the dough out into cling wrap, wrap tightly and refrigerate for at least an hour.

I mixed powdered sugar together with tapioca flour in a salt shaker to sprinkle my work surface with.

Cut the dough in half then re-wrap the unused half and refrigerate it again while you work with the first half.  Turn the first half out onto a well floured work surface and liberally sprinkle with the flour mixture.  Roll out to approximately 1/4 inch thick.

Stamp out your desired shapes.

Remove and collect the dough from in between the cut outs.

Transfer the cookies to an ungreased non stick cookie sheet about an inch apart and bake at 400 degrees for 11 minutes.

Work the dough scraps together in your hands until they begin to get sticky, flour the surface, and roll out again.  Repeat this process as necessary until all the dough has been used.

I transferred the baked cookies to a sheet of wax paper to cool,

Once the cookies have completely cooled, frost them as desired.  These will take any type of frosting from a wet glaze to a thick tough to spread frosting.

These came out with the perfect sugar cookie texture.  Not too crunchy, not too soft.  I love them and I know you will too.  Here is a picture showing the thickness and the interior.


Enjoy!






Sunday, December 12, 2010

Gluten Free Honey Oat Sandwich Bread


This was todays experiment and it turned out delicious enough to share the recipe.  Baked with Bob's Red Mill Gluten Free Rolled Oats inside and out.

Cold weather keeps me in the kitchen baking and I love how the house smells with fresh bread in the oven.  This bread made great peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.  It was delicious warm with just a smear of butter also.  It isn't too sweet like some gluten free breads, and using the honey only on the top gives it a sweetened crust but not sweet in every bite.  It was a big hit with Shawn and I'm sure it will be a big hit with your family also.

Ingredients

3 eggs
1 tablespoons clover honey

Group 1
1 cup potato starch
1 cup Bob's Red Mill Gluten Free Oat Flour
1/2 cup quinoa flour
1/2 cup arrowroot flour
1/2 cup Bob's Red Mill Gluten free Rolled Oats
1/4 cup sugar
1 and 1/2 teaspoons Xanthan gum
1 teaspoon Guar gum
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt

Group 2
1 teaspoon sugar
2 teaspoons active dry yeast (1 packet 5/16th ounce)
1/4 cup warm water

Group 3
1 cup whole milk
1 tablespoon cider vinegar
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil


Begin by setting all ingredients out to come to room temperature.  Do not use anything cold with yeast.

Mix all the dry ingredients from group 1 together with a whisk in your stand mixer bowl.  Make sure to be thorough.


Set the flour mixture aside.  Mix the ingredients together from group 2 in a separate bowl and set this aside in a warm spot  to "bloom". Mix the ingredients from group 3 together in a separate bowl and set it out to come to room temperature.   When you reach this step, preheat oven to 175 and walk away for about 45 minutes to an hour.  Allow all ingredients to reach room temperature.

With dough hooks attached, mix the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients using your stand mixer.



It makes a fairly sticky dough.  I used extra virgin olive oil in a spray to coat my loaf pan and filled the pan as pictured below.


Once the dough is in the loaf pan, score the top with a knife, squirt the honey into the knife cuts and sprinkle some loose oats on the top.  


Place into the oven at 175 degrees to rise for 1 hour.  After 1 hour turn the temperature to 350 degrees and bake for about 30-45  minutes more or until golden brown crust has formed.


Remove from the pan and cool on a wire rack.


This bread was a bit heartier and denser than my regular sandwich bread recipe.    It had the texture of one of those "whole wheat" or "9 grain" deli breads.


This is one of the first breads I've used Guar gum in and I have to say that the jury is still out on it.  I've had great success with using  Xanthan Gum as a binder in my breads.


Enjoy!






Tuesday, December 7, 2010

Gluten Free Gingerbread Cookies


With the Holiday Season in full swing I decided to make Gingerbread.   This was one of the easier recipes I remember from my gluten ladened past. So, Today I decided to give it a go, gluten free.

I really like a spicy gingerbread and I really like my gingerbread cookies to have a slight crunch to the exterior and an almost cake-like interior.  These turned out just perfect.  Delicious, with that perfect combination of crunchy and soft.

Here is the recipe for the cookies.

Ingredients



  • 1 cup potato starch
  • 1/2 cup sweet rice flour
  • 1/2 cup arrowroot flour
  • 1/2 cup tapioca flour
  • 1/2 cup millet flour
  • 2 teaspoons xanthan gum
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1 tablespoon ground ginger
  • 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
  • 1/4 teaspoon allspice
  • 8 tablespoons unsalted sweet cream butter (1 stick)
  • 3/4 cup brown sugar
  • 1/2 cup unsulphered molasses
  • 1 egg
  • 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract


Begin by whisking all the dry ingredients but the sugar together in a separate bowl and set this aside.

Next, cream the butter and the brown sugar together in your stand mixer.  Add in the egg, vanilla, and molasses next and blend until smooth.

Switch to dough hooks and add the flour mixture in slowly, I did it in thirds, mixing thoroughly together each time.  The dough will be thick, and a little sticky.

Turn the dough out into a sheet of cling wrap.  Cut in half and wrap half of the dough tightly in cling wrap to rest while you roll out the other half.

Turn the other half of the dough out onto a well floured rolling mat. (I use sweet rice flour).  Add flour as needed to prevent sticking, it can be brushed off later.

Roll to approximately 1/4 inch thickness and cut out your shapes.

Remove the unused scraps of dough and wrap them tightly in cling wrap to reuse.

Gently transfer each cookie to a cookie sheet, 1 inch apart,  for baking. Oven should be preheated to 350 degrees.  Either spray the cookie sheet with a cooking spray or line with paper.  Baking time is your choice.  I suggest around 8 minutes.  anywhere from 6 minutes to 10 minutes should be sufficient, softer cookies with less bake time, crunchier with more bake time.

Cool completely before decorating.

Decorating them was easy.  I decided to go with simple white icing.  I made a mixture of powdered sugar, milk, and water.  No particular amounts.  I just started mixing it in a bowl to the consistency I thought would be good. If I had to estimate, I would say 1 teaspoon milk, 1 teaspoon water, and a cup and a half to 2 cups of powdered sugar.

I then put the thick icing mixture in a zippered freezer bag and cut a tiny piece of one corner out.

Only one of my Gingerbread Men  was what you would call traditional.

These were delicious and I am glad that I made them.  I know I will be making more of them, they were a big hit with the family.  These will be perfect to take to a few Christmas parties this year.

Enjoy!




Monday, December 6, 2010

Gluten Free Blueberry and Oat Muffins



I have a fascination with blueberry muffins.  This is my second recipe for blueberry muffins that I have created and blogged about.  This time I added gluten free rolled oats and gluten free oat flour.



Not all people with Celiac can tolerate oats.  If you can tolerate them, I suggest Bob's Red Mill Gluten Free varieties.  Shawn is one of the super sensitive to gluten types and he can tolerate gluten free oats.

I will be doing even more blueberry muffin recipes in the future.  This one is still very American, in that it is more similar to a cupcake than a hearty muffin.  Next time I pick up some blueberries at the market I will make a denser, heartier, breakfast muffin.

Don't get me wrong.  These are delicious, wonderfully textured, and moderately healthy.

Ingredients

1 cup Gluten Free Oat Flour
1/2 cup Quinoa flour
1/2 cup Sweet Rice Flour
1/2 cup Gluten Free Rolled Oats
3 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon Ground Nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon Guar Gum
1/2 teaspoon Xanthan Gum
1 cup sugar
1 stick of unsalted sweet cream butter (softened)
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup whole milk
1/2 cup organic applesauce
3 eggs

Begin by mixing the flours, oats, salt, nutmeg, baking powder, and gums together in a separate bowl and set aside.

Next cream the butter and sugar.  I used my stand mixer for this.

Next add the eggs, milk, applesauce, and vanilla to the butter/sugar and blend thoroughly.  Reduce the speed and slowly add in the flour/oat mixture until thoroughly blended together being sure to keep one tablespoon of the flour out for the next step.

Wash and remove the stems from the blueberries.  Put them into a bowl and sprinkle a tablespoon of the flour mixture that you held back , onto the blueberries and toss slightly to coat them.

Next fold the blueberries by hand into the batter.  Mixing the blueberries in by hand seems to keep more of them "whole".

Spoon the mixture into your paper lined muffin tin.  Sprinkle the tops with brown sugar and gluten free rolled oats.

Bake at 350 degrees for 25 - 30 minutes, remove and cool a few minutes in the muffin tin.

After a few minutes, remove from muffin tin and cool on a wire rack.


These are a great dessert type muffin.  Makes 18 muffins.  Store in the refrigerator.

Enjoy!