gluten free baking

Raspberry Blueberry Muffin Madness!

Oh….the muffin saga continues. What shall I make for snack time?  Turning to my trusty muffin recipe I try a new variant; raspberry blueberry. Knowing I will get a similar texture to the cranberry blueberry if I use the same easy to dump together recipe. So easy: I think I can almost do it in my sleep! That’s why these fruity muffins are my go to baked snack; they can be quickly throw it together, dependably yummy and it is simple to vary the flavor depending on what fruit is available. I mention all this that so you can feel comfortable making your own version of them.  They are always tasty and far cheaper than GF muffins you can buy.spagetti and raspberry muffins 001

This particular batch of muffins did not disappoint: delicate texture yet slightly crunchy outside with zingy raspberry and sweet blueberry flavors and just enough sugar for me.  I used a bag of mixed fruit straight out of the freezer and picked out all the mango pieces leaving blueberries and raspberries -don’t defrost them before adding.  Slightly devious but I will enjoy the mango chunks later in a fruit salad. You can buy a bag of whatever berries float your boat or fit your budget

spagetti and raspberry muffins 005spagetti and raspberry muffins 004

The streusel topping insures that they look gorgeous and adds an extra layer of flavor.  There are walnuts in them to so you get some really great nutrients from the fruit, oats and nuts.  Not much guilt in eating one of these treats! You can swap the white sugar for coconut palm sugar which is very low as far as raising blood sugar.  I love how healthy these muffins are and the envious looks people give me when I chow down on one as they eat some noxious bag of salty/sugary snack full of preservatives and who knows what. People are envying ME and my GF treat…Love It! Much better than the pity party I sometimes face when people hear what I can’t eat anymore.

As always I taste tested a muffin from the batch while they were still warm out of the oven: at the moment of perfection.  This version is up there with the cranberry blueberry muffins I am addicted to.

It is smart to freeze any you won’t eat in two days time; a zip lock freezer bag works great.

Raspberry Blueberry Muffins

2 cups brown rice flour mix (see below)

2/3 cup granulated sugar

1 tbsp. baking powder

1 tsp. baking soda

¾ tsp. xanthan gum

¼ tsp. salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1 1/3 cup fresh or frozen raspberries and blueberries

1/3 cup chopped walnuts

2 large eggs

½ cup milk, 1 or 2 percent

½ cup canola oil

Topping: Mix the following in a bowl, make sure the butter is in tiny pebbles; use your fingertips to blend.

½ cup rolled oats

¼ cup brown sugar

2 tbsp. almond meal

1½ tbsp. butter

¼ tsp. cinnamon

——-

Directions: Heat your oven to 375 degrees, placing the rack in middle of oven.  Spray muffin pans with cooking spray.  One batch makes 14-16 muffins.  I got 16 when I made them.

Mix all dry ingredients in bowl of stand mixer or big bowl Add fruits and walnuts; stir to coat them with dry mix.  Combine milk and oil.  Beat in eggs, add vanilla.  Add liquids to big bowl; stir just until blended.  It is a very thick batter.

Fill muffin pans 2/3 full.  I use a big serving spoon and fill it about half way to dump in each muffin space. Sprinkle the top with the topping. Press it in a bit so it won’t all flake off after baking. Bake 21-23 min until golden brown. Do not over bake or they will taste dry.  Remove immediately from the pans and cool on a rack.  They freeze well for a few weeks, if they last that long.  Keeps in fridge (well wrapped) or an airtight cookie jar for 2-3 days.

Brown Rice Flour Mix base mix 

(This mix is the same as King Arthur’s blend)
2 c brown rice flour

2/3 c potato starch

1/3 c tapioca flour

Cranberry Blueberry Muffin Treats

muffin close up 002

Oh nuts, we are out of muffins….again.  That’s no good! I didn’t go far from my favorite recipes to make these, possibly my favorite muffins of all time. This is a riff on my fall of 2014 take on a muffin recipe out of Annalise Robert’s cookbook; Gluten-Free Baking Classics; her blueberry muffins but with a special topping. If you are looking for a great source recipe book this is it: her gf quick breads are particularly delicious, all my gluten loving friends and family enjoy them.  I made her brownies this past weekend; always perfection and rapidly devoured.

I have a confession to make: I have never been a big fan of cranberries.  Until this winter! I decided to experiment with them and found that they play very well with a variety of fruits for muffins, tarts, pies and crisps.  The cranberries brighten the flavor and add a lovely rosy color.  Do look beyond your prejudices to their sharp flavor and give them a second try.  I am so glad I did.

These muffins did not disappoint: delicate texture yet slightly crunchy outside with a great fruity flavor and just enough sugar for me.  To measure I poured about ½ cup of blueberries and added the rest of the measure out of the bag of cranberries. I used frozen fruit; easy to get in the winter, don’t defrost them before adding. The streusel topping insures that they look straight from a gluten free bakery.

There are walnuts in there so you get some really great nutrients from the fruit and nuts.  Not much guilt in eating one of these treats! You can swap the white sugar for coconut palm sugar which is very low as far as raising blood sugar.  I am out of it so I had to go with what was in my pantry.

I like to test eat a muffin from the batch while they are still warm out of the oven, at the moment of perfection.  This version is perhaps my favorite of every single muffin recipe I have tried.

It is smart to freeze any you won’t eat in two days time; a zip lock freezer bag works great.

Here are the pictures I took while making these muffins. From the outside they look somewhat plain so I took one shot of a cross section so you could see the baked fruit inside this yummy breakfast treat.

turkey meatballs, cranberry blue muffins 003turkey meatballs, cranberry blue muffins 002

turkey meatballs, cranberry blue muffins 005turkey meatballs, cranberry blue muffins 004

Cranberry Blueberry Muffins

2 cups brown rice flour mix (see below)

2/3 cup granulated sugar

1 tbsp. baking powder

1 tsp. baking soda

¾ tsp. xanthan gum

¼ tsp. salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1 1/3 cup fresh or frozen cranberries and blueberries

1/3 cup chopped walnuts

2 large eggs

½ cup milk, 1 or 2 percent

½ cup canola oil

Topping: Mix the following in a bowl, make sure the butter is in tiny pebbles; use your fingertips to blend.

½ cup rolled oats

¼ cup brown sugar

2 tbsp. almond meal

1½ tbsp. butter

¼ tsp. cinnamon

——-

Directions: Heat your oven to 375 degrees, placing the rack in middle of oven.  Spray muffin pans with cooking spray.  One batch makes 12-16 muffins.  I got 16 when I made them.

Mix all dry ingredients in bowl of stand mixer or big bowl Add fruits and walnuts; stir to coat them with dry mix.  Combine milk and oil.  Beat in eggs, add vanilla.  Add liquids to big bowl; stir just until blended.  It is a very thick batter.

Fill muffin pans 2/3 full.  I use a big serving spoon and fill it about half way to dump in each muffin space. Sprinkle the top with the topping. Press it in a bit so it won’t flake off after baking. Bake 21-23 min until golden brown. Do not over bake or they will taste dry.  Remove immediately from the pans and cool on a rack.  They freeze well for a few weeks, if they last that long.  Keeps in fridge (well wrapped) or an airtight cookie jar for 2-3 days.

Brown Rice Flour Mix base mix 

(This mix is the same as King Arthur’s blend)
2 c brown rice flour (must be finely ground: I spin mine a while in the blender cup by cup to improve its texture.)

2/3 c potato starch

1/3 c tapioca flour

 

Apple Cranberry Crisp is Awesome!

Apples are the heart of this recipe but the cranberries add snappy flavor to it and some great color.

yogurt and apple crisp 011

If you can, get organic as the sprays they use on growing apples are not good for you.  I made this last weekend with some golden delicious apples from a local orchard.  South of Hellertown is Bechdolt’s Orchard which grows many apple varieties.  Go there if you want the freshest tastiest apples in this geographic area.  The variety is up to you but I would not suggest red delicious as they are for eating only.

This recipe is out of Gluten-Free Baking Classics Cookbook by Annalise G. Roberts with a few additions.  Her flour mix appears to be identical to that of King Arthur Flour’s gf mix. I am betting you can use any GF flour mix in this recipe, not like a cake or other baked goods that have very specific flour requirements.

I have made this recipe several ways.  But it works best in the melted version below. I have made it egg free but it really somehow needs that egg to pull it together to mimic a wheat flour based crisp.  The oats can be left out if you don’t like them. I personally love oats in my crisp.  I don’t like it too sweet so I use the lesser amount of sugar.  This is entirely a personal choice.

yogurt and apple crisp 028

 

For those who love a topping and want to go low fat, this recipe is absolutely perfect with a big scoop of lowfat plain organic yogurt on it.  I love crisp warm from the oven but it also is tasty cold the next day, if you have any left over that is!

Angie’s Apple and Cranberry Crisp

3/4 cup GF flour (mix below)

½ to ¾ sugar (I used ½ a cup)

½ cup dry old fashioned oats

1 ¼ tsp baking powder

1 tsp cinnamon

½ tsp xanthan gum

½ tsp. salt

1 lg egg

5 cups thinly sliced apples

1 cup fresh or frozen cranberries

1/3 cup butter, melted

Directions:

Heat oven to 350 degrees.   Put rack in center level of oven.  Lightly butter a 9 inch square pan or spray with cooking spray.

yogurt and apple crisp 006

Combine all the dry ingredients.  Add egg and stir to mix well.   Place half the apples in the baking pan, top with cranberries and then the rest of the apples.

yogurt and apple crisp 007

Sprinkle with the dry mix and sprinkle with the melted butter.  Bake 40 minutes until bubbly and the topping is browning.

yogurt and apple crisp 010

Brown Rice Flour Mix [you can use King Arthur’s GF mix; identical to this recipe]
2 c brown rice flour (finely ground)

2/3 c potato starch – Not potato flour!

1/3 c tapioca flour

Sandwich Bread Worth Baking

Gluten Free bread is not generally known for rising high in the pan.  Nor does it often taste good enough to enjoy once the first day has passed.  Worse yet, it is mostly terrible in sandwiches, all crumbly and messy. I have tried a few recipes and, especially in the sandwich bread area, nothing was worth mentioning much less putting in this blog.  Until I baked the sandwich bread from the How Can It Be Gluten Free Cookbook, created by the America’s Test Kitchen team.  This cookbook promises “revolutionary techniques and groundbreaking recipes” right on the cover.  What I love about it is the discussion on how they came up with the final recipe; all the changes and reasons why things were added/subtracted or changed to create the best possible final result.  I guess it is the science teacher in me but those discussions are my favorite part of this book.

chickpea soup, salad, bread 014

A tall handsome loaf!

The bread recipes use one extra ingredient which put me off, I’m sort of getting tired of excessive ingredients and so many flour mixes after only two years of living gluten free.  Anyway, the ingredient is powdered psyllium husk.  The cookbook says psyllium husk powder is critical to building a stronger protein network that traps gas and steam, key to producing a taller loaf (pg171).  It took me a while but finally, I got a bag of it at Frey’s Better Foods right here in town, $6.75 in a twist tied baggie; bulk packaging lowers the price quite a bit from the commercially packaged versions.  It is a brown/gray powder.  Doesn’t look magical.  But apparently, it is!  My loaf rose and rose, to the top of my special tall sided 8 ½ x 4 inch pan.  And it stayed tall through the baking process, no shrinking or sagging either as it cooled.  It is found on page 171, classic sandwich bread.  I thought it tasted sort of like multigrain bread, not as white as I expected, which is fine by me.  The creating is typical of gf breads: mix the dry ingredients and in a separate bowl the wet ones, mix and beat well.  You do have to make up their flour mix: a blend of white and brown rice flours, potato starch, tapioca starch and non fat dry milk powder.  Not too fancy but yes, another big jar of flour mix to store somewhere…

sandwich bread, winter salad 001

Cuts nice, lots of slices for sandwiches or toast.

Anyway, it was tall and handsome and sliced easily into individual slices to enjoy now and to freeze for later.  There are lots of other recipes in this book that I plan to try. If you are serious about gluten free baking this recipe and this book are well work a good look.  I am having a sandwich today for lunch and I am excited, bread that looks normal and holds together, no more crazy crumbling sandwiches!

chickpea soup, salad, bread 015

Still slightly warm, buttered and ready for my first taste!

Classic sandwich bread

2 cups warm water, about 110 degrees

2 large eggs, room temp

2 tbsp butter melted

3 cups plus 2 tbsp ATK flour mix (recipe below)

1 1/3 cup oat flour

½ cup non fat dry milk powder

3 tbsp powdered psyllium husk

2 tbsp. sugar

2 ¼ tsp. dry yeast

2 tsp baking powder

1 ½ tsp salt.

Directions:

Spray an 8 ½ by 4 inch loaf pan with cooking spray.

Wisk the wet ingredients in a small bowl.  Mix all the dry ingredients in the large bowl of your stand mixer. Slowly pour in the wet ingredients, mixing slowly; scrape bowl sides down as you go; takes about a minute.  Increase the beater speed to medium and beat for 6 minutes, it should look very thick; sort of like a cookie dough. Glop it into the prepared pan, trying to fill the corners well. Then, smooth the top with your dampened fingers and spray with a bit of water.  Make a foil collar for your pan; if you have the tall pan like I do such a collar is not necessary.  The recipe says you can use a stapler to secure it around the pan. Cover the dough with a piece of plastic wrap and let rise at room temp until doubled. I heated my oven to 100 degrees and turned it off – popped the bread in and this gave it a nice warm temperature as my kitchen’s room temp is much too chilly for bread dough.  It took about 55 minutes for mine to rise; recipe says an hour.

Spray the loaf lightly with water before popping into the oven to bake at 350 until golden and firm and it sounds hollow if you tap on it. Although how you can tap on a hot loaf of bread is sort of beyond me!  Try to remember to rotate it half way through the time, I forgot…. Mine was done at an hour and 15 minutes; recipe says 1 ½ hours.  Let cool in pan ten minutes, cool on wire rack for two hours before cutting.  So don’t be diving into this bread warm; not happening.  If you cut gf bread too soon it can collapse and or get gummy in texture.  I hate the gummies so I resist the temptation to cut early and so should you!  This makes good toast too and great gf crumbs.

Bagel Bagel!

Bagels, I want bagels; chewy, flavorful and gluten free.  Not tasteless, sponge-like icebergs like the ones they sell in the freezer case.  But, fresh real bagels that are safe for me and anyone else with celiac disease.  So I finally tried to make them myself.  First try, success for most part.   Full of flavor and texture. Yummers!  I made one batch; makes six large bagels.  The blend of several gluten free flours and the long cool refrigerator rising gave them great flavor.  Mine were a bit saggy, a tad deflated! And not as pretty as the bagels in Nicole Hunn’s cookbook and one of mine broke in half in its bath.  Yes, in the bagel bath! Bagels get a quick dip in a molasses and salt flavored hot water bath before baking. I baked my batch 5 minutes longer than the recipe as they didn’t seem quite done at 20 minutes. Next time I will make sure I connect the two ends firmly so they can’t come apart no matter how clumsy I am at turning them in the water bath. The dough gets rolled into a fat snake that you join into a donut shape before letting them rise for an hour. Then their bath and bake and bagel heaven is yours…..

bagels 007

Now, this recipe is not one I created, you can get it from the cookbook, Gluten-Free on a Shoestring Bakes Bread, page 126. Nicole Hunn is a genius at baking gf breads. Please follow her recipes closely and you gotta use her special gf flour blends; just make the blend up from recipes provided in her cookbook.  The secrets include using some unorthodox ingredients like pectin and whey protein isolate.  The whey is very pricy and you need a fair amount of it.  I don’t bake her breads that often as I find the flour ingredients not that cheap.   But, I love her rolls fresh out of the oven, almost wheaty in texture and flavor.  So well worth a go.

Not bad for my first effort at bagels.  I took pictures as I went but in my excitement I forgot one of them bathing!  Aiden got his fingers in one of the shots; he was standing on a stool watching me shape them.  I had to take him  home before they were done rising, he was pretty disappointed not to have a bagel to munch on tonight.

bagels 001bagels 002bagels 003bagels 004bagels 005bagels 007

Nicole is not happy if other bloggers repeat her recipes therefore I will not provide it here; visit her website where you will find the whole grain bagel recipe: glutenfreeonashoestring.com, you might well return to attempt her other tempting baked goods.  I make things out of her cookbook regularly, some tasty cake recipes in there.

My homemade bagels are a great treat, several will go in the freezer to be consumed later as I am scared they might spoil before I can eat all six.  I sprinkled one with lots of sesame seeds and two with poppy seeds, two with both and one plain.  Do try them if you are yearning for a bagel with bite, one with some real yeasty flavor and you can add the toppings of your choice. I am thinking about getting some onion bits for a topping; wonder if anyone makes them gf? Worth a look for said freeze dried bits.  This recipe is a keeper.  No more dreams of bagels, I have the real deal in my kitchen…at last!