Gluten Free Bread

This is the best gluten free bread recipe! My sweet husband found this recipe for me. http://www.onegoodthingbyjillee.com/2013/03/finally-gluten-free-bread-that-doesnt-suck.html  I give this gal two thumbs up for her wonderful recipe! I love this recipe since the bread tastes so good. Simply the BEST!

 The Best Gluten Free Bread Recipe

Brown Rice Flour Blend

• 1⅓ cups brown rice flour
• 1⅓ cups tapioca flour/starch
• 1⅓ cups cornstarch
• 1 tablespoon potato flour

Bread Recipe

• 4 cups Brown Rice Flour Blend
• 1 tablespoon xanthan gum
• 1 tablespoon gluten-free egg replacer
• 2 teaspoons salt
• ½ cup powdered milk
• 3 large eggs at room temperature
• ¼ cup butter at room temperature
• 2 teaspoons cider vinegar
• ⅓ cup honey
• 1 package (2¼ teaspoons) active dry yeast (not INSTANT dry yeast)
• 2 cups warm water

Mix the yeast, a tablespoon of the honey, and 2 cups of warm water to temper the yeast.

Mix the flour blend with the rest of the dry ingredients.

Mix the eggs, butter, honey, and vinegar. There will be small lumps of butter-that's okay.

Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients until well blended.

Slowly add the yeast mixture to the batter and mix at medium to high speed for at least 4 minutes.

Pour into 2 well grease bread pans and let rise in warm oven (115 F) until dough is about an inch above pan rim.

Bake a 375 until internal temperature is 200 F, about 55-60 minutes.

Let cool in pans for 10-15 minutes and then remove for final cooling.

Gluten-free Chocolate Babka Buns

These are simple the BEST! The dough is just like a yeast dough!
I followed Karen Morgan's recipe: https://blackbird-bakery.com/recipes.php?id=9734.

My dough was very wet and sticky after the 30 minute rise compared to the recipe's dough. Since the stickiness made the kneading of the dough impossible, I just added more glutinous rice flour until I had the same consistence as shown in the recipe's photo.

These buns are so tasty with the warm melted chocolate. The next day, they still had the same texture of dough as they did when taken out of the oven.

I'm planning to use this dough recipe with a savory filling. A ham and cheese filling would make for a yummy breakfast bun too.

Perfect Popovers

I love popovers. I thought I would never be able to make the perfect popover with non-wheat flours, but was I ever wrong.

This excellent recipe can be found in the Gluten-Free Makeover cookbook by Beth Hillson. Her recipe calls for her basic blend flour and 1/4 cup of chickpea flour.  I substituted the chickpea flour with oat flour and used buttermilk for the milk. I was very surprised with how well this recipe worked with substitutions. The texture is just like the wheat flour popovers.

Rosemary Rolls

These rosemary rolls are a perfect accompaniment to the Chicken with Thirty Clovers of Garlic dish. The bread recipe can be found in "gluten-free girl and the chef" cookbook.

I baked these rolls on a pizza stone on the grill to achieve the flawless texture. 
Even though this dough requires 3 hours preparing, it's well worth the wait since the rolls are wonderful to use in soaking up the garlic gravy in the scrumptious chicken dish.

Just One Bite Left

While researching on gluten-free restaurants, I stumbled across Pica Pica in San Francisco. Their signature dish is the Venezuelan arepas. The photos of the arepas on their webpage looked so delicious that I had to try the one. So, of course I took a trip into the City. Well worth it too since the entire meal was delicious!

The arepas were so yummy and a novelty for me that I wanted to eat another the next day. So, after googling arepas recipes and watching numerous you-tube videos on how to make them, I decided that I could make my own. I just had to hunt down the proper corn flour that is needed. Lucky for me, I didn't have to hunt too far.

This corn flour is different from the masa harnina, a flour that is ground corn treated with lime and used to make tortillas.  P.A.N corn flour is precooked, ground corn flour that is used in Venezuelan and Colombian arepas.  A food that is served for breakfast, lunch, snacks, and dinner. They eat them throughout the day with whatever they wish to add: butter, cheese, meats.

Well, I made two arepas for dinner tonight.  Yes, only two since it was just my son and I eating dinner. One arepa is quite filling.

I mixed 1 cup of corn flour to just slightly over 1 cup of water and 1/2 teaspoon of salt, which I let rest for 3 minutes. Then I pan fried the patties on a lightly grease skillet until each side was a golden brown. Patties then were placed in oven to finish off the cooking for about 15 minutes. Surprisingly there are different methods of cooking arepas. I believe the traditional method is this two step method of pan frying for the needed crunchy exterior and then baking them in oven to finish the cooking so that the interior is light and airy.

I ate mine with grilled salmon and melted Monterey Jack cheese. Sorry, just one bite left. I almost forgot to take a picture since I was busily enjoying the food.

After dinner, I read the packaging of the P.A.N white corn flour. Under ingredients it states that it may contain traces of wheat. I was under the impression that this was only made from corn. Looks like this corn flour is processed in a factory that also processes wheat flour. Luckily, I'm only gluten intolerant and not celiac. I'll have to hunt for another brand. Hopefully, there is another brand that is truly gluten-free since I wish to enjoy these yummy breads again.

I Liked It!

I would have never thought I had something in common with Elizabeth Hasselbeck, other than being a woman.  I'm not a fan of hers. She's too blonde and conservative for my liking. So, when I came across her cookbook, Deliciously G-Free, at the library, I reminded myself to be impartial and just read the book. Surprisingly, I liked it!  I loved her story about her family, the layout of the book with beautiful photos of yummy looking food, and her suggestions on prepping flour mixes to have readily on hand. It's a simple cookbook, not daunting, for the beginner cook or someone with busy schedule just starting to deal with cooking gluten-free.

Since I had some bananas that were extremely ripe and millet flour on hand, I made the Banana Bread recipe from her book. I liked it! I omitted just one ingredient, the 1/3 cup of water in step three since the batter already seemed very wet and runny.  The brown rice and millet flour blend is a delightful flavor that complements the bananas and walnuts, much better than wheat flour. If you want the recipe, you will just have to borrow the cookbook from the library. Recipe can be found on page 213. Enjoy! Oh, and the blueberry muffins look scrumptious too.