Gluten-Free Yeast Donuts

Today I made donuts for my senior research seminar in American history.  Nothing takes the edge off having to present your research like some deep fried dough.  One of my students cannot have gluten so I ventured yet again into the world of yeasted but gluten-free dough.  After hunting around the interwebs, I settled on this recipe.  I liked that the main ingredients were weighed (more accurate), and the chemistry of the recipe made sense to me (baking soda and apple cider vinegar are standards in vegan baking).  It also seemed pretty easy to veganize.

So, here is what I did:
1. All-purpose flour: the recipe calls for Better Batter brand, which I do not have access to here.  Looking over the ingredient list I saw it it made of: Rice flour, brown rice flour, tapioca starch, potato starch, and potato four.  So, I made a mix of 1 cup rice flour, 3/4 cup brown rice flour, 1/2 cup tapioca flour, 2 tbsp potato starch, and 2 tbsp potato flour.  You can make up your own mix since it is the xanthan gum that binds everything together.
2. I used 2 tsbp vegan cream cheese for the egg, blending it into the milk mixture.  You could also use whizzed silken tofu.  Another time I might try ground chia seeds blended with some water.
3. I replaced the egg white with Ener-G "egg whites" as per the instructions on the box.  You might be able to omit this altogether, but I thought it might help the donuts rise a bit more.
4. I used vegetable shortening instead of unsalted butter.
5. I mixed the dough by hand and glazed them with this glaze.

The amazing thing about these donuts is that they actually do rise.  Not as high as a glutinous donut, but not too bad.  Also on the plus side is that they do not absorb much oil at all when deep fried.  They resemble an old-fashioned donut (i.e those cake-like ones) and aren't too dense.

Gluten-Free Country Batard

In the wake of the Vegan Sandwiches Save the Day! giveaway, I thought I'd post a few bread recipes to get you on your way to some great lunches.  As you know from all my previous baking posts, I am very familiar with gluten-filled baking.  And, while I have always been intrigued with gluten-free baking and what methods can produce tasty loaves, I have never explored it in any detail.  I was really looking forward to Peter Reinhart's new gluten-free cookbook and had it on pre-order for quite a while.  I figured if anyone could crack to code of wheat-free baking it would be him.  I love all of his previous books and find his recipes very easily veganizeable (usually eggs serve to enrich the dough and little else, and thus are easy to replace).  Not so this time.  All the recipes rely heavily on eggs and egg whites to give the bread structure and rise.  So, while it is easy to replace an egg or two in some enriched dough, it's not so easy to replicate the role 8 eggs whites are supposed to play in a wheat-free loaf.  Le sigh.

So, I was excited to discover Jennifer Katzinger's Gluten-Free and Vegan Bread.  I ordered it right away.  Katzinger's basic baking theory is gluten-free bread does not need to rise like its glutinous counterpart.  Instead, these loaves rely on oven-rise to give them some spring and a lighter crumb.  I decided to make a loaf for an NDP dinner party for which I was providing a variety of baked goods.  This country batard seemed like it would be a crowd pleaser.  Here is the recipe, taken from the preview on Amazon.

Now, if you are a baker you might be wondering how you can bake a loaf for almost 2 hours at 425+ degrees and not have it turn into a burnt brick.  Well, the answer is you can't.  The first thing that struck me as I read through the recipes were the incredibly long baking times (as long as four hours!).  I was dubious, but plunged ahead.  After an hour things were smelling burnt so I removed the almost black loaf from the oven.  So, while I like how these loaves come together (some may question the amounts of tapioca and/or arrowroot), I am perplexed with how way off the baking times are.  Thankfully, she does say that a loaf that reaches 205 to 210 degrees is baked.  So, armed with my thermometer, I tinkered around and found the following baking times produced a pretty impressive loaf:

1. 15 mins at 400.
2. 15 mins at 350.  Rotate loaf in the oven then
3. 15 mins at 350.

An hour less baking time?  Can that be right? Making the recipe a third time I accidentally added 1.5 cups of water.  It meant that I had to shape the loaf with extra flour, but the oven rise was better.  That is the loaf you see pictured above.  I also made the following changes:

1. Ground the chia seeds.
2. Used warm water for the yeast--I could not get it to activate in room temp water.
3. Added the oil after the yeast had activated.

I also made the Soft Millet Sandwich Bread and the Quinoa Sandwich Bread.  Again, the baking times are a bit mysterious.  The two loaves are essentially the same ingredients and the same wet to dry ratio.  And yet, the Millet Bread is supposed to bake for 1 hour 45 mins, and the Quinoa Bread for 2 hours and 30 mins at 350.  I found that an hour sufficed. 

So in the end I am not sure what to make of this book.  The basic ideas seem good, but the recipes are unreliable. But, if you have some baking sense, the end product can be tasty and not too dense.  

Indian Lentil and Rice Pancakes

I decided it was time to break out of my Indian food rut and explore some new recipes. I have been wanting to try this recipe for a while but have never had my act together enough to plan two days in advance. These are actually really easy to make, but you need to plan ahead. I guess this is also the first gluten-free bread(like) recipe I have posted on this site, so huzzah for me! These are thick and durable enough to be used to scoop up food or sauce from your plate. They are a nice change from naan bread and have a wonderful flavour despite the simple seasoning.

INGREDIENTS
Makes 10 pancakes
- 3/4 cup basmati rice
- 1/4 cup red lentils
- 1 cup warm water
- 1/2 tsp salt (or to taste)
- 1/2 tsp tumeric
- 1/2 tsp freshly ground pepper
- 2 tbsp chopped cilantro

METHOD
1. Place rice, lentils and water in a juice pitcher. Cover and let sit overnight.
2. Drain water off (reserve) and blend rice and lentils with an immersion blender. Then, blend water back into the lentils/rice until smooth. Cover and let ferment in a warm place for 24 hours. (Or, you can soak everything in a bowl, and blend in a food processor. I find the first method easier and less messy).
3. Heat a non-stick frying pan (like a well-seasoned cast iron pan) over medium heat. Mix salt, tumeric, pepper, and cilantro into the batter. The original recipe called for 1 tsp of salt, but I found that to be far too much.
4. Brush the pan with oil, and pour a scant 1/4 cup of batter on the pan. Spread/thin out batter with the back of a spoon (you can make 3 pancakes at once, depending on the size of your pan). Cook for 1-2 mins, until dry around the edges, flip, and cook another min or so. Keep cooked pancakes wrapped in a towel while you cook the others. Serve at once.