GF Flour for Thickening, Breading Meat,etc

I love the combo of flours in the book, "Gluten Free Baking Classics" by Annalise Roberts for adding to recipes. The ratio is 1 cup brown rice flour to 2/3 cup potato starch to 1/3 cup tapioca starch. I mix it together and have it on hand. You can use it for adding to gravies (adding a little water to it and whisking first just like regular flour). You can also add it to Daiya cheese and rice milk to make a cheese sauce. But I especially enjoy using it to bread chicken. I don't use eggs (although using egg replacer to dip it in first might work), but just put some in a plate, put the chicken in on one side, and then turn it over to coat both sides. I like to add salt, pepper, chives, parsley and dill to give it a ranch-like flavor. I saute it in a pan with olive oil, and bam! It works well. You can even press some extra flour on the side not cooking in the pan to increase the effect. This can be added to soups or whatever you might normally thicken with wheat flour.

The Dairy Free Secret

I posted this before, but thought it is worth repeating. This is a great tool for your dairy free arsenal. It's plum vinegar of all things. My friend told me to use it to add a cheesy flavor to dishes. I was really pleasantly surprised by the result. I was making a "cheese" sauce by using the gluten free mixture mentioned in my substitutes, olive oil, daiya cheese and rice milk. I used the daiya cheese sparingly since it is pricey. It tasted  barely cheesy. So I added the tiniest amount more of daiya and whipped out this plum vinegar. Walla! It truly made a big difference. Just a few shakes of it, and the cheesy flavor was there. My friend says she shakes some on eggs. I can see it adding a lot of flavor to things. Go here to find out more.

Xanthan Gum or Guar Gum

I thought this was a great tidbit from livingwithout.com

General Guidelines for Using Xanthan or Guar Gum

Gum (xanthan or guar) is the key to successful gluten-free baking. It provides the binding needed to give the baked product proper elasticity, keeping it from crumbling.

• Add 1/2 teaspoon xanthan or guar gum per cup of flour blend to make cakes, cookies, bars, muffins and other quick breads.
• Add 1 teaspoon per cup of flour blend to make yeast bread, pizza dough or other baked items that call for yeast.

Note:

If you purchase a commercial flour blend, read the ingredient list carefully. Some blends contain salt and xanthan or guar gum. If so, there is no need to add more.

My Secret for Dairy-free Frosting

When I make frosting I use Earth's Balance non-dairy spread (they have a soy free one now, too!) or Spectrum palm shortening (sometimes half EB and half PS) with rice milk, vanilla  and powdered sugar. I use ratios just like in normal frosting. However,  I have found the biggest secret with the frosting is adding enough powdered sugar to keep it thick and not runny. If it's just even a bit too much on the liquid side of things it turns runny later. I've found that if I add  just enough powdered sugar to make it quite stiff, you can't even tell that it's dairy free. It's thick enough for decorating even. The secret is putting in more powdered sugar and making it "thicker" than you might normally think. (but keep it spreadable!) Err on the side of too much powdered sugar as opposed to, too much rice milk.  If you want sugar free frosting go to the chocolate cake recipe to see how it's done.

Here is an example of the ratios from allrecipes.com

• 4 cups confectioners' sugar
• 1/2 cup Spectrum Palm shortening
• 5 tablespoons rice milkmilk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

More Great Substitutes! Nuts, Yogurt, and more!

This page here had some great substitutes for Dairy, Egg, Gluten, Yogurt, and Nut subs. Here are some highlights that were new to me.

Nuts

Replace tree nuts or peanuts with an equal amount of the following:
Toasted coconut
Sunflower seeds
Toasted sesame seeds
(use only 2 to 3 tablespoons)
Crushed cornflakes
Crushed crispy rice cereal
Crushed potato chips
Pumpkin seeds

Buttermilk

Replace 1 cup buttermilk with one of the following:
1 cup soy milk + 1 tablespoon lemon juice or 1 tablespoon white vinegar (Let stand until slightly thickened.)
1 cup coconut milk
7/8 cup rice milk
7/8 cup fruit juice
7/8 cup water

Yogurt

Replace 1 cup yogurt with one of the following:
1 cup soy yogurt or coconut yogurt
1 cup soy sour cream
1 cup unsweetened applesauce
1 cup fruit puree

Secrets of GF Bread Making and a Gluten Free, Dairy Free Bread Recipe!

This gal is the bomb. I love her cookbook, (see side bar), Whole Life Nutrition. Pretty much everything she does in the kitchen is magical. This recipe here looks fantastic. I especially love her secrets of bread making.  Here is what she says,
"Tips for making Gluten-Free Yeast Breads (from my own experiences):

1. Measure correctly! Use a knife to level off the flour and check at eye-level when measuring liquids in a glass-measure. Just a little bit too much flour or too little water can throw a recipe off. Be careful with the xanthan gum too, if this is off just a little the results could be drastic!

2. Don't bake when you are distracted or very tired. I know this from experience! Did I add that xanthan gum or not??

3. Make sure your oven is calibrated to the correct temperature. An inexpensive oven thermometer placed inside of the oven can tell you what the actual temperature is. Adjust your dial accordingly.

4. Make sure your dry ingredients are well-mixed. There was a time that I forgot to add the xanthan gum to my French Bread recipe (must have been distracted) and so I added it at the end after I had added the wet ingredients. I had french bread dough running out of the side of the pan, it was a total mess!

5. After the dough has been mixed, be your own judge and add a little bit of water (usually a tablespoon at a time) to get the consistency of thick cake batter. I made this recipe again this past Friday and realized it was too thick (I may have over measured ever so slightly or my ingredients held less moisture) and so I added 1/4 cup more of warm water to get the consistency I was looking for. You would do this with baking gluten bread only you would add (wheat) flour a little at a time. I have found that with my vegan, gluten-free bread adding water a little at a time works well.

6. When rising this dough make sure your environment is neither too hot nor too cool. Placing the bread pan in a warm water bath works well. I simply place the bread pan into a 9 x 13-inch pan and add hot tap water, boiling water is too hot for this recipe. The hot water cools fairly quickly and you are left with a nice warm water bath.

7. You be the judge to determine when it has finished rising. It takes me about an hour, though when my kitchen was very warm one day, it only took 40 minutes. Watch it and when it is doubled in size it is ready to go into your preheated oven.

8. If your recipe fails then take a look at these tips again to see where you could have made a mistake.

9. Though this recipe will stay fairly moist for days, freezing individual slices preserves the bread and makes it very easy to pop a slice in the toaster for a quick sandwich when you do not have time to make a whole loaf of bread. Simply slice the bread and place in between pieces of waxed paper then place into an airtight container in your freezer.

10. I almost forgot one very important tip, do not substitute ingredients. My recipes have been carefully tested and retested in a variety of ways and so using different ingredients could alter the recipe drastically."

How to Ease into the Gluten Free Diet from Rachel Ray"s Site.

This had some great tips so I wanted to pass it along on how to go gluten-free. Go here for some great tips from Rachel's editor in chief who cooks gluten-free for her son.  I especially liked this one.
"Ease into your new routine. Make the switch seamless by eating naturally gluten-free foods first. Fast-cooking proteins, vegetables, fruits, rice, polenta and mashed potatoes are a good foundation. Then, test out some gluten-free store-bought baking mixes until you’re ready to make your own".

Dairy Free Secret

Here is a secret one of my friends, Kristy,  told me awhile back. (Thanks, Kristy!)She read on-line that if you are going dairy free this is a must for your cooking arsenal. It's plum vinegar. A few shakes on your omelet, pasta, or baked potato can add the cheesy-ness you have been missing without the cheese. Go here or your local health food store to find some.