This might sound obvious, but it isn't. As I may have mentioned, in some flour mills and other food processing plants, items with and without gluten are processed in the same plant. This means that you might get cross contamination between your gluten free item, and other items with gluten. The cross contamination may happen from wheat flour left on a machine, or just from flour in the air.
Usually on the label an allergy warning is made that reads something like this:
"This item is produced in a facility that also processes wheat, milk, tree nuts, and peanuts."
It does not mean that the item is contaminated, it just means that it was made in an environment that may not be gluten free.
When I buy my gluten free items, I buy mine from makers who produced certified gluten free items.
For gluten free flours, I tend to buy Bob's Red Mill Brand. Not only do they have a gluten free facility (as per their website, http://www.bobsredmill.com/ ), their products are top notch. As far as I know, they test their gluten free flours with an ELISA test to check for the 'bad' proteins, as well as having a gluten free facility.
I make primary use of White Rice Flour, Tapioca Starch, and Corn Starch. I have found that amazon.com is a good place to buy these grocery items, as you can enter their 'subscribe and save' program where, with regular deliveries (as infrequently as every six months) you are given 15% off their price. I do this for a number of things, like flours, loose tea, and others.
Bob's Red Mill White Rice Flour may be found here:
Certainly you can also get Brown Rice Flour. Many folks like brown rice flour as it adds healthy fiber to the diet.
I have found that gluten free items made without egg do not rise as high made with brown rice flour. This may be because of a characteristic of the flour itself; when a whole grain like brown rice is ground, its flour is "sharper" than that of a partial grain (like white rice) because the ground bran has sharper edges.
It is also a personal preference thing for my wife. We both love brown rice eaten as a grain, but less so when eaten as a flour. Totally and utterly personal taste, and your milage may vary.
I do know that Bob's Red Mill makes a great Brown Rice Flour product as well. It may be found from amazon.com as well.
The other flour I use is corn starch. There are a number of options for corn starch as well. Ordinary Argo Corn Starch, which may be found in the supermarket, is gluten free, or so the company assured me some time back. We do use it and have had no unpleasant side effects.
Bob's Red Mill also makes a corn starch which is top notch.
The third flour I use is Tapioca Starch. The only tapioca starch I ever use is also a Bob's Red Mill product. My local supermarket only has tapioca pearls (or whatever they call them) for making Tapioca pudding. Since we make everything from scratch alrady, grinding tapioca pearls into flour seemed like too much work.
Here is a link to Bob's Red Mill Tapioca Starch
Again, this item is available through Amazon subscribe and save. [Can you tell I'm a real happy customer of Amazon subscribe and save?]
There are many suppliers for these items other than amazon.com, including Bob's Red Mill themselves.
In addition to the flours, I make sure my other ingredients are also gluten free. Other ingredients include:
- Baking Powder
- Vanilla and other extracts
- Nuts and other items that I use.
The Frontier alcohol free vanilla uses glycerin for a carrier for the vanilla 'flavor.' (It is real vanilla, but only vanilla extracted with alcohol can be called 'vanilla extract.')
Frontier also makes a top notch line of herbs and spices, which you can find in your local store or from their website, http://www.frontiercoop.com .
That's probably enough for today. Tomorrow, I'll discuss substitutes for milk and egg.
I use Bob's Red Mill All-purpose Baking Flour sifted half-and half with rice flour. A little extra eggs (if you can tolerate them, oil, and baking powder makes most things turn out yummy. Make sure the baking powder is fresh or it can't handle the heavier bean flours in Bob's.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the information! My wife cannot have gluten, so I won't do the egg for her, but I will try experimenting with it for others.
ReplyDelete