Kitchen Equipment

I will soon start to publish recipes and other tips but I thought that finishing laying the groundwork for 'how to do this gluten free stuff easily' would be best.

Regarding kitchen equipment:

Ordinary kitchen equipment suffices for most tasks in gluten free cooking and baking.  Obviously, breads need bread pans, cakes need cake pans, and so on. One important caveat:

If you use the same pans for gluten and gluten free baking, you must make sure that ALL of the wheat flour is cleaned off before using them for gluten free batters.

Many people simply wipe their tins down with a paper towel.  This will NOT get all of the gluten residue off of them.  Don't make yourself sick, take extra care to scrub and dry.  Or, have two sets of pans, one for gluten and one for gluten free.  This is what we do.

If your kitchen is large enough, consider having a dedicated 'gluten free' counter.  We have an "L" shaped kitchen and do just this - and I measure wheat flours out in the garage as small amounts in the air from sifting can settle into things and accidentally cause cross contamination.

The other item you might find useful is a kitchen scale.  Here is why:

Most of the world weighs ingredients when cooking or baking.  As per Elizabeth David in her book English Bread and Yeast Cookery, she speculates that Americans switched to our volume (cup) based measurements because, being pioneers, heavy items like a scale and weights couldn't be carried in a wagon.

Recipes for cakes, breads, cookies, pie crusts, are designed for flour that weighs approximately 4 ounces per cup.  Wheat flour typically weighs about 4 ounces per cup.  Yet, rice flour weighs about 6 ounces per cup.  This means, when using cup measurements, if you substitute rice flour on a cup basis you will have FIFTY PERCENT MORE FLOUR in your cup than with ordinary white flour. This will give bad results in your recipes.

There are several kinds of scales you can buy.  They range in price from a few dollars up to hundreds of dollars.  This is the one that I use:
This particular scale is quite reasonably priced, weighs up to 11 pounds (5 kilograms), has tare function, will weigh in pounds/ounces, ounces, and grams.  It is also accurate.

All recipes that I give will have weight and volume measures.  So if you prefer to use cup measure, that will work too.  I simply find that using the scale takes less time.

The other item I have only good things to say about is a bread machine.  For making gluten free bread, the rising and baking environment can be 'finicky' sometimes.  I find that using a bread machine yields excellent results.

As I have said previously, gluten free flours don't have the structure that developed gluten provides.  This means that baked goods may sink in some cases.  Typically using smaller pans for breads and cakes yields better results.  I have also found that baking gluten free bread on a short cycle works well, as multiple risings are not necessary, in fact, can cause the bread to sink. This is the bread machine we use for gluten free flours:
It is not cheap, but I also find that I can either a) spend about $2 on ingredients for a loaf of bread and bake it in this bread machine, or spend $4.50-$5 on a loaf of bread. Sheer economics makes me like this.

In addition to bread and quick bread settings, with regular and firm crusts, there are also a bread, jam, and cake settings.  When I provide bread machine recipes, this is the machine I have tested them in.

We have two bread machines: a gluten and a gluten free machine.  If you may only have one machine BE SURE to wipe it out thoroughly between uses, and you probably will need 2 bread pans.  I don't see how you could be sure of getting all the gluten out of one.

Tomorrow I'll actually write you a recipe!