Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Brave Bread Baking Buddies for Gluten Free Bread

Wow! We only had a few adventurous buddies this month who wanted to take on the No Knead Gluten Free Hearty Seeded Sandwich Loaf:

Rita of Soepkipje had an interesting ride to say the least using gluten free flours she had on hand. Don't worry Rita! Sometime you win and sometimes you don't.

Andrea at Food and Family had an easier time because she had all the flours on hand but didn't really care for the loaf either.

Nicole from Bread, Butter and Buns has new found respect for those who have to bake without gluten after her attempt.

Oh well, I'm glad that a few people tried to step out of their comfort zone and tried something new. After all, sometimes we won't know if we don't like something unless we try it.

Thanks to all the buddies who joined us this month!

Monday, March 22, 2010

Bread Baking Babes: Gluten? We Don't Knead No Stinkin' Gluten

Once again it is my turn to be host kitchen for the Bread Baking Babes and as usual, I wanted us to do something different.

I've made the Babes start sourdough starters from scratch for my Dark Onion Rye and then I made them not only make Injera but I made them make a whole Ethiopian meal to go with their injera.

Well, after this month, I'm pretty sure the girls are going to take my hosting duties away from me because I not only made them once again go scurrying around trying to find strange flours BUT I made them make a bread that didn't need to be kneaded when I chose a gluten free no knead sandwich bread from Nancy Baggett's Kneadlessly Simple for our bread of the month.

BBB logo march 2010

I've made no knead breads before and gluten free breads before but I have never tried to do both at the same time. Since I have really enjoyed the other recipes from Nancy's fine book I wasn't worried about the recipe (and this one didn't disappoint me). This will be the Bread Baking Babes first no knead bread and our first gluten free bread of the month. Hopefully, it won't our last of either.

The thing I was most worried about was some of our gang in Europe easily finding the flours. There were a few folks who had some trouble, but based upon the usual flurry of flour discussions on our super secret blog, I think most everyone had success.

The bread has a nice crust, good crumb and other than being a bit dense (common for gluten free breads) was pretty tasty. I'm not sure I would want to live on a diet of this bread but I really enjoyed it toasted spread with almond butter or Nutella.

If you want to join us this month as a Bread Baking Buddy, we're giving you a little extra time than the normal one week after our posting to give you some time find the gluten free flours. You have until March 31 to make the No Knead Hearty Seeded Sandwich Bread, post about it on your blog and email me a link to your post. I'll email you a badge for your blog and post a round up off all your wonderful loaves on April 1.

I hope you will find this bread as much fun and tasty as I did. To see how the other Babes did with this month's bread, go check out their blogs from the links on my sidebar.

Oh, and don't freak out Susan but I'm actually going to participate in Yeast Spotting this week too! I just may be getting back into the swing of this whole blogging thing again...

A special thanks to Nancy Baggett for allowing me to post her recipe in full on the blog. If you want to try no knead bread for the first time, I can't recommend a better or easier book to use.


So, without further adieu, here is the recipe.


Gluten Free No Knead Hearty Seeded Sandwich Bread
from Nancy Baggett's "Kneadlessly Simple"

1 2/3 cup white rice flour, divided (may need more depending on your dough)
1/2 cup cornmeal or brown rice flour
1/2 cup cornstarch
1/3 cup tapioca flour
1/3 cup flax seed or golden flax seed meal
1 1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp instant yeast
1 1/3 cup ice water
1/3 cup corn or canola oil
1/4 cup molasses (not black strap)
1 large egg, room temperature
1/4 cup plain yogurt, drained of excess liquid
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
3 Tablespoon of mixed seeds (millet, poppy seeds, sesame seeds, flax seeds, etc)

First Rise:
In large bowl, stir together 1 1/3 cups of white rice flour, cornmeal or brown rice flour, tapioca flour, flax seed meal, salt, yeast, and 2 Tbsp seed mixture. In another bowl, whisk together water, oil, molasses and mix thoroughly with flour mixture.

nkheartyseeded making dough

If too stiff to blend, add more water to form a barely firm dough. Tightly cover the bowl with plastic wrap. For best flavor, refrigerate dough for 3 - 10 hrs then let stand at cool room temperature for 12 - 18hrs.

nkheartyseeded 1st rise

Dough will stiffen as it stands and it is alright if it doesn't rise very much.

Second Rise:
Whisk egg and set aside 1 Tbsp to brush top of loaf. Stir the yogurt, baking powder, and 1/3 cup white rice flour into the remaining egg. Vigorously stir the yogurt mixture into the First Rise dough until completely mixed.

nkheartyseeded final dough

If it is too soft, you can add more of the rice flour (white or brown, doesn't matter which). Turn dough into a well greased 9" x 5" loaf pan and brush a little oil on top of loaf.

nkheartyseededslit

Brush the reserved egg and seeds over the surface. Using a well oiled serrated knife, make a 1/2" deep cut lengthwise down the loaf. Cover the pan with a lightly greased piece of plastic wrap.

Let dough stand for 2 1/2 - 4 hrs in a warm room until dough extends 1/8" above the pan rim.

nkheartyseededafterrise

Loosen plastic wrap as dough nears top of pan to prevent dough from smooshing down.

Baking:
15 minutes before baking, place a rack in the lower third of the oven and pre-heat the oven to 375 degrees. Bake bread on the lower rack for 55-60 minutes, until the top is nicely browned. If the top starts to over brown, cover with a piece of foil. Continue baking until a skewer inserted comes out with few crumbs or the internal temperature of the bread reaches 206-208 degrees. Bake for 5 minutes more. Remove bread from oven, and leaving bread in pan, let cool on wire rack for 15 minutes. Remove loaf from pan

nkheartyseededloaf

and let cool completely before slicing.

nkheartyseededsliced

Sunday, March 14, 2010

Happy Π Day!

Today is Π (Pi) day! The day geeks celebrate 3.141592653yadayadayada

In honor of Pi Day food bloggers around the world normally bake pies. Since I'm in the middle of my end of winter pantry/freezer clean out, I decided to make a summer treat, strawberry rhubarb pie.

2010 Pi Day Rhubarb Pie


I used the last of the frozen strawberries and rhubarb from last summer and my go to pie crust from Alice Water's The Art of Simple Food

It's cooling on the counter right now and when I'm done washing dishes, I'm plopping the last of the vanilla ice cream in the freezer right on top and grabbing a fork!

Bet I finish the whole pie before you can name the first 30 numbers in Pi!

Saturday, March 13, 2010

Weekend Cat Blogging: Where Did a Month Go!

OK, so obviously Mom hasn't been here a lot lately because I just had to clear away the cobwebs from the login button. I guess it is a good thing that I came by because we're hosting Weekend Cat Blogging this weekend.

Since Mom last typed any words here quite a few things have been going on for her both at work, on the golf course, and in the kitchen. On the work front, things are a crazy as ever but a few of her jobs are entering the really fun stage of a project where Mom gets to go out to the project and make lots of noise.

On the golf course, Mom has been working really hard this winter to shave strokes off her score.

Winter Golf

She has been taking her golf clubs with her on her business trips and hitting local driving ranges and golf courses after finishing her work. She also took a long weekend trip to Florida to meet her parents and golf with her Dad and Uncle at Disney on the Magnolia,

Ladies Tee 7th on Magnolia

home of the Children's Miracle Network Classic.

scoreboard at Child Network Magnolia

She purposely put her ball in the Mickey Mouse Bunker on the 6th Hole because Mom likes to play out of bunkers.

Mickey Mouse Bunker at Magnolia Golf Course

And when she's home, I try to help her with her putting.

LB on Putting Green

On the baking front, Mom has been really busy working on her home baking instruction business she started in the Fall. She has her business cards and is working on updating the website she used when she baked for clients out her home in Cambridge. That hasn't kept her from the kitchen though.

She had a special order from a friend who wanted cinnamon raisin swirl bread to surprise her mom on her birthday

Cinnamon Raisin Swirl Bread

and Mom made two loaves so she could make some bread pudding to take into the office.

Cinnamon Raisin Swirl Bread Pudding

She also made two King Cakes for a Super Bowl party complete with hidden Baby Jesus.

dual king cakes for super bowl

Today, she is in the kitchen working on a few new recipes and prepping for a lecture on baking with herbs she is giving at a garden show next weekend.

Me?

lbsleeping on his head

I'm napping on the couch listening to the wind howl outside.

If you want to join us for Weekend Cat Blogging leave us a comment and check back at the end of the weekend to see what other kitties have been up to!