Baking Flour

[jaxxz]

Is there any local stores that sell a "safe" baking flour that I can use for multi purpose cooking. I understand that there is a wide variety of GF flours available, can somone recomend one for me, Im looking for ideas to thinken sauces, coat fish and bake cookies. I still new at this and could use any help available

Jaxx

[the sensible celiac]

For thickening sauces, I always use corn starch. It is very inexpensive and I get reliable results with it.  Simply dissolve the corn starch in a cold liquid, then add the mixture to a hot skillet,  then stir until it thickens.

For coating foods you might try rice flour. If you are lucky enough to have any asian food stores in your local area you will certainly find it there at a low price.  You might also find rice flour in the asian food area of some larger supermarkets.


For baking cookies I see lots of GF food manufacturers using bean based flours.  I would expect rice flour to be a poor choice by itself for making cookies, as it might become too hard.

I hope these ideas help.

Steve

[Sharon]

I always thicken with corn starch too.  A book I found helpful is Marjorie Hurt Jones' The Allergy Self Help Cookbook.  Early on in it she lists a whole variety of flour options with notes as to which ones work well for thickening, coating or baking.

For baking cakes, cookies, etc. I go either with Bob's Red Mill GF all purpose flour, or I use some of the suggested recipes that combine brown rice flour, white rice flour, tapioca starch and maybe a bit of sweet rice flour (or maybe also include sorghum flour or garfava flour.  The options get to be almost limitless.)  This kind of combo results in products that aren't so heavy, hard or plain old bean tasting.

Truly I'm still learning on all this too, but it is becoming easier as I finally gather together a varied assortment of options and cookbooks.

[cmheppner]

I used Bob's Red Mill GF all purpose flour to make a fruit cake for Christmas.  No one knew it was GF.  It was wonderful.  I also make the banana bread that is listed on the back of the package... tastes great. 

[Sharon]

Did you use any xanthan gum or something else to hold it together?  I made my longstanding fruit cake, using Bob's flour too, and while it tasted great it didn't hold together in a slice.  I'm allergic to egg and so just used Egg Replacer and hoped that would be enough to hold it, but it wasn't.  (There was enough rum in it that I didn't particularly notice the texture!)  No, really, it could have used a little more form. Suggestions?

[the sensible celiac]

I don't use eggs either Sharon, and I have the same problem when I try to make GF bread. I've tried ground flaxseed and applesauce and the EnerG egg replacer which I believe is pure lecithin.

I expected the lecithin would work, because egg whites are nearly pure lecithin, and everybody knows that is a superb binding agent. Currently my theory is that I'm doing something wrong with the egg replacer when I use it, like too much or too little water, or maybe I'm mixing it too much or not enough.

I do a lot less GF baking these days than I used to, mostly because the results of my efforts are usually so, well, sad.

[Sharon]

My results with using Egg Replacer in Bob's Wonderful bread mix greatly improved when I spent more time whipping the Egg Replacer.  I remember one cookbook author saying she always used more Egg Replacer than called for in a recipe, (which is what I do with things like meatloaf) so that's probably a route to try.  It seems some gelatin would be a possible alternative also.  If I make one fruitcake per year, give me 10 years and I'll have it perfected.