Bread. For Real.

I may be seeing things, so I'm posting these pictures for documentation. Is that a quarter of a beautiful, gluten free, rustic Italian loaf? Notice the score mark? Did I just bite through a crust so crisp that's also chewy like a glutenous loaf of bread? Look at the developing interior! A little dense, yes, but...this is by far the best loaf I have created yet. It was was baked as a risen, shaped, and scored loaf of dough on a sheet pan, not as a batter in a loaf pan.

I'm really getting excited on my bread quest now. Gelatin...appears to be the missing link to what I am looking for. D'oh! I'm headed out tomorrow to start stocking fresh yeast, xanthan gum, gelatin, and perhaps some fine white rice flour to add to my brown rice flour and ever growing starch collection. I figure over the next 2 to 3 weeks, I will buy one or two of the finest quality ingredients I possibly can and keep them stored in my minimally stocked almost Spring freezer.

I'm amazed by the quantity of ingredients out there that I can work with. I have brown rice flour on hand at all times but haven't even yet touched bean flours (except in Bob's), nut flours, teff, amaranth, or millet flours yet! I am really excited to have unknown foods in my life. I hope that other people feel like this when thinking and living gluten free. It's an end to life as you know it but in the most positive way...you get to be living proof that food is medicine. I think that is a wonderful thing...even if the pharmaceutical companies don't want to hear it, people need to hear that.

My goal is to produce a worthy gluten free loaf, very similar to what I produced tonight, while using a mix of packaged ingredients, olive oil, and the overnight cold rise method. I'm praying for a stand mixer to fall out of the sky. I think it would make a big difference using that, not the wood spoon-hand method I am using now... though I can count it as physical therapy.

After I do get a stand mixer, I'm going to mix my way up to honoring my standard of gluten free bread...Udi's of Denver, CO, which is baked at high altitude, so it's going to be a serious shift/challenge/lesson at 2200 feet. Whoo-Hoo!

I may never get to train professionally, but sometimes hunger and a true passion can be the greatest teachers.

For The Love Of Pizza, part 3

A quick note from the front lines of experimental Pizza Night. I've come up with a promising flour blend, using what I had on hand. I poured a bag of GF Pantry's Favorite Sandwich Bread mix into a bowl, then scooped out one cup, and replaced that one cup with Bob's Red Mill Pizza Crust mix. I then followed the directions for the Bob's, not the GFP with one change; I proofed the yeast in warm water and agave nectar. It's rising now, and actually looks like I may be on to something that will require kneading. How exciting!

So, that was from last night. What was the result? The best tasting crust yet w/ a crunch and texture like an east coast Greek pizza place. It did not want to be kneaded; just wet with water, par baked, and topped. It was a little bready and thick but retained that foldable chew I am seeking. Next experiment will be using the GFP French Bread and Pizza Crust mix in same way...with a cup or so traded for the Bob's. After that, it's on to mixing my own. The fear of mixing is subsiding, that's for sure.

There is another beautiful dough ball in the 'fridge. I do believe I will be able to shape it into French or Italian Bread. Looking forward to trying anyway.