My Ongoing Brownie Battle

Since I was diagnosed with an egg allergy about 8 years ago, I've been trying various egg substitutes in recipes. I have something that works for most cakes and other odds and ends, but I've never been able to successfully make brownies without eggs.

Maybe I'm too picky when it comes to foods. But darn it, I have culinary standards!

Things have, of course, gotten even more difficult since the wheat allergy. But I'm still trying. Perhaps in vain.

So I lamented my latest attempt of trying to make the Namaste brownie mix. This time I used ground flax seeds instead of the egg replacer. It turned out as a gooey mess--not really changing from a batter into a baked good. I was complaining about it on Twitter, and had a Holistic Health nutritionist post a recipe for me to try. The original recipe is here.

Well, water is boring. And I don't have walnut or grape seed oil. And I don't have xylitol (although I wish I did. Good stuff.) So here's how I modified it.

4 T canola oil
2/3 c Splenda
1/2 c almond milk
1 t vanilla
1 c rice flour
4 T unsweetened cocoa powder (I used Green & Blacks)
1 t baking powder (the special, corn-free stuff)

Mix the oil, Splenda, almond milk, and vanilla. Add the flour, cocoa, and baking powder. Mix thoroughly. Spread into a greased 8x8 pan. Bake 20 minutes at 350.

Result?



Crumby. Dry. The taste isn't bad, but it's not quite sweet enough.


(Sorry about the blurriness.)

I need something that's going to give it moisture. (Oh, sure, and egg would work wonders. But, you know.) It also needs more sugar, which means it needs more liquid. I'm not sure how to fix this one. Ideas? Or should I just give the victory to the brownies and hang up my gloves?

Oh, the baking disasters! Part II: Cranberry Bread

I'd been craving cranberry bread or pumpkin bread or stuff like that for the past few days. So yesterday I decided "what the heck." Since I was baking shortbread anyway, I found a recipe to try.

Original recipe here.

2 cups gluten free flour (I used the Namaste All-Purpose list.)
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon xanthan gum
1 Tablespoon orange zest (I used two, actually)
3/4 cup orange juice, freshly squeezed
1/4 cup butter or butter substitute, melted (I used canola oil--I was so over the coconut oil by this time)
2 eggs (I used 2 tbs ground flax seed mixed with 4 tbs hot water)
1 cup whole cranberries )
3/4 cup-1 cup walnuts chopped- (I used about 1 cup of chopped cashews)

Mix the dry ingredients. Add the orange zest to the flour mixture.

Mix the canola oil and orange juice. In a separate bowl, mix the flax seed and hot water.

Combine the orange juice mixture with the flour just until it's wet. Fold in the flax seed mixture. Then fold in the cranberries and cashews.

Put into a bread pan, bake at 350F for 40-50 minutes.

Results:




The texture turned out perfect, but the cranberries were a little too tart. If you store it, though, make sure to put it into something that won't retain moisture, which will turn it into a gooey mess. This bread is much better the second day. The cranberries weren't quite so tart.

The next time, I plan to add more sugar and fewer cranberries. And not put it in a baggie.

Oh, the baking disasters! Part I: Shortbread

Scottish shortbread is kind of a holiday tradition for my family. It's a relatively simple food to make, and only has four ingredients. Unfortunately, I'm allergic to two of the four.

A normal shortbread is a mixture of flour, salt, sugar, and butter. Nothing else. So what do you use as a butter substitute when you're allergic to both milk and soy? And will the finicky gluten-free flour really stand up without the butter?

Actually, no. Not really.

I poked around for a recipe that only required the ingredients I had on hand. Several of the recipes used coconut flour, so those were out. Then I found a recipe for a vanilla and chocolate swirl shortbread and decided to try it.

Here's the recipe:

50g (2oz) rice flour
50g (2oz) potato flour
25g (1oz) tapioca (I wasn't sure whether this should be tapioca flour, starch, pearl, or whatever so I used tapioca flour)
.25 tsp xanthan gum
.50 tsp salt
50g (2oz) caster sugar (I assumed this was confectioner's sugar)
1 tsp vanilla essence (I used almond extract)
125g (4.5oz) dairy free margarine (I used coconut oil)

Combine dry ingredients. I stirred the almond extract into the coconut oil. Then I "rub[bed] in the margarine until the mixture combines, using [my] fingertips."

It was a creamy, gooey mess that stuck to my fingers because my hands were warm enough to melt the coconut oil.

Place dough in the fridge for 30 minutes.

Roll the dough out on wax paper (to about 1cm) and cut into rectangles. At this point, I had to put it back into the fridge because the "dough" was melting apart as I tried to put it on the cookie sheet.

Bake for 15-20 minutes.

Within 2 minutes, I knew it was a disaster. The rectangles spread and broke. In the "separating in weird ways" kind of broke.




Despite it not keeping its shape, the texture is actually about right. However, the coconut oil is a bust. The coconut flavor is overpowering, so they're more like coconut oil cookies. Meh. I'm not as much of a fan of coconut oil after these.

Moar pie experimentation

Another awesome recipe the Living Without magazine had was for a gluten-free fruit pie crust that actually looked normal. After looking at it and seeing that it actually required me to roll it out like a normal pie crust, I decided to give it a try with some pumpkin filling. 'Cause it's October, yo.

The pie crust recipe calls for

2 cups gluten-free High-protein Flour Blend or gluten-free flour blend of choice
2 tsp xanthan gum
pinch salt
2 tbs sugar
8 tbs coconut oil
.5 cups cold water
4 tsp cider vinegar

The High-protein Flour Blend is:

1.5 cups bean flour (chickpea or soy)
1 cup arrowroot starch or potato starch
1 cup tapioca starch/flour
1 cup white or brown rice flour

Combine the dry ingredients: flour blend, xanthan gum, salt, and sugar. Mix to combine.
In a separate bowl, melt the coconut oil (but don't let it get hot) and add to the cold water and cider vinegar.
Pour the wet mixture into the bowl with the dry ingredients and mix by hand only enough to combine. This dough gets tough really easily, so handle it as little as possible.

This recipe makes two pie crusts, so take 1/2 of the dough, roll out either using plastic wrap or a gluten-free floured surface. Fold dough in half or fourths to make it easier to get to the pie pan. Unfold and form edges.

Chill pie crust for 30 minutes in the freezer before baking.

I used the Libby's Pumpkin Pie mix with almond milk and egg replacer for the pumpkin filling.

The results:




One pie and a few tarts.

(Yes, yes. I know the picture sucks. I'll let the professional photographer know of your displeasure.)


First, I have to say that the pie dough smelled like my mother's apple kuchen. Yum. It was wonderful to work with. Second, the crust baked nicely, was firm when it was done (unlike my past pie attempt), and was absolutely delicious. The coconut oil gave it a certain coconutty sweetness that wasn't overwhelming and was very yummy.

Highly recommended.

Round and Holey Experimentation

Or in other words vegan, gluten-free, soy-free, milk-free, egg-free, corn-free doughnuts.

Yes, you read right. DOUGHNUTS.

My mother has a fabulous kitchen--marble countertops, smart stove, 1800 watt microwave oven, a Kitchenaid mixer, and a bunch of cool stuff that I've never been able to afford. On top of that, she also saved me a couple of issues of Living Without magazine. In one of these magazines was a recipe for awesome doughnuts. The fabulous kitchen and the fabulous recipe makes for an irresistible combination. So yeah. I made wicked doughnuts.

I haven't had doughnuts since, well, the vegan ones I found in Las Vegas when I was at Preston's wedding. But before then, it'd been YEARS. So I couldn't resist.

The recipe, since it's already gluten free, required very little in the way of modification.

Here's what I used:

1.25 cups white rice flour
1 cup granulated sugar
7/8 cup potato starch
1/2 cup tapioca starch
1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon chickpea flour (you can use soy flour here if you're not allergic to soy like I am)
4 tsp xanthan gum (Stuff's expensive, yo!)
1 tsp salt
1.75 tsp baking powder (I found some that uses potato starch instead of corn starch!)
3 pkg instant dry yeast
1.25 cup warm almond milk (or whatever kind of milk turns you on)
12 tbs coconut oil (instead of the 1.5 sticks of butter it called for)
1 tbs Ener-G egg replacer
4 tbs warm water (The egg replacer and water are substituting for 2 large eggs)

Here's the story about the flour blend. Gluten-free flour mixes come in all kinds of mad scientist ways. Some use tapioca starch or flour. Some use arrowroot. Some use soy. Some use amaranth or quinoa. The trick is putting the flours together in a blend that works for what you're trying to bake. In this case, it uses a little bit of rice, potato, tapioca, and chickpea flours. The most expensive items were the xanthan gum (about $11 for a small package), and the coconut oil (which is a good substitute for butter since it's solid at normal room temp and melts at 76F).

How to cook it:

First I combined the dry ingredients: the rice flour, sugar, potato starch, tapioca starch, chickpea flour, xanthan bum, salt, baking powder, egg replacer, and dry yeast all went into a Kitchenaid-type mixer with a paddle attachment. Lightly mix until relatively uniform.

Then I put the coconut oil, warm water, and almond milk into a bowl and stuck it in the microwave to warm up the whole thing. I added the warm mixture to the flour mixture and let the mixer beat air into it for 5 minutes. In the meantime, let the oven warm slightly. After the mixer is done, put the bowl into the oven with an open door. This allows it to rise without baking it. Leave it there for 20 minutes.

The recipe calls for piping the doughnut batter in little circles onto squares of parchment paper using a cake decorating bag. I used the parchment paper for this, but it wasn't really necessary--you just need to pipe the rings onto something that you can move to and from a proofing area (like a microwave oven.) Once you're done piping, the doughnuts need to go into somewhere that's humid and warm. The recipe suggests boiling water in the microwave oven and putting the doughnuts there. And that's what I did. I let the doughnuts proof for about 20 minutes.

Put about 4 cups of oil or so into a deep fryer, pot, or pan. Heat oil to 350F (than goodness for my mom's candy thermometer!). Fry each side of the doughnut for a few minutes until brown.

Results:

I now have heartburn for eating so many so late in the evening, the evil things. The doughnuts turned out more like cake doughnuts than a yeast-risen doughnut, but it was very good. The coconut oil added a very coconutty flavor to it.

I also tried to make a chocolate glaze to dip the doughnuts in, but as soon as I added the cold almond milk, it solidified into hard little pieces and wouldn't melt smoothly anymore. Silly thing. So the glaze is more like a frosting. But it's all good.

No, I don't know the calorie and fat content of these. And I don't really WANT to know. I could figure it out if I really wanted to, but then I'd probably hate myself in the morning.

ETA: Morning after results: I was a little sloppy with how much coconut oil I put in, and it ended up being too much. It also could use a bit more sugar. Next time I make these I need to make sure I only put in the exact amount it calls for of coconut oil and put in some extra sugar.

Needs Moar Cake

While I think I prefer the Gluten-free Pantry Gluten-free vanilla cake mix, it isn't sold anywhere in my county. So this time, I'm trying to make a vanilla cake with the Namaste mix.

My previous attempts with the Namaste Gluten-Free Cake Mix have been very meh. The texture is a bit gritty, and the vanilla flavoring is just...meh. So this time I'm playing with it to see if I can't make it a bit better.

The mix calls for
3 eggs
1/2 cup oil
1 cup water

I'm using:
3 tbs Ener-G Egg Replacer
3 tbs Dari-Free
2/3 cup oil
1 1/4 cups Pacific Vanilla Almond Milk
A dash of French Vanilla (which is *not* gluten-free, just so you know)
About 1/2 bag of Enjoy Life semi-sweet chocolate chips

There's nothing I can really do about the texture, but let's see how the creamy-up works.

Result: Texture is about the same. The taste is slightly better. Chocolate chips are a nice touch, but it's not the best cake ever. Meh.

Experimentation! This time with 1000% more pie!

While it isn't all that difficult to find cake mixes and whatnot without dairy products, it is a challenge to find ways of making cakes without eggs. So instead of making cakes for my and my brother's birthday several years ago, my mother decided to make fresh strawberry pie. And it was so good, I briefly considered making it an annual thing.

Well, I refuse to give up the things I like to eat simply because they're usually made with evil stuff like wheat flour or wholesome milk. And it helps that the local Costco had strawberries that smelled really good. So last night I tried out making a strawberry pie that I can eat.

It shouldn't be all that difficult, right?

Heh.

Here's what I used:

Filling:
Tons of fresh strawberries
1 package of Junket (strawberry flavored) [Sorry guys, this isn't vegan. But it *is* corn-free.]
Water for the gelatin

Crust:
Namaste gluten-free biscuit mix
Canola oil
Sugar
Water

The pie crusts didn't brown within the time the package gave me, so I baked it extra time. Turns out that's a bad idea. The crusts were too thick on the sides, and too crunchy.

But the filling turned out wonderfully. Mmmm. Red food coloring.