This is my own variation of the ubiquitous flourless peanut butter cookie recipe. They are a bit gooey when they first come out of the oven, so let them sit for a few minutes before trying to get them off the cookie sheet.
Ingredients:
1 cup Nutella
1/2 cup chocolate chips
1 egg
1 tsp baking powder
Preheat oven to 325 F. Grease a cookie sheet or line it with parchment paper. Mix all ingredients and drop spoonfuls onto the cookie sheet. Bake for 10-15 minutes, until the cookies have spread out and the edges are starting to crisp. It usually takes about 12 minutes for me, but oven temperatures vary. Makes 12 large or 24 small cookies.
Showing posts with label baking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label baking. Show all posts
Saturday, June 16, 2012
Wednesday, May 23, 2012
Chocolate Chickpea Cake
It's Wednesday, kids. Let's make some cake. This is a recipe my mom found somewhere and I've modified it a bit.
Ingredients
1/2 cups of chocolate (I use dark chocolate, but it's okay to use milk chocolate if you don't like dark chocolate. Obviously, it will not be dairy-free if you use milk chocolate.)
1 19oz can of chickpeas, drained and rinsed
4 eggs
3/4 cup brown sugar (you can use white sugar, but brown sugar tastes so much better)
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Preheat the oven to 350 F. Melt the chocolate over low heat in a saucepan (you can also use a microwave, if you have one. I don't.). Find some way to liquefy the chickpeas and eggs. You can use a food processor if you have one, but I do not, so I just put a little bit at a time in my magic bullet and blend it. Mix in the chocolate and other ingredients. Pour into a greased 9 inch cake pan and bake for 40 minutes, until a knife inserted into the center comes out clean. Let it rest in the pan for 10 minutes before transferring it to a plate. You can also make this recipe into cupcakes, just decrease the cooking time a bit (more like 20-30 minutes).
Ingredients
1/2 cups of chocolate (I use dark chocolate, but it's okay to use milk chocolate if you don't like dark chocolate. Obviously, it will not be dairy-free if you use milk chocolate.)
1 19oz can of chickpeas, drained and rinsed
4 eggs
3/4 cup brown sugar (you can use white sugar, but brown sugar tastes so much better)
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Preheat the oven to 350 F. Melt the chocolate over low heat in a saucepan (you can also use a microwave, if you have one. I don't.). Find some way to liquefy the chickpeas and eggs. You can use a food processor if you have one, but I do not, so I just put a little bit at a time in my magic bullet and blend it. Mix in the chocolate and other ingredients. Pour into a greased 9 inch cake pan and bake for 40 minutes, until a knife inserted into the center comes out clean. Let it rest in the pan for 10 minutes before transferring it to a plate. You can also make this recipe into cupcakes, just decrease the cooking time a bit (more like 20-30 minutes).
Saturday, April 21, 2012
Bread!
Alright, I keep saying that I'm going to post my bread recipe and then life gets in the way. But here it is! And unfortunately I'm not even sure that I know equivalent volume measurements for the dry ingredients anymore, but I will give my best guesses, but seriously consider trying to bake this by weight if you want the best results. This was inspired by/modified from a few recipes in the book "You Won't Believe It's Gluten-Free!: 500 Delicious, Foolproof Recipes for Healthy Living" by Roben Ryberg. I like to mix the dry ingredients in ziplock bags ahead of time and have a bunch in my pantry so that when I decide I want bread it only takes about 5 minutes to mix it up and then ~30 minutes in the oven.
Ingredients:
Dry:
75 grams brown rice flour (about 1/2 cup)
1 tbsp ground flax seed (this is approximate - just for flavor and fiber - you can leave it out, or add more/less)
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 tsp sugar
pinch of sea salt
1 3/4 tsp xanthan gum
3 egg whites
1 tbsp oil (I usually use grapeseed, sometimes olive, if you're into coconut oil you can use that, but you have to melt it first)
1/2 cup water (you can also use milk or non-dairy milk)
1 tbsp vinegar (I usually use white wine vinegar, but plain white vinegar, rice vinegar, and apple cider vinegar are all good choices)
Preheat oven to 375 F. Beat the egg whites until they are frothy, but not starting to form peaks. Add the other wet ingredients and mix well. Add the dry ingredients and mix until it thickens. You can use a mixer or do it all by hand. Either way works. The texture will seem really weird, but trust me, it will work. Place in a greased loaf pan or into a greased jumbo muffin pan to make buns. Smooth out the top a bit with wet hands. Bake for about 30 minutes, but check it after 2o minutes. It should be lightly browned and pulling away from the sides of the pan and it should slide out of the pan easily. Makes 1 small loaf of bread or 6 buns. 1/6 of the recipe has 2 Weight Watchers points if you're into that sort of thing.
Variations (note that adding things like raisins and cheese makes it stick to the sides of the pan a bit more, so slide a butter knife around the edges before trying to get it out):
-I like to add basil, garlic powder, and onion powder for herb bread.
-Add the above herbs plus 3 oz grated cheese for cheese and herb bread.
-Add just grated cheese and make in muffin pans for cheese buns.
-Add cinnamon and raisins for raisin bread.
The possibilities are endless...
Ingredients:
Dry:
75 grams brown rice flour (about 1/2 cup)
1 tbsp ground flax seed (this is approximate - just for flavor and fiber - you can leave it out, or add more/less)
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 tsp sugar
pinch of sea salt
1 3/4 tsp xanthan gum
3 egg whites
1 tbsp oil (I usually use grapeseed, sometimes olive, if you're into coconut oil you can use that, but you have to melt it first)
1/2 cup water (you can also use milk or non-dairy milk)
1 tbsp vinegar (I usually use white wine vinegar, but plain white vinegar, rice vinegar, and apple cider vinegar are all good choices)
Preheat oven to 375 F. Beat the egg whites until they are frothy, but not starting to form peaks. Add the other wet ingredients and mix well. Add the dry ingredients and mix until it thickens. You can use a mixer or do it all by hand. Either way works. The texture will seem really weird, but trust me, it will work. Place in a greased loaf pan or into a greased jumbo muffin pan to make buns. Smooth out the top a bit with wet hands. Bake for about 30 minutes, but check it after 2o minutes. It should be lightly browned and pulling away from the sides of the pan and it should slide out of the pan easily. Makes 1 small loaf of bread or 6 buns. 1/6 of the recipe has 2 Weight Watchers points if you're into that sort of thing.
Variations (note that adding things like raisins and cheese makes it stick to the sides of the pan a bit more, so slide a butter knife around the edges before trying to get it out):
-I like to add basil, garlic powder, and onion powder for herb bread.
-Add the above herbs plus 3 oz grated cheese for cheese and herb bread.
-Add just grated cheese and make in muffin pans for cheese buns.
-Add cinnamon and raisins for raisin bread.
The possibilities are endless...
Monday, September 12, 2011
Banana Muffins
Ingredients:
3 mashed bananas
1/4 cup grapeseed oil
1 tbsp ground flax
3 tbsp water
105 grams brown sugar (about 3/4 cup)
210 grams brown rice flour (about 1.5 cups)
70 grams cornstarch (about 1/2 cup)
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp vanilla extract
Mix flax with water and set aside. Mix sugar and flour together, then mix in banana and flax mixture. Mix in the rest of the ingredients. Drop into muffin pan and bake at 350 F for 25 minutes. Makes about 12 muffins, more if you make mini muffins (48+). Baking time will be shorter for mini muffins (more like 10-15 minutes), so watch them.
3 mashed bananas
1/4 cup grapeseed oil
1 tbsp ground flax
3 tbsp water
105 grams brown sugar (about 3/4 cup)
210 grams brown rice flour (about 1.5 cups)
70 grams cornstarch (about 1/2 cup)
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp vanilla extract
Mix flax with water and set aside. Mix sugar and flour together, then mix in banana and flax mixture. Mix in the rest of the ingredients. Drop into muffin pan and bake at 350 F for 25 minutes. Makes about 12 muffins, more if you make mini muffins (48+). Baking time will be shorter for mini muffins (more like 10-15 minutes), so watch them.
Monday, August 22, 2011
Whole Grain Gluten Free Vegan Cinnamon Cookies
Also known as lazy snickerdoodles, because the cinnamon is right in the dough instead of you having to roll them in cinnamon and sugar. I just kind of made this up after googling recipes and looking at common trends in them, and this actually makes a very good general cookie dough if you take out the cinnamon and sub in chocolate chips or oatmeal or whatever else you might want in a cookie.
Ingredients:
1 tbsp ground flax seed + 3 tbsp water (mix in small bowl and set aside - this is sometimes referred to as a "flax egg" and is taking the place of both egg and xanthan or guar gum here)
1/4 cup grapeseed oil
70 grams brown sugar (about 1/3 cup)
105 grams brown rice flour (about 3/4 cup)
35 grams cornstarch (about 1/4 cup)
1 tsp baking powder
Directions:
Mix together oil and sugar, then mix in flax mixture. Mix in dry ingredients. Form dough into a ball (it's actually the right texture to do that!) and chill for 1 hour. Chilling is very important so that your cookies don't spread too much. Shape into balls and bake at 350 F for 10-12 minutes. Makes 10 regular or 20 small cookies.
Ingredients:
1 tbsp ground flax seed + 3 tbsp water (mix in small bowl and set aside - this is sometimes referred to as a "flax egg" and is taking the place of both egg and xanthan or guar gum here)
1/4 cup grapeseed oil
70 grams brown sugar (about 1/3 cup)
105 grams brown rice flour (about 3/4 cup)
35 grams cornstarch (about 1/4 cup)
1 tsp baking powder
Directions:
Mix together oil and sugar, then mix in flax mixture. Mix in dry ingredients. Form dough into a ball (it's actually the right texture to do that!) and chill for 1 hour. Chilling is very important so that your cookies don't spread too much. Shape into balls and bake at 350 F for 10-12 minutes. Makes 10 regular or 20 small cookies.
Monday, July 11, 2011
Pizza Crust (Can also be flatbread or focaccia)
This pizza crust is the result of trying many different recipes and combining what works and what I like. I'll give you the basic recipe, then talk about variations. The main flour here is brown rice flour, which is a whole grain flour but surprisingly neutral-tasting. You could substitute white rice flour for picky eaters who like a really bland pizza crust, but it's a lot starchier and I don't think it makes as nice of a crust. Cornstarch is included for its rising power. It rises really well and will fill in the little cracks in your pizza crust as you spread it out in the pan. If you are allergic to corn, you can substitute potato starch (not potato flour - it's a very different thing) or tapioca starch, but just be aware that the texture will not be as good and try to fill in the cracks a bit better. I've tried to maximize the brown rice to cornstarch ratio as much as possible without sacrificing function since cornstarch has pretty much zero nutritional value, but this is pizza we're talking about here. See the variations below the recipe for alternatives to the the brown rice flour that make it more of a multigrain/legume crust.
Basic Brown Rice Pizza Crust
1/2 cup warm water (not hot, it will kill the yeast)
2 teaspoons sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons yeast (the yeast is used more for flavor than for leavening, so if you are allergic to yeast just sub in some baking powder)
105 grams (or approximately 3/4 cup) brown rice flour
35 grams (or approximately 1/4 cup) cornstarch
pinch of salt
1 teaspoon xanthan gum
olive oil
Preheat oven to 450 F. We're going to pre-bake the crust before we add toppings. You get a better texture that way, but if you're in a hurry you can skip the pre-bake and just top and bake the whole thing at 350 F. What's even better to do in a hurry, though, is to make up a bunch of pre-baked crusts ahead of time and just take them out of the freezer when you need one.
Dissolve the yeast and sugar in the warm water. Let sit for 5 minutes or so until the mixture is bubbly. Just like you were making regular bread. Mix in the other ingredients and make sure to mix really well. You can use a mixer, but I just use a spoon. Sometimes I use my hands, but it does get fairly sticky. Some wheat-based recipes warn you against over-mixing so that you don't develop the gluten too much, but we will never have that problem in gluten free baking! Drizzle some olive oil (or other oil of your choice) onto a large rectangular or circular baking sheet. Once the dough is pre-baked you can use a pizza stone if you like or just keep it on the baking sheet, but the uncooked dough isn't going to nicely roll out and go on a baking sheet. That's okay, though. A lot of the rules you learned about baking things with wheat flour no longer apply. We make our own rules around here.
Scrape the dough out of the mixing bowl with a spatula and onto the baking sheet. Notice that we are not letting the mixture sit and rise like we would with a wheat and yeast dough. You'll get enough rising power from the cornstarch and the yeast without proofing the dough all day long. Now fill the mixing bowl up with water. Dip your hands in the water, shake the excess off, and use your damp hands to flatten the dough out gradually. It will look like a bit of a pasty mess. If it does, you're doing it right. Continue flattening until the whole baking sheet (or most of it) is covered in a thin layer of dough. Try to fill in the holes as much as possible, but if there are a few little holes, they'll fill in as it bakes.
Put the baking sheet in your preheated 450 F oven and bake until the crust slides in the pan when you shake it and is just beginning to brown, about 5 minutes. It's kind of magical when this pasty mess of dough turns into something that looks like a pizza crust. Remove the pan from the oven and turn the temperature down to 350 F (or you can pack it up and freeze it for later at this point). Top with toppings of your choice and bake until the cheese is melted and browned as much as you like. You can also make the crust into several mini pizzas, and you can easily double (triple, quadruple...) the recipe.
VARIATIONS:
Multi-grain pizza crust: Replace 35 gram (1/4 cup amounts) of the brown rice flour with combinations of the following flours: chickpea flour, quinoa flour, millet flour, almond flour, sorghum flour, oat flour, etc. If you do this, it's extra important to do it by weight if possible because some of these flours have very different densities. But this is a good way to experiment and find new flavors that you like. I'm a fan of a combination of brown rice flour, chickpea flour, and sorghum flour.
Flatbread: Same way you made the pizza crust, but bake at 450 F a little longer (7-10 minutes for me, but make sure to watch it) until it's a bit more browned. You can add herbs, garlic, onion, cheese, chives, sun-dried tomato, etc. to the dough if you wish. Either make one big flatbread to cut in pieces, or several little ones. Eat on their own or top with your favorite sandwich fillings.
Focaccia: Like the flatbread, but spread the dough thicker and bake at 350 F for a little longer (10-15 minutes depending on thickness, but again, be sure to watch it). It'll be a bit fluffier inside than the flatbread and obviously thicker. Eat on its own, topped with melted cheese or your favorite sandwich fillings, or split in half and stuffed with your favorite sandwich fillings.
Don't be afraid to experiment, and if doesn't come out right the first time, figure out what you didn't like about how it turned out and what might make it work better for you. Feel free to leave a comment if you're having trouble, and I'll be happy to try to help! My personal favorite topping combination for this pizza is pesto sauce, slices fresh pears, roasted parsnips, a few chunks of cream cheese (rather than grated cheese all over), and some crumbled crisp bacon.
Nutritional information per 1/4 pizza crust (not including toppings and assuming you used about 2 tablespoons of oil in the pan, if you're concerned about fat content use a nonstick pan and brush on just a bit of oil): 170 calories, 3.1 grams fat, 0 mg cholesterol, 78 mg sodium, 32.6 grams carbohydrates, 1.8 grams fiber, 2.4 grams sugar, 2.7 grams protein, 5% of your RDI of iron. Source: http://caloriecount.about.com/cc/recipe_analysis.php.
Basic Brown Rice Pizza Crust
1/2 cup warm water (not hot, it will kill the yeast)
2 teaspoons sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons yeast (the yeast is used more for flavor than for leavening, so if you are allergic to yeast just sub in some baking powder)
105 grams (or approximately 3/4 cup) brown rice flour
35 grams (or approximately 1/4 cup) cornstarch
pinch of salt
1 teaspoon xanthan gum
olive oil
Preheat oven to 450 F. We're going to pre-bake the crust before we add toppings. You get a better texture that way, but if you're in a hurry you can skip the pre-bake and just top and bake the whole thing at 350 F. What's even better to do in a hurry, though, is to make up a bunch of pre-baked crusts ahead of time and just take them out of the freezer when you need one.
Dissolve the yeast and sugar in the warm water. Let sit for 5 minutes or so until the mixture is bubbly. Just like you were making regular bread. Mix in the other ingredients and make sure to mix really well. You can use a mixer, but I just use a spoon. Sometimes I use my hands, but it does get fairly sticky. Some wheat-based recipes warn you against over-mixing so that you don't develop the gluten too much, but we will never have that problem in gluten free baking! Drizzle some olive oil (or other oil of your choice) onto a large rectangular or circular baking sheet. Once the dough is pre-baked you can use a pizza stone if you like or just keep it on the baking sheet, but the uncooked dough isn't going to nicely roll out and go on a baking sheet. That's okay, though. A lot of the rules you learned about baking things with wheat flour no longer apply. We make our own rules around here.
Scrape the dough out of the mixing bowl with a spatula and onto the baking sheet. Notice that we are not letting the mixture sit and rise like we would with a wheat and yeast dough. You'll get enough rising power from the cornstarch and the yeast without proofing the dough all day long. Now fill the mixing bowl up with water. Dip your hands in the water, shake the excess off, and use your damp hands to flatten the dough out gradually. It will look like a bit of a pasty mess. If it does, you're doing it right. Continue flattening until the whole baking sheet (or most of it) is covered in a thin layer of dough. Try to fill in the holes as much as possible, but if there are a few little holes, they'll fill in as it bakes.
Put the baking sheet in your preheated 450 F oven and bake until the crust slides in the pan when you shake it and is just beginning to brown, about 5 minutes. It's kind of magical when this pasty mess of dough turns into something that looks like a pizza crust. Remove the pan from the oven and turn the temperature down to 350 F (or you can pack it up and freeze it for later at this point). Top with toppings of your choice and bake until the cheese is melted and browned as much as you like. You can also make the crust into several mini pizzas, and you can easily double (triple, quadruple...) the recipe.
VARIATIONS:
Multi-grain pizza crust: Replace 35 gram (1/4 cup amounts) of the brown rice flour with combinations of the following flours: chickpea flour, quinoa flour, millet flour, almond flour, sorghum flour, oat flour, etc. If you do this, it's extra important to do it by weight if possible because some of these flours have very different densities. But this is a good way to experiment and find new flavors that you like. I'm a fan of a combination of brown rice flour, chickpea flour, and sorghum flour.
Flatbread: Same way you made the pizza crust, but bake at 450 F a little longer (7-10 minutes for me, but make sure to watch it) until it's a bit more browned. You can add herbs, garlic, onion, cheese, chives, sun-dried tomato, etc. to the dough if you wish. Either make one big flatbread to cut in pieces, or several little ones. Eat on their own or top with your favorite sandwich fillings.
Focaccia: Like the flatbread, but spread the dough thicker and bake at 350 F for a little longer (10-15 minutes depending on thickness, but again, be sure to watch it). It'll be a bit fluffier inside than the flatbread and obviously thicker. Eat on its own, topped with melted cheese or your favorite sandwich fillings, or split in half and stuffed with your favorite sandwich fillings.
Don't be afraid to experiment, and if doesn't come out right the first time, figure out what you didn't like about how it turned out and what might make it work better for you. Feel free to leave a comment if you're having trouble, and I'll be happy to try to help! My personal favorite topping combination for this pizza is pesto sauce, slices fresh pears, roasted parsnips, a few chunks of cream cheese (rather than grated cheese all over), and some crumbled crisp bacon.
Nutritional information per 1/4 pizza crust (not including toppings and assuming you used about 2 tablespoons of oil in the pan, if you're concerned about fat content use a nonstick pan and brush on just a bit of oil): 170 calories, 3.1 grams fat, 0 mg cholesterol, 78 mg sodium, 32.6 grams carbohydrates, 1.8 grams fiber, 2.4 grams sugar, 2.7 grams protein, 5% of your RDI of iron. Source: http://caloriecount.about.com/cc/recipe_analysis.php.
Thursday, July 7, 2011
A note about baking by weight
I am not primarily a baker. I'm much more into the non-dessert, non-bread aspect of cooking, but I do bake sometimes (especially pizza crust and flatbreads). Other people who are much better at baking than I am (including Shauna over at http://glutenfreegirl.com/) have found that gluten free baked goods come out much better if you measure flours by weight rather than volume. This also makes it easier to substitute one flour for another, because they can have quite different densities.
Weighing things may seem really sciencey and intimidating, but it doesn't have to be. I find it easier to do because you can just stick your mixing bowl on the scale and zero it each time you start adding a new flour, and you don't have to bother with measuring cups and sifters. I strongly recommend that you bake by weight, and all of my recipes for baked goods will include weights. You don't need some sort of fancy high tech scale either. I bought mine at Canadian Tire for $10, and as an added bonus I can also use it split skeins of sock yarn in half by weight, so it's a multipurpose piece of equipment.
However, I know that some of you will absolutely refuse to bake by weight. I will try to also include approximate volume measurements, but if I ever don't, this is an approximate conversion you can use:
140 grams = 1 cup
105 grams = 3/4 cup
70 grams = 1/2 cup
35 grams = 1/4 cup
Hopefully you can interpolate a bit from there. This will also help you convert regular wheat flour recipes to gluten free recipes if you're really into baking. Just use 140 grams of gluten free flours for every 1 cup of white flour a recipe calls for. I really want to emphasize, though, that your will get much better and more consistent results with your baked goods if you bake by weight.
Weighing things may seem really sciencey and intimidating, but it doesn't have to be. I find it easier to do because you can just stick your mixing bowl on the scale and zero it each time you start adding a new flour, and you don't have to bother with measuring cups and sifters. I strongly recommend that you bake by weight, and all of my recipes for baked goods will include weights. You don't need some sort of fancy high tech scale either. I bought mine at Canadian Tire for $10, and as an added bonus I can also use it split skeins of sock yarn in half by weight, so it's a multipurpose piece of equipment.
However, I know that some of you will absolutely refuse to bake by weight. I will try to also include approximate volume measurements, but if I ever don't, this is an approximate conversion you can use:
140 grams = 1 cup
105 grams = 3/4 cup
70 grams = 1/2 cup
35 grams = 1/4 cup
Hopefully you can interpolate a bit from there. This will also help you convert regular wheat flour recipes to gluten free recipes if you're really into baking. Just use 140 grams of gluten free flours for every 1 cup of white flour a recipe calls for. I really want to emphasize, though, that your will get much better and more consistent results with your baked goods if you bake by weight.
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