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Gluten Free, Casein Free Cooking
Apr. 25th, 2023 05:43 pmI've been investigating substitutes for wheat and milk in baking and other recipes. I've also been trying to brainstorm what recipes would work best with these limitations.
Many Passover recipes are designed for low gluten flours. So, the techniques used by them translate well to gluten free baking. For instance, popovers, sponge and angel food cakes are recipes that adapt well.
I've been looking into alternatives to wheat flour. I've yet to come up with a palatable flour replacement that I like. Multiple flours and starches are typically used to replace various characteristics of wheat. Many commercial flour replacements and several online recipes use xanthan gum. With mold allergies, xanthan gum is something I avoid whenever possible. I have read that psyllium husk works well to replace the springiness in breads. I've also read that some people don't like the taste of psyllium husk in bread recipes. Some of the different gluten flour alternatives I've been looking into are buckwheat, sorghum, teff, chestnut and tigernut. Rice and oatmeal flours are typically the most commonly used. Useful starches to mix with gluten free flours include tapioca, potato, arrowroot. I've read that sweet rice flour is used in a way similar to starches and can add more moist flavor to baked goods. I personally like water chestnut flour which is also a useful starch to bake with or to use as a thickener. However, I've yet to find a gluten free source for it. If one has a Vitamix or high powered blender, one can grind gluten free oatmeal, flax or other grains to create flour or meal. This often costs less than just buying the flour.
I tried my first gluten free bread recipe using the apricot buckwheat bread listed here:
https://edibleeastbay.com/2016/05/14/buckwheat-sorghum-and-teff/
It came out surprisingly well for a first try with no gluten. I did learn not to bake it in the toaster oven since there wasn't enough room for it to fully rise. It was just fine when moved to a standard oven. I would like to find a gluten free bread machine recipe that works well. When making standard breads, there are general rules of thumb as to how much liquid and how much dry ingredients a bread needs in order for it to bake decently. Unfortunately, I can't seem to find similar rules for gluten free breads. I may try a dough mode bread and see how that works with gluten free ingredients. I made my pizza crusts in the bread machine as well. Yeast can be gluten free, so gluten free bread machine recipes can still make use of the ingredient. However, from what I've read and heard about cauliflower pizza crusts, it may be an even better alternative than trying to modify a pizza dough recipe to work with a decent gluten free flour blend. I also like using a crisp matzo brie as a base for pizzas. Unfortunately, it's extremely hard to find a decent gluten free matzo and even harder to find one at an affordable price. I considered trying to make matzo from scratch using oat flour, but I'm still searching for a decent recipe. Nothing I've tried so far came out tasting even remotely like matzo.
Just purchased the Panasonic YR-2550. I looked at tons of bread machine recipes. I wanted to find one with ingredients I had on hand and one that avoided ingredients I have issues with like xanthan gum. I finally found this one:
https://www.cookingwithcamilla.com/vegan-gluten-free-bread-machine-loaf/
Can't say I did a good job of making it because I had trouble with the new bread machine. It kept beeping a lot and I had trouble getting it to restart after the pause to wipe down ingredients. The older Panasonics seemed easier to work. Ingredients are supposed to have liquids go first for gluten free breads. However, I stubbornly put the yeast and dry ingredients first because that's the way I used to do it with my other Panasonic machines. Can't say the bread tastes like wheat bread. It was rather dense and low. However, it's better than anything I've seen in the stores. The recipe mentions substituting buckwheat and teff for two of the ingredients and that's what I did. If you're looking for a bread machine recipe, this one is worth a try. It certainly seemed forgiving if you didn't follow it exactly.
It's very hard to find gluten free recipes I like that can substitute successfully for foods that I used to make with wheat. Many just don't seem palatable to me. I'm finding it frustrating that most gluten free cookbooks just give you standard recipes and then say to replace the ingredients containing gluten with gluten free ones. Many gluten free wheat flour replacements use a mix of flours, starches and other ingredients. I've yet to find one I like. It makes it hard to find recipes I want to try when many recipes call for a specific gluten free flour replacement mix. They might not taste right or cook the same with other replacement mixes. Also, many gluten free recipes require absolute measurements for ingredients or they could easily fail. I tend to prefer to work with single ingredients rather than mixes. I also like to work with recipes that have a lot of leeway as far as getting amounts right or substituting or adding ingredients. I feel like I'm on the right track to finding a decent gluten free recipe when I locate one that requires simple, basic ingredients. For instance, recipes such as injera and ashishim are designed to work without wheat flour and don't require gluten free flour substitute mixes. I've been looking for a replacement for whole wheat pie. So far, the best option for me seems to be a teff pie crust. Here's a link to a simple teff pie that's somewhat similar to the basic pie crusts I make:
https://www.bobsredmill.com/recipes/how-to-make/teff-5minute-pie-crust/
I needed to buy a new waffle iron to make gluten free waffles. Had some recommendations for the Dash waffle maker. It's small but it's inexpensive and I could easily purchase a new one to replace my old one which was exposed to gluten multiple times. I've seen several recipes for gluten free waffles. I was most interested in the mochi waffle recipes using sweet rice flour. The sweet rice flour makes the waffle crisp and it does look a lot like a regular wheat based waffle in appearance. However, I can't get used to the taste. Had to add in some buckwheat, teff and flax to make it taste less rice-like.
I've noticed several black bean brownies. I've also seen a few for black bean cakes. Was introduced to this one at a program at work: https://familynutritionprogram.org/black-bean-brownies-recipe/ I like it because it doesn't require any flour. Now if I could just find a good substitute for the cocoa for family members with chocolate allergies...
I thought this recipe might make a nice cake or muffin substitute:
https://sammibrondo.com/double-chocolate-blended-baked-oats/ It doesn't need a lot of sweetener. I made some substitutions for food allergies and preferences. I left out the cocoa because of chocolate allergies in the family. I use oats that are labeled gluten free. It's easy to contaminate oats with gluten during the production process so clear and truthful labeling is important. Many recommend using oats that are manufactured using a purity protocol. Some people with celiac have reactions to the proteins in oats as well as the gluten in wheat, barley and rye. I also tried the recipe using ground quinoa instead of oats. Thought the quinoa gave it a bitter aftertaste. I'm going to need to work on figuring out how to effectively lower the saponins in the quinoa before I make something else with ground quinoa.
Casein free desserts seem even more challenging. I'm unable to come up with a decent mousse recipe without some form of milk product. There are gluten free lasagna noodles on the market but I don't have a good filling for them. My recipes used cottage cheese. Cheesecake is another difficult recipe to replace. Yogurt, pudding and ice cream are also problems. There are only so many ingredients that can replace the creamy consistency of milk. Many recipes use coconut or avocado. Allergies prevent me from working with either. I did try cashew cream which is made by soaking cashew nuts and then chopping them in a Vitamix. I'm not a huge fan of nuts and was disappointed in the taste. One option possibly worth looking into is ghee. It's made from milk but it's casein free and you can buy gluten free varieties. I've often seen nut or soy or coconut milk used to replace milk in recipes. I avoid them because of allergies. In some cases, I think just using water or possibly a fruit juice especially in a baked good would suffice. Sometimes I use water with some ground pumpkin seed added. I haven't tried it yet, but I thought some flax milk recipes looked promising. I also saw mention of potato milk and potato milk powder. There are several ice cream recipes that use tropical fruits as a base. I'm wondering if mamey sapote pulp might make a decent base for an ice cream or sorbet. Some sources recommend using mangoes to add creaminess to frozen desserts.
I tried ghee in a few recipes. So, far I don't like the taste of it. However, it might not be bad mixed with an oil as part of a pie crust recipe. I've started investigating some goat milk related options. Goats' milk has A2 casein as opposed to cows' milk which typically has A1 and A2 casein. Some people seem to tolerate A2 casein better than A1. However, I've yet to run across any definitive studies (such as on PubMed) that check whether casein proteins (and which casein proteins) could cause damage to the intestines similar to gluten. The local health food store had a sale on goat milk, so I decided to see what I could make with it. I tried for over an hour to make a simple white cheese with it. I added vinegar and lemon as acids for curdling. I just could not get it to separate into curds and whey. Possibly it was too homogenized. There's an article ( https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022030255949419 ) that mentions that curdling might be restored by adding dry milk solids. I have done that before in the past when I've made homemade cheese. It was a trick I figured out on my own even before I read the article. I made to sure to add powdered goat milk to the goat milk I was working with before attempting to make cheese. Unfortunately, it didn't work this time. I don't know what kind of processing they're doing, but I've found it harder and harder to make a basic cheese from milk in more recent times. Maybe ultra high heat pasteurization is far more common than it was. I hate throwing out milk when cheese fails, so I added more lemon and some gelatin and will attempt to see if it can be salvaged as a cheese cake filling. A lemon pudding might be another option when cheese making fails. One would need to add a thickener like a starch (tapioca, water chestnut, etc.) or use gelatin to make it more solid. Was extremely disappointed in the results working with goat milk so far. I also found some goat milk kefir in a local health food store. Kefir can be drained with cheesecloth to make labneh. It's a great sour cream substitute.
While I'm very familiar with substituting for ingredients because of allergies, substituting for ingredients that have casein or gluten in favorite recipes can be very difficult. I'll continue my research (reading as many gluten and casein free recipe books as I can), but it would be nice to come across more tips or informative articles on this subject matter. I'll also update this post if I run across any other interesting alternatives. If anyone has some useful tips to share, please e-mail me or let me know on Mastodon ( https://fosstodon.org/@lmemsm ).
Many Passover recipes are designed for low gluten flours. So, the techniques used by them translate well to gluten free baking. For instance, popovers, sponge and angel food cakes are recipes that adapt well.
I've been looking into alternatives to wheat flour. I've yet to come up with a palatable flour replacement that I like. Multiple flours and starches are typically used to replace various characteristics of wheat. Many commercial flour replacements and several online recipes use xanthan gum. With mold allergies, xanthan gum is something I avoid whenever possible. I have read that psyllium husk works well to replace the springiness in breads. I've also read that some people don't like the taste of psyllium husk in bread recipes. Some of the different gluten flour alternatives I've been looking into are buckwheat, sorghum, teff, chestnut and tigernut. Rice and oatmeal flours are typically the most commonly used. Useful starches to mix with gluten free flours include tapioca, potato, arrowroot. I've read that sweet rice flour is used in a way similar to starches and can add more moist flavor to baked goods. I personally like water chestnut flour which is also a useful starch to bake with or to use as a thickener. However, I've yet to find a gluten free source for it. If one has a Vitamix or high powered blender, one can grind gluten free oatmeal, flax or other grains to create flour or meal. This often costs less than just buying the flour.
I tried my first gluten free bread recipe using the apricot buckwheat bread listed here:
https://edibleeastbay.com/2016/05/14/buckwheat-sorghum-and-teff/
It came out surprisingly well for a first try with no gluten. I did learn not to bake it in the toaster oven since there wasn't enough room for it to fully rise. It was just fine when moved to a standard oven. I would like to find a gluten free bread machine recipe that works well. When making standard breads, there are general rules of thumb as to how much liquid and how much dry ingredients a bread needs in order for it to bake decently. Unfortunately, I can't seem to find similar rules for gluten free breads. I may try a dough mode bread and see how that works with gluten free ingredients. I made my pizza crusts in the bread machine as well. Yeast can be gluten free, so gluten free bread machine recipes can still make use of the ingredient. However, from what I've read and heard about cauliflower pizza crusts, it may be an even better alternative than trying to modify a pizza dough recipe to work with a decent gluten free flour blend. I also like using a crisp matzo brie as a base for pizzas. Unfortunately, it's extremely hard to find a decent gluten free matzo and even harder to find one at an affordable price. I considered trying to make matzo from scratch using oat flour, but I'm still searching for a decent recipe. Nothing I've tried so far came out tasting even remotely like matzo.
Just purchased the Panasonic YR-2550. I looked at tons of bread machine recipes. I wanted to find one with ingredients I had on hand and one that avoided ingredients I have issues with like xanthan gum. I finally found this one:
https://www.cookingwithcamilla.com/vegan-gluten-free-bread-machine-loaf/
Can't say I did a good job of making it because I had trouble with the new bread machine. It kept beeping a lot and I had trouble getting it to restart after the pause to wipe down ingredients. The older Panasonics seemed easier to work. Ingredients are supposed to have liquids go first for gluten free breads. However, I stubbornly put the yeast and dry ingredients first because that's the way I used to do it with my other Panasonic machines. Can't say the bread tastes like wheat bread. It was rather dense and low. However, it's better than anything I've seen in the stores. The recipe mentions substituting buckwheat and teff for two of the ingredients and that's what I did. If you're looking for a bread machine recipe, this one is worth a try. It certainly seemed forgiving if you didn't follow it exactly.
It's very hard to find gluten free recipes I like that can substitute successfully for foods that I used to make with wheat. Many just don't seem palatable to me. I'm finding it frustrating that most gluten free cookbooks just give you standard recipes and then say to replace the ingredients containing gluten with gluten free ones. Many gluten free wheat flour replacements use a mix of flours, starches and other ingredients. I've yet to find one I like. It makes it hard to find recipes I want to try when many recipes call for a specific gluten free flour replacement mix. They might not taste right or cook the same with other replacement mixes. Also, many gluten free recipes require absolute measurements for ingredients or they could easily fail. I tend to prefer to work with single ingredients rather than mixes. I also like to work with recipes that have a lot of leeway as far as getting amounts right or substituting or adding ingredients. I feel like I'm on the right track to finding a decent gluten free recipe when I locate one that requires simple, basic ingredients. For instance, recipes such as injera and ashishim are designed to work without wheat flour and don't require gluten free flour substitute mixes. I've been looking for a replacement for whole wheat pie. So far, the best option for me seems to be a teff pie crust. Here's a link to a simple teff pie that's somewhat similar to the basic pie crusts I make:
https://www.bobsredmill.com/recipes/how-to-make/teff-5minute-pie-crust/
I needed to buy a new waffle iron to make gluten free waffles. Had some recommendations for the Dash waffle maker. It's small but it's inexpensive and I could easily purchase a new one to replace my old one which was exposed to gluten multiple times. I've seen several recipes for gluten free waffles. I was most interested in the mochi waffle recipes using sweet rice flour. The sweet rice flour makes the waffle crisp and it does look a lot like a regular wheat based waffle in appearance. However, I can't get used to the taste. Had to add in some buckwheat, teff and flax to make it taste less rice-like.
I've noticed several black bean brownies. I've also seen a few for black bean cakes. Was introduced to this one at a program at work: https://familynutritionprogram.org/black-bean-brownies-recipe/ I like it because it doesn't require any flour. Now if I could just find a good substitute for the cocoa for family members with chocolate allergies...
I thought this recipe might make a nice cake or muffin substitute:
https://sammibrondo.com/double-chocolate-blended-baked-oats/ It doesn't need a lot of sweetener. I made some substitutions for food allergies and preferences. I left out the cocoa because of chocolate allergies in the family. I use oats that are labeled gluten free. It's easy to contaminate oats with gluten during the production process so clear and truthful labeling is important. Many recommend using oats that are manufactured using a purity protocol. Some people with celiac have reactions to the proteins in oats as well as the gluten in wheat, barley and rye. I also tried the recipe using ground quinoa instead of oats. Thought the quinoa gave it a bitter aftertaste. I'm going to need to work on figuring out how to effectively lower the saponins in the quinoa before I make something else with ground quinoa.
Casein free desserts seem even more challenging. I'm unable to come up with a decent mousse recipe without some form of milk product. There are gluten free lasagna noodles on the market but I don't have a good filling for them. My recipes used cottage cheese. Cheesecake is another difficult recipe to replace. Yogurt, pudding and ice cream are also problems. There are only so many ingredients that can replace the creamy consistency of milk. Many recipes use coconut or avocado. Allergies prevent me from working with either. I did try cashew cream which is made by soaking cashew nuts and then chopping them in a Vitamix. I'm not a huge fan of nuts and was disappointed in the taste. One option possibly worth looking into is ghee. It's made from milk but it's casein free and you can buy gluten free varieties. I've often seen nut or soy or coconut milk used to replace milk in recipes. I avoid them because of allergies. In some cases, I think just using water or possibly a fruit juice especially in a baked good would suffice. Sometimes I use water with some ground pumpkin seed added. I haven't tried it yet, but I thought some flax milk recipes looked promising. I also saw mention of potato milk and potato milk powder. There are several ice cream recipes that use tropical fruits as a base. I'm wondering if mamey sapote pulp might make a decent base for an ice cream or sorbet. Some sources recommend using mangoes to add creaminess to frozen desserts.
I tried ghee in a few recipes. So, far I don't like the taste of it. However, it might not be bad mixed with an oil as part of a pie crust recipe. I've started investigating some goat milk related options. Goats' milk has A2 casein as opposed to cows' milk which typically has A1 and A2 casein. Some people seem to tolerate A2 casein better than A1. However, I've yet to run across any definitive studies (such as on PubMed) that check whether casein proteins (and which casein proteins) could cause damage to the intestines similar to gluten. The local health food store had a sale on goat milk, so I decided to see what I could make with it. I tried for over an hour to make a simple white cheese with it. I added vinegar and lemon as acids for curdling. I just could not get it to separate into curds and whey. Possibly it was too homogenized. There's an article ( https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022030255949419 ) that mentions that curdling might be restored by adding dry milk solids. I have done that before in the past when I've made homemade cheese. It was a trick I figured out on my own even before I read the article. I made to sure to add powdered goat milk to the goat milk I was working with before attempting to make cheese. Unfortunately, it didn't work this time. I don't know what kind of processing they're doing, but I've found it harder and harder to make a basic cheese from milk in more recent times. Maybe ultra high heat pasteurization is far more common than it was. I hate throwing out milk when cheese fails, so I added more lemon and some gelatin and will attempt to see if it can be salvaged as a cheese cake filling. A lemon pudding might be another option when cheese making fails. One would need to add a thickener like a starch (tapioca, water chestnut, etc.) or use gelatin to make it more solid. Was extremely disappointed in the results working with goat milk so far. I also found some goat milk kefir in a local health food store. Kefir can be drained with cheesecloth to make labneh. It's a great sour cream substitute.
While I'm very familiar with substituting for ingredients because of allergies, substituting for ingredients that have casein or gluten in favorite recipes can be very difficult. I'll continue my research (reading as many gluten and casein free recipe books as I can), but it would be nice to come across more tips or informative articles on this subject matter. I'll also update this post if I run across any other interesting alternatives. If anyone has some useful tips to share, please e-mail me or let me know on Mastodon ( https://fosstodon.org/@lmemsm ).
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