Gluten Free Chocolate Cake!!!!

I had a birthday this past weekend and was blessed by one of our dear friends. She took a recipe that I was planning on trying and made it for me. It is a modification of a simple chocolate cake recipe that I have used for years. My dear husband even made the original recipe to sell at our Church's Men's Bake Off. It was yummy!!! So here is a picture of the cake my sweet friend made and a couple of different possible ways to make this chocolate cake. It is the best Gluten Free Cake I have EVER eaten. It lasted beautifully in the refrigerator and did not dry out. (I ate a piece today after it sitting for five days.) It is chocolaty, sweet, moist, and delicious! YUM! YUM!

This is where I got the original recipe. You can top this with a German Chocolate Cake Frosting if you are able to do dairy. You can make it Gluten Free with Dairy OR Gluten Free and Dairy Free. If you want to make this dairy free you can make a confectioners frosting to put on it. The picture above is frosted with a butter cream frosting made out of butter, confectioners sugar, vanilla and coconut milk.

1 3/4 cups All Purpose Flour (Gluten Free Pantry's All Purpose Flour was used here)

2 Cups granulated sugar

3/4 cups unsweetened cocoa powder

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1 1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

2 large eggs

1 cup milk (coconut milk was what was used here)

1/2 cup vegetable oil (I use safflower oil)

1 1/2 tsp vanilla

1 cup boiling water

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Combine dry ingredients in a large bowl. Add eggs, milk, vanilla, and oil. Beat with an electric mixer for 2 minutes on medium. Add boiling water and mix gently with a spoon by hand until well combined. Pour the batter into two greased and floured 9 inch round cake pans or three 8 inch round cake pans. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 to 35 minutes and until a toothpick comes out clean. Let cool slightly and then turn out of pans onto cooling racks to cool. Let cool to just barely warm and then cover loosely and let finish cooling. Frost with your frosting of choice when cool and store in refrigerator before serving.

Our Favorite Gluten Free Bread

I've been meaning to post this for a while. I still have not created a scratch recipe for gluten free bread. But this is our favorite gluten free mix Gluten Free Pantry's French Bread and Pizza Mix. This is the way I make it for our food limitations.

First off I will give you the ingredients for the mix: white rice flour, potato starch, corn starch, guar gum, granulated honey, salt, and Red Staf Instant Yeast (packet included). It does say "may contain traces of soy". But my son has never had a problem with it.

(Set Oven to preheat at 375 degrees. )
In my Bosch Universal mixer with batter whips attached I dump the contents of the box and yeast packet and then the following ingredients

1 3/4 cups warm water (110-115 degrees)
1 tsp cider vinegar (if vinegar is an issue you could probably substitute lemon juice)
1 Tbsp honey
1/2 tsp salt
1/3 cup olive oil
2 eggs plus 1 egg white

I turn my mixer on low to combine the ingredients and flip it to medium and let it run for 2 minutes. While it is running, I spray my 9X5 bread pan will Pam Olive Oil Spray. When the two minutes is over, using a ladle I carefully scoop the batter into a well greased pan. The batter has the consistency of mashed potatoes.  This is what it looks like.

Then cover with plastic wrap and let sit in a warm place until the dough rises to touch the plastic wrap. After I pulled the wrap off the risen dough, it  looked like this.

Place in 375 degree preheated oven. And bake for 40 to 45 minutes. Turn out of the pan onto a cooling rack and let cool until warm to touch. I bag my bread as soon as it is warm and no longer hot. That keeps the crust soft. Then once it is cool in the bag, I take it out and slice it. I place plastic wrap between each slice and then freeze the bag of sliced bread. I pop a slice at a time into the microwave for 25 seconds, then flip it over and then another 10 seconds. Voila! Instant fresh soft bread!

Gluten Free Pancakes (Take 2)

I have played a little with my pancake recipe, thanks to my sweet sister who has been trying them out. She is helping me to know if my recipes are easily reproducible in another person's kitchen. This last time I made them I took some pictures and changed one thing to hopefully create a better product for more people.

2 cups Rice Flour mix

5 tsp aluminum free baking powder

1 tsp salt

2 Tbsp honey

4 Tbsp oil of choice ( I use safflower oil)

2 eggs

2 cup almond milk (I like Almond Breeze unsweetened) or other milk

Mix dry ingredients together and them add wet ingredients and whisk. 

Using a ice cream scoop, ladle mixture onto hot non-stick pan or griddle. I use my electric griddle and set it at 350 degrees. These pancakes seem to do better on a slightly hotter griddle than my wheat pancakes.  The honey seems to help them brown. Flip when lightly brown on one side and bubbles pop. 

Cook and eat or freeze right away. Makes about 24 standard sized pancakes. We love these with butter and agave nectar or maple syrup or even jelly.

Gluten Free Corn Muffins

1 1/4 cups corn flour
1/2 cup Rice Four Mix
1/2 tsp salt
4 tsp baking powder
1 egg (beaten)
1/3 cup oil (I used safflower oil)
1/3 cup honey
1 cup almond milk or water

Mix dry ingredients together. Add wet ingredients and stir to combine. Spoon into greased muffins tins and bake at 350 degrees for 15-19 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean. Remove from pans and set on cooling racks to cool after baking, then wrap/cover right away. Gluten free baked goods tend to dry out really fast. Freeze leftovers and reheat by wrapping in aluminum foil and placing in 350 degree oven for 5-10 until warmed through and soft.

I turned these into gluten free cornbread stuffing yesterday for our Thanksgiving.

Happy Baking!

Brown Rice Waffles aka Mystery Waffles

I'm on a recipe roll today. So I guess I will roll with it....

These waffles come from Diane at http://www.homeschooling.net/blog/recipes/mystery-waffles/

They are great. We used these allot the first few weeks our son was on his new diet. They were great with cashew butter and maple syrup or PB with honey... you name it.

4 cups brown rice flour (I grin mine from organic long grain rice in my Bosch Nutrimill)
1 1/4 Tbsp baking powder
3/4 tsp salt
4 eggs
2 3/4 cups of milk of choice (I used water)

In large mixing bowl combine dry ingredients. Seperate eggs. Beat the egg whites until soft peaks. Mix egg yolks into flour mixture along with milk or water. Stir until just mixed. Fold beaten egg whites into mixture. Cook in waffle iron.

These freeze well but I put some plastic between them to keep them from sticking as they froze. They were better microwaved versus reheated in the toaster.

Gluten Free Play Dough

1/2 cup rice flour
1/2 cup corn starch
1/2 cup salt
2 tsp cream of tarter
1 cup water
1 tsp cooking oil
few drops of food coloring (if desired)

Mix ingredients in a medium sized pan. Cook stirring constantly on low until mixture forms a ball and is no longer sticky. Pour out onto heat safe surface and knead until smooth and uniform texture. Store in ziploc bag.

Mixture tends to be a little more sticky than conventional playdough. But my son didn't care. Crayola Model Magic is gluten free, but this is way cheaper.

Rice Flour Mix

3 cups brown rice flour

1 1/4 cups cornstarch (or potato starch) I didn't have any so I used cornstarch.

3/4 cup tapioca flour

Mix together and store tightly covered. Use to replace all purpose flour cup for cup.

Gluten Free Dairy Free Pancakes

Here is the first of hopefully many recipes that I have had success with for our son.

These recipes are wheat free, dairy free, soy free, legume free, sorghum free, and often sugar free (sugar is rotated in his diet).

2 cups Rice Flour mix

5 tsp aluminum free baking powder

1 tsp salt

2 Tbsp honey

4 Tbsp oil of choice

2 eggs

2 1/4 cup almond milk (I like Almond Breeze unsweetened)

Mix ingredients together and fry in skillet or on griddle until lightly brown.

Note without the honey the pancakes will not brown. I cook these and then freeze the left overs in a ziploc bag and take out as needed.