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Basic Gluten Free Bread

Let’s start with some basics. Bread! If you are gluten free you know the struggle to find a good bread replacement. A lot of the time, you just go without, or you eat cardboard that has been artfully made to look like something edible.

Honestly, I would much rather go to the store and buy bread, but I do not like paying $6 plus for a loaf of bread shaped cardboard. I also really wanted a bread that was not only gluten free, but soy, dairy, and corn free. This is hard to do.

I started looking for recipes, and a lot of gluten free recipes use dairy to help them have more taste. But with a milk protein allergy, I really needed a dairy free recipe. That is when I found this recipe. It was amazing! But I can not bring myself to use 1/4 cup of Brown Sugar in a loaf of bread! So I started playing with the recipe and created this recipe.

A couple of notes, I have a stand mixer, so please don’t ask if you can make this by hand! I do not know. Plus the dough is NOT like a wheat dough, you are really going to want to use a mixer of some kind.

USE A KITCHEN SCALE!!! I have included the volumetric measurements, but please, please, please, use a kitchen scale. your bread will turn out so much nicer.

Start by separating 3 eggs, and setting aside the yolks. (Next week I will post a recipe where we will use them!) Add the whites to the mixer bowl and whisk to stiff peaks.

Next add together 3/4 C warm water, 2 Tablespoons Honey, and 1 1/2 Tablespoons yeast to proof.

Measure out 260 g (2 cups) Tapioca Flour/Starch, 74 g (1/2 c) Millet Flour, 95 g (1/2 c) Potato Starch, 2 teaspoon xanthum gum, 1 teaspoon sea salt, and 1/2 tsp baking powder into a separate bowl and stir together.

When the yeast is bubbly and the whites have stiff peaks, slowly whisk in the yeast mixture and add 1/4 c extra virgin olive oil and 1 Tablespoon Apple Cider Vinegar.

Now, switch from the whisk attachment to the paddle attachment, and add in the flours mixture. Beat on medium (4 on a kitchen aid stand mixer) for 5 minutes. Be sure to scrap down the sides occasionally to make sure everything gets mixed together. The final “dough” will be more like a think quick bread batter.

Scrap the batter into a 2-pound loaf pan, BE SURE to spray it with a gluten free kitchen spay or grease before adding the batter!!! Carefully spread it out to fill in the bottom of the pan.

Cover and set in a warm place to raise for about an hour. I like to put it in the window and to cover it with a warm damp tea towel. I then set the timer for 45 minutes, so that I can pre-heat the oven for 15-minutes before baking.

Place the risen loaf into a 400 Fahrenheit degree oven to bake for 30-45 minutes.

Let cool before slicing, and then store in a freezer bag in the freezer if not planning on eating the whole loaf today!

NOTE: The flat top of this loaf is because I let it over raise. I should have placed it into bake after a 30 minute raising period, but my oven wasn’t ready. It doesn’t change the bread much, like it would with a wheat loaf. I just have some bigger holes.

Here is a link to a printable recipe.

Food is Love

I love food, and after a year of trying to figure out how to keep my SIBO away, I have come to learn that I love recipe testing. I mean, I love food, and eating, so it just comes naturally that creating and perfecting recipes is amazing.

My little notebook of recipes is quickly filling, and people are always surprised to hear my food is gluten, dairy, soy, and usually corn free. Maybe it is because we are in the south now, and finding good gluten free food is impossible, at least compared to Washington, but making my own is saving me.

My recipe notebook

A few weeks ago I was talking to some new friends and we were talking about gluten free cooking. I have always seen food blogging to be something that almost every stay at home mom does. I don’t want to be the next “mommy blogger”, but I do want to share my recipes.

I have been typing up and editing my recipes and am going to start sharing them with you! Look for a new recipe every Friday! I think you will enjoy them, I know we do.

We moved!

About 3 months ago, I FINALLY got to say “Peace out, Pullman!” with a mic drop.

I moved there in Aug 2005 for school. I HATED it here, and I let people know. Washington State University was not my first choice or my second choice for school. It wasn’t even on my list. But it was the only school my parents would help pay for. In an alternate universe, I went to Embry Riddle Aeronautical University, wasn’t medically disqualified for Air Force ROTC and graduated with an Aerospace engineering degree.

Instead, I moved about 300 miles from home into a small dorm room with another girl on a floor with about 120 other girls. For 6 years my life revolved around getting an engineering degree. In 2011, I graduated with a Material Science and Engineering degree.

In 2009, I married a local boy, and Pullman, became our home. For 7 years, we lived in our large one bedroom duplex. We have seen many people move out of the basement apartment, and from the other rentals on our street.

In 2013, we welcomed home a beautiful baby boy. That house, was all he has ever known, and asks to go back.

This year, 2016, we celebrated 7 years of marriage, our baby turned 3, and we moved.

To another country.

Texas

Well, basically. 2,500 miles away to Texas, the Lone Star State, where everything is bigger.

Many people who leave Pullman, do so sad. This is their first home away from home. But for me it hasn’t been that. For me, this was my home. My bank teller, knew my name, our struggle with infertility, she was a friend. I know the cashiers at the local grocery stores. I came to Pullman with definite end. Then it changed.

Now, that our house is in shambles and there are stacks of boxes on every free wall, I am excited! We, as a family, are getting to experience something new and yes, scary!

This process has been a whirlwind of events. We thought for sure we would only be moving to Oregon. I know when the decision was made, Mr. Wonderful was heart broken. I remembered that feeling from 2005 when my parents said no to my dream.

This time, together, we have come to be excited for this change. And now that it is our turn to leave Pullman, we do so without looking back on the heartbreak this town has had for us and we look forward to the possibilities College Station, TX has to offer.

But Mommy’s Aren’t Supposed to go Away.

Mr. Z hasn’t been feeling well the last couple of days, and so along with lots of snuggles, naps, and chocolate, there has been a lot of TV time.

One movie he keeps requesting has been “Radar the Police Car” or as it is actually titled, Bold Eagles. It is a cute little animated movie about a nature preserve in Norway, called Eagle Park. Some poachers come in and start taking the animals. They take the Mommy Eagle, before her egg can hatch. Radar, starts to care for the eaglet, and the eaglet, Scruffy, starts calling Radar mommy.

At the end, Radar is telling Scruffy, that the Eagle is his REAL mommy. To which the eaglet replies, “But mommies aren’t supposed to go away.”

I don’t know how many times in the last 3 three years, I have personally said that.

In casual conversation, people will sometimes say things like, “My mom, is going to outlive me.” or “Mother’s can’t die.”

I know they mean well, and I don’t walk around with a sign that says, don’t talk about mothers not dying, mine is dead.

But today I heard that line, I just just wanted to turn into a puddle.

But mommies aren’t supposed to go away.

My mother wasn’t the picture perfect mother, and most of the time I have to think really hard to remember the good. But she is my mine. While she might not be here today, and I can’t just call her whenever I have a question. I still feel her presence.

When loved ones pass before us, do they really leave us?

Personally, I don’t think so.

So even though, physically my mom is not here, I think she is still around, smiling and laughing with right along side us.

Mr. Z kissing grandma Nancy, April 30, 2015, her 60th birthday.

July 28th, 2015– The End is in My Sights

Two full days left! 6 meals! I am looking forward to kicking the no SWYPO rule out the window.

No, I won’t go “carb” crazy, but being able to have the option to have a “real” sandwich is freeing.

Started my SIBO antibiotics today. Hopefully, this is the cure! Or at least helps, significantly.

Food Log:
Breakfast: 2 hard boiled eggs, cucumbers, and blueberries

Lunch: leftover meatloaf, carrots, and cucumbers
Dinner: a giant taco salad, lettuce, taco meat, guacamole, “sour cream” olives, and cucumbers

ALSO! Today, I went on my first run (ok, walk/run) in over 2 months! At my last race, I sustain a bad muscle strain and have been in physical therapy since. It wasn’t pain free, but using the tools I learned in PT, I was able to stretch and relief my discomfort.

July 23, 2015– How much longer?

7 days. 21 more meals.

Trying to be strong. But I really just want to give in, or as the Whole30 Timeline says, “I am SO over this.”

Next Friday, we are having homemade pizza. And this SWYPO rule is OUT THE FLIPING WINDOW! I can give up sugars and added sugars. But I just want to eat a hamburger with a bun, a real sandwich, and have a bowl of cereal with my 2 year old.

Food log:
Breakfast: homemade sausage, 2 eggs and a GGS (I needed something to spice up my eggs)
Lunch: an over stuffed enchilada stuffed sweet potato with cucumbers
Dinner: zoodles, pasta sauce and meatballs

July 8th-blah

Blah, blarg, blah.

That’s how I feel today.

Food log:

Breakfast: I am sick of eggs. Green smoothie: hemp hearts, avocado, romaine, water, mango, banana, orange. (Split it 3 ways, saved some for tomorrow and gave some to the kiddo)

Lunch: Enchilada stuffed sweet potato, I might be eating this often.

Snack: grapes and oranges

Dinner: I made a big batch of Kalua Pork to take with us this weekend, we also had it for dinner, along with some leftovers to clean out the fridge. I had mine over some lettuce, green beans, and smokey sweet potatoes, and topped with some guacamole and “cashew cream”.