Friday, September 11, 2009

Oh, for the love of all things gf...

After years of finding myself in varying degrees of discomfort and pain after eating, I was finally diagnosed with Coeliac disease, which is a severe allergy to gluten (found in wheat, rye, barley, oats and their products).

At the time of diagnosis, the most exciting gluten-free flours one could lay your hands on here in South Africa were rice flour or sorghum flour (which tended towards creating muffins which could seriously injure someone).

These days, there are a choice range of gf flours from which to choose, the products of which taste akin to the best glutinous creations that can be offered up for comparison.

However, just like Sarah Michelle Gellar's character in the movie Simply Irresistable whose emotions were poured into her culinary creations, causing those who ate them to exhibit the same - I am of the opinion that a heaping helping of love helps to sweeten any baked good. Enter...my mom.

Now, mom is a baker of note. Every childhood birthday party offered up a new and exciting cakely creation. Upon hearing of my coeliac disease, she was saddened at not being able to bake up a storm for me to enjoy anymore. However, just as the range of gf flours grew, so did my mom's adventurous ways in the kitchen.

Enter...modified versions of the old favourites. Below is just such a recipe. Please bear in mind when baking with gf flours that the consistency often has to be adjusted according to feel (usually just a little more flour or a little more liquid). Use baking intuition, have fun and most of all...born-up-a-tree!


Gluten-free Yoghurt Cake
Rebaked recipe in July 2011 (this one works):
  • 175ml yoghurt
  • 175ml self-raising gluten-free flour (I used Nature's Choice, which isn't self-raising, and the cake still rose sufficiently...although it is a denser cake)
  • 175ml castor or white sugar (not brown)
  • 87ml sunflower oil
  • 2 large eggs
  • pinch of salt (I always leave this out)

Method:
  1. Mix all ingredients together.
  2. Place in a very, very well greased loaf tin (also dusted with flour), and then bake in a pre-heated oven at 180 degrees Celsius (sometimes it's best to decrease your oven temp by 5 degrees when trying a new recipe, as oven temps differ....so 175) for 40 to 45 minutes (or until just golden and a cake skewer inserted comes out clean).
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Ingredients (original 2009 recipe missing sugar...ignore):
  • 175ml gluten-free flour (I use Nature's Choice, which is a mixture of gf flours);
  • 175ml full-cream yoghurt (mixed fruit or strawberry is particularly yum);
  • 1tsp xanthum gum;
  • 1/2 tsp each of bicarbonate of soda and cream of tartar;
  • pinch of salt; and
  • 1 egg.

Method:
  1. Mix ingredients together (gently) in no particular order.
  2. Pour into a greased loaf tin.
  3. Bake at 180 degrees Celsius for 30 minutes.
Check out some cool blogs dedicated to gluten-free cooking:
http://gfsouthafrica.blogspot.com
http://milkforthemorningcake.blogspot.com
http://glutenfreegirl.blogspot.com
http://glutenfreeday.com
http://www.thespunkycoconut.com

4 comments:

Rahel from TX said...

Juanita, first, I must say that your GF banana bread and GF chocolate banana cake are the best - I cannot praise them enough. Those are ultra-fabulous :-) so I hesitate to comment that I did not have much success with this recipe. Could be because I used 98% fat-free yogurt, my egg-substitute (condensed milk) did not work or my proportions were not exact. I should have paid attention to what you said in the intro: the consistency needs to be adjusted to feel right :-) Couple of questions: 1. could you confirm whether the absence of sugar in the ingredient list is on purpose? 2. Is the consistency of this cake the same as the banana cake i.e more liquidy than doughy? Here, when you say to add more liquid if required, I assume you mean more yogurt? Thanks much!

Juanita said...

@ Rahel: My apologies for this recipe. This post was my 3rd ever blog post, and I was so over-eager that I didn't re-read the recipe...which I see now is posted wrong (big oops!)

I acutally rebaked this recipe two days ago for my Mom's birthday, and this is the original recipe (I also don't use xantham or guar gums anymore).She can eat eggs, so I didn't substitute those. I only used a good gf cake flour.

Here's the original:

175ml yoghurt
175ml self-raising gf flour
175ml castor or white sugar (not brown)
87ml sunflower oil
2 eggs
pinch of salt

- Mix all ingredients together
- Bake in a loaf pan at 180 degrees Celsius for 40 to 45 minutes (or until a cake skewer inserted comes out clean).

I think you will definitely have more luck now, and that the consistency will be much different with the sugar (although it is still quite liquidy, hence the longer oven time)! I'm sorry the one posted flopped....I'm a lot more careful to make sure I edit what I write now :-)

Happy baking!

Rahel from TX said...

Juanita, thanks very much for posting your modified recipe - and so quickly! You are dedicated :-)

Just so you know, my son ate up the cake which I commented on above so its all good :-) Before I try out your modified recipe, i have a question: how do you measure flour/sugar in "ml" - do you use the same measuring cup (I have pyrex) as used for liquids? Thanks!

Juanita said...

You're most welcome...glad to hear it was edible nonetheless! :-)

I have a 25/50/100/125/250 milliliter measure that I use for liquids and solids. Milliliters are not like ounces, where you get a distinction between liquid ounces and solid ounces.

So yes, you use the same measuring cup.

Successful baking trails!