Safe baking

Using prepared mixes and flour blends eases making of gluten-free cakes, cookies, bread
By Heather Lalley, Special to Chicago Tribune Newspapers

September 15, 2010

As most bakers know, gluten is your friend.

This protein found in wheat, barley and rye forms a network in baked goods that creates pillowy breads, chewy cookies and light, moist cakes.

Gluten can also make some people very, very sick.

For years, those with celiac disease, gluten intolerance or allergies thought their days of fresh-baked bread, hot-from-the-oven chocolate chip cookies or even birthday cake were over.

But that's changing. And now, thanks to a growing number of gluten-free baking mixes and alternative flours, home cooks can whip up treats without getting sick.

General Mills recently introduced gluten-free Bisquick, and its Betty Crocker line has gluten-free cake, brownie and cookie mixes. A number of companies, including Bob's Red Mill, Gluten-Free Pantry and Domata Living Flour, sell all-purpose flour blends.

Anne Byrn, the Nashville-based writer who has sold millions of books as "The Cake Mix Doctor," returns this December with "The Cake Mix Doctor Bakes Gluten-Free." Her readers demanded it, she said.

Using three readily available gluten-free cake mixes, Byrn created some 75 recipes for cakes, cookies and other baked goods.

"I knew they needed doctoring for sure," she said. "I wanted to give these cakes more flavor and more structure and get rid of the gritty texture."

Adding (gluten-free) ingredients such as instant pudding mix, peanut butter, juices and chocolate chips helped improve the flavor and structure of the mixes, she said. And turning the cake mixes into cookies — by decreasing the number of eggs in the recipe — helped hide the grittiness, she said.

Many people who are gluten intolerant also have problems with dairy proteins. So Byrn included dairy-free options in her book.

Rose O'Carroll and many of her family members, including her mother and three children, suffer from varying levels of gluten intolerance. She opened Rose's Wheat Free Bakery and Cafe in Evanston, Ill., 21/2 years ago.

"We get people who routinely come in and cry" when they see the gluten-free breads, cakes and pies, O'Carroll said.

Gluten-free bakers should experiment with different flour blends, she said. She finds bean flours, such as garbanzo and mung flour, in Indian shops and buys rice flour at Asian markets. A small amount of xanthan gum, available in health-food stores, added to gluten-free baked goods boosts elasticity and structure, she said.

Expect gluten-free products to become stale more quickly than wheat-filled counterparts, she said. Freeze leftovers that will sit more than a day.

Jen Cafferty, founder of the Gluten-Free Cooking Expo and the Web site Gluten Free Life (gfreelife.com), suggested starting with a gluten-free baking mix and finding ways to bump up the nutrition and flavor by adding flax, cinnamon, raisins or caraway.

Gluten-free bakers will want to invest in a stand mixer or bread maker, Cafferty said. "The dough is so thick and dense and goopy," she said. "There's no way to shape it, really."

Breads made without gluten will only rise once, in the pan, since there's no network to support the structure.

And be sure you read all labels, she said. Imitation vanilla often has gluten, as do some baking powders. Also, make sure you don't grease your pans with "baking spray," which has wheat flour, she said.

Gluten-free yellow birthday cake

From "The Cake Mix Doctor Bakes Gluten-Free" by Anne Byrn (Workman Publishing, scheduled for release in December).

Prep: 15 minutesCook: 19 minutesMakes: 12 servings

Vegetable oil spray, for misting pans

2 teaspoons rice flour, for dusting pans

1 package (15 ounces) yellow gluten-free cake mix

1/4 cup (half of a 3.4-ounce package) vanilla instant pudding mix

3/4 cup milk (for a deeper yellow-cake color, substitute orange juice for 3 tablespoons of the milk)

1 stick (8 tablespoons) unsalted butter, at room temperature

3 large eggs

1 tablespoon vanilla paste or pure vanilla extract (be sure it's gluten-free)

Gluten-free frosting of your choice

1. Place a rack in the center of the oven; heat to 350 degrees. Lightly mist two 9-inch round cake pans with vegetable oil spray; dust with rice flour. Shake out the excess flour. (For a taller cake, bake in 8-inch pans for about 5 minutes longer.)
2. Place the cake mix, pudding mix, milk, butter, eggs and vanilla in a large bowl; beat with an electric mixer on low speed until just incorporated, 30 seconds. Scrape down the bowl. Increase speed to medium; beat until smooth, scraping down sides of bowl again if needed, 1 to 1 1/2 minutes. The batter should be well blended. Divide evenly between pans, smoothing the tops with a spatula.
3. Bake side by side until golden and the tops spring back when lightly pressed, 19 to 23 minutes. Transfer the pans to wire racks; cool 5 minutes. Run a sharp knife around the edge of each cake; give the pans a good shake to loosen the cakes. Invert each layer onto a wire rack; invert again so they're right side up. Cool completely before frosting.

Nutrition information

Per serving (without frosting): 241 calories, 35% of calories from fat, 9 g fat, 5 g saturated fat, 74 mg cholesterol, 36 g carbohydrates, 3 g protein, 170 mg sodium, 0 g fiber