Have you recently decided to try a gluten-free diet? Perhaps you’re allergic to it, and miss having that home-baked bread. After all, gluten-free bread in the shops can be expensive. Or you might live somewhere where it isn’t easily available. Don’t worry, there’s still a way to get the bread you want so that you can keep having toast and sandwiches, and that’s by making your own gluten-free bread.
Maybe you aren’t allergic to gluten but still want to start having a bit less gluten in your diet. Some people have recently started to notice the health benefits of a gluten-free diet. Even if you aren’t going to completely eradicate gluten from your diet, having less in general might be a goal. One item of food that contains most of your gluten intake is normally bread, so you’ll surely want to read the rest of this article on how to get more bread with less gluten.
In this article, we’re going to look at a number of tips for baking the best gluten-free bread around. Even if you’re used to baking bread, you might not have thought of all of these tips before. You can even use them alongside your favorite gluten-free bread recipe if it just isn’t producing the absolute best results. Let’s have a look at a few important things to remember when making gluten-free bread…
How to make gluten-free bread
The best thing about gluten-free bread is that it shouldn’t be expensive. While gluten-free living is taking off, it’s also something that’s often confined to a health store or specialist shop. These shops are often expensive. But bread should be cheap, and it is if you make it at home. Follow these tips to get the best results with your gluten-free bread when making it for yourself:
Get all the right ingredients
When you find the right gluten-free bread recipe, stick to it. Often, when you come across a new recipe, you find you have to substitute certain items. This isn’t a great idea when you’re trying gluten-free bread for the first time. So when you get your recipe, make sure you can find all the right ingredients with no substitutions. You’re probably used to looking up substitutes for all sorts of ingredients that you can’t get your hands on. Don’t rush things like this with gluten-free bread. The ingredients required shouldn’t be too hard to find, so there isn’t really an excuse. Sometimes, you get bad results simply because you didn’t use the right ingredients. A substitute isn’t always the answer.
Pay attention to weights instead of volume
Some recipes ask you to match volumes of ingredients but this isn’t always the best idea. Weight everything, especially when you’re starting out. You might get the hang of doing things by touch and feel when you’ve got a bit more experience, but this isn’t the best way to do things in the beginning. Make sure you weigh everything and follow all instructions super-carefully. If you need more accurate scales, get some. Digital ones are a good idea as they’re less open to interpretation and rounding up.
When you use volume measuring tools like cups and jugs, and especially spoons, it’s much harder to stay accurate. One tablespoon could be heaped and the other could be flat. That’s not the same tablespoon. While the recipe at the end of this article does mention the use of spoons, make sure you heap them exactly the same amount each time.
Stick to the same amounts
Some people think that when they’ve got a recipe they can either double or half the amount. Maybe they want to make twice as much, or a smaller loaf. This is a bad idea. Halving and doubling simply doesn’t work as well as you think it should. ANd it’s a reason why many loaves fail to turn out very well. Recipes are made to have certain rations that work well with each other, while you might think exactly half of everything, or double everything, will work just as well—it won’t. Not only that, it isn’t easy to adjust cooking times in the same way, and you’ll be opening yourself up to a lot of confusion, and ultimately—bread that isn’t as good.
Keep beating
Another reason some people’s gluten-free bread doesn’t turn out that well is because they don’t beat it hard enough. Beating just after the mix is important. It might be tiring, but you need to get the air out of the bread mix. Beating is one of the most important tasks in making good bread, so don’t rush the process.
Check the temperature
Your bread might look good on the outside, but you can’t tell if it’s good to go without getting into the middle. Some people like to use a knife, but this can damage the bread. Not only that, it isn’t the most accurate measure. Use a food thermometer to carefully poke through and take the temperature of the bread at it’s widest point. Make sure it’s the right temp inside (you can find guide temps online for this depending on the bread and recipe as well as elevation, but around 180 degrees should be about right).
Simple gluten-free bread recipe
Mix 400g of gluten-free white flour with 1 teaspoon of salt and 7g of dry fast-action yeast. Separately, whisk 290ml of buttermilk and 2 eggs with 2 tablespoons of oil. Mix the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients.
Shape the dough into a bread shape and place into a greased tin. Cover with clingfilm and leave in a warm place for around an hour. Make sure it has risen about a third. Put into a preheated oven at 180 degrees C. Bake for around an hour until golden and risen. Leave to stand for around 20 minutes before cutting and serving. There you have it, gluten-free bread with ease! Enjoy! Just remember to follow the tips earlier in this article.
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