Hummingbird Cake

It was my birthday yesterday. Of course I'm well past the age where birthdays feel like some momentous, exciting occasion - after all, waking up and remembering you've turned 23 is nothing like the feeling of, say, waking up and remembering you're now 13. Still, though, this is the first birthday in recent memory that I am neither trying to finish some massive final project nor in the middle of moving to a new home (or even worse, both at once).

So, I made myself a cake.

This was the first time I've ever attempted any kind of big layer cake, so believe me when I say that this recipe is pretty foolproof! It's also very easily adapted to gluten-free, since it's meant to be dense and moist (in a good way - think carrot cake or banana bread). The cake recipe is adapted from the "original" Hummingbird Cake recipe printed in a 1978 issue of Southern Living magazine; aside from the obvious difference in flour, I also replaced part of the oil with applesauce to keep it from being too overwhelmingly rich. The frosting, however, is my own creation. Instead of the normal cream cheese frosting, I went out on a limb and made something similar, but using goat cheese with honey and some coconut oil. Don't let that combination put you off - - it still definitely tastes like cream cheese frosting, but even better. The tanginess of the goat cheese and the subtle coconut aroma pair perfectly with this fruit-filled cake cake. (Of course you can also use whatever other frosting you like - the cake itself is dairy-free, so if you can't eat dairy simply use a different frosting.)

Classic Hummingbird Cake
35 g oat flour
35 g chestnut flour
70 g brown rice flour
140 g tapioca flour
1/2 tsp Pomona's citrus pectin
1 1/2 tsp psyllium

200 g sugar
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon

3 large eggs
120 mL oil (I used grapeseed oil)
120 g (about 1/2 cup) applesauce
2-3 bananas, chopped into small pieces
1 can of crushed pineapple, including liquid (8-oz can)
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
120 g (1 cup) chopped pecans

Method:
1. Grease three 8" cake pans and preheat the oven to 175ºC/350ºF
2. In a medium bowl, combine flours, pectin & psyllium, sugar, salt, baking soda, and cinnamon. Set aside.
3. In a large mixing bowl, combine the eggs and oil. (If using a mixer, use the paddle attachment on low speed.)
4. Add the dry ingredients to the egg mixture and stir just enough to combine.
5. Add in the applesauce, bananas, pineapple (with liquid), vanilla, and pecans. Stir just enough to distribute everything uniformly.
6. Pour batter into the three pans. Bake for about 40 minutes (more or less, based on how well your pans heat).
7. Cool in the pans for about an hour, then tip out onto a rack to cool completely before frosting. (If you won't be frosting them right away, put them in the refrigerator after completely cooled.)
8. Frost the cake using a flat spatula. If desired, stick chopped pecans and shredded coconut to the sides of the cake using a spatula.

Creamy Honey Goat Cheese Frosting
1 8-oz package Trader Joe's Honey Goat Cheese (chèvre)
56 g unprocessed coconut oil
1 tsp vanilla extract
250-275 g powdered sugar
2-3 tsp tapioca starch (if needed)

Blend goat cheese and coconut oil until smooth (an electric beater works well). Blend in the vanilla and gradually add the powdered sugar. Beat until it resembles whipped cream cheese. If the consistency is too runny, add 2-3 tsp tapioca starch.

{Ratio Rally} Bagels

How long has it been since you've had a bagel? And I mean a real bagel, not just round-shaped bread with a hole in the middle...which is how every commercially-available GF "bagel" I've tried is best described - some aren't bad at all, but they're also not bagels. A bagel, as you probably know, is more chewy on the outside (rather than crusty) because of the way it's poached before baking. It's also more dense inside - which means bagels adapt to gluten-free surprisingly well compared to some other gluten-heavy foods. Really! They taste like bagels! (And that's coming from my boyfriend, who spent part of his childhood in New York City, so I'll trust him on how bagels should taste.) And now you can have a bagel, too. Or several - there are quite a few different kinds of bagels in this month's roundup, hosted by Morri at Meals with Morri!

The ratio I used was approximately 5 parts flour:3 parts water. This is different than the ratio for wheat bagels; while some GF recipes need more liquid than wheat flour, this needed a higher amount of liquid than I was expecting to make a smooth dough. I think part of the reason may be because I used larger-than-usual proportions of some flours which can hold a lot of water, including oat flour. I haven't had a chance to try the recipe with other flour blends to see how much of a difference it makes. (Many GF flour blends are 40% whole grain and 60% starch, but for this recipe I used a blend containing 60% whole grain because I like bagels which are more hearty than an "all-purpose" type flour would make.)

Don't be intimidated by the long set of instructions - bagels are boiled before baking, so there are a few extra steps in here, but I felt like they were actually fairly easy to make.

Like most of my recipes, this recipe calls for some ingredients and techniques that may be different from the gluten-free recipes you are used to. If you're new to this blog, please take a look at this post and this one for a quick introduction.

Classic Poppyseed Bagels
Makes 12 bagels

For the Sponge:

240 g Brown rice flour

160 g Oat flour (make sure it's certified gluten-free; many oats are cross-contaminated)

80 g Buckwheat flour

2 tsp yeast

480 mL warm water

Other ingredients:

300 g Tapioca flour

20 g Potato flour (not the same as potato starch; see note on my Ingredients page)

4 T Psyllium husks

1 tsp Pomona's Pure Citrus Pectin (see note on my Ingredients page)

1 T Molasses

1 T Honey 

15 g Sea salt

1 tsp yeast

2 T grapeseed oil or other high-heat oil

2 L water, for poaching

1/2 T baking soda, for poaching

1 T sugar, for poaching (optional)

Rice flour, for dusting baking stone

Method:

The night before you want to make the bagels, combine the dry ingredients for the sponge, including yeast, in a large mixing bowl or the bowl of your mixer. Stir in the water. Cover bowl and let the sponge ferment for 8-12 hours. 

The next morning, mix together tapioca flour, potato flour, psyllium, pectin, salt in a separate bowl. Stir the molasses, honey, and extra 1tsp yeast into the sponge, then add about half the flour mixture. Mix well by hand or using a mixer on the lowest setting (I find the paddle attachment works better than a dough hook). Mix in the rest of the flour blend, then add the oil. 

The dough may look very crumbly at first, but after 1-2 minutes of mixing it should begin to come together to form a stiff dough. (If the dough crumbles or falls apart when you squeeze a handful, mix in more water 1T at a time until the dough is stiff but smooth.)

Now, on a baking sheet, flatten the dough out into a large, thin rectangle, brush the surface with water, sprinkle the baking powder evenly over it, and roll it up (all this is demonstrated here). Use a dough scraper or knife to slice the dough log into 12 pieces, as if making cinnamon rolls. Use wet hands to smooth out the "seams" of each piece as you form it into a flattened round, and use your thumb to poke a hole in the middle. Cover all the shaped bagels with a damp cloth or damp paper towels and set the tray in a warm place to rise for about an hour.

After the bagels have been rising for about 45 minutes, pre-heat the oven with a floured baking stone to 230ºC/450ºF, and heat 2L of water in a wide pot over medium-high heat. (It is important to measure the water, to ensure you are using the right concentration of baking soda - this is necessary for bagels' characteristic taste and texture!) When the water begins to simmer, add the baking soda (and sugar, if using). With the water still simmering, use a spatula to transfer 3-4 bagels to the pot. Let them simmer for 1-2 minutes, flip them over and poach for an additional minute. (The bagels will appear to keep rising the longer they are in the pot, but don't let them poach more than 1-2 minutes per side or they will soak up too much water!) Use a spatula to remove them from the water and allow them to rest on a rack for several minutes before putting them in the oven - use this time to sprinkle with poppyseeds or other toppings. (If they are too wet when you put them in the oven they will stick to the baking stone.) Bake for 20-25 minutes, or until they appear nicely browned and easily come off the baking stone.

~Check out the rest of this month's Rally recipes at Meals with Morri!~

P.S. - Want to see fresh, gluten-free, real food more widely available? You can help make it happen! Simone of Zenbelly Catering is trying to open a 100% gluten-free shared kitchen, which would serve as a community work space for people who want to use certified gluten-free ingredients, as well as a space for an organic, celiac-safe catering company and a coffeeshop serving locally-made gluten-free baked goods. And I think it's a really, really wonderful idea. Visit Simone's Kickstarter page to contribute, or to learn more about how you can help. Below is a short video from the Kickstarter page which explains Simone's vision for the project more fully:

This project will only happen if the funding goal is reached by May 20th! Remember that even if you're not in the San Francisco area, opening this kitchen could help pave the way for more recognition of gluten-free needs everywhere, and help demonstrate that there is a market for local, sustainably-produced food.

How MythBusters made me a better baker (Or, Why I put baking powder in yeast bread)

If you've spent more than 5 minutes on the internet, I'm sure you're familiar with Diet Coke + Mentos. More specifically, what happens when you drop the latter into a bottle containing the former. 

(This. This is what happens.)
[source]

What you may not be so familiar with, though, is why this happens (and how you can apply it to baking).

Well, it turns out that the surface of a Mentos candy is actually covered in tiny pits - pits which trap carbon dioxide when the candy is submerged in the carbonated liquid. Now, to be fair, with the specific combination of Mentos mints and Diet Coke, there are also some chemical factors contributing to the extreme nature of the reaction - but you can see a somewhat milder effect using even plain carbonated water. Plus, the same underlying physical principle of the trapped gas applies to many other things, too - like a fingertip:

Thanks, Wikipedia!

See how the bubbles gather around the rough surface of the finger? That's because the carbon dioxide dissolved in the water is forming bubbles in the small irregularities on the fingertip. As more tiny bubbles combine, the areas of trapped carbon dioxide grow bigger. This same principle is why when you open a new bottle of a carbonated drink, the carbon dioxide (which was dissolved in the high-pressure environment of the bottle) suddenly forms large bubbles; providing a rough surface (like a fingertip, or a small scratch inside a glass) just allows this to happen more quickly. These pits are known as nucleation sites, and the very rapid bubble formation when you add Mentos to Diet Coke helps cause that dramatic eruption above when the gas pushes towards the surface. This animated clip from MythBusters illustrates the process up-close:

You're probably wondering by now what on earth this has to do with bread. Well...a lot, actually. Now of course I'm not going to tell you to put Diet Coke or Mentos in your bread - that would just be silly. And gross, and messy. But you do already put something into bread which creates carbon dioxide: yeast produces this gas as part of its metabolism, and the bubbles that form help create that wonderful airy, open-crumbed texture of rustic bread. That texture - or rather, the lack of it - was probably the first thing you noticed when you tried gluten-free bread for the first time, too. Gluten, as you know, is stretchy - when gas bubbles form as gluten dough rises, the elastic network stretches, like a balloon, and does not collapse when steam further expands these bubbles in the oven. 

The binders we use in gluten-free bread, though, are not as strong or as stretchy as a gluten network. Combine that with the fact that gluten-free breads tend to retain more liquid, and you can probably see why the bubbles seem to sort of collapse, resulting in a small, dense loaf. 

But there are ways to help compensate for this! For one thing, we can make it easier for these bubbles to form and grow larger. (This is where the "nucleation" concept comes in.) 

Try to imagine blowing air into a balloon. It's hardest when you first start, right? That's when you have the highest resistance to push against. It's a similar situation in the dough: the bubbles start out very tiny, with very little surface area, and a lot of pressure from the surrounding dough pushing in from all sides. If adjacent bubbles combine to form one larger one, though, it can withstand the pressure a little bit better - and in the oven, it is easier for water to turn into steam in an area that's already filled with air than when it's surrounded by water. This also means that if steam expands where there's already a bubble, that bubble becomes bigger (if the dough hasn't "set" yet). Steam formation from water in the dough actually has a much bigger impact on expansion than the air bubbles alone.

Yeast is not the only way we can get these bubbles, though. Baking powder produces gas too - in the case of double-acting baking powder (which is what I use), there's actually an initial chemical reaction and then a second, heat-triggered reaction which occurs in the oven. By rolling in the baking powder right before the final rising, I'm providing extra "starting points" for bubble formation - ultimately making it easier for bubbles to expand and hold their shape both during the final rise and after the bread is in the oven. This results in a loaf which is larger, less dense, and also lighter, because more water was able to "escape" in the form of steam. 

In the picture at the very top of the page, you can see the split along the top of the loaf from where it expanded during baking. And in the one below, you can see the holes in the crumb of that same loaf (you may also notice the seam from where I rolled up the dough, a possible sign that slightly more water is necessary). This bread is, of course, 100% gluten-free - but it's also free of the major food allergens (making it vegan by default as well). But it looks like real bread, right? Well, that's because it is. Real bread, gluten-free. 

You don't need eggs to get this kind of rise in a gluten-free loaf...just a bit of science!

There is something I need to say

Hello again.

It hit me that as of a few days ago, this blog, Gluten-Free Boulangerie, is 2 years old. But that is not what this post is about. This post is about why I've been away for nearly six months - and not just from the blog, or the comments that went unread until yesterday (for which I offer sincere apologies to all those asking questions I did not reply to). I've been away from everything. Emails sat unopened and unanswered. Those of you on Twitter maybe noticed I didn't make a peep. And for every day that ticked by, it became harder and harder to come back - you see, my life had been changed in a huge way, and it felt increasingly impossible to bridge the gap that formed between the "before" and "after," the "then" and the "now."

All of you with celiac disease already know all too well the stress of a chronic illness: the worry and fear prior to a diagnosis; the pain and exhaustion in parts of your body you didn't even know could hurt or be tired; the pain of not being believed by doctors, family, and friends - and maybe you even begin to doubt yourself. You know that a diagnosis will bring relief, in some ways, but that it also brings new kinds of fear, and worry, and pain. You know those desperate questions you ask yourself: How am I supposed to get used to this? When will this ever feel normal? 

Well...that's what I've been trying to figure out myself, all over again. And this time it's a lot harder to adjust to than celiac disease was. 

I had been in a holding pattern of uncertainty and lab tests for quite some time, up until a few months ago - over the past few years I was tested for things ranging from devastating autoimmune disorders all the way to easily-treated ailments, and a lot of things in between, and the only answers I got amounted to little more than "we still don't know." I had no idea what was making me sick, or how long it would last.

And then, partly thanks to the sheer luck of choosing a doctor who happened to have seen a "nearly identical" case a few years before, we were getting somewhere. I found out I met the criteria for "generalized hypermobility" - that means many joints all over my body are more flexible than normal, and not in a good way. (Unlike some very flexible people like, say, ballet dancers or gymnasts, my muscles cannot compensate enough to support my joints, meaning my joints are loose and unstable.) It was not a diagnosis in itself, but rather a central piece of the puzzle. That was October. Since then, all the medical evidence has confirmed my doctor's initial suspicion. There's still a piece or two that needs to be filled in - I'll be seeing a geneticist before the "finished" diagnosis ends up in my chart - but after all this waiting, I finally have a name for this thing that turned my life upside-down: Ehlers-Danlos syndrome. It's a genetic disorder which affects collagen, a protein which plays an important role in muscles, ligaments, tendons, blood vessels, and skin, among other things. There are several types, depending on where the gene mutation is and which type of collagen it affects (that's where the genetic testing comes in). In my case, the effects are extreme fatigue, muscle weakness, chronic joint pain (and frequent injury during normal activities because the joints are unstable), and circulatory issues which leave me frequently out-of-breath & lightheaded with sluggish, foggy thoughts (this makes things like communicating, reading, and writing difficult, and things like driving downright dangerous). There are other complications too, but the ones I've just described have the biggest impact on my life.

And they've been impacting my life for longer than I've let on - it's true I've gotten more ill over the past year or so, but I've known something was wrong, and had been searching for a diagnosis, since well before I even started this blog. (Technically, I was born with it; however, like a lot of people with Ehlers-Danlos, my symptoms - despite being present on some level since I was very young - did not become glaringly problematic enough to demand medical attention until my late teens.) And, as you can probably understand by now, over the course of trying to come to terms with all this I also became pretty depressed.

By this point you're probably wondering why I'm telling you all this "personal" information. That's a reasonable thing to wonder and, to be honest, the same question has flitted across my own mind. These are not easy things to say. Yet I feel it's something I need to do, for a few reasons. 

When I was still undiagnosed, I kept telling myself that the illness, whatever it was, could still be something "fixable." That once the doctors figured out what it was, I'd be able to repair what was broken and get back to my life. Sure, some plans had to be put on hold for a while, but I didn't really see it as a big deal; I kept trusting things would get back to normal, because the idea of not getting better was unfathomable. Instead, I found out that I will have this for the rest of my life, and that some of the complications will likely get worse with time. That I may not get to do all the things I had set aside for "when I get better." Unlike with celiac disease, there is no special thing I can change to make the symptoms go away. Of course I'm trying to be optimistic, but all the optimism in the world won't change the fact that some things are, at least right now, not physically possible. And the things that are possible are really, really hard - I can't even bake the way I used to. I got a mixer for Christmas, which does help a lot by taking over the strenuous stirring and kneading, but baking - which used to be my "therapy," the activity I could always count on for a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction - still requires energy that these days, I often simply don't have. Now, I'm trying to figure out if going to grad school - the main reason I moved here in the first place - is even a realistic option at this time. 

I went so long without mentioning the problems I was having because I didn't see them as part of my reality. It just didn't fit with how I saw myself. Even when I started having to walk with a cane, I was still in denial, of sorts. The cane may have made it obvious in the "real world" that something was wrong, but online, I could keep that denial alive - all I had to do was omit the unpleasant stuff, I reasoned, and I could continue to be me as I saw myself. Yes, I know just about everybody does that on some level; lots of people make their life sound a little more interesting or exciting or glamorous than it is, especially when they're doing it on the internet with the intention of getting people to actually read it (aka blogging). After all, no one wants to read a lot of complaining unless the writer manages to be really funny and snarky in the process. There are of course some bloggers who have that gift; however, I am not among them. (Which is really too bad, because the ability to pull off more snarky jokes would probably help me cope with the whole need-a-cane-and-I'm-only-22 thing.) (Actually, now it's a pair of canes, per the physical therapist's recommendation; since my wrist, elbow, & shoulder are just as hypermobile as my knees & hips are, putting all the weight on one side was causing new problems.) 

But the point I was getting to is that I am neither able nor willing to hold onto that denial anymore. Doing so would be dishonest, and what's more, I have no reason to. Either way, I am still just me.

Which brings me to another point. 

As it turns out, there's still a lot of stigma associated with chronic illness and disabilities in general, whether physical or mental, visible or invisible. On the internet in particular, where someone can speak from behind the veil of anonymity, I've seen some downright hateful statements. I haven't experienced any intentionally mean comments out in the "real world" in the relatively short time that I've been visibly disabled, but I know some other people with disabilities who have. More frequently, I encounter ignorance and misunderstanding: for instance, some people are quick to say things like "just get more sleep and you'll be fine" (it's not that kind of fatigue), or "it can't hurt that much" (yes it can, and it does), or "you're probably just too stressed-out" (don't even get me started on that one). These often-frustrating, occasionally-insulting experiences leave a lot of people, myself included, very reluctant to be open about having a chronic illness. 

...And that's exactly why I finally decided to go ahead and just be open about it. It hit me that if I want to help change how healthy people view people with chronic conditions, hiding my condition was one of the worst things I could do; on the other hand, one of the best things would be to just be myself plus a little extra honesty. Yes, I have a chronic illness. Yes, I am physically disabled. And I am still also a gluten-free baker, a food lover, a tutor, and a scientist, and a lot of other things...in short, the stuff you already knew about me is still all true. When I put it that way, I know it seems like common sense. But given the way some people act, I think sometimes people forget that. 

That's really all I wanted to say for now. I'm really hoping I'll be able to start posting recipes again soon. But now, if I go a long while without posting, now you know why. If I take a while to respond to your email or comment or tweet, please know that I'm not just ignoring you. I'm still getting used to this, and I still have a long way to go, but I've put my life on hold for long enough now - I may not be able to "get back to normal" in the way I'd hoped, but I am ready to start living again, in whatever way I can. 

{Ratio Rally} Ratios by the slice

The cool weather arrived a few days ago as abruptly as the turn of a calendar page. Normally I'd welcome the smell of crisp morning air, watching the leaves turn gorgeous shades of orange, but that day it just felt too soon. Too fleeting. Almost as if I'd been expecting late summer to somehow stretch on indefinitely - as though the hypnotic ebb-and-flow of cicada song and rasping crickets had taken the place of clocks and calendars, placing time on hiatus like one long, lazy afternoon suspended in amber. I found myself daydreaming about that lingering summer, my mind drifting to romanticized images of some idyllic place; closer, probably, to one of Van Gogh's Provençal landscapes than to any actual place I could visit. Images of the late-afternoon sun slanting across golden fields and hilly vineyards and row upon row of lavender...

Yes, I suppose I do daydream quite a bit. My cooking and baking are often expressions of those daydreams - whereas some people may flip through travel books for a brief escape, or look at old photographs of somewhere they're longing to revisit, I'm just as likely to head to the kitchen, inspired by the cuisine of whatever new place has captured my imagination.

Which finally brings me to this month's Ratio Rally. Karen of Cooking Gluten-Free chose pizza dough for this month's theme. I used my dough to make pissaladière, the Provençal equivalent to pizza - partly because of the daydreaming as I explained, but partly just because it's delicious! Well, I suppose that's subjective. I think anchovies are delicious. If you are not fond of anchovies, you can of course choose different toppings - the dough itself is actually free of all major allergens, making it vegan as well. Pizza is an endlessly adaptable recipe, as you can see from everyone's creations in the roundup.

It is also, I think, one of the most difficult things to make gluten-free. It has to be chewy but not crusty. It has to hold up under sauce and toppings without getting soggy or falling apart, but it still needs to be soft, not stiff or dry. And (according to my boyfriend, who grew up eating New York pizza) you must be able to fold a slice without it breaking.

I've finally developed a dough that does all those things.

While the reference ratio in Ruhlman's cookbook, 5 parts flour:3 parts water, did produce a workable dough, the resulting bread was always a bit too stiff no matter what flour blend I used. I was frustrated that I couldn't come up with a flour blend that worked like wheat flour, until a thought occurred to me: what if a 5:3 ratio would not give me the sort of crust I was aiming for, even with wheat flour? What if the bread in that cookbook is not like the bread I was used to? I'd forgotten that the doughs for many traditional and artisan-style yeast breads use a higher hydration than 5:3, where the water amounts to 60% of the flour weight; ciabatta dough, for instance, is usually around 85% hydration. With that in mind I increased the water to a 5:4 ratio and the result was amazing. This dough, at 80% hydration, gives a crust which is pleasantly chewy, will hold up under toppings, and yes, you can even fold it - and the taste is just as excellent as the texture.

Real pizza crust. Without gluten.

Note: This is meant to be baked directly on a baking stone, rather than on parchment. If you don't have a baking stone, or if you don't feel comfortable transferring dough from a pizza peel, shape dough on parchment instead of a pizza peel when instructed.


Pissaladière
This recipe, using a total of 250g flour, makes enough dough for a small pizza. It can easily be doubled.

Sponge:

65g brown rice flour

25g oat flour

15g chickpea flour

10g millet flour

10g potato flour (not starch)

1tsp yeast

150mL warm water

Combine flours and yeast in a large bowl, stir in water, and allow to ferment for 12-16 hours.

Dough:

75g tapioca starch

50g potato starch

1T psyllium husks

3/8 tsp Pomona's citrus pectin (see note on my Ingredients page)

2 1/2 tsp raw sugar

5/8 tsp sea salt

1tsp yeast

All of the sponge

50mL warm water

2 tsp grapeseed oil or other high-heat oil

3/4 tsp double-acting baking powder (set aside)

Method: In a small bowl, combine starches, psyllium, pectin, salt, & sugar. Stir the extra teaspoon of yeast into the sponge. Stir about half of the starch mixture into the sponge, add the warm water, then add the rest of the starch mixture, "kneading" it with a soft spatula. After the dough has come together, knead in the oil by hand. The dough will seem very soft and slack - this is normal. Shape into a ball, cover the bowl, and set aside in a warm place for about an hour.

The dough will be very soft, but not sticky.

Meanwhile, prepare the topping:

1 small yellow onion, sliced very thinly (a mandoline is helpful here)

1 clove of garlic, minced

2-ounce tin anchovies in oil

8-10 olives, cut into halves or quarters (Not the watery black kind from a tin! Use Mediterranean-style olives. I used Castelvetrano Italian olives, which have a rich, almost buttery taste.)

1 bay leaf

1-2T olive oil

Heat the oil in a heavy pan. Add the onions and bay leaf; when the onions have softened slightly, add the garlic and turn heat to low. Let cook for 30 minutes or so over low heat, stirring occasionally - do not let them brown, just get them nice and soft and melty. (Yes, I know onions don't technically melt. But that's really the best way to describe it.)

See? Melty.

Assembling the pissaladière:

Pre-heat your oven, with a baking stone on the middle rack, to 395ºF/200ºC. Knead the dough gently a few times in the bowl and tip it out onto a work surface. Pat it flat, sprinkle the baking powder over the surface, and roll it up as demonstrated here. This ensures even distribution of the baking powder and creates a better texture. Now generously coat a pizza peel or baking sheet with white rice flour, place the dough seam-side down on it, and shape it into a rectangle - pat and stretch the dough until it is almost as thin as pizza dough. Slightly curl up the sides to create an edge crust. (Your crust will be smoother than in the picture if you do this now, rather than forgetting to do it until after you arrange the toppings as I did!) Now, gently attempt to slide the dough around on the pizza peel, to make sure it will slide off easily. If it sticks, gently lift up one corner at a time and push more rice flour underneath.

Scatter the onion-garlic mixture over the surface of the dough. Arrange the anchovies and olive pieces in a decorative pattern on top. If desired, brush the edges with a little olive oil and honey (optional). Let the dough rise for 20 minutes or so, then gently slide it onto the baking stone using your pizza peel or baking sheet (you will have to coax it towards the end of the pizza peel, but it really will slide off smoothly, I promise). Bake for about 30 minutes. It is delicious hot from the oven or after it has cooled.

Check out all of this month's Ratio Rally creations! 

{Ratio Rally} Old-Fashioned Doughnuts

I've been especially excited about this month's Ratio Rally for a few reasons. For one, I have a kitchen again! We moved last month, and not just to a new house or a new city - I mean over 3000 miles. In a car. If you've ever done something like that, you know how topsy-turvy everything gets. And that's not even considering how details like "eating something other than cookies for dinner" seem to suddenly go to the very bottom of your priority list. A proper, sit-down meal seems like a luxury - doubly so when you're dealing with dietary restrictions. And blogging? Forgetaboutit.

You can imagine, then, how excited I was to finally get back to cooking and baking and sharing new recipes. This was the first chance I got to work on a big "project" since leaving our old apartment several weeks ago, and I got to do it in a new kitchen...with windows! And a pantry! In a house! And did I mention the kitchen has windows?! OK, um, I'll calm down now. It's just that after living in stuffy apartments and dorms for the last 4 years, this is a Big Deal.

Anyway...

On top of all that, I was excited for a second, completely separate reason - I have the pleasure of hosting this month's Rally! That also means I got to choose what we'd be making this month, which brings me to reason #3: doughnuts.

These things.

Yeast-raised doughnuts. Cake doughnuts. Fritters. We covered them all this month! How long has it been since you've had a doughnut? A real, fried, melt-in-your-mouth sugary doughnut? It had been a long time for me, that's for sure.

I remember occasionally visiting a certain small doughnut shop when I was much younger, peering into the glass case filled with row upon row of tantalizing treats, all frosted or glazed or covered in sprinkles or maybe even filled with jam. And I could pick out any one I wanted. Now, to put this in context - I didn't eat much "junk food" when I was a kid. There was no sugary cereal on the breakfast table; with the exception of some special occasions, snack foods and desserts were usually low-fat, sugar-free, or both (SnackWells, anyone?). Yet here I was, being encouraged to pick something that had been deep-fried and covered in sugar. A visit to the doughnut shop was a real treat. I always liked the simple ones best: powdered-sugar-covered doughnut holes; buttermilk bars; dense, cake-y chocolate doughnuts. They didn't need to be fancy; I just loved the way powdered sugar would melt ever-so-slightly into the golden, fried surface of the dough, forming a wafer-thin layer of crisp glaze as I bit into the springy cake. So simple, and so delicious.

Yet sometimes simple things are the hardest to get right. You see, there was an extra challenge complicating this month's Ratio Rally: while the book that introduced many of us to the concept of baking by ratio has a reference ratio for fritters, there isn't one for doughnuts (and they are quite different). So many of us wanted to make doughnuts, though, that we set out to find a ratio!

I started by referencing and comparing regular doughnut recipes. After a few rounds of experimentation, adjustments, and more research, the ratio I came up with for both yeast-raised and cake doughnuts was 4 parts flour:1 part liquid:1 part egg. (Unlike some other foods, this ratio differs from wheat-based recipes; I decided not to go into the science of why that is because that would have made this post ridiculously long, but if you really do want to know, tell me in the comments and I will do a follow-up post!)

Old-Fashioned Yeast Doughnuts (And Cake Doughnuts)

As with all ratio recipes which use eggs, start with the weight of your egg(s). To make a dozen doughnuts, I used 2 eggs, which had a combined weight of 100g - that is fairly standard. Since eggs and liquid are each 1 part, that means I need 100g liquid. Flour is 4 parts, so for me that was 400g.

My flour blend was: 100g tapioca starch, 100g potato starch, 80g brown rice flour, 50g millet flour, 40g chickpea flour, 20g buckwheat flour, and 10g potato flour.

You may use a different flour blend as long as you keep the same starch:whole-grain ratio (here, it is half starch and half whole-grain/whole-bean flour).

If you are making a double batch or a half batch, remember to adjust the amounts of your other ingredients accordingly! The following amounts are based on 400g flour.

Method for Yeast Doughnuts:

In a large bowl, blend your flours together and add in
- 40g sugar
- 1 1/2 tsp psyllium husks
- 1/2 tsp Pomona's citrus pectin (see note on my Ingredients page)
- 1 tsp salt
- 1/4 tsp nutmeg
- 1 T yeast

In a smaller bowl, beat the eggs and add in
- 100g buttermilk (or mix equal parts milk and yogurt to total 100g)
- 50g melted butter

Add the wet ingredients to the dry. Mix well and knead until a soft, but not sticky, ball of dough forms. Let rest in bowl for about 20 minutes.

Method for Cake Doughnuts:

Follow the instructions for yeast doughnuts with the following changes:
- omit yeast; instead add 1/4 tsp baking soda and 1 1/2 tsp double-acting baking powder
- decrease salt to 1/2 tsp (because the baking soda adds sodium)

All other ingredients and amounts stay the same. Proceed as directed for yeast doughnuts.

Cooking the Doughnuts:
Tip out the dough onto a surface lightly dusted with tapioca starch. Pat out the dough to a thickness of about half an inch and cut with a round biscuit cutter (or, if you are just making doughnut holes, roll dough into balls approximately 1 1/2 inches in diameter). You can make a traditional doughnut shape by simply poking a hole in the middle of each circle (see picture at top of the page). Repeat until all dough has been shaped.

Now let the doughnuts rest, to rise a little bit. While they are resting, prepare the frying oil:

Heat palm shortening or high-temperature oil (e.g. grapeseed, soybean, or canola oil) in a medium pot or deep-fryer over medium heat - the oil should be at least a couple of inches deep, so the doughnuts do not rest on the bottom of the pot. Keep a thermometer clipped to the pot at all times - oil can very easily overheat if you are not monitoring it closely, and it will retain that heat for a long time.

When the oil reaches 375ºF/190ºC, you are ready to begin! Make sure you have a cooling rack ready.

Using a heat-safe flat spatula, transfer one doughnut into the oil. (I recommend frying just one at first; after that, you can do 3 or 4 at a time if they fit.) I cannot tell you the exact amount of time they will take to cook - this will vary depending on the thickness and how well the oil retains heat. Instead, take a look at the pictures below to see what happens in the first 1-2 minutes:

The one on the left has just been added - it sinks to the bottom.

As it cooks, it soon floats to the top like the other two.

Now all three are browning - time to flip them!

Gently flip the doughnuts so they cook evenly on both sides. It doesn't take long, so watch them closely! When they are evenly brown,  use the spatula or tongs to carefully transfer them to a cooling rack, one at a time. Make sure to let the oil come back up to the proper temperature before adding more doughnuts. Continue this process until they are all cooked. While they are still warm, roll them in powdered sugar or cinnamon-sugar, or dip them in a glaze. For the best texture and taste, wait about 3 hours before eating them.

Be sure to check out the links below for all the delicious, creative doughnut and fritter posts in this month's Ratio Rally! 

Britt of GF in the City | Blueberry Fritters

Brooke of B and the Boy! | Apricot Fritters

Caleigh of Gluten Free[k] | Beetroot Fritters

Caneel of Mama Me Gluten Free | Thai Fried Bananas

Charissa of Zest Bakery | Picarones (Sweet Potato & Pumpkin Fritters)
Claire of Gluten Freedom | Chocolate Coconut or Cinnamon-Glazed Vanilla Cake Doughnuts
Gretchen of Kumquat | Peach Cider Doughnuts
Irvin of Eat the Love | Roses & Pearls Vanilla Bean Doughnuts
Jean of Gluten-Free Doctor Recipes | Cinnamon Apple Fritters
Jeanette of Jeanette's Healthy Living | Pumpkin Spice Doughnuts
Jenn of Jenn Cuisine | Mini Raspberry Doughnut Cakes
Lisa of Gluten Free Canteen | Apple Butter Maple Syrup Doughnuts
Mary Fran of Frannycakes | Raspberries and Cream Doughnuts
Mrs. R of Honey From Flinty Rocks | Jelly Doughnuts
Pete & Kelli of No Gluten, No Problem | Jelly Doughnut Holes
Rachel of The Crispy Cook | Chocolate Doughnuts with Chocolate Glaze
Silvana of Silvana's Kitchen | Vanilla-Glazed Chocolate Chip Doughnuts
Shauna of Gluten-Free Girl | Glazed Yeast Doughnuts
Tara of A Baking Life | Brioche Doughnuts with Italian Plum Jam
T.R. of No One Likes Crumbley Cookies | Sweet Pepper and Pancetta Fritters

Fresh fettuccine for the Ratio Rally

Pasta! Like bread, pasta can be found in various forms around the world: from the dozens of Italian shapes and styles, to the tiny couscous of northern Africa, to the chewy hand-pulled noodles eaten throughout Asia, it's the foundation of countless familiar meals. There's something inherently satisfying and comforting about its texture and taste. And much of it (though not all of it!) is made from wheat. A lot of people say it is one of the things they miss most about eating wheat, in fact. Personally, I've been quite satisfied with most of the dry gluten-free pastas I've found; even some that are 100% brown rice can be very good - and I guess that's not entirely surprising, since some traditional Asian noodles are made from rice alone. However, aside from possibly as a component of ravioli or tortellini, I don't think I had ever tasted fresh pasta, the kind made with eggs. Because of that, I chose to dress my pasta simply, so I could really taste it. It would also be delicious with some bright, summery marinara sauce or a hearty ragù (which is traditional with a number of ribbon-cut fresh pastas like fettuccine and tagliatelle)! If you're feeling ambitious, you can even make ravioli. If you need inspiration, have a look at all of this month's Ratio Rally pasta creations, hosted by Jenn of Jenn Cuisine!

Sun-dried tomato, olive oil, garlic, & spices pair wonderfully with fresh pasta

As with last month's Ratio Rally post, you will need to start by weighing your eggs, and that will tell you how much flour you need. First of all, decide how much pasta you want to make. Each serving of pasta requires one egg - my example recipe is for two servings.

For fresh pasta, the ratio of flour:eggs is 3:2 (by weight).

My eggs weighed a total of 110 grams. Since the eggs' weight is 2 parts, I divide that number in two and find that each "part" equals 55 grams. That means that 3 parts = 165 grams; that is the amount of flour I need.

I got the best results using a blend of 60% starchy flours and 40% whole grain flours. You can vary your choice of flours as long as you keep that basic ratio the same.

This was the blend I liked best:

20% (33 g) millet flour 
20% (33 g) brown rice flour
20% (33 g) tapioca starch
20% (33 g) potato starch (not potato flour)
20% (33 g) sweet rice flour

The weights given are based on my total weight of 165 g flour - if you want to use this exact flour blend, adjust each amount according to whatever is 20% your total flour weight. You do not need any gums or other binding agents for this recipe! The eggs provide plenty of strength.

You will also need:
Parchment paper or pastry board, rolling pin, sharp metal bench scraper or knife, wire cooling rack to dry the pasta on, olive oil, and plenty of extra tapioca starch for rolling.

Method:
Weigh your eggs into a small bowl and determine how much flour you'll need, as explained above. Weigh your flour into a large bowl and mix in 1/4 tsp salt. Make a small well in the flour and tip the eggs in. Gently begin stirring the eggs to break the yolks, and then stir in larger circles to incorporate the flour. Knead by hand for a few minutes, until the dough is very smooth - expect that it will be sticky at first, though if the dough is still sticky after several minutes of kneading, work in a small amount of additional tapioca starch. Form the dough into a ball and rub the surface with olive oil, and let it rest in the bowl for ~30 minutes (refrigeration optional, but chilling might make the dough easier to work with).

Now, generously flour a pastry board or piece of parchment with tapioca starch, and reserve another piece of parchment to place on top. Divide the dough into smaller balls according to how many servings you are making (in other words, how many eggs you used) - place one ball on your floured work surface, and cover the remaining dough so it doesn't dry out. Pat the dough into a large, flat rectangle and dust the surface generously with more tapioca starch. Place the other piece of parchment on top of it, and roll it as thin as you can get it without tearing. Slice into strips with the bench scraper or knife, wiggling the blade slightly to separate the strips, but do not move them yet.

Separate them just enough that they won't stick together.

Let them dry slightly for ~15 minutes, then carefully slide the blade underneath them and use it to transfer them to a wire cooling rack to dry further. Repeat with remaining dough. Let the strips dry for ~45 minutes before placing them into heavily salted, boiling water.

This allows both sides to dry evenly.

If they do not dry long enough, the texture won't be right and they will taste doughy. If they dry too long, they may break, though it's OK if that does happen because the texture and taste will still be good. Boil for about 2 minutes - this time may vary slightly based on how thick and wide your pasta is, but it will cook very quickly! Drain the pasta, but do not rinse. Toss immediately with whatever sauce or oil you want to use, and enjoy!