gluten free familyA mum's blog about gluten-free living in Australia

gluten free mini muds

I got a bit experimental today with one of our favourite mudcake mixes. The Deliciously Free mix by Naturally Good was one of our faves when we did our recent choccy cake bakeoff.

It has an enticing blurb on the back called Cup Cake Ideas in which it suggests you use the mix in this way. The only thing holding me back was the lack of detail on the pack about actual execution of these ideas. There was nothing about how long to cook them or how many cupcakes it could produce.

Given my penchant for mudcake, though, it was only a matter of time before I took the plunge. Turns out that half an hour is enough (about half the time of the large cake version) and it makes about a dozen medium-sized cupcakes.

Because this mix does not include frosting, I topped it with gran’s chocolate icing recipe which is nice and shiny and hardens nicely.

You mix together a a knob of butter, about half a cup of icing sugar and a few tablespoons of cocoa (until it looks right) over a little heat. You will also need a dash of milk, enough to make it nice and shiny and runny enough to spread.

I found the cupcakes a little less spongy and moist that the larger mudcake – but on the upside, they are very cute, handy and freezable.

MB

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gluten free kids birthday

It’s bumper to bumper birthdays in our house at the moment.  All four of us get a year older within the space of a few months and fittingly, we do this in age order from oldest to youngest.

With the final celebration nearly upon us, it is time to dust off our gluten free party food ideas.

These will have to please not only our gluten free birthday girl but also her gluten-quaffing kindy buddies.

So I am busy workshopping ideas:

Potato chips, corn chips, rice crackers & cheese and popcorn are shoo-ins.

I’m also thinking little jellies. Individual tubs with fruit are great if the invite list doesn’t get too long.

Then there are chocolate dipped strawberries. I have never quite gotten these right but when you do they are strangely compelling to all age groups. Read the rest of this entry »

is glucose syrup gluten free?

Have you ever noticed that all of the truly delicious stuff has glucose syrup in it? Of course you have because the treat makers usually flag that it is derived from wheat on the label.

This declaration alone has kept me safe from thousands of calories in recent years.

Most lollies and a lot of dessert products like icecream have glucose syrup on their ingredients lists.

Then my co-blogger Lucy casually asked a few weeks ago: “So what’s the deal with glucose syrup?” And I said: “I don’t really know”.

So here we are again, finding out together.

For those who like the sciency angle, glucose syrup is a liquid sweetener that is made through the “enzymatic hydrolysis” of starch. It can be made from any type of starch including corn or potato though wheat seems to be pretty common.

The Coeliac Society of Australia says that glucose syrups are so highly processed that no gluten can be detected in them (that means they have less than 20mg/kg). That means for official purposes glucose syrup is gluten free even though, confusingly, manufacturers who use it declare gluten on the label.

A randomized, double-blind, placebo controlled Finnish study a couple of years ago found that starch hydrolysate products (ie glucose syrup, dextrose and maltodextrins) were safe for coeliac sufferers to consume on a daily basis.

Some still choose to avoid trace gluten.

And me? Ignorance was bliss.

MB

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Another holy celebration is upon us and with it comes the traditional feasting on chocolate, buns and everything else that is usually taboo in our household.

Easter egg hunts and visits with indulgent grandparents bearing Lindt bunnies must all be planned with military precision so no feelings get trampled on, and no tears of deprivation haunt our precious holiday memories.

So here is my Easter survival plan. We think we can sidestep the hot cross bun issue for our toddler this year because they don’t come in shiny paper and will thus be less sorely missed.

The chocolate thing is so much trickier so we are going to put it back on the family menu for this one day of the year and treat it as an experiment to see what happens when our food sensitive toddler eats it.

For the rest of the year we will continue to find alternative treats. Gluten free jelly snakes and marshmallows are his favourites.

For those that don’t have the luxury of making exceptions, some retailers are coming out with dairy free eggs that are packaged in exactly the same way as the real thing. I researched this fairly thoroughly last year and vegan shops seem to be taking a lead. Some will even deliver products to your door by post or courier.

Hot, crossed and wheat free?

This brings us to the subject of gluten free hot cross buns for me (stodge fan that I am). I haven’t yet had chance to check out whether any of the supermarkets have got something in store for us this year, but I am quite a bun fan so this is on my to do list – and I would love to hear from anyone who has spotted GF easter buns for sale anywhere mainstream. [LH: have since checked out my local Coles and Harris Farm - and found no GF hot cross buns in either].

It is my suspicion that if you want something particularly fresh and delicious, you may be best off going to a specialist GF bakery like Choices (Sydney) or Silly Yaks (Melbourne) or even cooking something up yourself.

There are umpteen recipes online if you do happen to Google “gluten free and hot cross bun” and though I haven’t had time this year to experiment with any of these, we would, as always, love to hear from you if you have found a fabulous recipe that you think is worth sharing with us.

Happy Easter!

LH

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It’s pricey and hard to get hold of but if you know the right people you can get your hands on it.

Yes I’m talking about gluten free beer.  A couple of Aussie companies brew the stuff and though it costs between $70 and $80 a case, I am assured by a beer enthusiast (co-blogger, Lucy) that at this price, it does at least taste good.

The gluten content in ordinary beer varies but can be found in the grains used or in the yeast. Apparently sorghum is most commonly used in gluten free beer.

Lucy has sampled the gluten free range from O’Brien – a brewery dedicated to gluten free – and can vouch for its flavour.  We also like the fact that it is preservative free and has no artificial colourings. It comes in three varieties, a lager, a malty bitter and a brown ale.

Although O’Brien is a Victorian brewer, you should be able to find a retailer that stocks it near you via its website. Dan Murphy’s in particular seem to stock it and you can order it online for just under $70 a case.

Billabong Brewing in Perth makes four gluten free beers, a lager, a bitter, a ginger beer and an apple beer with plans to rollout more including a mid-strength and a dark ale. It also lists retail outlets and you can buy online. Billabong notes not all outlets listed sell the entire line, which also includes traditional beer. The gluten free beers sell for between $75 and $80 a case.

German brewer, Schnitzer Bräu also sells gluten free beer here in Australia. It  makes a traditional lager and a lemon and lime-infused lower alcohol version and these are sold at Dan Murphy’s. You can buy them in a six pack for just under $30.

Ouch. Perhaps I will learn to brew my own!

MB

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My babycakes cupcakes

They don’t look anywhere near as glam as the picture on the front of the Babycakes recipe book, but I would like to introduce to you my new gluten, casein and egg-free cupcakes.

Are they moist, springy and delicious I hear you ask?  As a matter of fact yes they are – and they rose beautifully as they cooked.

I know I shouldn’t get quite so excited over the texture of a cupcake, but let me put this into perspective for you. I have never once baked a gluten free cake without dairy or egg that didn’t go straight into the bin.

Packet mixes are fine in their place, but the absence of dairy and egg ingredients tends to rob them of the luscious texture one would usually associate with cake. And most can’t survive beyond a few hours unless they are frozen.

So what is the secret of the Babycakes cupcake recipe? I think it is the ingredients.

Just to recap for anyone who didn’t read my previous post about this, Babycakes started out as a gluten-free, vegan cake shop that has won a loyal following in the US (first in New York and now LA) for its yummy muffins and cakes. The recipe book was launched so we at home could emulate some of their success.

Only problem is that many of the ingredients are either hard to get hold of over here, or are just plain expensive!!

My biggest problem was that the flour recommended for the recipe was a blend of fava bean and garbanzo (chickpea) – something I gather is fairly easy to get hold of in the US. I substituted this for a blend of chickpea (besan) and rice flour (1:3 ratio).

The Agave syrup that replaces sugar in the recipe is less easy to substitute because it adds essential moisture to the mix. Although you can get this in health-food section of the supermarket, it costs around $8 per bottle and you will need an entire one of these for a batch of 12 cupcakes. My plan is to substiture it with slightly watered down golden syrup  next time around to see if this will work as well.

Another ingredient I decided to ignore (at my peril) was coconut oil – mosty on the basis of expense. Apparently it is okay to substitute it for a number of other expensive oils – or plain old canola if you want to save some pennies.

For this reason I skipped the recommended cake frosting  (which is quite a fiddle and cannot be substituted) and instead I just went with the recipe on the icing sugar packet, substituting butter for margarine, and milk for rice milk, (and of course a dash of sprinkles at the end).

And what of the finished product? It got the big thumbs up from all the cake eaters in my house.

LH

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Lets face it, kids’ birthday parties are glorified gluten-fests.

Okay, so they also mark the glorious growth milestones of our friends and family… with cake, fairy bread, nuggets, sausage rolls, hot dogs and … well you get the picture.

Navigating the giddy round of festivities on behalf of your gluten free offspring can therefore be tricky. So with a couple of years’ experience under my belt, I have put together a list of suggestions. The only problem is that most of them suck:

1. Decide to boycott parties altogether and deprive you and your child of this great social ritual. By the way this option never goes down well with the little ones.

2. Become an ace helicopter pilot and steer them toward the chips and jelly with military precision. This one requires CIA-style vigilance. It also makes you feel like a great big wowser.

3. Drop them off with a few of their own treats including a squishy slab of gluten free cake you whipped up earlier. This obviously requires forethought and can potentially offend.

4. Offer to bake the cake for every party you plan to attend. This may win you popularity with your parent peers but could also backfire if the cake comes out of the oven concave.

5. Bribe your child wtih something extra delicious for after the party if they manage to stay with the program without doing the big sad eyes thing to you or the host.

6. When the birthday candles are lit and start reflecting in their teary little eyes, give in and say they can have a small piece of cake just this once as a special treat and then regret your decision for the rest of the week.

My strategy? I pick and choose from the above list depending on the situation.

Happy hovering!

MB

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It was a nervous start to the school year (or pre-school year in our case) as I tried out a variety of gluten and dairy free lunches for my food intolerant toddler.

I have been making his lunches for over a year now but these have been meals like bolognaise or pizza that were just warmed up and served at his daycare. This year we must adapt to packed lunches.

Because these are served up at their little tables, I still get a little more latitude than we will have in kindy, but my biggest hurdle is that whatever I send him in with must taste nice cold.

So far we have had success with a fairly dry Tuna pasta with sweetcorn, and fried rice is popular too, but to my disappointment I have had my sandwiches, sausage rolls, and cold pizza all rejected.

I have been slipping a little dessert into his satchel each day just to hedge my bets in case he doesn’t like his main course – but because the kids are expected to help themselves to their own lunch, I am beginning to suspect he has been eating his lunch in reverse order (it makes perfect sense to get the yummy stuff out of the way first after all) so I guess I am going to have to rethink it all.

They are also encouraged to bring along cupcakes for their birthdays and because he has around 30 kids in his class I reckon he will need a cupcake at least once a fortnight – so of course I must provide a little batch that can be frozen for use at school so he doesn’t feel left out.

So the challenge is on to find a yummy cup cake that tastes nice not just when it is cooked but also when it is defrosted (without the aid of a microwave to restore its sponginess.)

My habitual port of call for all things cakey was Orgran muffin mix, but while these regain their form beautifully when whizzed for a few seconds in the microwave, I was not so confident of the outcome without this vital step.

It must have been synchronicity then that a friend of mine recently lent me the Babycakes recipe book which is chocker-block full of delicious sounding muffins and cakes that are all dairy and gluten (mostly) free.

Babycakes is in fact a gluten-free, vegan cake shop that has turned thousands of heads in the US (first in New York and now LA) for its delicious, moist produce. The recipe book was launched to help us recreate the joy at home, but unfortunately a number of the listed ingredients are not readily available here.

They include a ready-made flour from Bob’s Red Mill which includes chickpea and fava bean flour. ( They do ship abroad but I doubt its cheap.) Many of the recipes also ask for things like coconut oil (expensive), dry soy milk powder (expensive), agave nectar (expensive) as well as arrowroot, xanthum gum, potato starch, brown rice flour, and the list goes on. Fortunately some of these can be substited for cheaper or easier to find ingredients but many cannot.

I have made it my mission for the past few weeks to hunt down these ingredients and now I have the full complement, I think I am almost ready to start baking. If they prove successful, I will be jubilant, as I had begun to fear delicious casein and gluten free baked goods were just a fantasy.

It may have cost me an arm and a leg, but I hope to have some really awesome cakes in the pre-school freezer by this time next week.

LH

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I admit it. I am a mudcake fan. But I am not a fan of slaving over a hot oven baking gluten free treats that my kids won’t eat.

For this reason, Woolworths’ Freefrom Chocolate Mud Cake Mix has become a bit of a fixture in our house when it comes to birthdays and school bake days.

Lots of kids we know love to turn their noses up at gluten free food on principle (it’s a kid thing) but they never even suspect they are being deprived of the stuff when they eat this cake.

I realise that there are plenty of delicious gluten free cake recipes that you can make from scratch. I have had great success with some in particular and plan to share my favourites on this site. Cakes really do seem to suffer less from gluten deprivation than many other food categories.

But this one is so quick, foolproof and tasty, especially when you are running late (which is almost always) that I always keep one in the cupboard.

You just add oil, water and eggs, fold with a spoon, cook for 40 minutes and it comes out perfectly every time. The chocolate icing (pretty much pure chocolate) is easy too.

And it is set off nicely by my handy stash of gluten free hundreds and thousands, made by Cupcake Mountain, which I bought recently at the gluten free expo.

Mudcake purists, though, will find this cake more spongy than muddy. Packet mixes do have their limits.

MB

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