Going gluten free can be quite challenging when it’s all new to you.
When we completed our GAPS journey of healing (no grains), the decision was made to be gluten free allowing some grains of a gluten free nature whilst still following all the principles of a whole food nutrient dense diet.
We couldn’t do nut flours due to my son’s nut allergies and were also very limited using coconut flour due to the amount of eggs it typically requires as he also had an egg allergy.
Looking at the packaged gluten free flours they were full of starches and fillers, so I was very limited to what I could use and was left with no option but to make my own.
So I started looking through my allergy cook books for a recipe and thankfully found one that was not too complicated. The one below is adapted from the original recipe in the book “YUM- Top tips for feeding babies and kids with allergies”
Plain Gluten Free Flour
Ingredients:
· 150g of chickpea flour. I buy it in bulk from here
· 150g of Sorghum flour. I use Bob’s Red Mill which is easily sourced from Coles or health food stores
· 150g of Tapioca flour. Make sure this does not contain any preservatives
· 1.5 tsp of guar gum. This is needed to help bind the flour. It has the number 412 and in The Chemical Maze is listed as safe for most people. There are some noted side effects; however it has been fine for my family.
Self Raising Gluten Free Flour
Ingredients:
· All of the above
· 1tsp of bicarb
· 2 tsp of cream of tartar
Mix all together and store in an airtight container.
Notes:
· You can swap the sorghum & chickpea for the following flours:
o Millet, quinoa, buckwheat, almond (if no nut allergy)
o Coconut flour can also be used as an option, but then you will need to play around with the liquid content and eggs in your recipe as coconut flour is very thirsty. This makes it slightly more challenging to do a straight swap in recipes.
After playing around with various combinations, we personally prefer the taste & texture of the above mix and use it very easily as a replacement to make just about any recipe Gluten Free.
To be time effective, I triple the recipe and store in a large airtight container.
Working with gluten free flour is very different to that of wheat, so be patient and play around with it, you WILL get the hang it.
Any recipe I post saying gluten free flour will use this mix unless specified otherwise.