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Carb Factor For gluten-free Cake

tabdegner

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tabdegner Apprentice
tabdegner
Posted

My son and I are both type 1 diabetic and I have made a gluten-free Pantry cake mix w/chocolate frosting. Does anyone know if there is a different carb factor for gluten-free Cake versus a nonGF cake. I have a salter scale and can weigh the cake out and it will give me the carbs if it is a nonGF cake. But I'm wondering if gluten-free cake has a different carb factor.

This is more of a diabetic question, but my diabetes forum will probably not know about carb factors specifically for gluten-free cake.

THANKS!!

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RiceGuy Collaborator
RiceGuy
Posted

Well, I don't have a specific answer, but what I'd do is compare the percentage of carbs in wheat-based cake flour with the flours in the blend you used. I have some data on gluten-free flours, so if you know the blend, I may be able to do some rough calculations.

I don't see how weight alone could be accurate, especially since the recipe can vary so much in egg/dairy/fat/sugar content.

tabdegner Apprentice
tabdegner
Posted
  • Author
Well, I don't have a specific answer, but what I'd do is compare the percentage of carbs in wheat-based cake flour with the flours in the blend you used. I have some data on gluten-free flours, so if you know the blend, I may be able to do some rough calculations.

I don't see how weight alone could be accurate, especially since the recipe can vary so much in egg/dairy/fat/sugar content.

A carb factor is the percentage in weight (in grams) of a food that contains carbs. For example, a banana's carb factor is 0.20. If the weight of a banana is 100 grams you multiply it by .2 and get 20 grams of carbs. This is a very very accurate weigh to measure how many carbs are in a food and is very widely used in the diabetic community (because we dose insulin based on how many carbs we eat) and by the USDA Food Nutrition Database.

The salter scale has built in carb factors that are provided by the USDA food database. So I can type in to the scale "yellow cake with frosting" then weigh the cake and it will give me a very accurate carb count.

Rice flour has more carbs than white flour, but it also weighs more -- so I'm thinking that if I weigh it on my scale it will be close to correct.

But really I'm looking for a specific carb factor....

RiceGuy Collaborator
RiceGuy
Posted
A carb factor is the percentage in weight (in grams) of a food that contains carbs. For example, a banana's carb factor is 0.20. If the weight of a banana is 100 grams you multiply it by .2 and get 20 grams of carbs. This is a very very accurate weigh to measure how many carbs are in a food and is very widely used in the diabetic community (because we dose insulin based on how many carbs we eat) and by the USDA Food Nutrition Database.

The salter scale has built in carb factors that are provided by the USDA food database. So I can type in to the scale "yellow cake with frosting" then weigh the cake and it will give me a very accurate carb count.

Rice flour has more carbs than white flour, but it also weighs more -- so I'm thinking that if I weigh it on my scale it will be close to correct.

But really I'm looking for a specific carb factor....

I see. Well, I would agree it can be accurate for foods that are made in the traditional manner, but gluten-free foods have a tendency to be very different from one recipe to another. For instance, when I make a cake, I use no dairy, eggs, or sugar. One tsp of Stevia is a lot lighter than a cup of sugar, so that alone would change everything. Not to mention Stevia is zero on the glycemic index, no carbs, no sugars, no calories. Completely natural too :)

If it were me, I'd add up the carbs and divide the total by the ratio of a single serving. In other words, if the total carbs in the recipe is 200 grams, and a serving is 1/12 of the cake, then 200/12 is your answer. You could use the same basic idea with the weight too I suppose. So if the cake weighs 1lb, and a serving is 2oz, then the answer is 200/8.

Incidentally, the carbs in a banana change as it ripens. See the following for more:

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