What Would You Like To See In A Cookbook?

[MissBonnie]

what would everyone like to see in a gluten free cookbook? im having sections like 'kids' 'christmas' 'snacks' 'dinner' etc... i create alot of my own recipes and then record them, test them over and over, and then put them in my notebook ready to go in my gluten free cookbook i will hopefully someday publish! im only 22 and i figure if im going to be trying this lifestyle out the rest of my life i might as well make a book out of it

[Marilyn R]

I guess I get dismayed at many of the gluten-free Cookbooks because they rely on so many soy and/or dairy products, neither of which I, and apparently many others, can consume.

Good for you for your ambitions of publishing a cookbook! I wish you the best.

As for categories, "Potluck dinners" would be good. We all need to tote a dish for social events.

[MissBonnie]

this is true. perhaps i should have a dairy and soy free section. maybe eggs free also. otherwise label which dishes come under these catagories

[Lisa]

Love the Pot-Luck suggestion!

[Poppi]

I actually feel the opposite as Marilyn R, I don't want an allergen free diet. Just a gluten free one. I like dairy and nuts and eggs and white sugar in my baked goods. I'm tired of cookbooks (and processed foods) that try to cover every possible allergen.

I got a cookbook from the library and the recipes all had agave nectar and celtic sea salt and other obscure and expensive ingredients. That doesn't work for me.

[MissBonnie]

i feel the same. because if you wanted it egg free you can just use egg replacer, dairy free just use soy milk etc.. perhaps this is something i need to really think about

[GlutenFreeManna]

i feel the same. because if you wanted it egg free you can just use egg replacer, dairy free just use soy milk etc.. perhaps this is something i need to really think about

Actually, recipes can change dramatically by using different subs and sometimes they don't work at all. I have one recipe that I improvise by using almond milk or coconut milk in place of the regular milk. The texture is completely different depending upon which milk I use (coconut or almond). I have given up using most cookbooks for gluten-free stuff. Instead I look for recipes online with reviews or comments because the comments sometimes have people that had to use a milk sub and they will say whether it worked or not. Now given all that, if you don't have additional allergies you should probably stick with what you know. However it would be nice if there was at least a notation on the recipes on whether they would work with using subs (and not just the suggestion that "substitutes could be used", but an actual description of how using the subs will change the flavor/texture/taste of the baked good.

Another thing I dislike about most gluten-free cookbooks I see is that they involve making a big batch of a flour mix first and the same gluten-free flour mix with a name (example: "featherlight mix") is used throughout the book. As a new gluten-free baker I remmember being overwhelmed and afraid to try most of those recipes because if I mixed up that big batch of the author's all purpose flour and then did not like the way the recipes turned out I had wasted a lot of expensive ingredients. I felt I would be stuck using that flour mix and those recipes until the mix was gone. Now I have slowly collected most of the flours called for in those books and I can put together recipes but to spend so much to buy all those new flours without a guarentee was not something I wanted to try right off the bat. I have discovered many recipes that only use one or two flours instead of multiple flours and they work. I think it would be a nice feature if the book had a range of recipes--some that use only one type of flour and some that are more complex. And if they were labeled somehow--maybe an icon letting begginers know which were the more advanced and complex recipes and which were easy? It would also be nice to have asection describign the different flours and explaining which flours could be subbed out for one another--not only for people with allergies (I can't do soy flour so any book that used exclusively that with no substitute suggestions I would put back) but also for people that live in areas with limited flour options (I cannot find sorghum flour where I live).

Just some thigns to think about. There are many gluten-free baking books out there--what will make yours stand out form the ones that are already in stores and libraries? Good Luck!

[WinterSong]

Gluten free seitan, hahaha

It's too bad that was one of my favorite foods before going gluten-free

[MissBonnie]

Actually, recipes can change dramatically by using different subs and sometimes they don't work at all. I have one recipe that I improvise by using almond milk or coconut milk in place of the regular milk. The texture is completely different depending upon which milk I use (coconut or almond). I have given up using most cookbooks for gluten-free stuff. Instead I look for recipes online with reviews or comments because the comments sometimes have people that had to use a milk sub and they will say whether it worked or not. Now given all that, if you don't have additional allergies you should probably stick with what you know. However it would be nice if there was at least a notation on the recipes on whether they would work with using subs (and not just the suggestion that "substitutes could be used", but an actual description of how using the subs will change the flavor/texture/taste of the baked good.

Another thing I dislike about most gluten-free cookbooks I see is that they involve making a big batch of a flour mix first and the same gluten-free flour mix with a name (example: "featherlight mix") is used throughout the book. As a new gluten-free baker I remmember being overwhelmed and afraid to try most of those recipes because if I mixed up that big batch of the author's all purpose flour and then did not like the way the recipes turned out I had wasted a lot of expensive ingredients. I felt I would be stuck using that flour mix and those recipes until the mix was gone. Now I have slowly collected most of the flours called for in those books and I can put together recipes but to spend so much to buy all those new flours without a guarentee was not something I wanted to try right off the bat. I have discovered many recipes that only use one or two flours instead of multiple flours and they work. I think it would be a nice feature if the book had a range of recipes--some that use only one type of flour and some that are more complex. And if they were labeled somehow--maybe an icon letting begginers know which were the more advanced and complex recipes and which were easy? It would also be nice to have asection describign the different flours and explaining which flours could be subbed out for one another--not only for people with allergies (I can't do soy flour so any book that used exclusively that with no substitute suggestions I would put back) but also for people that live in areas with limited flour options (I cannot find sorghum flour where I live).

Just some thigns to think about. There are many gluten-free baking books out there--what will make yours stand out form the ones that are already in stores and libraries? Good Luck!

yeah thanks! great suggestions. i really want some sort of theme to my book so it will stand out. still thinking about that though...

[freeatlast]

I do not need main dish suggestions. Those are easy enough. What I need are recipes that TASTE GOOD for gluten free baking. Agree with Gluten-Free Manna about not basing recipes around a mix that you have to mix up and then use.

[MissBonnie]

I do not need main dish suggestions. Those are easy enough. What I need are recipes that TASTE GOOD for gluten free baking. Agree with Gluten-Free Manna about not basing recipes around a mix that you have to mix up and then use.

my brother has been experimenting with alot of gluten free baking for me. some really great chocolate cakes, lemon cookies, and patstries have come out of it

[freeatlast]

my brother has been experimenting with alot of gluten free baking for me. some really great chocolate cakes, lemon cookies, and patstries have come out of it

The lemon cookies sound good. Been looking for a recipe for lemon cookies.

[Noomers]

The theme should be "easy". I'm super pot-off by recipes that have many ingredients. Keep it simple.

I actually am sick of gluten-free cookbooks being all baking. I need main dish ideas that don't break the bank!

[luvs2eat]

I'll have to agree with another poster who said you can find just about any gluten-free recipe online anymore. I even googled things like gluten-free puff pastry and filo dough! Plus, there are always peeps there who've tried the recipes and I really appreciate their feedback.

The million different flour mixes would also turn me off. I had tons of small bags of (expensive) flours for a long time. Now I buy Better Batter flour for the small amount of baking I do and I use bread mixes. I used to love to bake, but not so much anymore.

[Kelleybean]

Re other allergens ... one of the cookbooks I have gives you the recipe, then in a sidebar tells you how to make it dairy free. I found that really helpful.

When I'm looking for cookbooks, I look for one that has at least a couple of recipes that are super fast and easy. I don't mind more complicated recipes when I have time to cook, but I like having options when things are crazy. I also agree with others that I hate it when a recipe requires another recipe - you look at the list of ingredients and one of the ingredients refers you to a recipe on another page. I pretty much always skip recipes like that. Total psychological thing b/c I suspect that frequently it's not any harder or time consuming.

This might be too specific, but I'm always looking for recipes that sneak nutrition in (carrot bread, zucchini pancakes, etc.). My son is autistic and super sensitive to food texture, so I have to get really creative sometimes.

[Marilyn R]

I know you all are sick of me coming back at you like certain door knocker religious maniacs, but I'm a believer in the pressure cooker. Minimal time, minimal ingredients, maximum taste.

Pressure cookers are coming back in vogue, maybe that's a way to get into the cookbook market?

I actually e-mailed a PC guru with a request to write a pressure cooker for celiac disease book. She never responded. I may have offended her with a comment about the logo she uses (ripe wheat sheaf).

[Juliebove]

I guess I get dismayed at many of the gluten-free Cookbooks because they rely on so many soy and/or dairy products, neither of which I, and apparently many others, can consume.

Good for you for your ambitions of publishing a cookbook! I wish you the best.

As for categories, "Potluck dinners" would be good. We all need to tote a dish for social events.

Agree with you there. We also can't do many nuts or eggs. So in most gluten-free cookbooks I am lucky to find one recipe I can use.

[Juliebove]

I know you all are sick of me coming back at you like certain door knocker religious maniacs, but I'm a believer in the pressure cooker. Minimal time, minimal ingredients, maximum taste.

Pressure cookers are coming back in vogue, maybe that's a way to get into the cookbook market?

I actually e-mailed a PC guru with a request to write a pressure cooker for celiac disease book. She never responded. I may have offended her with a comment about the logo she uses (ripe wheat sheaf).

What sorts of things do you cook in one? I've never had one but have a birthday coming up so I might ask for one.

My mom had one. I can't remember what she cooked in it. She didn't use it very often and was mostly terrified of it because she said it could blow up. That made me frightened of it too but apparently the ones sold these days are quite safe.

[Juliebove]

i feel the same. because if you wanted it egg free you can just use egg replacer, dairy free just use soy milk etc.. perhaps this is something i need to really think about

That doesn't necessarily work. I've found that egg replacer really doesn't work well for most things at all. And we can't use soy milk. We can use rice milk but it's very thin and doesn't work for most things either. Plus it really ups the carb count and as a diabetic I don't need the extra carbs.

[freeatlast]

That doesn't necessarily work. I've found that egg replacer really doesn't work well for most things at all. And we can't use soy milk. We can use rice milk but it's very thin and doesn't work for most things either. Plus it really ups the carb count and as a diabetic I don't need the extra carbs.

How about coconut milk? I sub that all of the time in biscuits and they come out great.

[Juliebove]

Actually, recipes can change dramatically by using different subs and sometimes they don't work at all. I have one recipe that I improvise by using almond milk or coconut milk in place of the regular milk. The texture is completely different depending upon which milk I use (coconut or almond). I have given up using most cookbooks for gluten-free stuff. Instead I look for recipes online with reviews or comments because the comments sometimes have people that had to use a milk sub and they will say whether it worked or not. Now given all that, if you don't have additional allergies you should probably stick with what you know. However it would be nice if there was at least a notation on the recipes on whether they would work with using subs (and not just the suggestion that "substitutes could be used", but an actual description of how using the subs will change the flavor/texture/taste of the baked good.

Another thing I dislike about most gluten-free cookbooks I see is that they involve making a big batch of a flour mix first and the same gluten-free flour mix with a name (example: "featherlight mix") is used throughout the book. As a new gluten-free baker I remmember being overwhelmed and afraid to try most of those recipes because if I mixed up that big batch of the author's all purpose flour and then did not like the way the recipes turned out I had wasted a lot of expensive ingredients. I felt I would be stuck using that flour mix and those recipes until the mix was gone. Now I have slowly collected most of the flours called for in those books and I can put together recipes but to spend so much to buy all those new flours without a guarentee was not something I wanted to try right off the bat. I have discovered many recipes that only use one or two flours instead of multiple flours and they work. I think it would be a nice feature if the book had a range of recipes--some that use only one type of flour and some that are more complex. And if they were labeled somehow--maybe an icon letting begginers know which were the more advanced and complex recipes and which were easy? It would also be nice to have asection describign the different flours and explaining which flours could be subbed out for one another--not only for people with allergies (I can't do soy flour so any book that used exclusively that with no substitute suggestions I would put back) but also for people that live in areas with limited flour options (I cannot find sorghum flour where I live).

Just some thigns to think about. There are many gluten-free baking books out there--what will make yours stand out form the ones that are already in stores and libraries? Good Luck!

Agree on disliking the flour mixes! When I first started gluten-free baking, I had two big containers that I had to go out and buy that I filled with mixes. One was a general mix and one was a I think a French bread mix. But oh, that wasn't enough! Many of the recipes called for all sorts of other flours and starches, all of which I bought. The end result was a cupboard full of expensive stuff, some of which I never used! I looked through the cookbooks making notes of all the different flours and starches and bought them all. And then because of our additional allergies (I think) I had to sub in some things and mostly nothing worked. In the end I just threw it all out, cursed myself for buying it all and started over again.

When I used gluten, I made all sorts of stuff from scratch and never once did I use a flour mix! I wouldn't even have thought of it. And yes some regular cookbooks do have such mixes for things like cakes and cookies.

Not only do I not want to have to make mixes, but I don't want to have to buy 12 different kinds of starches and flours! I do keep an all purpose four or five flour mix in the house. I do know that for most things a mix will be required, but I buy it already mixed. I keep brown or white flour (whatever my current recipe calls for) and I will sub back and forth between the two. Seems to work. I keep sweet rice flour in the house. I use it for thickening and sometimes baking. And once in a while I will buy some other flour or starch. But I would prefer not to have to buy a ton of things, especially when a lone recipe calls for a tiny amount of something and then I'll never use it again.

[Juliebove]

I'll have to agree with another poster who said you can find just about any gluten-free recipe online anymore. I even googled things like gluten-free puff pastry and filo dough! Plus, there are always peeps there who've tried the recipes and I really appreciate their feedback.

The million different flour mixes would also turn me off. I had tons of small bags of (expensive) flours for a long time. Now I buy Better Batter flour for the small amount of baking I do and I use bread mixes. I used to love to bake, but not so much anymore.

That's true too. Although I own many cookbooks, I just don't use them any more. I sometimes get a recipe from a magazine, but mostly I get them online. They're free and easy!

[Marilyn R]

What sorts of things do you cook in one? I've never had one but have a birthday coming up so I might ask for one.

My mom had one. I can't remember what she cooked in it. She didn't use it very often and was mostly terrified of it because she said it could blow up. That made me frightened of it too but apparently the ones sold these days are quite safe.

OMG. I cook homemade chicken vegetable soup in six minutes. It tastes like it cooked all day. I make all of my own stocks (vegetable, beef, chicken) in 10 minutes. And they're good.

You can cook a split pea soup in six minutes without soakiing the peas first. Granted, you have to chop up those onions and carrots first, and brown them.

I'd give up my oven before I gave up my pressure cooker. I use it three times a day sometimes. There are days I don't use it at all, but I'm always glad I have one r used it.

[GlutenFreeManna]

OMG. I cook homemade chicken vegetable soup in six minutes. It tastes like it cooked all day. I make all of my own stocks (vegetable, beef, chicken) in 10 minutes. And they're good.

You can cook a split pea soup in six minutes without soakiing the peas first. Granted, you have to chop up those onions and carrots first, and brown them.

I'd give up my oven before I gave up my pressure cooker. I use it three times a day sometimes. There are days I don't use it at all, but I'm always glad I have one r used it.

You should do like the crockpot lady did and make a blog about using the pressure cooker every day for a year or something.

[mushroom]

The million different flour mixes would also turn me off. I had tons of small bags of (expensive) flours for a long time. Now I buy Better Batter flour for the small amount of baking I do and I use bread mixes. I used to love to bake, but not so much anymore.

I guess that's why there are so many different cookbooks, because we are all so different. Nobody writes recipes for me. But I do have to say that I get most of my recipes off the internet, because I have so many grain restrictions, while I do like to get some nutrition in my flours, so I need recipes with buckwheat, sorghum and almond flours, but no soy, millet, quinoa, corn, amaranth,.bean or pea flours.......