Substituting For Gluten Free Flour

[marys2012]

I can't figure out how to change where my topic posts, so I hope I get some hits from this. But I enjoy cooking and have a lot of recipes whose only gluten containing ingredient is all-purpose or self- rising flour. I want to continue to make these recipes substituting gluten free flour. But I've read you can't just choose any type of gluten free flour to substitute for these and expect it to be pretty much the same. Can anyone advise to me on how to substitute? For instance, lets say I have a recipe requiring 2 cups of all purpose flour. What would I substitute that with. These recipes are not for baking breads.

Thanks for any advice you can give me!

[mushroom]

  On 5/6/2012 at 5:03 PM, marys2012 said:

I can't figure out how to change where my topic posts,

There ya go - we mods have magic wands

[eeyorelvr]

I just used Cup 4 Cup, I read about it in gluten free living magazine. It was expensive but since I am not planning on making bread with it I figure it will last me a long time. I used it in sweet potato casserol and figured all the other goodies in the recipe probably masked the real tast of gluten free flour, so yesterday I a strawberry, bluberry cobbler from a regular recipe and it was wonderful!!!

I have yet to find a gluten free cookie that is a good subsitute so that is going to be my next expierement with the Cup 4 Cup flour. It does contain dry milk though if that is an issue for you.

[ciamarie]

I'm not a big fan of the pre-mixed flours, mostly due to their cost. What I've done is substitute about 25-30% of the flour quantity using one or a combination of starches (tapioca, potato and/or corn starch -- though for tapioca it may be called tapioca flour and that will be the same as tapioca starch. For potato and corn, you want the starch and not the flour.)

The for the remaining 70-75% of the flour I use a combination of white rice and brown rice flour. (I was using some sorghum for a short while also, but I think it's not agreeing with me...). And if I want to use buckwheat (i.e. for pancakes), I'll sub some of the starch for buckwheat. I've successfully used that method with a couple Fannie Farmer recipes, though for cookies I need to cut out some of the butter. Oh, I also add a little extra leavener (baking powder or soda) than the recipe calls for. One last tip is to add the rice flour to whatever liquid your recipe uses and let it sit for about 15 minutes or so before mixing the rest of it, or mix it all and let it sit before baking it, so it's not gritty.

Real life examples:

buckwheat pancakes - recipe calls for 1 cup flour, I use 1/2 cup white rice flour, 1/4 cup tapioca starch and 1/4 cup buckwheat flour. Recipe also calls for 2 teas baking powder, I added that plus an additional 1/4 teas baking soda.

Banana nut bread - called for 2 cups of flour, I used 1 1/2 cups of rice flours (3/4 c each of white and brown rice), and 1/4 cup each of tapioca and potato starch. It also called for 1 teas baking soda, I also added 1 teas baking powder. (I use Rumford, it's non-aluminum and non-GMO).

Hope that helps!