Gluten-Free Tortillas (Wraps)

I love the texture and flavour of amaranth flour and so should not have been so surprised to discover that it makes chewy, flexible tortillas.

My mother is the queen of burritos and has been looking for a wrapper that the celiacs in the family could eat. I think this may just do the trick! This small batch is enough to make two large, burrito-stuffable tortillas or three smaller (10 cm) tortillas to wrap around a sandwich filling or to eat as fajitas. So far, I've only eaten these warm, so I'm not sure how they work with cool fillings.

2/3 cup amaranth flour
1/4 cup water
sprinkle of salt

Combine amaranth flour, water, and salt, mixing well until the dough can be formed into a dense, slightly sticky ball. Form into a disk and wrap in plastic wrap. Allow to sit for 30 minutes.

Divide into two or three balls. Place each between two sheets of plastic wrap (sprinkling with a little rice flour, if necessary). Roll until tortilla-thin. Gently peel away plastic wrap from each side.

Heat a frying pan over medium heat. Lightly grease with a mist of vegetable oil. Cook the tortillas one at a time, just until each side bubbles slightly and the bubbles brown (30 seconds to 1 minute per side).

Stack tortillas on a warm platter and stuff while warm and soft.

These reheat nicely in the microwave with a warm sandwich filling.

Makes 3 (10cm) or 2 slightly larger tortillas.

Chewy Chocolate-Butterscotch Chip Cookies

An adapted version of a recipe from an old Harrowsmith recipe. These were popular when I made them yesterday, though I can't comment on how well they might keep, since they didn't last long enough . . .

1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 large egg
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 1/4 cups ground oatmeal (gluten-free oatmeal pulverized in a food processor)
1/3 cup amaranth flour
1/3 cup brown rice flour
1/3 cup potato starch
1/2 tsp xanthan gum
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
4 oz chocolate chips
2 oz butterscotch chips
1/4 cup unsweetened coconut
1/2 cup sliced almonds

Preheat oven to 375F.

In a large bowl, cream butter, sugars, then eggs and vanilla. In a separate bowl, whisk oatmeals, flours and starches, xanthan, soda, and baking powder.

With the electric mixer running, blend flour mixture into butter mixture. Add chocolate and butterscotch chips, coconut, and almonds and mix with the electric mixer until well combined.

Roll into balls, one large tablespoonful at a time, to make 36 balls. Place 2" apart on a parchment paper-lined or silicone sheet-lined pan. Flatten balls slightly with your hand. Bake for 10 minutes, until beginning to brown lightly. Allow to cool a few minutes on the pan before transferring to a rack to cool completely.

Makes 3 dozen cookies.

Gluten-Free Crepes

These turn out beautifully. No one will know they are gluten-free -- if secrecy about celiac happens to be your thing. They can be used for supper or for dessert and extras store well in the refrigerator.

1/3 cup rice flour
1/4 cup potato starch
2 tbsp tapioca starch
1/4 tsp salt
3 large eggs
1 1/2 cups 2% milk

Whisk flours with salt in a medium bowl or cup with a pouring spout. Whisk eggs and milk until well combined. Stir wet ingredients into flours and refrigerate batter at least 1 hour.

Remove from the refrigerator and whisk batter again very thoroughly. (Flours will have settled lumpishly to the bottom.)

Grease a crêpe pan with butter over medium heat. When butter has fizzed and the bubbles have subsided, pour a scant 1/4 cup batter into the pan. Tilt pan to cover evenly. Cook until set, about 30 seconds to 1 minute. Flip and cook lightly (30 seconds) on the other side. Stir the batter well from the bottom before cooking each crêpe, as flours will settle again swiftly.

Makes 10 to 12 thin crêpes.

Porridge-y Goodness

Brown rice porridge doesn't have enough flavour for me, and quinoa flakes don't have enough texture -- but put them together and they balance each other out deliciously and nutritiously.

The porridge recipe below is almost instant. Amounts are for one big bowlful. I measure five or six individual servings into little resealable snack bags so I can "just add water" in the morning.

3 tbsp quinoa flakes
2 tbsp cream of brown rice cereal
1 tbsp unrefined sugar (sucanat - evaporated cane juice)
1 tbsp whole flaxseeds
1 heaping tbsp raisins
dash of cinnamon
sprinkle of salt
3/4 cup water

Stir dry ingredients together, then stir in water. Cook three minutes in the microwave, stirring once partway through. Remove from microwave, stir well, and allow to sit for two minutes.

Serve with milk or soy milk - or cream, if you are feeling decadent.

Gluten-Free Herbed Popovers

These popovers are delicious soaker-uppers of gravy at supper, or you can make them without the herbs and serve them with butter and jam for breakfast. They freeze very well, but reheat them in the oven, not the microwave.

How big you make them and how long you cook them will affect whether they are light and dry throughout or a bit more dense and custardy on the inside. The instructions below tend to the custardy.

1 cup water
1/2 cup butter
1/3 cup potato starch flour
2/3 cup brown rice flour
1/4 tsp salt
1 tbsp each fresh rosemary, chives, and parsley, chopped (optional)
1/2 tsp black pepper (optional, if using herbs)
4 large eggs

Preheat oven to 450F. Butter muffin tins well for 10 popovers.

Boil water and butter in a small saucepan. In a small bowl, mix flours and salt well. Add to the boiling mixture in the saucepan, all at once, and stir rapidly until the mixture forms a ball. Remove from heat, scrape into a bowl, and allow to cool slightly (5 minutes).

Beat in eggs, one at a time, beating very well after each. Put one goose-egg-sized lump of dough in each prepared muffin tin.

Bake at 450F for 15 minutes, then reduce heat to 350F. Check popovers for doneness after ten more minutes.

When done to your liking, remove from oven and prick each popover with a fork to release steam. Turn out of the pan and serve right away.

Mousse-Filled Chocolate Tartlets

I tried this chocolate pastry for Valentine's Day and, other than overcooking it so it was a bit smokier than hoped, it was delicious. Filled with mousse and chopped toasted nuts, it was even better.

I wished I had sprinkled a little cayenne pepper into the pastry, for a subtle hit of hotness. A teaspoon of pulverized instant coffee granules would also have been good. I imagine that using ground hazelnuts in the pastry and chopped hazelnuts in the cups would be just as delicious as almond flour and chopped almonds.

1/3 cup softened butter
1/4 cup sugar
1 egg yolk
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/4 cup almond flour
1/4 cup sweet rice flour
3 tbsp potato starch flour
2 tbsp cornstarch
3 tbsp cocoa powder
1/4 tsp xanthan gum
pinch of salt

In a large bowl, beat butter, sugar, egg yolk, and vanilla. In a separate bowl, whisk together flours and starches, cocoa, xanthan, and salt. Using an electric mixer on a low setting, mix flour mixture into butter mixture until well combined.

Wrap dough in plastic wrap and chill for at least an hour.

Remove pastry dough from the refrigerator and from the plastic wrap. Divide into 24 even balls, warming the dough as little as possible with your hands. Set out 2 12-cup mini-muffin or tartlet pans. Place one ball in each of 24 tartlet cups. Press gently and evenly over the bottom and up the sides of the little cups. Prick the bottoms with a fork.

Chill the pastry while the oven preheats to 375F. Bake for about 15 minutes, watching carefully in the last minutes to prevent burning. (The dough is so dark, it's hard to tell if the brown is edging to black.) Turn the pastries out of the pans to cool on a rack. Allow to cool completely before filling.

Chocolate Mousse: Finely chop 8 oz bittersweet chocolate. Place in a heatproof bowl. Heat 3/4 cup of cream in a small saucepan until just beginning to boil. Pour cream over chocolate. Whisk until smooth and chocolate is melted and glossy. Stir in 2 tbsp orange liqueur. Refrigerate for about 1 hour; remove from refrigerator and whip until light.

Assembly:

Coarsely chop 1/2 cup of toasted almonds. Reserving 1/4 cup of the chopped nuts for garnish, sprinkle the remaining nuts into the bottoms of the cooled pastry cups. Mound each cup with mousse, using a knife to make sure the mousse adheres to the outside edges of the pastry and seals in the nuts. Sprinkle the reserved nuts on top of the mousse.

Refrigerate the tartlets until ready to serve.

Makes 24 tartlets.

Golden Cornmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

These cookies have a lovely buttery taste, like chocolate chip cookies should, but they also have a hint of corn flavour that is very pleasant. Corn flour, which is like very fine cornmeal, is best; cornmeal is a little grittier, though equally nice in flavour. This is a great recipe for someone who is baking for a celiac friend and usually has cornmeal and other baking goods in supply -- the only "special" flour is the rice flour. The parchment paper is absolutely necessary, unless you have a silpat nonstick baking mat.

6 tbsp butter (1/3 cup)
1/4 cup soft brown sugar
1/4 cup white sugar
1 egg, beaten
1/2 tsp vanilla
3/4 cup rice flour
3/4 cup fine cornmeal or corn flour (very fine cornmeal)
1 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt
2/3 cup chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 375F.

Prepare cookie sheets with parchment paper.

Combine dry ingredients in a small bowl. In a larger bowl, cream sugars and butter until light. Beat in egg. Stir in dry ingredients. Mix well, then add chocolate chips.

Form into cookies by the tablespoonful. Place on the parchment paper-lined pan about 1 1/2” apart. Cook about 12 minutes, until lightly browned. Cool on pan before transferring to a rack.

Makes about 2 dozen cookies.