Food, glorious (and not so glorious) food

1 minute read time.

Love it , or loathe it, Marmite is a pretty handy ingredient. I made a fantastic chilli non carne, yes, you read that correctly. Marmite was part of the sauce bit. I think it could have done with a bit more moisture. I am toying with the idea of doubling the tomato quota from 1 can to 2. It was a recipe for 2-4 persons and lasted me 3 days and each day I had a different grain to go with it, rice, quinoa and millet. Trying vegetarian or vegan recipes is proving to be a fun thing for me to do and adding new variety to my diet. As I didn’t have the required ingredients I had to add extra carrots. It was truly, truly yummy.

The not so glorious was a recipe for gluten free rice bread. I am trying to ring the changes and enjoy foods other than those we take for granted. I made the dough last night (during half time of the rugby) and let it stand until this morning. I was suspicious as it hadn’t risen that much, but I baked it and I got a glorious crust (and a not bad scent rising up the stairs) but a soggy interior. Surely one of my readers must be a clever baking person and can tell me where I went wrong?

Not being a clever cooking person, I am mystified how a reputable company (it sounds like - Lionel Blair / Una Stubbs time - glove, arm) that sells rice flour under its name allowed such a disaster of a recipe to go out. I am not the only one to have have experienced a problem I later found out. I know, I should have checked, wise after the event , blah-blah-blah. I have slapped my wrists and my botty most severely.


Anonymous
  • You'll never get a great texture with gluten free bread - safer to look for GF recipes for flat breads or types that don't rely on gluten for their texture.

    TBH, unless you have a medical reason to avoid gluten, I'd say skip the idea of cutting it out when it comes to bread. Plenty of good/fair GF cakes and cookies but bread needs gluten.

    Go marmite! 

  • FormerMember
    FormerMember

    Hi Tim.  I'm a clever baking person, I don't bother to try!  That's not quite true.  I did attempt to bake some sort of fruit loaf once, ended up severely stressed with a ruined baking tin.  My bakery items are all in wrappers with "Morrisons" on them. x

  • Hi Tim,

    I have recipes for a nice GF Lemon Drizzle Cake and Chocolate & Pear Cake/Pudding (neither of which use GF flour) and a nice flat bread but GF loaf, well, I've decided I just don't like it so make do with polystyrene tiles, sorry, rice cakes or GF oat cakes.  

    I'm in the love it camp when it comes to Marmite and I use it in veggie cooking but I used to like it on thick slices of bread or hot, buttered toast (non GF) but it now goes on the rice/oat cakes. 

    Ann x

  • FormerMember
    FormerMember

    barbaral, not to put too fine a point on it, I don't fart as much with gluten free products!

    Margaret853, you give up too easily!

    annfran, now don't tease me dangling lemon drizzle in front of my eyes without giving me succour and the recipe! As for the polystyrene, it depends on the brand as to how palatable it is! 

    Tim

  • Hi Tim,

    Here you go, one lemon cake.  it's not like a cake made with flour but I think it's nice.  It's good warm with cream.  

    I love cooking, it's my one nod to domesticity, but, since Nev died, I've had to rein it in or I'd be the size of a house!

    for the cake

    • 200 grams soft unsalted butter (plus some for greasing)
    • 200 grams caster sugar
    • 200 grams ground almonds
    • 100 grams fine polenta (or cornmeal)
    • 1 ½ teaspoons baking powder (gluten free if required)
    • large eggs
    • zest of lemons (save juice for syrup)

    for the syrup

    • juice of lemons
    • 125 grams icing sugar

    Method

    1. Line the base of a 23cm / 9inch springform cake tin with baking parchment and grease its sides lightly with butter.
    2. Preheat the oven to 180°C/gas mark 4/ 350°F.
    3. Beat the butter and sugar till pale and whipped, either by hand in a bowl with a wooden spoon, or using a freestanding mixer.
    4. Mix together the almonds, polenta and baking powder, and beat some of this into the butter-sugar mixture, followed by 1 egg, then alternate dry ingredients and eggs, beating all the while.
    5. Finally, beat in the lemon zest and pour, spoon or scrape the mixture into your prepared tin and bake in the oven for about 40 minutes.
    6. It may seem wibbly but, if the cake is cooked, a cake tester should come out cleanish and, most significantly, the edges of the cake will have begun to shrink away from the sides of the tin. remove from the oven to a wire cooling rack, but leave in its tin.
    7. Make the syrup by boiling together the lemon juice and icing sugar in a smallish saucepan.
    8. Once the icing sugar’s dissolved into the juice, you’re done.
    9. Prick the top of the cake all over with a cake tester (a skewer would be too destructive), pour the warm syrup over the cake, and leave to cool before taking it out of its tin.