Glutenfree oatcakes

I'm reading Jenny Colgan's The Summer Seaside Kitchen and in them the main character Flora makes Scottish oatcakes. Usually her books contain a few recipes and this one is no exception.... except... the Scottish Oatcakes aren't one of them. So I searched the ever knowing world wide wide and made my own version of the various different recipes I've found. 

These oatcakes are wonderful with a bit of butter or cheese, but I think they make a great and quite healthy breakfast option too, as I'm one of those breakfast cracker kind of person. ;-)

I made these crackers with 100% gluten free oats and oat flour so my two gluten free sons can eat them as well. My sons don't react to oats (i know that is not the case for everyone with coeliacs disease) and they love eating oatmeal and such. 

Ingredients: 

• 100 grams of rolled oats
• 175 grams of oat flour
• 1 teaspoon of cream of tartar
• 60 grams of cold butter
• 1 teaspoon of iodised salt
• 1 teaspoon of sugar
• 100 ml  of hot water

Instructions: 

1. Pre-heat the oven to 200 degrees centigrade or 390 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. Mix together the rolled oats, oat flour, cream of tartar, iodised salt and sugar in a big bowl.
3. Add the cold butter mix this through the flour and rolled oats mixture by rubbing it together until everything is mixed. It should have the consistency of bread crumbs. 
4. Add the water (just bit by bit) and combine until you have a somewhat thick and slightly sticky dough. The amount of water varies; depending on the oats. I needed a lot of water. 
5. Sprinkle some flour on a clean work surface and roll out the dough to  thickness that's about 1/2cm. Use a cookie cutter to cut out shapes. 
6. Place the oat cakes on a baking tray and bake  them in the oven for  about 20-30mins until a light golden brown colour. 
7. Let them cool a bit on a wire rack before you eat them with some salted butter or cheese. 

Yoghurt cheesecake with blueberries and a country cookie base

This recipe popped up in my mind  the moment I saw the biscuits cakes they were baking in last weeks Heel Holland Bakt- episode (this is the Dutch version of the Great British Bake Off). But... just before the new broadcast tonight, it is finished: a gluten-free yoghurt cheesecake with blueberries and a country cookie base.

My kids (and I am too) are crazy about country cookies based on (gluten-free cultivated and processed) oatmeal. It seemed to me an ideal crust for a zingy cheesecake. And blueberries and cheesecake .. they just belong together? Right? So that cheesecake had to be made before it drove me crazy.

Ingredients:

For the bottom and some cookies for decoration

• 300 grams of oatmeal (gluten-free cultivated and processed)
• 3 teaspoons of ground cinnamon
• a pinch of salt
• 100 grams of ground coconut
• 4 small eggs
• 10 tablespoons honey
• 125 grams of butter (melted)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

For the cheesecake filling

• 500 grams of Greek yogurt
• 300 grams of cream cheese (at room temperature)
• 4 small eggs or 3 large ones
• 150 grams of fine caster sugar
• 50 grams of rice flour (gluten-free)
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon of  lemon zest

For the blueberry topping

• 100 ml of pear juice
• 150 grams of blueberries
• 3 leaves of gelatin

NB. Make sure you have some extra blueberries to put on the bottom of the cheesecake

Preparation:

1. Preheat the oven to 160 degrees Celcius (325 Fahrenheit).
2. Cover a spring tin of 20 cm diameter with baking paper and grease it.
3. First make the dough for the bottom and the biscuits. Put all of the ingredients in a bowl and mix with a mixer until you have a cohesive mixture (it will not be a firm dough, but all oatmeal and coconut must be sticky with the other ingredients). Fill the tin with 2/3 of the dough and make sure you coat the edges.
4. From the remaining dough, make small biscuits, that you bake on a baking tray covered with baking parchment for 10-12 minutes at 200 degrees Celcius.  This can be done while your cheesecake is in the oven (or if you only have 1 oven: after baking the cheesecake, as this must cool down for 3 hours in the fridge).
5. Now make the cheesecake mixture. I put everything in the bowl of my kitchen machine and that beat it until well combined. To prevent lumps (that's what happens with the Monchou cream cheese if you have just taken it out of the fridge like I did) I used my blender to whip it into an airy mixture (and the lumps will also have disappeared ;-) ).
6. Sprinkle blueberries over the dough and pour the cheesecake mixture over it.
7. Put the cheesecake in the oven and cook it for about 60-80 minutes. The top is then light brown and the middle can no longer wobble. If the cheesecake is slightly cracked in the middle and it doesn't wobble it is usually cooked. First let it cool down and then refrigerate the cake to completely cool in 3 hours.
8. When the cheesecake is in the oven, make the blueberry jelly. Cook the pear juice with the blueberries  and let it boil for 5 minutes or so. Take it off the heat. Soak the leaves of gelatin in cold water and add to the warm blueberry mixture, puree it with a blender to get a smooth jelly. Allow to cool and pour over the cheesecake when it is cooling down in the oven (in my case the jelly was too set already so it is slightly less smooth than I intended).
9. Decorate with some cookies and serve your guests (or eat it yourself ;-))

Bon Appetit !!

Carrot cake with walnuts, raisins and coconut

Now that autumn has arrived I wanted to bake a nice robust cake, a pie in which you can taste the fall. My first instinct was to make pumpkin pie, but my boys were not quite in favor. They think pumpkin is delicious in a risotto, but as a pie ... that's a step too far. So carrot cake it was. Not typically autumn, but mixed spices give it a hint of autumn. And it contains lots of fiber, something thatmy boys with their gluten-free diet can really use. When the batter was finished I had so much that I ended up baking two cakes. One for us at home, and one that I take to work, where they already know that gluten free tastes good. ;-)

I have a basic recipe adapted added lots of extras. 
The end result:

Ingredients:
For the carrot cake

• 300 grams (10.5 oz) of grated carrot
• 180 grams (6.35 oz) of walnuts
• 50 grams (1.75 oz) of coconut
• 100 grams (3.5 oz) of raisins
• 2 tbsp mixed spice
• 50 grams (1.75 oz) of almond flour
• 200 grams (7 oz) of rice flour
• 2 bags of baking soda (or two teaspoons)
• 300 grams (10.5 oz) brown sugar
• 100 grams (3.5 oz) of butter
• 200 ml (7 fl oz) of coconut oil
• 4 eggs (separated)

For the cream cheese buttercream:

• 400 grams (14 oz) of cream cheese
• 250 grams (8.8 oz) of butter
• 250 grams (8.8 oz) of icing sugar
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla flavoring

Preparation:

1. Preheat the oven to 150 degrees Celsius/300 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. Melt the butter and coconut oil (if solidified) and whisk in a bowl with the caster sugar until creamy.
3. Mix the carrot, walnuts, coconut, raisins, spice cake, almond flour, rice flour and baking soda in a separate bowl.
4. Beat the egg yolks with the butter and sugar mixture and add the dry ingredients to this. Beat the egg whites in a clean, dry bowl and fold gently into the batter. Do this carefully so that you keep the air inside.
5. Grease a large springform pan (I used two little ones) and line it with parchment paper. Spoon the batter into the springform pan(s) and smooth. Put it in the oven and bake 45 minutes at 150 degrees/300 degrees fahrenheit.
6. After three minutes, turn the temperature to 170 degrees celsius/ 340 degrees fahrenheit and bake the cakes even further (about 30 minutes). Make sure the top is not too dark, otherwise you cover it with aluminum foil.
7. Meanwhile, make the butter cream by putting all the ingredients into the food processor and mix for some time (I let my machine mix for 45 minutes on a low setting). Thus, it becomes a light cream.
8. If the cake(s) are ready, remove them from the oven and let them cool completely on a rack. When they are cool you cut them and fill them with some of the cream and the rest you spread over the top. Decorate the cake with whole walnuts (or as I did with marzipan and chocolate figurines).

Bon appetit!

Blueberry muffins

I'm almost ashamed to say it's been a really, really, really long while since I've actually blogged a recipe. That doesn't mean I've stopped baking, because baking never stops when you have two gluten free boys to take care of. But life has been a tad bit hectic so blogging the recipes I developed never quite 'happened' to make it onto here. 

This week a brand new kitchen gadget arrived: My very own Kenwood Kmix and that was reason enough to bake something. Because, it is no use letting it be pretty on your kitchen countertop right? So... blueberry muffins it was. And they turned out so nice I just couldn't let them go "unblogged'. So hey... I'm back! 

This recipe makes 12 midsize muffins

Ingredients: 

• 100 grams (3.5 oz) of rice flour
• 50 grams (1.76 oz) of corn flour
• 100 grams (3.5 oz) of almond flour
• 75 grams (2.65 oz) of sugar
• 10 grams (0.35 oz) of vanilla sugar
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 2 teaspoons fiber husk
• 1 teaspoon of xanthan gum
• 1 teaspoon of cinnamon
• 100 grams (3.5 oz) of soft butter
• 2 dl (3.33 fl oz) of butter milk 
• 2 eggs
• 175 grams (6.17 oz) of blueberries

Instructions:

1. Preheat the oven to 175 degrees centigrade/ 350 fahrenheit. 
2. Put the paper cups into the muffin tray or butter the muffin tray. 
3. Mix all the dry ingredients in one bowl. 
4. Beat the sugar into the soft butter until it is a fluffy mixture. Add the eggs and beat them into the butter mixture. 
5. Add the mixed dry ingredients and mix it all in until it is combined. Then add the blueberries and fold them in carefully so they won't break open. I added them to the mixture in my Kmix and let it mix on the slowest/first setting. 
6. Scoop the mixture into the muffin tray with a spoon. 
7. Put in the oven and bake for about 20-25 minutes until golden brown. 
8. Take them out of the oven, let them cool in the tray first for a couple of minutes. Then take them out and let them cool completely on a wire rack. 

Enjoy!!

Lemon & Honey cookies

I not only bake for my kids or my blog, I bake for my colleagues too. Almost two weeks ago I had a work dinner and I spent half the evening taking requests from colleagues for cookies. My cookie baking reputation at work has taken a flying leap. And every now & then I indulge them. And I always love their reaction: "You can't tell this is gluten free!" Well, duhhh, of course not. Gluten free does not equal cardboard cookies. Not if you do it right.

But first I needed a recipe for cookies that were delicious, taste like summer & that I could make in enormous quantities. So I adapted another recipe that had the consistency I was looking for with honey and lemon and a bit more sugar to match the summery feel I wanted. This is the result. So I first made a batch for my little men and soon I'll be baking a gigantic amount of cookies & I'll take a tour to visit all the cookie begging colleagues and bring them some. 

They may not look like summer, but they taste like it all the same!

This recipe makes two dozen cookies.

Ingredients:

• 300 grams (10.5 oz) of rice flour
• 1 teaspoon of xanthan gum
• 1.5 teaspoon of cream of tartar
• 15 grams (0.5 oz) of vanilla sugar
• 100 grams (3.5 oz) of light caster sugar
• The zest of two lemons
• 100 grams (3.5 oz) of butter
• 4 tablespoons of honey

Instructions:

• Preheat the oven to 175 degrees centigrade (350 degrees fahrenheit)
• Put all the ingredients in one big bowl and mix till you have a combined dough. It will feel soft, but not extremely sticky.
• Pour some gluten rice free flour on a clean kitchen surface, kneed the dough on it and then roll it out with a rolling pin. Cut out cookies with your favourite cookie cutters. Repeat until you have used up all the dough.
• Put the cookies on baking trays lined with baking parchment and put in the oven for about 15 minutes until slightly risen and golden. 
• Take them out of the oven and let them cool completely before you serve them with a cup of tea or coffee. 

Enjoy! My boys loved them and I think they have a new favourite cookie.

Sinful Gigantic Chocolate Chip Cookies

I could tell these cookies would be fabulous just by tasting the dough. Crunchy, velvety dough full of chocolate. And you know what makes it so fabulous? Loads of full fat butter, sugar, vanilla & egg yolks. Lots of stuff that basically is not healthy for you, but oh so delicious every now & then. 

Those of you who know me a little know that I'm totally horrified by the fact that some people seem to think that the gluten free diet is a good way to lose weight. It's not, it's a diet that helps people get their health back. That doesn't mean that I'm opposed to living healthy either. Those that know me well know I've struggled with my weight for a period of my life and the only way I got back to a healthy weight was by cutting down portions, eating healthier (read loads of veggies, fruits, rice, wholemeal bread and such and above all no more processed packaged foods) and exercising way more (riding my bike to work every day). So I get people wanting to live healthy. I just don't believe that the gluten free diet is going to do you any favours. Because gluten aren't your enemy unless you have celiac disease. Sugar, fat & such are. But if you don't eat unhealthy stuff all day, every day, it's ok to indulge yourself every once in a while. And that's what I've done by making these cookies. Cookies that I'll serve to my kids and some of my colleagues tomorrow because I think they deserve a bit of indulgence. And I may just have one myself. ;-)

This recipe makes about 20 huge cookies. 

Ingredients:

• 250 grams (9 oz) of full fat butter
• 250 grams (9 oz) of light caster sugar
• 250 grams (9 oz) of (sticky) rice flour 
• 2 egg yolks
• 2 teaspoons of xanthan gum
• 1 teaspoon of baking soda or cream of tartar
• 0.5 a teaspoon of iodised salt
• the scraped seeds of a vanilla bean
• 100 grams (3.5 oz) of white chocolate
• 100 grams (3.5 oz) of dark chocolate

Instructions:

• Preheat the oven to 175 degrees centigrade or 350 degrees fahrenheit.
• I bought to bars of chocolate and bashed them to smithereens with my meat hammer (make sure you have some big chunks left in there too for good measure).
• Put all the ingredients in a big bowl and mix them until you have above mentioned crunchy velvety dough with tons of chocolate.
• I rolled out the dough (on a gluten free, clean surface) till it was about 0.5 cm (almost 0.25 of an inch) thick and punched out round cookies with cookie cutter with a diameter of 7 cm (2.5 inch). I put them on a baking tray (make sure you leave a lot of space in between) and put them in the oven for about 10-12 minutes. 
• Leave to cool & then impress your friends, family, colleagues (or yourself) with them as you serve them with a cup of coffee.

Gluten-Free Easter Bunny bread rolls

This week my boys will have Easter brunch at school, after the Easter service in the local Catholic church. It is a nice end to the church service and a wonderful beginning of the Easter weekend. But it is always one of those days that my boys realize they eat differently. That they're the odd one out. The rest of their class will eat the brunch served by school and they will be eating their own gluten free bread rolls. Because school won't provide a gluten free brunch for them. Part of me understands, because the chance of glutening the kids is huge, and you don't want to be responsible for that, but on the other hand it is still a bit sad that school can't provide for kids with special diets. But... it is what is is, so I made my boys these Easter Bunny bread rolls, so they have something special at the brunch.

These are so easy to make, you can make them with your kids. 

I used Peak's Free From fibre-rich bread mix to make these airy bread rolls, but I did not quite follow the instructions on the box. This recipe makes about 12 Easter Bunny's.

Ingredients:

• 450 grams  (1 lb) of Peak's Free From fibre-rich bread mix
• 1 teaspoon of xanthan gum
• 15 grams (0.5 oz) of yeast
• 12 grams (0.3 oz) of sugar
• 2 eggs
• 250 ml (9 fl oz) of warm milk
• 60 ml (2.03 fl oz) of extra vergine olive oil
• 1 teaspoon of apple cider vinegar
• 1 tablespoon of molasses
• oatmal to make noses
• black currants to make the bunnies eyes
• an egg (whisked) to brush on top of the bunnies
• a bit of oat flour to roll out the dough and prevent it from sticking to the surface & the rolling pin

Instructions:

1. Preheat the oven to 175 degrees centigrade /350 degrees fahrenheit
2. Mix the bread mix, xanthan gum, yeast and sugar in a big bowl.
3. Mix the milk, eggs, olive oil, apple cider vinegar and molasses in another bowl.
4. Add the milk mixture to the bread mix and beat with an electric mixer till all is combined and you have a sticky dough.
5. Dust a clean surface with a bit of oat flour and roll out the dough till it's about a centimeter or half an inch thick. Dust the top with oat flour too when you roll out your dough. Then use a (large) bunny shaped cookie cutter to cut out the bread rolls.
6. Brush the top of the bread bunnies with the whisked egg and then make noses from the oat flakes & press in black currants for eyes. 
7. Put the bread rolls in the warm oven and bake for about 35 minutes until golden and fluffy.
8. Put them on a wire rack to let them cool. 

Serve them with a bit of salted butter and some cheese. Happy gluten free Easter!