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Piquant lemon myrtle imparts an intense lemon aroma to this macaroon made with LSA, a mixture of linseed, sunflower seeds and almond meal.
The beautiful, mild flavour of quandong, Australian native peach, pairs well with the aroma of oriental almond (apricot kernel) and peach scented osmanthus flowers.
Together, these ingredients create this exquisite quandong macaroon. The amaretto-like aroma from apricot kernel and peach flavours work wonderfully together. There is a subtle hint of sourness from quandong to balance the sweetness of the meringue. The lovely colour comes from quandong and red fermented rice (ang kak). This macaroon is truly for the connoisseur.
Wattleseeds give these macaroons their hazelnut-coffee-chocolate flavour. The perfect pairing for wattleseed is vanilla cream, chocolate, and fruit like pears, peaches or berries.
Post in progress.....
Black Sesame Macaroon
55 g black sesame seeds, milled*
75 g icing
40 egg white (from 1 x 67 g egg)
15 g sugar
1/4 t salt
1/2 teaspoon water, optional
To make these macaroons, check out instructions listed by David Lebovitz or use the method found at this restaurant. In a nutshell, process sesame seeds with icing and fold into a meringue made with the remaining sugar. The meringue can be made using French (slow sugar addition), Swiss (bain marie) or Italian (sugar syrup) methods.
This macaroon is designed to be eaten without filling. Suitable fillings include vanilla cream, caramel/butterscotch, palm sugar/coconut, chocolate and jasmine rice ganache.
*To mill the black sesame seeds, freeze beforehand. Mill in a spice grinder using short bursts. Freeze again should oil forms during milling. Finish milling with icing and return to the freezer. Just before making the macaroons, remove from the freezer and process to aerate and remove clumps. The milled black sesame and icing sugar mixture resembles a fine grey powder, not an oily paste.
For a dramatic look, sprinkle with black sesame seeds before cooking.
Nothing beats the mystique of the delicate almond flavoured macaroon whose history spans some 4 centuries, from monastic origins to haute Parisian tea parties, and war time interludes. The romance of these meringue cookies that marries a crisp crust and a soft chewy interior goes as far back as 1533 (The Food Chronology by James Trager). Read the history of Italian and French connections.
Traditional macaroons are like the Italian amaretti without the bitter-sweet amaretto almond liqueur. These macaroons are baked on edible rice paper. The rice paper is trimmed around the cookie after cooking.
Rice paper is used before the invention of silicone baking parchment. Some of the older folks probably remember the recycled brown paper shopping bags which require steaming over a hot wet tea towel to remove the cookies.
Coconut kisses are many a grandma's x-rated version of the macaroon.
The French spelling is macaron. Pedantic French patissiers refine the cookies, giving them ruffled petticoats or skirts, and smooth shiny, dome sugar crusts, by air drying while resting the uncooked cookies. Haute restaurants serve these intimate French rendition, sandwiched with ganache, buttercream or jam in many combinations of colours and flavours.
Part of the fun making macaroons is to find the perfect matching pair to join together. Grandma's generation bakes slap dash "kisses" without fuss. It takes time to master the intricacies of the macaroon, to create that perfect union in the French style.
Ingredients
60 g icing sugar (3 tablespoons)
40 g almond meal (1/3 c or 1/4 c + 1 tablespoon ground rice/cornstarch/cocoa)
40 g egg white (from 1 x 67 g egg)
30 g castor sugar (1.5 tablespoons)
1 teaspoon water or reserved egg white, optional
2 drops almond essence, optional
Method
Notes
One large egg white (40 g) makes about 72 cookies or 36 sandwiched macaroons with a diameter around 2 cm. For 3 cm diameter, the number of cookies is around 40, or 20 sandwiched pairs.
Instead of almond, use other nuts, seeds, crushed biscuits or coconut. Toast the seeds in a cast iron pan or roast the nuts in an oven at 200 degrees Celsius for 5 minutes. Freeze before milling to prevent clumping and/or oily butter from forming.
For icing sugar, mill granulated sugar to powder in a spice mill. For castor sugar mill granulated sugar in short bursts until the required texture.
Age the egg white at room temperature for at least 1/2 hour before, or overnight for a better consistency of batter.
For browning, cook at 160 degrees Celsius.
Cracks often develop for shorter resting time. Traditional macaroons are not rested. For the characteristic skirts (also called feet) on the French versions, rest for 2-5 hours for the sugar crust to form. Some patissiers dust the raw cookies with icing. Depending on humidity, resting times can be longer or shorter.
To flatten and even out the piped cookies, slap the silicon baking parchment on the kitchen bench before transferring to a baking tray.
To prevent the bottom from browning and reduce cracks, put 3 sheets of printing paper under the silicon baking parchment.
Cubic noodles brought awe to Australian TV watching households after Masterchef Poh Ling Yeow thrilled judges with her intriguing black cubic noodles made using squid ink. Masterchef Poh served her winning dish with fried snapper, preserved mustard greens and caviar in a white stock.
Penang cubic noodles, known as char kuih kark (with many variations of spelling depending on Chinese dialect group), act as a poor man's version of the daikon rice cakes served in dim sum restaurants: hawkers stalls make the noodles without daikon.
Here is a recipe to make your own cubic noodles, for use in your noodle or pasta dishes:
Ingredients:
150 g (1 cup) rice flour
20 g (1-2 tablespoons) black glutinous rice, tapioca starch, wheat starch, or cornstarch
1 tablespoon oil (preferable flavoured)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon onion powder, optional
150 mL lukewarm water
350 mL boiling water
Method:
Blend the flour, starch, oil and seasoning with lukewarm water into a smooth paste.
While stirring add the boiling water to par-cook the batter to help prevent the flour settling during cooking. If the batter has not thickened enough to leave thick trails, either gently heat on a stove or microwave on high in 10 sec bursts until the consistency is achieved.
Pour the batter into a wet ceramic lasagne dish measuring 20 cm by 30 cm. The batter is enough for a 1-cm thick noodle sheet.
Steam for 30-45 minutes until set. On cooking, the batter darkens and the surface feels firm. To cook by microwave, cover the dish with plastic wrap. Set power to 30% (medium low) and cook for 20-30 minutes.
Let cool for at least 15 minutes to stiffen before using. Cut into 1 cm cubes. For frying, chill the noodles, preferably overnight.
... pan fried black and white cubic rice noodles with omelette, shitake, coriander and chilli
Notes:
The starch improves the texture by adding softness and/or chewiness. Rice on its own gives a somewhat starchy mouth feel. Adjust the ratio of rice to starch to suit your personal preference.
Some recipes call for kan sui (lye water) to add a springy texture, or borax to prevent stickiness, add gloss and improve flexibility. Others suggest 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon baking soda per cup of flour as a substitute for kan sui and borax.
The flour to water weight ratio is 1:3, or volume ratio 1:2 (1 cup flour to 2 cups water).
Simple recipe for sheet and cubic rice noodles 40% rice flour, 40% cornstarch, 20% tapioca starch, 300-350% FWB warm water. Make a slurry and steam.
Red millet bread as a rye bread replacement. Red millet is also known as finger millet or ragi at Indian grocers. As with the beautiful breads in this blog, this pseudo rye bread is made using the starch gel technique.
Gluten-free rolls and buns become a reality now that Noodle Cook perfected French style bread. These lovely baguettes baked to perfection in baking paper molds. The crisp crust and bakery aroma from the yeast really compare well with wheat baguettes.
Using the starch gel method for bread making, the baguette turned out light, fluffy, moist and flexible without the need for GFG, xanthan or guar gum.
The bread dough is a cake-like batter. Seen here are well risen baguettes ready to bake. There is no time consuming kneading with batter breads.
The paper molds are made by folding and stapling silicon paper parchment, and held in place using skewers. The paper molds can be used several times before discarding. These molds make a cheap alternative to specialty French stick tins. Check out GFVeg for foil molds.
After 2 months hanging out for gluten-free Easter bread, Noodle Cook celebrates with a successful high protein LSA white French style bread for lunch. Shown here is a beautiful moist, fluffy and flexible sandwich. This is incredible for a bread made without GFG, xanthan, guar gum or any other potential allergens with foodcodes. The bread stays fresh for 2 whole days with acceptable eating quality for close on 4 days.
The celebration proves premature as there is one slight problem. Like all gluten-free bread, including commercial ones, this type of bread often stales rapidly. The main effect is rapid drying out of the starches (syneresis), leaving a dry mouth feel. The other effect is crumbling when the texture of starches changes on cooling (retrogradation), such as freezing to extend shelf life. The crumbling occurs when frozen bread is defrosted, but is easily reversed by toasting, or reheating in a microwave oven.
The moistness of the bread is achieved using the starch gel method of bread making, also known as "tangzhong" in Chinese wheat bread making. Through gelatinization of a small portion of the total flour, the starches swell to absorb more moisture.
For gluten-free bread doughs (batters), the gelatinization enables 2 things:
Behold, a feather-light, fluffy, moist, flexible high protein white bread that stays fresh for 2 whole days, with a crispy golden crust to top that achievement for a gluten-free French breadstick style bread.
Homemade using a simple starch gel without GFG, xanthan or guar gum. Finally, a real bread for those who dream of something better than eating those dense gluten-free bread while pretending the taste is wonderful.
Noodle Cook not only dreams of that oven fresh gluten-free loaf with bakery aroma, but researches and produces the real thing on the first try.
There's still work to stabilize the starch when freezing to extend shelf life, but what an amazing achievement to come this far after the Easter weekend bread drama.
Indian grocers provide a range of non-wheat flours suitable for bread making:
Lentil = urid/urad dal
Chickpea = besan/gram/garbanzo
Sorghum = juwar/jowar/milo/cholam
Millet = bajri/kurakkan
Red Millet (Finger Millet) = ragi
Water Chestnut = singoda
Amaranth = rajagro
Buckwheat = kutta ka atta/kuttu/kasha
Shown in this post is a beautiful sorghum bread made without GFG, xanthan or guar gum. The beautiful texture is controlled by room temperature fermentation (25-30 degrees). Slowing down the fermentation gives a much more refined and softer texture.
A picture says a thousand words! After not having much success with gluten-free Easter bread, Noodle Cook discovers the use of gelatinous starches. A simple combination of potato starch, rice flour and lentil flour together with yeast and bicarbonate soda yields a soft, fluffy, flexible white bread which toasts well. Best of all, no expensive xanthan gum is needed.
The aroma from toasting is to die for! There is still a lot of room for improvement such as using a dough conditioner to enhance shelf life.
Replacing half the rice flour with sorghum gives a very light and airy texture. The beautiful structure holds up well during baking. This is really amazing for a gluten-free bread. There is only minor tweaking needed to make the texture finer.
When all the rice flour is replaced, the bread unexpectedly develops a much finer texture. The bread is much harder than the fluffy white bread without sorghum.
The bread making technique is work in progress. The next step is to make kneadable and shapable bread rolls instead of using the batter method.
1/2 cup chickpea flour
1/2 cup water (or coconut milk)
1 teaspoon olive oil (very important)
1 tablespoon rice flour, optional
1/2 teaspoon curry powder, optional
ajwan seeds, garlic, onion, chilli, coriander optional
Mix everything together. Can be stored in the fridge until ready to use.
Oil a cast iron skillet. Heat to medium (50% power).
Pour in batter and spread to a circle.
When the edges start to brown, drizzle oil or sprinkle water to release. Flip over and brown.
Serve with fresh tomato chutney (tomato, onion, coriander leaves) or potato masala.
The crispy version is good with Indian meals compared to the soft European socca.
Fermented rice crepe, also known as dosai, dosa, dhosa or even dosay, originates from India. It is often served fillled with masala or tumeric spiced potatoes. The addition of lentil or chickpea flours imparts crispness to the rice crepe.
Successful rice crepes rely on aeration by overnight fermentation, or a shortcut using bicarbonate soda and yoghurt. When fermented, the batter looks spongy and smells slightly acrid. The technique to cook rice crepe requires that the crepe batter be sprinkled or drizzled with oil or water when half cooked to aid the release from the cooking surface. Without this step, the crepe will stick and hardens with disastrous results. A non-stick or oiled cast iron skillet works best.
To make lacey crepe, scrape off half cooked batter before sprinkling with oil or water.
Recipe
150 g long grain rice
500 mL hot water
50 g white urid (lentil) or chickpea flour
1/2 teaspoon fenegreek, ground
1/2 teaspoon salt
Soak rice in hot water for 30 minutes.
Blend in an electric blender until the rice looks like granulated sugar.
Add the remaining ingredients and blend to porridge consistency.
Cover and ferment at 30 degrees Celsius. Try using a car parked in the sun, or an oven overnight after preheating to 180 degrees Celsius and turning off. Allow 6-8 hours for fermentation until the batter doubles in bulk.
Grease a cast iron skillet. Heat on 30% power (low to medium). When hot enough, water droplets will bounce.
Pour in some batter. With the base of a ladle, quickly distribute outwards using a circular motion.
When bubbles appear and start setting, sprinkle oil or water to aid release of the crepe.
To make paper thin crepe, scrape off the soft half cooked batter.
Cook until the edge starts to brown, around 1/2 to 1 minutes.
Add fillings like potato masala at this point.
Release the crepe by sliding a non-stick spatula underneath. Fold to desired shape. Unfilled crepe can be flipped over and brown.
Serve immediately with coconut cream and tomato salsa.
Potato Masala
2 potatoes, diced
1 carrot, diced
2 tablespoons water
1 tablespoon oil
2 onions, diced
2 teaspoons cumin seeds
2 spring curry leaves, optional
1/2 teaspoon chilli powder or 3 dried chillies, crushed
1 teaspoon brown mustard seeds
1 teaspoon turmeric
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 peas
2 teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon salt
Cook the potatoes and carrots with 2 tablespoons water in the microwave for 5 minutes.
Saute the onions. Add the spices and cook until aromatic. Add the rest of the ingredients and saute.
The difficulty of finding gluten free ingredients for baking over the Easter long weekend calls for a shortcut. After baking 2 loaves of bread which compared less favourably than commercial ones available from Country Life Bakery, Noodle Cook dashed into the local supermarket just before closing to grabbed a box of gluten free bread mix which costs AUD$0.55 per 100g. That means a standard 750g loaf made using 500 g mix costs AUD$2.75, which is very much in line with standard breads.
Product: Gluten Free "Easy Bakers Instant Oven Bread" by Laucke Flour Mills
Usage: Bread, rolls, pancakes, pizza, tortillas, cakes, lunch wraps
Version: "Meals and Grains"
Ingredients: Potato flour, tapioca flour, rice flour, grains 13% (linseed, kibbled corn, sunflower seed, soy grits), soy flour, raising agent (575, 500), canola oil, salt, sugar, vegetable gum (464, 412, 415).
Availability in Western Australia: Coles and Woolworths supermarkets
Method suggested for bread: Add 380 mL water to 500 g bread mix. Beat for 2 minutes 30 seconds. Pour better into 1.8 L baking tin. Let rise at 30 degrees Celsius for 20-25 minutes until almost double. Bake at 215 degrees Celsius for 35 minutes until golden brown.
Bread Shelf Life: 2-3 days
Recipes: Not available at website for Gluten Free. Recipes found on the box include pancakes, basic cake, lamingtons, pizza, rolls, bread, wraps and tortillas
Notes: Beautiful, even texture with pleasing moistness. Light, well risen, spongy and flexible. Salty. Smells of beans from the soy flour. Hard to remove from baking tin due to tough crust. Very pale crust when baked to instructions. Crust cracked during baking. Can be used for sandwiches. Toasts can be quite hard.
To produce a better bread with more acceptable aroma, better keeping qualities and crisper crust, try the following. The yeast used here is to produce a more pleasing, bakery-like aroma.
Recipe
250 g Gluten Free Easy Bakers Meals and Grains mix
50 g lentil flour
1 teaspoon dried yeast (1/2 of 8 g packet)
200 mL water
2 teaspoon sugar
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon lecithin granules, optional
1 tablespoon flavoured oil (eg. garlic infused)
Dissolve the yeast in water. Make and bake to instructions given above.
After the surprisingly poor results from the gluten free almond quick bread, Noodle Cook puts on the scientist's hat. Research shows that
General purpose gluten-free flour:
1/2 rice flour
1/4 maize starch
1/4 potato starch
Fortified gluten free flour:
1/4 nut/bean/pea/lentil flour
3/4 general purpose gluten-free flour
Improved gluten free flour:
10 g soy flour for each 100 g gluten-free flour (general or fortified)
10 g milk powder for each 150 g gluten-free flour (general or fortified)
10 g lecithin for each 500 g gluten-free flour (general or fortified)
Egg substitute:
1 egg = 1 tablespoon lecithin minus 1 tablespoon fat from recipe, plus 2 tablespoon liquid
1 egg = 1 tablespoon flaxseed meal plus 2 tablespoon hot water
1 egg = 1/4 cup beancurd
1 egg = 3/4 cup soy yoghurt less some water and fat
1 egg = 1 tablespoon to 1/4 cup fruit sauce or puree
1 egg = 1 1/2 teaspoon Egg Replacer by Ener-G plus 2 tablespoons water
1 egg white = 1 1/2 teaspoon Egg Replacer by Ener-G plus 2 tablespoons water
1 egg yolk = 1 1/2 teaspoon Egg Replacer by Ener-G plus 1 tablespoons water
Gluten replaced flour for pizza, bread, scones, muffins, pasta:
20 g Orgran "Gluten Free Gluten" (GFG) for each 100 g gluten-free flour (general or fortified)
1 teaspoon xanthan gum = 30 g "Gluten Free Gluten" (GFG)
Ingredients listed on Orgran "Gluten Free Gluten": Superfine rice flour, pea extract, maize starch, potato starch, vegetable derived gums & cellulose: guar gum, methylcellulose, carboxymethylcellulose, monoglycerides from vegetable.
Recipe:
Adapted from Buckwheat Bread at taste.com.au
2/3 c rice flour (80 g)
1/3 c maize starch (40 g)
1/3 c pototo starch (40 g)
1/4 c Orgran "Gluten Free Gluten" (30 g)
1/2 c almond meal (50 g)
3 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 egg whites (80 g)
1 cup milk
2 tablespoon sugar
2 teaspoon lecithin (improves keeping quality, reduces oil and replaces egg yolk)
1 tablespoon macadamia/walnut oil
poppy seeds for decoration, optional
Method:
Sift the flours. Combine with almond meal, baking powder and salt.
Whisk the egg whites.
Whisk the remaining ingredients, except for poppy seeds, until the mixture emulsifies.
Fold all ingredients together until combined.
Place in a loaf tin. Sprinkle with poppy seeds.
Bake at 180 degrees Celsius for 1 hour.
Notes: The bread is very dense and heavy, and in part due to insufficient egg. The beautiful aromas produced during cooking did not transpire to the finished product. Overall, this bread tastes awful. Commercial Gluten Free Low GI bread made with almond is available from Country Life Bakery.
The pain perdu (French toast cooked in egg custard) shown here is made from low GI gluten-free bread available from by Country Life Bakery. The low GI comes from almond and linseed fortification of the bread. When cooked, the bread softens to a texture very much like sponge cake. The pain perdu, together with low fat ricotta accompaniment, makes an excellent low GI and high protein meal suitable for weight control. Gluten free food is particularly useful for people with autoimmune diseases like hypothyroidism due to Hashimoto.
According to celebrity gossip, the very famous Betheny Frankel claims her new book "Naturally Thin: Unleash Your SkinnyGirl and Free Yourself from a Lifetime of Dieting" will make Oprah Winfrey thinner.
Noodle Cook cannot claim that food alone can make anyone skinny, but a gluten free meal can contribute to the well being of autoimmune disease sufferers. Would Oprah Winfrey like to try gluten free, low GI, high protein food instead of dieting?
For high protein diets, check out the CSIRO Total Wellbeing Diet Book 1 and Book 2. For gluten free ideas, follow Shauna, the Gluten Free Girl.
A gluten free mecca is the best description for this year's Coles Gluten Free Food & Allergy Expo at the Perth Convention Exhibition Centre. It's not often that a lifestyle expo offers some much FREE food, the sort that coeliac sufferers crave, such as the scrumptious biscuits, cakes and breads.
When the good folks at the Country Life Bakery stand handed over 3 FREE loaves of frozen Gluten Free breads from their range, Noodle Cook accepted greedily.
Well, it's greedy if you didn't share. So here are the leftovers, from the Low GI and White varieties. There's also a Multigrain version.
The white bread looks slightly yellow. The texture resembles that of quick bread, tea bread or soda bread, namely firm, dense and somewhat heavy. In some way, the bread reminds of home made sour bread without the tangy taste. Unlike soda bread, there is no unpleasant mouth feel.
The bread toasted well with a lovely golden colour and an aroma that rivalled any top cafe. On toasting, the bread softens on the inside while the outside remains firm and crisp. The crispness is not delicate like wheat bread. This texture is excellent for pain perdu and croutons for topping French onion soup. The low GI bread is truly filling: one slice can ruin dinner!
The packaging is clearly labelled for people who need to avoid gluten. The ingredients are listed together with food codes. Both loaves contain sulphites preservative (220).
You can find out more about the gluten free breads from the Country Life Bakery website or writing to 21 Hydrive Close, Dandenong, Victoria 3175.
If you need gluten free ideas, head over to Gluten Free Girl, the top food blog for coeliacs.
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