Gluten Free SD starter | The Fresh Loaf

Hello to the community of the Gluten free bread,

I have been asked by a friend to make a bread gluten free and free yeasted ! I read everything I could about the subject understanding that with no yeast I need at least to begin with a sourdough. I tried to follow the intruction of Nicob or d ( may be I mispell his name) using brown rice flour. but the result is not at all what he shows on his blog (in Italian) mine refuse to bubble like his. It's already one week and still just a little very little few miniature bubbles... I cannot go further before I have the sourdough question sorted. I also read to try and build the sourdough from a teaspoon of Rye sourdough, so I parted my on going SD try, and try this way as the baker explain that at the end of the process the % of the Rye will not be noticable and may be the person who need this bread is not allergic to Rye.

Is someone can help me with this subject ? also I rather prefer to use potato flour soy flour balsam flour or... than to use more rice in the bread after the SD will be mix with the rest of the ingredients. do you have something to tell me about ?

And the last, if no yeast, is it possible to use baking powder and/or soda bicarbonate ? will it help to raise like it does in a cake ?

Please Help !

Bea

in the jar like it's non-glutinous counterpart but it will loosen up indicating yeast is active. A see thu container is a must. Then you can observe the bubbles forming between the starter and the container.

It's already one week and still just a little very little few miniature bubbles...

That sounds pretty good to me! Just keep with it, discarding about half to two thirds and feeding water and flour to the maintain the same amount of starter. Keep it warm, between 75 and 85°F and keep track of the aromas coming off the starter.

Running in to the GF (gluten free) breads has it's problems... getting the dough to rise with a different kind of gel structure other than gluten and trying to get the taste of ... what... wheat? The biggest hurdle (in N.America) is trying to get a wheat taste out of non-wheat ingredients. Unless...

If one ignores the idea of wheat tasting bread, then the kitchen is open for much more experimentation! :)

I can't speak to making the bread but the yeast part has many options available for gluten free. "Yeast" can be made with any sugar/starch(apples,raisins,tomatoes).Yeast is everywhere.

Enter "Yeast Water" in the search box but here is a link to a long post by RonRay that kind of summarizes some instruction along with philosophizing about the delights of yeast water. Skim over it.

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/23441/yeast-water-amp-other-wee-beastie-bubbles-no-math

Have fun and post your results.

A contrarian viewpoint which you may choose to ignore: You may not want to tell your friend that "sourdough" is still yeast; "natural" yeast rather than "commercial" yeast ...but from the same family (sometimes the very same species:-)of funky biological organisms nevertheless.

Thanks to all of you, Thanks to your remarks Mini, and to your link Clara I made a big jump yesterday. The main thing I did was to discard 1/2 of my RiceSD who was going for 10 days now and was not showing enough bubbles to my satisfaction. Instead of throwing out the 1/2 I put it in another container, so that I got the same amount in two containers and fed them with the same amount of rice and water. The second thing was to make sure that they were standing in a very warm place in the kitchen (aka near the stove !) were I could got a temperature close to 30C. First thing I did this morning was to rush to the kitchen and here it was, the miracle, the SD had doubled and finally shows very strong signs of big bubbles (holes) Wandering from one link to another, yesterday I reached a link about kefir water... and decided to do it on the spot. but just before doing it I reached the link to Ronray and I then mixed 1.5 liter of water with slices of pink lady apple a handful of organic currants and a slice of lemon, and as I had a sachet of Kefirpowder I put it into the mix also, thinking that it should not affect the result may be the opposite. I'm now in front of a cupboard full of all sort of GF flour,like brown rice, potato, corn, flaxmeal, buckwheat, soy, and I'm wondering what will be the best combination to use in order to get something that will look like a loaf and won't have a too strong Rice flavour. I think to mix Potato with Buckwheat as main flours and use the recipe of Janedo. I have now two containers with about 300 gr.of sourdough in each (they continue to grow up!) which should be enough to fill a cup and 1/2 as it is recommanded in all the recipes I read.The smell is slightly acidic but not too much. In fact two days ago it smelt like pure vinegar! I have done good photos of my SD results as well as from my bottle of yeast water (about 12 hours ongoing) but I have absolutely no idea how to upload them on the site. The window where I'm writting right now don't have any spot showing a way to upload photos as it was in the past when I managed to upload succesfully through flicker. If you are interested you can send me a email address and I will send them to you. Thank also to Ananda who gave me a better link to Sharonk articles than I had, and thank to Ronray who is a well of practical knowledge about the yeast water. The most funny thing is that the TFL first threads of the blogging from last night are about natural yeast water ! I could not believe my eyes when I saw this, just when I was turning my head towards this same subject. The difference is that the writers don't seem to need it for a GF bread baking. Chuck, what you say is absolutely right, but I expect that the Doctor was talking about commercial yeast... may be they don't even know about the yeast water or kefir water. Next time I will see my GP I will grill him about this subject!.... So today will be probably the D Day for my first GF loaf of bread. I let you know the result catastrophic or good ! Bea

I have been making gluten free bread for about 2 years with excellent results. Mine is not a sourdough but it is very good. Because there is no gluten I use xanthan gum (1 1/2 teaspoon per loaf). I also don't make loaves anymore because the bread dries out too fast once cut. I prefer instead to make "buns" as my kids call them. I use a muffin top pan and they are just the right size for a sandwich. The flour mix that I make contains millet, sorghum, arrowroot starch (or cornstarch but the arrowroot works the same IMO and is cheaper), potato starch and tapioca flour (tapioca adds a bit of chewiness to the bread). I also add some teff flour sometimes which makes the bread a little bit healthier. For pizza I use brown rice flour, potato starch, tapioca flour, and millet. Hope this helps. I have read about gluten free sourdough but it seems pretty tricky and I just don't have the time right now to experiment. I would love it if I could make it because I love sourdough bread the best. Good luck and keep us posted on the results.

Hi jbaudo, your tip arrived just in time as I was about to make a small loaf for my first experiment. My rice sourdough kicked out after I went through the remarks of Mini, the heat temperature demanded is a very important factor. The place where you do your sourdough should be around 30C ! it's a big difference from when I do a Rye sourdough which will stand in a room temp. that won't pass 20/22C and will rise without a problem. Can you give me the quantities of the flours you use to do your buns ? I was about to use Buckwheat flour and potato flour mixed with tapioca and flaxmeal. Are you from Australia ? you seem to be at the same time as I'm. What is Teff flour ? Bea

I am actually in the US central time zone.

Here are the proportions for my flour mix - 1/3 part millet (2cups) , 1/6 ppartsorghum (1cup), 1/6 part arrowroot or cornstarch (1 cup), 1/6 part potato starch(not flour)(1 cup , 1/6 part tapioca flour (1 cup). The reason for all the starch is to give the bread a lighter texture and improve mouth feel. Also, steer clear of rye because rye has gluten.

Teff four - here is what it says on the Bob's Red Mill website: "Teff (Tef, T'ef) Flour is a pleasingly light, uniquely flavored, whole grain flour. Due to Teff?s size, it is almost impossible to grind in your home mill. We are glad to do the work for you! Ethiopians make a flat crepe-like bread called injera from teff flour. Substitute teff for about a fourth of the all-purpose flour called for in your favorite baked goods recipe to add an appealing taste and added nutrition."

The bread I make does not need to be kneaded and the dough looks more like a thick cake batter than a regular bread dough. It does, however, need to be mixed very well - I use my kitchen aid stand mixer). I just pour it in the pan (or use a large scoop for the buns) and then smooth down the top with wet hands (so the dough doesn't stick to me). I am pretty sure if you can get a good starter you won't need to add any xanthan gum to make it hold together. My recipe also calls for unflavored gelatin(1 tsp per loaf) which I am sure helps it to hold together as well.

In case you are interested there is a website for a magazine (LivingWithout.com) that specializes in gluten free and allergy friendly recipes.