Saturday, September 8, 2012

Allergy - Free Zucchini Bread

After making the Brown Rice Cream the other day, the first thing I wanted to do was start experimenting! Luckily, these days I'm at no loss for inspiration thanks to the array of cookbooks in my "to-review" pile, and when I found a recipe in Colette Martin's Learning to Bake Allergen-Free: A Crash Course for Busy Parents on Baking without Wheat, Gluten, Dairy, Eggs, Soy or Nuts
that used both rice milk and the dirt-cheap zucchini the local farmers were trying desperately to sell at the market I knew immediately I had to try it out.

Since the book only called for a vague "gluten free flour blend", I opted to make my own mixture instead of going out to buy a premade one. Not only was this a cheaper option (since I have an arsenal of flours in my pantry) but I find the commercial mixes to be very "bean heavy" and dense in most baking applications. I added a dash of cinnamon and cardamom to the batter too, since there was no spice at all in the original recipe, and since the finished loaf was still more of a a "white" or "vanilla" cake that happened to have zucchini in it than your standard spice-laden quick bread I added a cinnamon-sugar drizzle for a bit of extra "oomph".  


In the end, all the little tweaks and twists I made coupled with an already fantastic formula to create a truly delicious dessert. The girls at my hair salon whom I served it to told me that they'd never know it was allergen-free if I hadn't said anything - and a few of the ladies who had children at home loved that the only real indication of the vegetable at all were the green flecks, which can be eradicated by simply peeling the zucchini!

Allergy - Free Zucchini Bread
Serves 12
2/3 cup chickpea flour
2/3 cup sorghum flour
2/3 cup brown rice flour
1/2 tsp guar gum
3/4 cup sugar
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp cardamom
pinch nutmeg
1 tbsp enerG egg replacer (or 2 eggs, eliminate the water)
1/4 cup warm water
1/2 cup canola oil
3/4 cup rice milk (I used my Brown Rice Cream)
1 tbsp pure vanilla
1 large zucchini, finely shredded

Glaze:
3 tbsp icing sugar
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 - 2 tsp water

  1. Preheat the oven to 350F and grease a 9x5" loaf pan.
  2. Whisk together the flours, guar gum, sugar, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, cardamom and nutmeg, set aside.
  3. In a large bowl, beat together the egg replacer powder, water, oil, rice milk, and vanilla until well combined.
  4. Beat in the flour mixture until smooth, then add the zucchini and beat in.
  5. Bake 55 - 60 minutes. Cool for 30 minutes in the pan, then carefully un-mould onto a wire rack and cool completely.
For glaze:
  1. Whisk together the icing sugar and cinnamon, then drizzle in the water until a thick but pourable mixture is achieved.
  2. Drizzle over the cooled cake and let set. 

Amount Per Serving 
Calories: 226.0
Total Fat: 9.9 g
Cholesterol: 0.0 mg
Sodium: 201.0 mg
Total Carbs: 32.6 g
Dietary Fiber: 1.8 g
Protein: 3.0 g
 

Linked to #glutenfree Fridays Recipe Party #4

1 comment :

Thanks for the feedback!