Banana Bread

I was excited and nervous about my first foray into gluten-free baking. Extensive online research had informed me that gluten-free baking is very difficult to get right. Most gluten-free baking utilizes either potato flour or xantham gum/guar gum, making my task even more difficult. Everything I read emphasized that you MUST use a gum to create elasticity within your baked goods, i.e. replace what normal gluten accomplishes. Great. 

Then I ran across this blog (http://glutenfreegirl.com/chia-seeds-and-flaxseeds/) touting a solution to the problem of gum-free gluten-free baking: subbing in flax or chia seeds. The author suggests subbing the same amount of flax or chia seeds as the amount of gum called for in a recipe, and making a slurry with flax/chia and boiled water in a 1:2 ratio. I opted to use flax in this recipe because I wanted the nutty flavor for my bread.

I chose to adapt my future mother-in-law's well-loved family recipe for banana bread. I cut out the flour and processed sugar and reduced the butter from 1.5 sticks to 1.  I also added in cinnamon and ginger. I subbed agave syrup for brown sugar; you cannot substitute in a 1:1 ratio because the agave is liquid and regular sugar is not. The original recipe called for 1 c. of sugar, which I cut in half. In regular baking, most recipes caution you to mix the dry and wet ingredients separately and carefully fold them together. My understanding (and I am no food chemist!) is that over-mixing activates the gluten and makes the final product less light and fluffy. However for gluten-free baking that's not a concern. I prepared the whole batter in one mixing bowl and used the hand-mixer extensively because I wasn't worried about over-working the batter. I think that my resulting cake had such a nice texture precisely because I mixed so heavily.

For my flour, I chose to try out Jeanne's Gluten-Free Flour (http://www.artofglutenfreebaking.com/2009/11/the-story-behind-my-gluten-free-flour-mix/). It calls for white rice flour, brown rice flour, mochiko (the sweet rice flour used to make mochi), tapioca flour, and xantham gum. 

I ground up white and brown rice separately in my blender to make flour. I didn't get every tiny bit of rice ground up and was a bit worried that would affect the baking, but it didn't seem to. The mochiko and tapioca flour I purchased at the grocery store. I also ground up the flax seed in the blender.

brown rice flour

 

whole flax seed, ground flax seed, flax seed slurry

Ingredients:

• 2 cups Jeanne's Gluten-Free Flour, minus xantham gum
• 2 t. ground flax seed, mixed together with 4 tsp. boiling water
• 2 t. baking powder
• 3/4 t. salt
• 1 t. baking soda
• 1 T. ginger
• 2 T. cinnamon
• 4 eggs
• 1 stick butter
• 1/2 c. light agave syrup
• 4 ripe bananas

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
2. In a bowl, stir together the dry ingredients. Add in the flax seed slurry. 
3. Melt the butter and add that along with the eggs to your dry mixture. Use the handmixer to beat together. Add the agave and beat that in as well. 
4. Gradually cut bananas into the batter, stopping periodically to beat the slices in. 
5. Pour the batter into a greased 8x8 pyrex dish or two 8x4 loaf pans. 
6. I baked this for one hour at 350 degrees. HOWEVER, my oven is notoriously bad. The original recipe calls for baking the bread for only 25 minutes. I suggest setting your timer to 25 minutes and then monitoring carefully after that point. 

The bread is soft, dense, rich, and absolutely lovely. My future husband ate three pieces in one sitting!