Sunday 25 March 2012

Gluten-Free Waffles for National Waffle Day

Today is National Waffle Day!  It’s also National Flour Month so I decided to celebrate both events by making gluten-free waffles with different types of flour. 

Flax-Coconut Pancakes are featured on the cover of the March Issue of Food and Wine. I thought they looked divine so I used the same ingredients for the batter, but added a good bit more milk to make these crispy, Gluten-Free Flax-Coconut Waffles.  These delicious waffles are made with brown rice flour, white rice flour, potato starch, tapioca starch, coconut flour and flaxseed meal.

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Milling the Gluten-Free Grains

I went to the Asheville Bread Baking Festival this past weekend and attended a session on milling your own flour with Debi Thomas of Wildflour Bakery in Saluda, NC. She demonstrated milling different types of flour in different kinds of mills. I took photos of some of the mills, but forgot to get a photo of the beautiful Swedish mill.  It was on the other end.

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This one is a hand grinder.

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This is a Kitchen Aid Mixer with a grain mill attachment.  It actually worked pretty well.

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I was still in the milling mindset when I decided to make these waffles. I didn’t have any tapioca starch and thought I was going to have to run to the store, but then I remembered I had an attachment for my WonderMill electric grain mill that allows me to grind smaller grains such as tapioca pearls. I had some tapioca pearls in the freezer so that saved me a trip to the store. I was able to use my new attachment to grind the tapioca pearls into tapioca starch. So cool!

 

Gluten-Free Flax-Coconut Waffles

A combination of brown rice flour, white rice flour, potato starch and tapioca starch makes an excellent substitution for all-purpose flour. Adding coconut flour provides rich fiber and it’s a good source of protein.

You might enjoy some of these Gluten-free flours for baking.

Makes: About 10 –12 Waffles

Adapted from “Flax-Coconut Pancakes” Food and Wine, March 2011 Issue

Ingredients:

  • 1/3 cup brown rice flour
  • 1/3 cup white rice flour
  • 1/4 cup sugar
  • 3 tablespoons potato starch
  • 3 tablespoons tapioca starch
  • 3 tablespoons coconut flour
  • 2 tablespoons flaxseed meal
  • 2 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 1/4 cups milk, at room temperature
  • 1/4 cup coconut oil, melted, plus more for the griddle
  • Fresh fruit and maple syrup, for serving

 

Tapioca Pearls

Tapioca Starch

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I had coconut flour, white rice flour, potato starch and flax meal, but no brown rice flour.  So I ground some brown rice into flour.  It’s pretty cool to see brown rice kernels turn into flour.

Brown Rice

Brown Rice Flour

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Directions:

1) In a large bowl, whisk the brown and white rice flours with the sugar, potato starch, tapioca starch, coconut flour, flaxseed meal, baking powder and salt.

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2) In another bowl, whisk the eggs and milk with the 1/4 cup of coconut oil and mix into the dry ingredients just until the batter is moistened.  Add more milk if the batter is very thick. 

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Note: Be sure the milk is room temperature.  Otherwise, the coconut oil will harden when you add it to the other liquid ingredients.  Ask me how I know…

 

3) Preheat a griddle and brush lightly with coconut oil.    Follow the manufactures instructions for using your griddle.  I used about 2 tablespoons of batter per waffle. I added a good bit more milk, but the first batch was still pretty thick so I added even more milk when I made the rest of the waffles.

 

4) Remove the waffles to serving plates and serve with fruit and real maple syrup.

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As you can see, I enjoyed the bite that was just waiting to be eaten.  The first batch made thick waffles, but the flavor was wonderful. 

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For the next batch, I added more milk and let the waffles cook a little bit longer on the griddle so they were slightly more browned and crispy. The coconut flour and coconut oil give these waffles a very unique flavor and the brown rice provides the crispiness. Deliciousness!

 

Happy Baking!

Cathy

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