Tag: gluten free

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Colombian Crunchy Chicken Bites Seasoned Corn Coating

I like this packet for making crunchy chicken bites.

A mild blend for light, oven-baked, crunchy, gluten free bites. Use our simple blend to make delicious Colombian-inspired crunchy chicken bites in your oven. We use corn, instead of wheat, to get that extra crispiness which is loved by adults and kids alike, making it perfect for a family night in. Buen provecho!

What I also like about this pack is that it is gluten-free.

The process is nice and simple, I take some chicken thighs and cut them into strips which are placed in a bowl, to which I add some sunflower oil and the contents of the pack. This is mixed together and then the chicken is placed on a baking tray. I usually line the tray with baking parchment.

The chicken strips are then cooked in the oven.

What you get a crunchy spicy chicken. I like to eat them in a wrap with some sour cream and pea shoots. 

However I am now having real trouble finding it in my local supermarkets, Morrisons no longer sell it, my local Waitrose had it on special for a while, but now it’s no longer on the shelves. In theory it’s available at Asda, but I have never seen it at my nearest branch. So as a result I have been looking at making my own version using spices and gluten free breadcrumbs.

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Gluten Free Spicy Crispy Chicken Strips

I made these spicy crispy chicken strips to accompany an asian inspired meal I was cooking.

Gluten Free Spicy Crispy Chicken Strips

I cut some chicken thighs into strips and then coated them in a homemade batter. The batter was made from gluten free self raising flour, mixed with a single egg and flavoured with salt and pepper, and Schwartz Japanese 7 Spice Yakitori Seasoning. The aim was to coat the chicken with the batter, ensure the batter is thick enough to coat the chicken, but not too thick so that there is a thick layer of batter on the chicken.

The chicken strips are then shallow fried in batches in hot oil. After draining on kitchen paper, I finished them off in the oven.

I served them with sweet chilli sauce.

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Homemade Gluten Free Pizza

I have made my own gluten free pizza dough, but I was intrigued when I found the Davina Steel Pizza Base Mix in my local branch of Waitrose. I had tried their Focaccia mix and we had enjoyed eating that.

The process of using the mix is rather interesting in that you stir the mix, with yeast and water, into a batter and then “cook” the bases in a dry frying pan. Basically you spread the batter into the frying pan, cook on the hob, before removing. You then add your tomato base, cheese and toppings, before finishing off in a hot oven.

I was really impressed with the end result, these looked and tasted like pizza. I personally think the bases are better than others we have bought, both mixes and ready made bases.

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Gluten Free Colourful Victoria Sponge

Gluten Free Colourful Victoria Sponge

This is a tasty but colourful gluten free colourful Victoria sponge cake.

The recipe is based on the weight of two eggs

Ingredients

For each layer of the cake

      • 3 standard eggs
      • Take the same weight of two of the eggs of soft butter
      • Take the same weight of two of the eggs in caster sugar
      • Take the same weight of two of the eggs in self-raising gluten-free flour
      • Vanilla essence
      • Food colouring (different colour for each layer)

For the filling

      • Strawberry jam
      • Whipped cream

Method

Cream the sugar and butter until you have a smooth consistency. I try and leave the butter out so that it is really soft.

Beat the eggs, add some vanilla essence. I then added athe food colouring to brighten the cake mixture.

Stir the eggs into the creamed butter and sugar with some of the flour, until the mixture is smooth and consistent.

Then fold in the remaining flour until it is combined with the rest of the mixture.

Spoon the mixture into a greased cake tin.

Repeat the process for the second (and if required third layer).

The bake the cake in a 180º normal oven or 160º fan oven for 25-30 minutes or until a metal skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean.

Cool and then construct the cake, spreading jam and then cream.

Finally dust the cake with icing sugar.

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Time for Gluten Free Scotch Eggs

Gluten Free Scotch Eggs

Myself and others in the family quite enjoy scotch eggs, however now with a couple of people in the family on gluten free diets I was set the challenge of making some gluten free scotch eggs. The main issue with shop bought scotch eggs is the wheat in the breadcrumbs on the outside and potentially wheat in the sausage meat.

So remembering a cookery programme where they had cooked scotch eggs (I think it was Professional Masterchef) I went out and bought some ingredients.

As well as the medium sized free range eggs, I got some gluten free chipolata sausages. I did think if I should make my own gluten free breadcrumbs, but in the end I did find a packet of gluten free breadcrumbs from Morrisons.

I decided to use these as they would ensure the scotch eggs looked like the ones you could buy in the shops.

I hard boiled the eggs for ten minutes and then left them to cool. I did think about doing soft boiled eggs with a runny yolk, as they did on the telly, but in the end I wasn’t sure of the timings.

Having peeled the eggs I took the sausage meat from a single chipolata. I did this by gently slicing the skin of the sausage and removing it. I patted the sausage meat into a thin circle before wrapping it around the egg. One tip I had picked up from the cooking programme was to ensure that the sausagement was an even layer around the egg, which I think I managed to do.

The scotch egg was then rolled and covered in gluten free plain flour, then covered in beaten egg, before being covered in the gluten free breadcrumbs.

The resulting scotch egg was then deep fried in hot oil. It’s at times like this I wish I had a proper deep fat fryer, but in the end I cooked them in a smallish pan one at a time.

Once I thought the sausagemeat was cooked, the scotch egg was removed from the oil and drained on kitchen paper.

Well the end result was an authentic looking, tasting scotch egg with the texture one would expect. I was well pleased and they were very tasty.

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Time for a Caesar Salad

I did quite fancy a Caesar salad for lunch, but I don’t buy the kits, partly as I prefer making my own, partly, as I like more than croutons and parmesan, and mainly as I need to have gluten free croutons.

For my Caesar salad I took some Romaine Lettuce and cut in half and set them across the plate. To this I added some white anchovies, quartered small tomatoes and peelings of parmesan.

For the croutons, I took the crusts of a Schär white loaf and sliced it into cubes. In a hot pan I added some olive oil and some butter, to which I added the cubes of bread and some dried Italian herbs. Once the croutons are browned I took them out of the pan and drained them on some kitchen paper.

These were then added to the salad, followed with some freshly ground black pepper.

I have variations, sometimes I prefer sun-dried tomatoes, but then I do like fresh, it’s a preference. 

I do sometimes add Caesar salad dressing, but usually have it on the side.

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Gluten Free Chocolate Fudge Cake

Though I do make my own cakes I sometimes use mixes, both for convenience, but also sometimes to try something new.

One pack we recently used, and really enjoyed was Betty Crocker Gluten Free Devil’s Food Chocolate Cake Mix.

Despite what you see on the box, you don’t get the icing, so you need to buy that as an extra.

As well as the mix you also need:

      • 125ml vegetable oil
      • 250ml water
      • 4 medium free range eggs

There are three steps:

      1. Mix the eggs, oil, water and cake mix gently together and whisk (by hand or electric mixer) for 2-3 minutes until smooth and creamy.
      2. Pour the cake mixture evenly into two greased cake tins.
      3. Bake in the centre of the oven for between 23-28 minutes or until a rounded knife inserted fully into the centre of the cake comes out clean. 

Once cool you can smother the cake with chocolate fudge icing.

It was rather good, and to be honest you wouldn’t know it was gluten free as it had the taste, texture and smell of a chocolate fudge cake even without the icing.

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Gluten Free White Chocolate Chip Biscuits

I made some gluten free white chocolate chip biscuits or cookies using my normal recipe which is in this blog post. This is the same recipe that I use to use before I needed to bake a lot of gluten free cakes and biscuits.

Ingredients

      • 1 standard egg.
      • Take the same weight of the egg in cold butter.
      • Twice the same weight of the egg in plain gluten-free flour.
      • Same weight of the egg of sugar.
      • Vanilla essence.
      • Handful of white chocolate drops or chips

Take the flour, and add the cold butter, cut into small cubes. Combine the butter and flour by rubbing the butter into the flour, until there are no lumps and the mixture resembles breadcrumbs.

Then stir in the sugar and the white chocolate chips. You could of course use milk or dark chocolate chips if you prefer.

Add the egg and vanillla essence combine until the biscuit dough is smooth.

How you could take spoonfuls onto a banking sheet, but what I do is wrap the dough in cling film and cool in the fridge for a fair few hours. This firms up the dough, so then you can roll it into a 2cm roll of dough and then slice it into 1cm rounds.

These rounds can the be placed onto a baking sheet or tray.

Bake in a pre-heated oven, at 180 degrees for about six minutes until the edges are brown. Be careful as they will go from done, to overdone very quickly.

Place on a cooling rack.

Enjoy.

These can also be the basis for homemade rocky road as well.

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Colourful Gluten Free Cake

This is a tasty but colourful loaf cake.

The recipe is based on the weight of two eggs

Ingredients

      • 3 standard eggs
      • Take the same weight of two of the eggs of soft butter
      • Take the same weight of two of the eggs in caster sugar
      • Take the same weight of two of the eggs in self-raising gluten-free flour
      • Vanilla essence
      • Yellow food colouring
      • Red food colouring
      • Green food colouring

Cream the sugar and butter until you have a smooth consistency.

Beat the eggs, add some vanilla essence. I then added a little yellow food colouring to brighten the cake mixture.

Stir the eggs into the creamed butter and sugar with some of the flour, until the mixture is smooth and consistent.

Then fold in the remaining flour until it is combined with the rest of the mixture.

Spoon a third the mixture into one side of a loaf tin. Then separate the remaining mixture into two portions.

With one of the portions, add some red food colouring to the mixture and stir it carefully until you have a nice consistent coloured mixture. With the other portion use green food colouring.

You can of course use whatever colours you like.

Spoon these cake mixture portions into the loaf tin.

I then used a knife to gently swirl the three coloured mixtures together, you’re trying to achieve a swirly effect, not to combine the mix.

The bake the cake in a 180º normal oven or 160º fan oven for 30-35 minutes or until a metal skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean.

Cool and then serve in slices.

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More homemade Gluten Free Sausage Rolls

I have used Jus-Rol’s gluten free puff pastry quite a few times now, it is easy to use and works well.

Jus Rol Gluten Free Puff Pastry

It comes as a ready rolled sheet, so using a different method to what I did before, on the short edge I added the filling. I did two kinds of fillings, both using the meat from standard sausages (I removed the skins), but with one I added some diced apple.

Having laid out the filling I rolled the pastry across the filling, that gave me an indication where to cut. I brushed the join with egg and then sealed the join. I then cut them into three rooms, before I  placed them on a baking tray, made slices in the top and  brushed with beaten egg.

This was then baked in a hot oven for around twenty minutes, until they were golden brown.

Homemade Gluten Free Sausage Rolls

They worked very well, the pastry I think it needed to be a bit more flakey, but it was really easy to use and tasted very nice.