Some GF recipes you might want to try

[Guest guest]

A number of us get together, generally monthly, for a pot-luck. Here are three recipes that worked out well and disappeared quickly during our most recent brunch.

GF Orange Cake: Here is a recipe straight out of the newspaper, modified to be gluten-free and then zipped up because it was a little dull: http://home.comcast.net/~vhdolcourt/gfbaking/desserts/orange_cake.html or http://tinyurl.com/33canx. The version we served was without "official" frosting but the cake was split in half and the area between the two layers was spread with a mixture of blackberry and blueberry preserves. The top had a thin layer of peach-raisin preservers. You can let your imagination run wild!

Since some of our members have issues with soy, dairy and eggs, it was a bit of a challenge to come up a single recipe that tasted good and could be made to accommodate the group of 25 brunchers. A modification to the following recipe, previously posted on our Gluten Free Baking website, did the trick: http://home.comcast.net/~vhdolcourt/gfbaking/quick_breads_and_pancakes/ocqb_pancakes.html or http://tinyurl.com/2s4jty. The modification, using applesauce, worked extremely well. The modified pancake recipe is different than the original, but it is wholly good in its own right.

If you have The Best-ever Wheat and Gluten-Free Baking Book by Ann and Mace Wenniger, you might want to try the following modification to "Basic Pancakes" on page 83. Since one of our members can't eat corn, I substituted sorghum for the cornmeal. But I thought the recipe looked kind of Wonder Bread-y with 2/3 of the flour being cornstarch and tapioca starch. So I left out 2 Tablespoons of each and substituted in 2 Tablespoons of Millet flour, 2 Tablespoons of Bob's Red Mill Garbanzo-Fava flour and 1 Tablespoon of golden flaxseed meal. The recipe is pretty rich with two eggs and 3 Tablespoons of melted butter, so I left out the butter and one egg. I've made the recipe before with and without the yogurt, and I think omitting it improves the pancakes. These, too, disappeared quickly. The plain pancakes were an interesting contrast to the ones above, and I figured that soy, dairy and egg-free pancakes would be a bit too health-foody for some of our guests that could eat either. Must have been the crowd, because people were taking both, even the kids. Go figure!

Please let me know your changes to the recipes. We are always looking for improvements.

Vic and Hallie - Sunnyvale