dead sun's Journal: Gluten Free Cookies (Help!)

Okay, so, the backstory. I'm hosting a cookie party. Entry fee, one dozen cookies. Lots of people come, lots of cookies are had. Everybody is happy.

Problem. One of my wife's (still getting used to that) coworkers' significant other has a wheat alergy. No gluten allowed. They weren't going to come, because what fun is it to be surrounded by tasty treats and not be able to eat any of them.

Solution. I know gluten free flour exists, know my local grocery store even carries it. Offer to make a couple batches of gluten free cookies. Yay, everybody is once again happy.

Problem number two. I made a test batch of cookies, to make sure they'd come out right. I added Xanthan Gum in a teaspoon per cup of gluten free flour ratio, to try to replace the gluten. The dough turned out sticky and tasted horrible as dough. The cookies cooked, spread out way too much, and stuck to my non-stick pans. The cookies tasted fine after cooking, but they didn't turn out right at all.

Can anybody tell me what's going wrong, or maybe just post a good gluten free cookie recipe or two? Thanks in advance.

wich I could help

[sparky4]

but I tend to buy the packaged mixes instead of baking from scratch. To be absolutely honest, I buy the premade cookies more often than not due to time constraints.

I will say that the texture will not be the same as from any gluten containing cookie. It took me a while to get used to fresh made gluten free items, they are just , well, different. My sister made has made me three different gluten free items and she was not positive in her critique of taste/texture. I found them delightful.

Pamela's has a g

3 Words

[ellem]

blind
er
Sol

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[dead sun]

Yeah, I knew Sol had to deal with this stuff regularly, and thought others in the circle might. I have an email out to Sol now (but not before) asking for help. Hopefully somebody can help me out here. I don't want to have said there'll be cookies and not have any. :(

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[turg]

I'm another one. Gluten free baking is tricky. And there are lots of stores around me that have great gluten free baked goods already made. So I haven't done any GF baking in a very long time now. The recipes section of celiac.com is a good reference.

Don't approach this as standard baking...

[danlyke]

In a weblog post I made about gluten-free pancakes [flutterby.com], a friend pitched the Nameste Foods [namastefoods.com] mixes.

In general I've had better luck when I don't think of gluten-free flours in terms that you'd normally use for wheat flours. For instance, you could use a soufflé technique (like I describe for my pancakes) to fluff things a bit, or you could ditch the flour all together and do a meringue (I forget what they call them, but those white cookies).

I haven't tried it, but a hybrid, beat the whites, gently fold the

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[dead sun]

Meringues are good, but I'm not great at making them for some reason. They always come out such that they pack together into a hard sugary substance and don't chew right. My mother always makes them at Christmas time though, and they're good. It's a good idea, but I'm not sure I can put it into practice.

I have an inquiry out as to whether there are any other alergies, like to nuts and the like. Peanut butter cookies of various sorts require little to no flour, so that might work.

I'm using Bob's Red Mill flo

the dragon's on the case

[blinder]

she's on top of it. we make some very good cookies and we also manage to find really good cookies also.

we think its gluten free pantry that has a bunch of really good mixes. but like i said, solemn will help you out there :)

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[dead sun]

Thanks a ton. I really appreciate it. Looks like there's a few places that carry Gluten Free Pantry products in the general vicinity of me, so I can go and pick something up if needed.

Thanks again.