Our next #CookWithLou live session will be on Friday 10th July, when we will be making gluten free tea cakes. This follows a request from a lovely friend, who has missed tea cakes since being required to adopt a gluten free diet for health reasons. If you want to register for the session, please do so here.
If anyone else has any similar requests, please drop me a line here. Your request may even end up on a future CookWithLou live!
When making gluten free bread or cakes, the first thing to notice is that you’re not working with a dough. You’ll find that the mixture is more like a batter due to the lack of gluten, so you can’t shape and mould it as you would with conventional dough. Hence, for these tea cakes, I would recommend you use four crumpet rings to provide the support needed to produce a tea cake which looks authentic as well as tasting delicious.
For those interested, I’ve developed lots of other gluten free bread recipes working with Coeliac UK, and they are available on Coeliac UK’s website at www.coeliac.org.uk.
Gluten Free Tea Cakes
Preparation: 10 minutes, plus proving
Cooking Time: 15 minutes
Portions: 4
Ingredients
175ml whole milk (you can use a dairy free alternative if you wish)
1 tsp. dried yeast
1 tbsp caster sugar (can add more if you want a sweeter bread)
2 egg whites (you can use the yolks for another recipe)
1 tbsp vegetable oil, plus extra for greasing the rings
Pinch of ground cinnamon
225g gluten free bread flour
75g sultanas or dried fruit of your choice
Method
- Preheat the oven to 200 °C, 375°F, gas mark 6.
- Warm the milk so it’s just warm (30°C). Add the yeast and sugar and leave for 10 minutes or until it starts to bubble. This is so we know the yeast works. Add the egg whites, oil, and cinnamon and whisk them together with the milk.
- Put the gluten free bread flour into a bowl, and gradually add the milk mixture, beating it until a smooth batter is formed. Add the sultanas and stir so they are evenly distributed, then divide the mixture between the prepared, greased crumpet rings.
- Cover with a clean damp tea towel and prove in a warm place for about 30 minutes. After this time, they should have doubled in size – if not wait a few more minutes. In a warmer kitchen this might be slightly quicker.
- Once proved, bake in the oven for about 15 minutes.
- Transfer to a wire rack, and leave to cool before removing from the crumpet ring.
Photography by James Kennedy.
