Essential equipment for gluten free baking

A great friend of mine EG happened to be an Australian living in London. She was my foodie friend and with her husband they became our eating out friends. But they went home back to Adelaide. I was very sad to see them go, and have not yet found a replacement (nominations accepted by email...!).

EG's parting gift was an electric hand whisk - although thinking about it, I think she made me buy it from her. Anyway, everytime I use it I think of her. Thats quite a lot at the moment as I have baking like crazy, partly because I now have eletric hand whisk.

Without using wheat flour or a gluten ingredient in making cakes, puddings and deserts you loose the associated structure, texture and rise. Another way of bringing volume and texture to the final result is through eggs, which is how most of the recipes I have been using replace the need for wheat flour.

Seperating the eggs and whisking air into the whites or creaming the sugar with egg yolks makes the cake lighter and rise with a souflee like texture. Before my good friend's departure I used to do this all by hand making which made me much less inclinded to bake. But now....with electric whisk in hand - nothing can stop me.

My weekend ritual has become experimenting with new cakes - and we are getting a little more round in this house as a result. This weekend with an excess of seasonal beetroot, I was emailed by my organic box scheme company Riverford Organics a recipe for beetroot brownies... inspired!

They should however come with a warning...they are bright PINK!

The mixture is bright pink from the cooked and pureed beetroot, so you do need to be careful where you put the lid from the food processor, for example...

A great use for the surplus of beetroot at this time of year, they resulted in a very moist, gluten free chocolate brownie with the slightest hue of deep pink. Testament to this...? There were none left a day later!

If you are newly diagnosed and looking to get into gluten free baking...get an electric hand whisk...

Other cake recipes - Poopy seed cake, Lemon and Polenta Cake, Christmas Cake, Victoria Sponge, Chocolate Cake, Chocolate Brownies, Lemon Pudding and plenty more to come.