It turned out that I’m gluten and dairy intolerant. I haven’t been drinking milk for 12 years now and I’m off wheat the last five years (on and off to be precise and honest). It was a very straight forward process with dairy exclusion but with gluten, I didn’t have much clue, didn’t think about it or simply didn’t want to admit I might be intolerant. Freshly baked bread is just so delicious! Let’s cut the story short as this blog isn’t about my health issues. It’s about delicious gluten-free baking you can easily make at home, coming from my background and the reason why I bake gluten-free cakes for the last five years.
There are several gluten-free, dairy-free, sugar-free, egg-free or vegan products on the market nowadays simply to satisfy customers’ demands. That’s all right I think as somehow more people are suffering from food sensitivities and intolerances. However, the cause of food adverse reactions might be somewhere else and this would be another topic of a discussion. So can savioury rolls, cakes and other delicatessens be so tasty as ordinary food if they happen to be either gluten, sugar, dairy, egg, nut, yeast or fat-free? Of course, they can but it depends what you put in. ‘Free from’ available products in supermarkets usually contain other ingredients to substitute the allergens. Sometimes too many unnecessarily. For this reason, I bake cakes, muffins, raw fruit bars, savoury snacks or even bread rolls by myself whenever a time allows me to do so. It’s fun, delicious, unprocessed and also quite cheap.
I have my favourite cookbooks where I’m getting my inspiration from but sometimes I make my own recipes. Here is the one I would like to share with you. Wild apple and pumpkin seeds cake. It’s tasty, moist and extremely easy. You will need the following ingredients:
WILD APPLE AND PUMPKIN SEEDS CAKE
5 medium garden apples
1 overripe banana
100ml of water (depending on juiciness of your apples)
3 tbls coconut oil melted
juice from 1/2 lemon
1 tbls honey or maple syrup (or according to your taste)
2 tbls pumpkin seeds
1 tsp chia seed
1 tsp cinnamon
1 1/2 tsp bicarbonate soda
100g jumbo oats (gluten-free)
100g rice flour
50g ground almonds
Clean and coarsely grate the apples (with skin on) or put in a blender and chop ruffly. Blend the banana until smooth and mix altogether all the wet ingredients including 1 tsp of chia seeds (chia and banana act as a binder instead of egg and gluten). Set aside. Meanwhile mix all the dry ingredients in separate bowl. Add into the bowl with wet ingredients and mix well. Smooth out into a baking tray and bake in preheated oven at 180’C for about 40-50 minutes.
I love these type of cakes, full of fibre and not too sweet. A breakfast or afternoon snack is sorted.
With autumn season it’s a perfect way to accompany our time indoors regardless our dietary restrictions. So I hope you will enjoy.
Love and hugs.
J.