My First Foray into Gluten-Free Baking

Okay, I promise that my blog is not going to be about the food I eat for the rest of forever... but this entry definitely is.  You see, when I first came to terms with the whole, "No more gluten" thing, my immediate response was to reach out to some of the people in my life who are already dealing with it, and get their recommendations on cookbooks, etc.  One thing that I kept hearing, over and over again, was that "Gluten-free baking is a pain in the posterior," usually followed by, "So I just don't bother."

This distressed me, Gentle Readers, because I like to bake.  Not to the extent that I want to do it for a living, or blog about it all the time, but I genuinely enjoy baking as a leisure/stress-relief activity, and I genuinely love sharing the results with others.  So "not bothering" with baking was not really an option.

Of course, my extreme dietary restrictions over the past month or so have meant that any sort of baking, gluten-free or otherwise, was off the table.  But now that I've been adding things back in (including sugars, nuts, and eggs) I'm at a point where it was feasible once more.

Enter my totally awesome mother.

She has been very supportive of my "weird new diet" (my words, not hers) and when I got her back to my house from the airport (she's visiting for a while- yay!) one of the very first things she unpacked (possibly even the first) was a handful of gluten-free baked-goods recipes.

Did I mention how totally awesome she is?
 

Also I totally roped her into being the photographer for my messier-hand-moments.

So this morning (with a giant mental shout-out to my pumpkin-loving-paleo-pal Lara) I tried my hand at the Civilized Caveman Cooking Creations' Pumpkin Cranberry Scones.  Except... well, no one ever spices things enough for my tastes, so I definitely modified the spices.  Behold!

Ingredients:

Some day I will convince my photographer husband he should spend more time photographing for my blog and then you will not be forced to deal with my camera-phone images all the time...

2c almond flour
1/2c pumpkin puree (This is not the same as pumpkin in a can.  Which I did not know, so it's a good thing I saw a display of the stuff as I was walking towards the front of the store with my canned pumpkin...)
1/2c dried cranberries
1/4c shredded coconut
1/4c crushed pecans (My mom, who is visiting from the South, was mortified by how expensive these nuts are up here.  She promised to send me some from her front yard.  Score!)
1 large egg
3Tbsp raw honey (It should go without saying to use local stuff- it is so much more flavorful than Mr. Bear)
1tsp sea salt
1tsp baking powder
2.5tsp cinnamon
2tsp ginger
healthy dash of cloves
healthy dash of nutmeg (I think I did seven shakes?)

Instructions:

pre-heat oven to 400
line a large baking sheet with parchment paper
mix your dry ingredients in a large bowl, then add wet ingredients and knead by hand until well-mixed

One of the afore-mentioned messier-hand-moments.

use a spoon to dollop out the dough onto the parchment paper (I made it an even dozen)
shape into tiny adorable triangles about 1/4" thick

My dread pastry fleet, just prior to deployment.

put the baking sheet (parchment paper, raw scones, and all) onto a second (preferably larger) baking sheet, to ensure the bottoms don't burn

bake in oven apx 15 minutes (I checked mine at 12, then kept them in another 4)
remove when tops starts to brown and a toothpick pushed into the center of a scone comes back clean
remove from oven, set baking pan to cool on rack.  gently loosen scones after about 2-3 min, continue to cool an additional 2-3, then enjoy!

Striking a smug baker's pose is part of my enjoyment.

We had ours with tea, because we have some British heritage in there somewhere.  (That's a lie- mine was tisane, not tea!)

On the cusp of the Moment of Truth!

Super-flattering.  Thanks Mom.

Considering...

...considering...

DELICIOUS SUCCESS!

For some reason Mom didn't want photographic evidence of her chowing down on scones...