Brown Bread
Are you Tired of Eating Cardboard ?
This bread will make you happy!
The colour and flavour of this bread is so good, that you will not miss normal bread. And my sourdough (gluten) obsessed husband tried it and liked it, he even eats it, if he runs out of his bread. And if he likes it, it means A LOT!
I use 1/2 cup of red rice flour, which gives it the amazing colour and flavour. As I am currently in Sydney, I shopped for red rice in Chinatown at Thaikee Supermarket and use my Ninja Blender to grind the rice into flour.
In Saigon they actually call this rice flour colour "brown". You can see in the photos below that it is actually quite red. Only 1/2 a cup of this flour makes all the difference in the colour of the loaf and the taste. In Saigon I was able to previously buy the flour from www.laholista.com.
Otherwise big supermarkets sell red rice and you can grind/process it yourself with a strong 1500 Watt food processor. Process
1/2 a cup at the time and use a medium fine sieve to make sure the rice is as finely ground as possible.
Re-grind bits that are too coarse.
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Gluten-Free Bread Basics:
This recipe was
developed in Ho-Chi-Minh City and Sydney.
If you cannot get the flour brand I am using here, please read about the
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Hardware you need
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a standard bread loaf pan, non stick if possible, mine is 11 cm by 21.5 cm or 4.5" by 8.5". If in doubt that your pan could have lost its non stickiness, use baking paper to line the tin, I do
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1 large mixing bowl and 2 smaller ones for wet and yeast mix
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a cup measure container
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a whisk and large mixing spoon
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a set of measuring spoons:
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1/4 teaspoon (tsp), 1/2 tsp, 1 tsp and 1TB (tablespoon). These are important due to the amounts in gluten free baking being sensitive and all teaspoons that are not proper measuring spoons have different sizes-
Ingredients for the Dry Mix
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white rice flour, red rice flour (can be tricky to find and I show you below how to make your own) potato starch and tapioca starch
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fine himalayan rock salt
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nutritional yeast flakes
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roasted sunflower and pumpkin seeds
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gluten free baking powder. I recommend Bob's Red Mill double acting baking powder, due to being gluten and aluminium free
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filtered/clean water
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guar gum (Guarkernmehl in german) or xanthan gum
Make your own Red Rice Flour
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you will need red rice, which is usually easy to find in asian supermarkets or in Australia you can buy it at the source bulk foods
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you may ask yourself "why bother with red rice?" Is has so much more flavour than white rice and makes this bread so good! All the effort is worth it!
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you also need a strong food processor. I use the smoothie part of my 1500 Watt Ninja and it works perfectly
Use a strong Food Processor
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if you can find red rice flour, you are lucky and you can skip this process
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if you found red rice you are also lucky: put half a cup into your food processor (minimum watts 1500) and process for 10 seconds
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you need to sieve the rice as it does not grind everything 100% on the first round
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Use a Sieve and Shake
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I do this step to make sure no rice is left unprocessed
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the sieve lets most of the ground rice through and the pieces that are too big I simply process again, with the next lot of rice until they are fine enough
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the last bits of left over you can process for 30 seconds and they should be fine enough
The Processed Rice
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on the right you see the finished rice flour, which is not as fine as bought rice flour, but it does not have to be! The consistency is all part of why the bread is so delicious-
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on the left you see the rice after processing and sieving and it needs to be processed further to reach the consistency of the rice on the right-
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use the magnifier to zoom in and see the finished flour close up
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point the curser onto the rice and click
Ingredients for the Wet Mix
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extra virgin olive oil, but it works as well with normal olive oil and sunflower oil
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organic apple cider vinegar, with the mother. I like the raw, unfiltered version from Bragg. I recently used lemon instead and it worked too
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psyllium husks
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filtered water
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​I am using this mix as an egg replacement
Ingredients for the Yeast Mix
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active dry yeast
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luke warm tap or bottled water
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rice malt syrup
Roasted Sunflower and Pumpkin Seeds
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It is definitely worth the effort to roast your seeds, they develop a much more intense flavour
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You can see in the photos how they look before and after (on the right side)
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I line 2 baking trays with baking paper and spread the seeds on it
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pre heat the oven to 180 Celsius or 350 Fahrenheit
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bake them approximately 10-12 minutes
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every oven is different, and some are not evenly hot, so keep a close look at them and stir them up every few minutes
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make sure you do not burn them
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I roast 2 trays and store the left overs in a lidded glass jar
Click on images below to start enlarged slideshow
follow instructions how to do it in recipe
make sure the mix is still luke warm
so that most of the yeast stays in the water
for about 20 minutes
Prepare the Yeast Mix
Amounts needed
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3 tsp (teaspoons) of active, dry yeast (Bob's Red Mill)
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1/4 cup of very hot water
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1/2 cup of water, room temperature
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1 TB (tablespoon) rice malt syrup
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Process
Boil some water, you need 1/4 cup recently boiled water. Add hot water to mixing bowl and add the rice malt syrup. Stir until combined.
Add room temperature water, stir to combine. Now drizzle in the yeast, give it a gentle stir and let the bowl rest in a warm, wind free spot for 20 minutes. Click on the images to enlarge them and you can see how the yeast is rising. Photos were taken 5 minutes apart.
I have tried this recipe a few times with dried stevia powder, and the yeast does not rise with stevia. Rice malt syrup is needed to feed the yeast.
Prepare the Wet Mix
Amounts needed
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1 tsp of apple cider vinegar (acv)
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1/2 cup of tap or bottled water
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3 TB of water
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1 TB olive oil
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1 TB psyllium husks
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Process
Get your amounts organised, as the psyllium husks thicken up quickly and you don't want uneven blobs in the mix-
Whisk the acv and the oil into the 1/2 cup of water.
Pour 3 TB of water into a bowl, add the psyllium husks and whisk quickly to combine, then straight away add the oil-water-acv-mix and whisk again to combine. Make sure it is lump free.
Let this mix rest for about 5 minutes.
Prepare the Dry Mix
Amounts needed
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1/2 cup red rice flour
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1/2 cup white rice flour
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1 cup tapioca starch
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3/4 cup potato starch
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1 tsp pink salt
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2 tsp guar gum or xanthan gum
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2 tsp baking powder
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2-3 TB each of roasted sunflower and pumpkin seeds, amount can be increased to your liking, up to 1/2 cup of seeds
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1 TB nutritional yeast flakes (optional)
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extra water if needed​
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Process
Add flours, starches, salt, guar gum, yeast flakes, seeds and baking powder to a large bowl and whisk till well combined. Or add all ingredients into a lidded plastic container and shake it until combined.
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click on images below to enlarge
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Mix the Mixes
Add the wet mix and the yeast mix to the well mixed dry mix.
Stir with a large spoon until all flour is mixed in well. If that is impossible and the mix is too dry add up to 1/2 cup of water, but start with a tablespoon and slowly add more spoon by spoon. Stir until well combined. Keep a note of how much water you added for the next loaf...
Every flour behaves differently and you may be thinking that you should add more water. Try to avoid adding too much water as it can lead to a rubbery bottom in the bread.
The end result should be quite moist and very well mixed. Once you found flours you like you will be able to confirm the correct amount of water to suit your ingredients. If the loaf has a rubbery bottom that looks undercooked, you used too much water...try the next loaf with half the amount of extra water or none...
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Add Mix to the Tin
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line the tin with baking paper by cutting two rectangles and add the mix​
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level the mix with the back of a large wet spoon
click on images below to enlarge
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Add Olive Oil
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drizzle 1/2 - 3/4 teaspoon of olive oil onto the dough, and spread it over the top with a spoon
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this helps to keep the crust from getting too hard
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click on images below to enlarge
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The Rise
This bread rises for 20 minutes
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Start pre-heating your oven at such time that it reaches 180 degrees celsius when the bread finished raising. Use the fan force setting.
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Gluten free bread does not rise as high as a normal wheat bread would, but you can see in the pictures that it raises a little bit.
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Ready for the Oven!
Slice the top with a sharp knife (optional).
Put the bread into the pre-heated oven,
in the centre.
Bake for 70 minutes.
Due to every oven performing differently, the time may vary.
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Keep a timer handy and record exactly how long yours took, so that you can adjust the recipe to your appliance.
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Done!
Done!
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I take mine out when it has a good colour and sounds a little hollow when knocking on the bottom. This takes 70 minutes in my oven.
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Rest the loaf for 3-5 minutes in the pan before removing it and cooling it on a drying rack or timber board.
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Let it cool for about 2 1/2 hours before slicing it and freeze to keep it fresh.
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The bread tastes delicious toasted, which means you can just take a slice from the freezer and stick it into the toaster when ever needed.
Proper BREAD!
I am very happy with this loaf- The colour reminds me of German Mischbrot and the taste is amazing!
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Dig in!
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The Bread is amazing when it's fresh and also performs really well after it has been frozen.
When you freeze slices make sure they don't sit directly on top of each other, as it gets tricky to seperate a slice. Either freeze 2 slices next to each other or freeze them off centre from each other, which makes it easier to break a slice off.
Clean-up
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It is important to clean your bowl really well before washing it.
I once had to call a plumber to unblock my drain due to washing my dough bowls in the sink and flushing the sticky leftovers down the pipes.
Pour some flour (I buy the cheapest white flour I can find and label it "cleaning flour") into the bowl, wipe clean and discard into the bin, not the sink.
The last image is the cleaned bowl, ready to be washed.
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GF Bread Baking Basics
Every flour brand will need different amounts of water, please read below information:
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This is my recently acquired wisdom regarding GF baking:
I went back to Sydney recently and my bread recipe needed an extra 1/2 cup of water with a Sydney rice flour....
Flours from different brands and different countries are never the same. Therefore one needs to "play" with the flours you purchase and adjust water amounts. If you live in a country with no access to the Thai flour I used, you will most likely have to adjust the water amount I used to achieve the same consistency.
In Vietnam, I developed this recipe with a Thai rice flour by www.bangkokinterfood.co.th (BIF)
This was the only rice flour I could find here and it turns out it is my favourite so far. The bread rises beautifully and the end product is a perfect, fluffy and light bread, with a fantastic "springy-ness"-
When I arrived in Sydney, I tried the exact same recipe with an Australian brand of white rice flour and to my surprise I had to ad 1/2 cup of water to achieve the consistency I needed. So please use this above recipe as a guideline and adjust your water amount to achieve a moist and quite sticky consistency.
Let me know if you find a nice tasting flour brand near you, I would like to start a list of the most delicious flour brands to share with everyone!
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