More trials.....half a loaf is better?

Yet another Gluten-free Bread attempt 

Here's the next episode in my on going gluten-free bread-making saga...lots of hyphens there and more to come! I'm trying to make a (here it comes!) gluten-free, egg-free, dairy-free, nut-free, yeast-free, corn-free  (no xantham gum), soy-free and gelatine-free bread using a gluten-free sour dough starter. Till now, my sour dough starters have been non-starters (sorry,couldn't resist). At last, in my latest attempt, the starter turned out the way I perceived it should. I was so excited! Then I got into the actual mixing and baking. For this loaf, I used a store bought gluten-free bread mix. It was a premix of rice, tapioca and potato flour with xantham gum added. I know I keep going on about xantham gum having corn in it but I figured I'll give the premix a go to see if I could actually make a reasonable tasting gluten-free bread. The bread flour with the sour dough starter mixed up fine. I kept it in my oven with just the light on to let the bread dough rise. Then when I carefully transferred the beautifully risen loaf to a heated pan, poof! My bubble burst......literally. The dough started sinking and I ended up where I started.......with a bookend! Back to the drawing board..........sigh. 

The trials and tribulations.....gluten-free bread.

The Lemon

I've been sporadically trying to make gluten-free bread these past months, but success has been elusive. Worse, my resultant gluten-free bread has been disastrous. There are dozens of success stories on the internet (and they have the pictures to prove it) but mine have ranged from bread which can be used as book-ends or door-stops. If  thrown at someone, be forewarned, you might be charged with causing GBH! I'm sure you get the picture. Well, like all the success stories out there, I decided to post the picture of one of my recent attempts at gluten-free bread. Looks pretty good, right? Well, it was a lemon.....literally. I made a sour dough starter, prayed over it for about 3 days, used rice, urad (type of dhal)  and millet for the gluten-free flours and then had the "brilliant" idea to add a pinch of citric acid in the hope that it will improve the leavening effect.....sour-dough with citric acid? Bad idea. Really bad. Might give this a whirl again without the citric acid. Apart from that, the bread was actually quite soft (an improvement from my door-stop days) and the texture was not too gummy. I did not use any xantham gum as I'm still leery about the corn content in it. Maybe I will add some guar gum instead and see what happens. I'll keep you posted.