Newsletter April 2017 Sourdough and a Bad Dog

Email from a Reader

Hello Sharon,
Thank you so much. We received the Baker’s Sampler yesterday.

So far, we sampled the chocolate bread (yay dessert), gingerbread (I really enjoyed the clove) & English muffin-cinnamon (toasted- cut in half as disks, slathered in yes, pasture-raised butter).

Your newsletter post about including animal fat in the bread was super-inspiring. The fat lends a singular satisfying element.

When I was a child, we would visit Argentina and have "factura" which are tea time pastries made of bread and tallow and sugar topped with quince jam or a custard. OMG

In my most recent baking exploits, 2 sourdough & 1 bread event slowed things down:
1. Jasper my redbone coonhound dog got into a batch of sourdough
2. I neglected to feed a starter and got mold :(
3. Jasper ate a full pan of bread.

Jasper is the quintessential "bad dog" when it comes to food.
Worse than a chocolate lab.



I finally baked a loaf again. This loaf was a full-on buckwheat starter with milk kefir whey, coconut flour, salt, eggs, bacon drippings & chicken schmaltz (chicken fat). I forgot to add both chia and flax seeds. It was still a success.
Half is frozen, half is high above out of any possible dog reach.

My prior successful bread batches consisted of:
teff starter made with milk kefir whey
coconut flour
olive oil
flax & chia gels
bacon drippings

I baked these uncloched (uncovered) and they became very DENSE biscuits.

The next trial, Round 2, baked up softer, given that I used a cloche (cover).

On another note,  I am using Milk Kefir to boost my starters because it seems to be beneficial for me. Also, I have not had great success with water kefir. Also, my kombucha seems too sugary.

Joyous, delicious baking to you :)
C.

Hello C,
Thanks for your feedback of my Baker’s Sampler so far. Also thanks for the interesting and humorous stories of your baking adventures. It is obvious to me that Jasper is a well educated dog as he truly enjoys the benefits of sourdough starter as well as the finished bread.

Sorry to hear your starter got mold. Gluten-free starters are more delicate than wheat or rye starters and need to be fed regularly to prevent spoilage.

I’m so glad you found my animal fat post inspiring. I hope more people will come around to the possibility that animal fat builds health rather than hurts it. It is a good source of energy that digests slowly, reducing hunger. Using animal fat is also a good way to rotate your diet rather than eat the same fats all the time. (Food rotation is important for people healing leaky gut. Everything in moderation, of course.)

One questions about Factura, the Argentinean tea time pastries made of bread and tallow? Could you taste the tallow or did it blend into the pastry? I never noticed a tallow or lard taste in my breads or cookies when I use it. However, sometimes when I use a soup fat that had been heavily seasoned, the taste of the seasonings goes into the fat, and then into the bread, giving it some delicate, savory spice.

I found your buckwheat-coconut flour bread very interesting as far as flour combinations. I always think of buckwheat making a very spongy bread that tends to be dry without enough water in the starter. I also think of coconut flour as a super absorbent flour with a tendency to be dry without enough oil in the finished product.

In my experience, using those flours together might make a severely dry bread. However, the oil, bacon fat and eggs would help balance any density as would chia and/or flax gel.

I must try this combination the next time I experiment. The bonus is that I could use up a trifle of the enormous amount of fat in my freezer.

Sometimes I use a “cloche” or cover for the breads during baking and really appreciate the soft top it gives. Other times I like the slightly crusty tops. Cloches can be oven-proof glass, clay, (sometimes people use clean flower pots), or a simple metal baking pan placed over the bread pan.

I’m glad to hear the milk kefir is working well for your starters. For those who are unfamiliar with milk kefir, it is a culture that will ferment milk into a yogurt-like product. The actual combination of bacteria and yeast are different than yogurt cultures so the taste and texture are different than yogurt.

In my early gluten-free sourdough experiments, I used it as a booster and saw that it gives a bit more lift than water kefir-boosted starters. Unfortunately, I had to give it up because I couldn't tolerate it. I continued making it for my family, though, making milk kefir liquid for morning hot cereal as well as milk kefir cheese. I would snitch a bit as I made the cheese. I really loved the sour, creaminess of the milk kefir cheese.

I would make the milk kefir, which means adding the kefir culture to the milk and let it sit on the counter until it separated. For cheese, I would pour it into a strainer lined with a cloth, tie up the cloth and let the whey (water) drip out.  Depending on how long it hung and how much whey dripped out, I could make yogurt, cream cheese or farmer cheese. The whey was excellent for boosting starter or just drinking as a probiotics tonic.


 Milk Kefir separating
   
Milk Kefir strained with a metal strainer for cheese. The whey drips into the bottom of a bowl for other uses.
If you are interested in trying Milk Kefir, here's a link to an excellent company to purchase the culture. Cultures for Health

Thanks again for your feedback and sharing!
All the best,
Sharon

I received a follow up from C about how the taste of the animal fat blended right into the factura pastries from Argentina.
 

Exhibiting at the Gluten-Free Food Allergy Fest in Stamford, CT.

The Gluten-Free Food Allergy Fest was totally exhilarating. My good friend, Peggy Matthews, went above and beyond. I could not have done it without her! Thank you, thank you, Peggy! The conference staff was amazing as they were always helpful and efficient. The hotel staff at the Hilton Stamford was outstanding.

As I got to know the other vendors I was continually amazed at the stellar level of creativity in the products that people are bringing to the gluten-free community. Lots of whole grain pastas and chips, beautiful whole grain and grain-free breads and gorgeous healthy snacks and treats. We have waited a long time for the healthy products and I believe, they are here to stay!

We rented a cargo van to contain all the stuff we brought. Driving the van on the highway took a bit of getting used to but we eventually mastered it. Peggy loves to document events and took many fabulous photos. Here are the boxes finally unloaded in the exhibition area:

 

We brought those rolling carts as well as a toaster oven to warm up samples.
The 2-shelf cart doubled as extra table space, which we sorely needed.

 

Peggy and I leaning on each other in utter exhaustion
after driving all day and setting up for way too many hours.

 

Here are many labeled boxes of samples. (Peggy brought her label maker!)
We were left with many lbs. of samples due to much lower attendance than projected. Thanks to all of you readers who bought bread cubes for your holiday stuffing and cobblers!

 

I had the opportunity to meet many appreciative attendees during the 2-day fest!

There was one vendor sampling unbelievable Ethiopian food from a local gluten-free restaurant named, of all things, "Teff"!!
This is a family-owned business, with mom being the head cook. Check out their website: www.teffrestaurant.com/

 

Their samples were served on little strips of Injera,
which is traditional Ethiopian flatbread made of fermented teff.

The artfully spiced vegetables and meat dishes were complimented by the
very sour, very spongy injera.

Peggy found out that their restaurant was close to the hotel and we eagerly planned to have our Saturday night dinner there.

After working a very long day, we thought we would go for a swim and then go out for dinner...just after we laid down for a little rest. We rested in bed for what we thought was a little while and woke up 3 hours later, astonished that so much time had gone by. Thankfully, we managed to find the restaurant before they stopped serving dinner.


Notice my plate with cabbage, kale and meat placed on a giant injera flatbread. The waitress showed us the traditional method of ripping off a piece of injera and scooping up the food with it.

We began ripping and scooping and dipping and found it worked really well. The metal taste of the silverware never interferes with the taste of the food. I never noticed the taste of silverware until I experienced the absence of it.

Peggy is holding up a piece of injera that is practically transparent!! It must take years of practice to make injera that thin.

Since the food was fabulous, we decided to order take out for the next day's meals. Notice the injera flatbread neatly folded in a take-out container. We were happily well fed for the next 2 days until we got home.


Gluten-free people know how challenging it can be to eat out so Peggy and I deeply thank Teff Restaurant for feeding us with such care during our stay.

More about out the Gluten-Free Food Allergy Fest

Grains or Not?

Currently in our culture, an extraordinary number of people have digestive disorders and challenges, some involving gluten sensitivity. There are now two well known diets recommending the elimination of grains: The GAPS diet and the Paleo diet.

The GAPS diet recommends removing all grains from the diet for a period of time in order to let the digestive system rest and heal. They believe that this protocol will heal people of the gluten sensitivity, allowing them to eventually tolerate gluten products after they heal. Many people have embraced the Paleo diet which also suggests removing grains from the diet and theorizes that humans are not meant to eat grains.

If you are focused on healthy eating and are trying to heal your body from digestive issues you have probably heard of these diets. For those of us that seem to heal slowly or barely at all, we are always looking for the next food or supplement or diet or practitioner that might help us turn things around. It can be grueling.

I have heard from people that have made progress on the GAPS diet. They will often turn to my book and gluten-free breads as a stepping stone before they reintroduce gluten breads. I have also heard from people that didn't do well on the diet. They were always hungry or their issues simply did not resolve. Some lost an alarming amount of weight and felt like they were starving.

I don't know too many people who practice the Paleo diet although a dear friend of mine has embraced it as a last resort after going through years of tests and different practitioners. She finally was diagnosed with intestinal parasites. Her practitioners are trying to strengthen her body to prepare for the parasite treatment. After many years, her health is finally improving on this diet! Removing the grains has really worked for her although she said she had to get used to the feeling of never feeling full after a meal. The Paleo diet eliminates all grains, gluten-free or otherwise, as well as legumes.

It could be very easy to fall prey to cultural pressure to go grain-free. As I get older, I need less grain at meals. Is it because I'm healing and utilize and assimilate my food better? Is it because I should be grain-free? Is it because humans need less calories as we get older? Is it because my blood type is a grain-eating blood type? (remember the blood type diet?)

As a child, I had blood sugar fluctuations. As an adult, I was diagnosed with Hashimoto's Thyroid disease, the symptoms of which, mimic hypoglycemia. We now know that these symptoms are linked to gluten sensitivity. Once, I tried going without grains which became a severe blood sugar roller coaster. I simply could not function. Proponents of those diets might say I'm grain-addicted but if grains makes me feel healthy, strong and clear headed and going without them makes me a nonfunctional mess, I don't see eating grains as an addiction or a problem for me.

Some people never need grains at a meal. Some people always need grains at a meal. It seems that for me, grains are fuel...and I need them to feel clear headed and stable. But not everyone seems to need them for fuel.

Those of us who are able to heal on a grain-free diet are fortunate that they have found the next step that moves them towards optimal health. Those of us that heal using other methods are also fortunate for the same reasons, that we move on to the next level of health. That's what it's all about. To get to the next level. And the next. And the next...until we feel good again.

People's bodies are different and people's histories are different. People's bodies need different diets at different times in their lives. No diet is right for everyone, no practitioner is right for everyone and no food is right for everyone.

Our generation has a host of new diseases that have baffled conventional medicine. The answers are coming slowly and seem to have to do with having access to clean food and water while minimizing medication and environmental toxins.

Grains or Not? The answer will always lie with how you and your children react to grains or no grains. Your gut knows what it needs and will let you know, if you pay close attention. If you are the parent of a small child with food sensitivities, until your child can tell you how s/he feels, you must trust your own instinct and observations over the many strong messages out there.

A mother of a young child asked my opinion about something I've heard a number of times:
"Fermentation will completely eliminate the gluten in wheat or rye bread."

This woman's sister was pressuring her to give her gluten-sensitive child sourdough wheat bread, saying it was safe and would not hurt her since it was fermented. The mother was hesitant, given her child's other anaphylactic allergies. This is where I began ranting. I apologized for the rant but she said "Please, I really want you to tell me how you feel about thisl". I ranted and railed for awhile and finally got to a place of composure again whereupon I said:

             "Even if the tests say that fermentation will completely neutralize gluten, the tests still don't speak to the depth of the child's complicated medical history and stressed digestive and immune systems. The tests test the gluten, not the patient. New diseases cannot be resolved with blanket statements that worked in the past, even if they fed people for millenia, like sourdough bread. And you know how committed I am to the concept of sourdough bread!!

I strongly believe in traditionally prepared foods as they dramatically helped me to heal. But so did removing gluten from my diet. Together, they helped me heal. Our current diseases are deeply complex. Our road back to health can be equally complex since we have little information about these diseases upon which to base healing treatments."

New diseases, new theories, new treatments. Our bodies will let us know what works for us. I support you to trust your gut and exercise control over your body as well as your child's body. And keep the faith that you will heal. It makes a big difference!

Famous for more than 15 minutes...I hope

I was recently video-interviewed by Missy Cohen, a local health coach, for her cable program, New Beginnings in Health. The interview is now being aired by my town's cable station, WACA, Ashland, Massachusetts. Click Here for Missy's website.

Missy carefully read through my bread book, Art of Gluten-Free Sourdough Baking, so she could really understand my baking techniques. She wanted me to share my healing journey as an inspiration to those that have health issues but have not yet found their unique ways to recover.

This made her an excellent interviewer as she asked questions that built upon each other and helped me share a clear overview of the larger concepts of my work as well as many of the details.

I was really enthralled to see myself on TV!!
I hope I'll be a bit famous for more than 15 minutes.

Click here and Watch the 28 minute video and let me know what you think!

View From the Other Side of the Table

Before I was a farmer's market vendor, I was a farmer's market customer, checking out booth after booth and sometimes balking at the prices of things. Imagine charging that much for homemade bread, chocolate, salsa, wine or produce! Not having yet been a vendor, it was impossible for me to know how much time, energy and resources went into the crafting of the product that seemed so pricey.

Now that I've been on the other side of the table, I really get it!! High quality ingredients, hand made beautiful products, long hours making the products and on market day (after working at a frenzied pace in the days before, then packing the car the night before)...up at 5 am, out the door carrying lunch, drinks, coffee (or in my case, vitamin powder drink), set up the tent, tables and products by opening bell.

It can be challenging to have a smile on one's face at that opening bell especially if it's cold and drizzly or burning hot or even if it's a nice day because the long week of preparations has left us with some real fatigue.

Yet we keep on keepin' on to build our businesses, try out new products, and best of all, to take part in the community spirit!

Market day is a happy day. Everyone is out with babies, kids, and dogs looking for beautiful food and crafts and connection.

My friend, Peggy, who helped me at the market a few times, pointed out the changes in people's faces upon trying my products. Of course, not everyone likes my products but most people did. When someone tried the Sprouted Almond Cookies or a Pumpernickel Muffin Top I watched their face move from neutral to pure joy and delight.


Comments like "these cookies are delicious and are not too sweet!" and "I haven't had pumpernickel in sooooooo long! Thank you!!" remind me that I am on the right path, bringing healthy delicious food to people like myself with food restrictions.

Peggy suggested that sometime we set up a video camera to document the facial changes. I think it's an interesting idea!

I learned so much from my first vendor year at the market. I didn't figure out everything, though. Some days I sold out of one product. The next week I'd bring lots more of that product but it would just sit there while something else would sell out. Baffling.

I felt a lot of solidarity and support with and from the other vendors. We shared business tips and supported each other through the season.

We have one last market, the Pre-Thanksgiving Market which will be indoors so no tent to set up. I'll be presenting  my newly perfected Chocolate Bread as well as my Ginger Bread. Hopefully, my new Cocktail breads, which need another week or so of testing, will also be ready.

               
        Ginger Bread                               Chocolate Bread

Being a farmer's market vendor was a fabulous experience and I hope to do it again, next year!!

Click here to learn more about and order products!

Video of my Bread Mixes!

A friend of mine, Wardeh Harmon, creator of Gnowfglins, a Real Food cooking site, made a video of herself making my Gluten-Free Sourdough Bread Mixes. I think she did a stellar job! 

Click here to Watch the video!

Why Gluten-Free Sourdough?

I created these breads and bread recipes to cope with my own multiple food allergies and sensitivities. After mastering and enjoying old fashioned sourdough rye bread I learned I was gluten intolerant and could no longer eat rye. I learned I was also allergic to eggs,dairy and soy products, ingredients that are often used in gluten-free breads. There were other ingredients used in conventional gluten-free baking that I would rather not use: commercial yeast, baking soda, baking powder, xanthan and guar gums, and sweeteners.

Wanting to continue eating bread, I looked at the ingredients in retail gluten free breads and found there was at least one ingredient I needed to avoid in each one. If I was going to be able to eat bread I needed to be able to control the ingredients.

I began experimenting with some gluten-free flours using the sourdough techniques I had mastered for the rye bread. I learned pretty quickly that gluten-free flours are more delicate than gluten flours and spoil easily. I solved this challenge by boosting the starter with a small amount of a lacto-fermented drink called Water Kefir. I used it to begin all my starters for a number of years. Now, I dehydrate and sell my own Gluten-Free Sourdough Starter as an alternative.

What is Water Kefir?

Water Kefir cultures

Water Kefir is a culture, which is a colony of bacteria and yeast, similar to a yogurt culture. The water kefir culture is added to water, that has had sugar dissolved into it. The fermentation process begins when the bacteria and yeast eat the sugars and in exchange, put probiotics and enzymes into the sugar water. Most of the sugar will actually be consumed by the bacteria and yeast during fermentation. The sugar water turns from very sweet to sweet/sour/bubbly.

There are many uses for this tasty liquid. It can be drunk in small amounts as a tonic or digestive. It can also use it in a gluten-free sourdough starter to kick-start the bacterial activity and prevent spoilage in the starter. This enables the starter to stay fresh as it grows to the size needed for  baking. Water kefir is a culture that must be acquired and cared for. Cultures for Health is an excellent company that offers dehydrated water kefir culture with directions for rehydration.

Finished Water Kefir
Ready to drink or use as a booster

An Alternative Booster: 
Dehydrated Sourdough Starter:

An alternative to boosting a starter with water kefir is to boost it with  Dehydrated Sourdough Starter.  I recently began offering 2 of my own Gluten-Free Sourdough Starter cultures, Brown Rice and Teff. While you have to regularly care for a water kefir culture, the dehydrated sourdough starter will last many months in the refrigerator or freezer until you need it.

Learn more and purchase Sourdough Starter Here

The starters are grown in my recenlty opened dedicated Gluten-free commercial kitchen. Click for photos of the construction!

Track Record of Sourdough
Sourdough baking is an ancient and time tested bread baking technique that was used exclusively until the discovery of modern commercial yeast. It utilizes the natural yeasts and bacteria present on the grain and in the air to leaven bread. Sourdough bread becomes highly digestible because the flours are “soaked” in the starter and as well as during the long rise period.

Some people may remember their grandparents soaking oatmeal the night before cooking it for breakfast. Soaking neutralizes natural enzyme inhibitors in the grain, begins breaking down the tough cellulose fibers, fosters the formation of probiotics and enzymes and releases vitamins. All this makes for a more nutritious finished product that is easy on the digestion with many more nutrients available for assimilation. Sourdough breads have a robust taste, a long shelf life and freeze well.

One other benefit of the sourdough process in gluten-free breads is that it eliminates the need for gums and sodium-based leaveners. For people who want to eat as simply and cleanly as possible, this is a tremendous benefit!


The recipes in my book, The Art of Gluten-Free Sourdough Baking, are free of gluten, dairy, eggs, soy, yeast, baking powder/soda, and xanthan and guar gums. They use whole grain ingredients and minimal amounts of starch flours and sweeteners.

My New Recipes PDF are recipes that I perfected after publishing The Art of Gluten-Free Sourdough Baking. They were developed upon the foundation of experience I gained from the first 5 years and are simpler and use less ingredients. They will become part of my next book and are now available in PDF. The cost is only $10 for all the recipes as they become perfected.

My  baking technique is different than what most bakers are accustomed to but with a little time and patience the technique can be easily mastered. You could be baking your own high quality homemade breads soon!

 Teff Tapioca
 

Rice Quinoa Cranberry English Muffins
 

Teff Pumpernickel

Learn more about my breads and other products

A bit less water may make your bread just right!

One of my readers sent in photos of her Teff Carob Pumpernickel loaf. The bread looked excellent but I noticed a slight dip in the top of the loaf. From my own many trials and errors, this usually means there is too much moisture (water) in the overall dough. I suggested that the next time she make the bread, she reduce the water in the last feeding of the starter. Sometimes, reducing by just 1-2 tablespoons makes enough of a difference to get it just right. 

Here's the first bread. Notice the slight dip in the top.



This recipe is Teff Carob Coconut minus a bit of extra moisture.
Instead of a dip, a nice arc on the top!


The sliced bread shows a perfect form: a nice arc and nearly uniform texture



There are many factors that affect the moisture balance in gluten-free sourdough bread:
-Some grain mills reach very high temperatures.
If the grain was heated when it was milled, it will dry it out causing it to absorb more water.
If it wasn't heated when it was milled, it won't absorb as much water.
-The humidity in the kitchen will affect the starter.
Very high humidity causes the flour too absorb less water.
Very low humidity causes the flour to absorb more.

-The grind of the flour
A very fine grind will absorb more water.
A medium to coarse grind will absorb less.

Another interesting piece of information:
A reader wrote to me wondering why I used volume measurements (cups and spoons) rather than weight measurements (a scale) for my recipes. She reminded me that the most accurate baking uses weight and that professional bakers use weight.

A few years ago I tried to convert from volume to weight but discovered something very surprising. I measured 1 cup each of home milled brown rice flour, Arrowhead Mills brown rice flour, and Bob's Red Mill brown rice flour. Each of these has a different fineness of grind resulting in a slightly different weight per cup! Instead of an exact weight I was looking at even more variables in a sourdough process that already has enough variables.

The more coarsely ground flour particles leave more air space between the particles. The finely ground flour takes up less space, filling up the spaces between particles with more flour. The finer flour will weigh more per cup than the coarse.

I did not see how I could give an accurate  measurement given the fact that people use all sorts of different brands of brown rice flour and use all different types of grain mills to mill their own. I decided to stay with the volume measurements and give helpful information about how to work with the flours and what the visual and tactile goals are for the final texture.

I wish I could say " Just follow the recipe and it will be perfect every time". I wish it were true! Sourdough is a living entity that is affected by everything around it. To receive the benefits of sourdough, we must respectfully, and sensitively, learn to work with it.

Keeping this in mind, when you make starters and breads, you gain experience as to what thicknesses and textures you are looking to create.

Gluten-Free Sourdough Bread Mixes...At Last!!!

Bake a Gluten-free Sourdough Bread Mix in your own home!! Pumpernickel, Cinnamon Spice, and Simple Dark Bread.

Old-fashioned sourdough technique adds complex flavor, easy digestibility and long shelf life.

Mixes are fully fermented and free of gluten, dairy, eggs, soy, commercial yeast and gums.

Ingredients: Unsprayed, high-protein Teff flour and Organic flavorings.

Assembled in a dedicated gluten-free vegan facility.

www.glutenfreesourdough.com

Free November Newsletter

November Newsletter Click Here to Read
This month's topics:

• Holiday Food
• Natural Antihistamine
• My article published in Living Without Magazine Dec/Jan edition!!
• My new website!