I am working on learning to make breads, muffins, etc, without using any kind of regular flour, like wheat or even oatmeal flour. I have been watching YouTube videos to learn how to make foods using almond, coconut, flax meal, and things like chickpea flour. I just ordered some chickpea flour and coconut flour, as well as some monk fruit sweetener. Does anyone else do alternative flour baking ? I think that @Steve North mentioned making flax meal muffins and maybe pancakes as well.
Interesting timing. I just read this article the other day. https://phys.org/news/2023-09-spent-coffee-tea-boost-shelf.html “…the team brewed either black tea or Arabica coffee, then thoroughly rinsed, dried and pulverized the leftover grounds or leaves. These were then added into the flour used for sponge cake batter in different amounts, creating loaves with either 1%, 2% or 3% powder. This material gave the cakes a higher antioxidant activity and increased concentrations of important nutrients compared to control ones made with only regular flour.” … “Additionally, the fortified cakes were slightly more shelf stable, and had less microbial growth after up to 14 days of storage.”
We use coconut, almond, and buckwheat flours, but our favorite is ivory teff flour. Regular teff four is a little stronger tasting, but the ivory teff is a seed flour that tastes a good bit like wheat flour in the things we use it for--flat breads, pancakes, and such.
I use flax seeds, grind them into powder in my seed grinder, and then make flax muffins.. My seed grinder is also a coffee grinder.. Now, for my pancakes, I use a flour called wheat gluten which is very low in carbs... Almond flour is OK but it has a very short shelf life as it goes bad fast..
compared to standard wheat flour @Steve North the one you mentioned ( wheat gluten ) is 1641 kilojoules (kJ) are equal to 392.2 calories (kcal). per 100 grams = 3/4 cup , just 50 calories more than standard flour.
Are we looking at calories or carbs ??? definitely lower in carbs... Personally, I don't even look at calories...
what the worst for us …..the carbs or the calorie’s asking because I know you have extensive knowledge @Steve North ……and I honestly don’t know … It’s a bit like my husband can eat anything he likes carbs / bread / sweet foods and rarely gains weight ….but if I was to eat more than one slice of bread a day I’d gain a kg in a week ( I don’t eat bread daily anyway )
I went to a "natural foods" festival once and tasted bread made from kudzu flour. Yep, flour made from the invasive vine that threatened to eat the South. While it *was* edible, I doubt you'll be seeing it in the bread aisle at WallyMart.
I see so many different kinds of flour on the shelves of the grocery store. When did white flour become the enemy? I bake most of all my breads with white flour/ bread flour, and on occasion I make whole wheat and rye. Is there a reason you all use the specialty flours? Is it the carbs, calories, or allergies? Am I missing something? I make all kinds of bread in different shapes; thick sliced, thin sliced, rolls, buns, hoagie, etc., and package them in the freezer. I have done this a very long time. I don't remember the last time I bought store bread.
I don't know that it the enemy, but many have developed problems with grains, especially wheat during the past decade or so. I tend to blame GMO wheat as the causative agent, since the rise in gut issues seems to coincide with the widespread introduction of those products, but I really have no evidence to support it. My wife has had gut issues for decades, as did her mother and aunts. She switched to a SIBO diet and most of her problems vanished. She found she was sensitive to rice as well as wheat and now avoids all grains, and works with seed, nut and bean flours. Occasionally she still has issues if we go out to eat, but she is very careful what she orders. Wheat and rice fed mankind for millennia and now it appears to be a problem. We have consumed carbs for at least that long but not in refined forms, and I don't think I ever saw a fat Japanese person when I lived there--except for the Sumos who ate copious amounts of meat. Many people have developed issues with wheat, but I really don't know why.
Calories or carbs............. We are aware of both because we are trying to control our weight.. Both are important in weight control, but the best thing is... moderation... You definitely won't lose any weight by consuming 6000 calories a day and you won't lose weight by consuming 500 carbs a day either.. Also there is the fat to also watch.. You don't want to consume a whole lot of fat either... If you are looking for something that has no calories, no carbs, and no fat.............. Drink water ..... Unfortunately, that isn't the answer... If you are looking for the best diet, remember that diets don't work.. You only gain back the weight you lost with interest.. What works is a food plan that you will be on for the rest of your life.. Be it a low carb or a low calorie way of life, both are OK, but don't do both together.. Low carb has more of a variety of things to eat.. Just stay away from the 5 major high carb foods and eat everything else in moderation.. Bottom line is we must face the fact that we all have an incurable disease.. Admit it or not, that is the truth.. WE ARE ALL COMPULSIVE OVER EATERS.... If we weren't, we wouldn't be in this situation..
We have gmo'd the heck out of it. We dry our grains with the help of glyphosate sprayed at harvest! In Italy they keep the old wheat growing, I hear, and that is why people can go over their and enjoy pasta. Processed foods and sugars (Including refined carbs) are the enemy now. They are the cause of the obese and diabetic epidemics now as well as most other modern diseases.
I can only answer your questions as it pertains to myself, @Krystal Shay . I recently finished reading Dr. Davis book, Wheat Belly, which explains the damage that grains, especially ones that have been changed by GMO, can damage our body, particularly the digestive tract, which is where many of the chronic disease starts, because of a leaky gut that is not working properly. When the gut is not working right, then we get inflammation, and inflammation causes pain and damage to the body. I am also trying to lose weight, and following a low carb eating plan, so regular flour is not acceptable because it is very high carb and causes insulin-resistance. So I am now learning to bake with alternative flours, as I mentioned in my first post. I am now reading the Grain Brain Whole Life Plan book , by Dr. David Perlmutter, and he is a neurologist who focuses on the damage that grain can do to our brain, and how it can lead to diseases like alzheimers, autism, ADHD, and Asperger’s, as well as the auto-immune diseases ; so this is yet another reason why I want to get grain out of my life.
I haven’t seen it in words but heard on the radio recently , that not all who eat gulten free products have issues eating normal wheat bread….. its just a fad for many We have a friend coming up here tomorrow to go out looking at open gardens and she’s gluten free , so I bought a pack savoury biscuits and a pack of sweet biscuits it cost me well over $11 for both and they are only tiny packs
I have been told that many who go gluten-free lose the ability to process gluten. It makes sense with all the attention being given to gut biome these days. Make yourself gluten-free and you are turning yourself into a celiac perhaps. For some like my spouse, gluten isn't the problem, grain is the problem. Even rice, which is totally gluten free gives her difficulties worse than wheat. Also note that wheat gluten is now being removed from wheat and is being used in many vegan dishes. As a result, some flours being marketed as bread flours have lower gluten content than formerly.