I think gluten free bread products vary enormously in quality and taste.

I'm not gluten-sensitive but wheat aggravates my asthma and I've found it's best just not to pretend, because they're all pretty dreadful. I make a rather penitential oat cake that at least makes me feel like I've had something grainy but otherwise I just live in a bread free world.

The pre-packaged selections out there are pretty awful. Very lab experimental and often sweetened to compensate for the lack of knowledge and lack of taste buds by the maker.

A couple restaurants in NYC that also have take-out and in-house made savory and sweet choices are above and beyond delicious. So it can be done.

Yes, it is sad what is out there for sale. That is the reason I offer exclusively gluten free from my bakery and sell it at the local farmers market. You might try to find a gluten free bakery near you to compare and not discount all gluten free as bad.. It can be done - although it took me 2 years to get French Bread right. Any sweet bread like Challah is much more tasty than plain sandwich bread, and English muffins and Crumpets are really nice. GF plain sandwich bread does not taste like Wonder Bread, never will. My PSB bread is OK but knowing what wheat flour bread tastes like, there is no recipe for a same tasting GF good one. They are just "different" but not crumbly like store bought. Like most things homemade is better than store bought from a conglomerate.

Yeah, I should have mentioned that for some reason there are plenty of good sweet options, at least from GF bakeries, but even their bread isn't much like bread except for the sweeter kinds, like Challah.

Before I had so many diet restrictions I did like Nut Thins for crackers, but now those are off the menu for me, too. I've made many different GF recipes for unsweet breads, but only oatcake and hoe cake seem at all like they aren't pretending to be something else.

Colleenoz,

Rofl! How do you know what a ball of hair tastes like?

Colleen, I was going to say it tasted like a slice of sawdust, but I guess I don't really know what that tastes like either, LOL.

So far Amanda has found that it's easier to just skip the bread altogether, although I make crepes with cornstarch and gluten free cornbread and corn tortillas, and those are good. I'm working on burger buns now, so when it's grilling time, she can have a nice big juicy burger, which is one of the things she's hungry for.

Nancy, what is PSB?

Annie

I'm not familiar with a lot of the store bought GF stuff -- it even looks bad. I have a couple of dear ones with serious gluten issues, however, and in exploring what to feed them, I've learned that the biggest thing is not to try to replicate gluten! You can't. So if you start from the premise that fluffy is out, you'll go a long way towards good tasting stuff. It's a lot easier if you're okay with eggs. Vegan GF is where it gets really hard. Wrawp flatbreads are raw vegan and quite good, or, at least, the "Asian" one that has no coconut is (I'm allergic). It's like a somewhat brittle small lavash, made out of pressed apple, zucchini, seeds and spices. They have a pizza crust, too, but both flavors have coconut. Whole Foods carries them. There's plenty of good commercial GF pasta as well.

Grainlady has posted a lot of good sounding GF recipes. I've made some others. If you think about the "normal" things you can make with rice or corn, you'll get a good idea of good things to eat GF. Also, think about the wheat things you don't want to develop the gluten in, like biscuits. Good cornpone or GF biscuits are a zillion times better than bad GF bread. A couple of us have found that people like GF pie crust better than normal (that being another thing you don't want to develop the gluten in).

Put together legumes, beans, GF grains, eggs, sticky seeds, and a little gum, and you can make a whole world of good things. People like Nancy do and share. Is it more work? Sure. But I think most people could use to be mindful eaters.

Homepro, I have a pretty good imagination for how things will taste :-)

Annie - PSB is plain sandwich bread.

I've given up most of the gluten free breads. The sandwich bread is awful. What I really miss is sourdough toast. For sandwiches, burgers and the like, I just ask for lettuce wrapped. My body feels better, even if it is less satisfying.

A few years ago we dined at the NY Culinary Institute's fine dining room and were served an amazing gluten free french bread. I about gobbled the entire basket. Since there's no way to replicate that bread, I just do without.

The one gluten free bread product that I prefer and DH doesn't mind, is Trader Joe's gluten free waffles. So once in awhile...

Annie, on FB, Stacy S made burger buns using big sweet potatoes. She was really pleased with their outcome. I'll try and get the recipe for Amanda.

compuom - There is way to replicate it. Would you like my copied recipe for French bread? It really is easy to make and freezes well. What gets a couple three days old gets ground up into bread crumbs - or chunked for stuffing. You might want a special pan to make it look right but taste wise you can use a loaf pan or even a muffin tin.

Nancy

Thank you, I certainly would! I've never made bread, but I would be willing to undertake it for a great result!

Nancy I would love the recipe too! Both my 9yr old and I have wheat allergy and are always looking for good recipes!

Thanks, Nancy, I just couldn't figure that out, LOL, and now it makes perfect sense, of course. I'd love your French bread recipe too, I keep trying but I still don't have bread right. I make pretty decent GF muffins and pancakes and crepes and biscuits, even an OK cupcake, but I just haven't figured out bread yet. I even have one of those baguette pans so I could get the right shape, if I could figure out the texture.

Ellen, I would love to see that sweet potato "bun", if Stacey would be willing to share.

Has anyone tried the "cloud bread" I've seen on the internet? I have lots of eggs, so I'm going to give that a try, I think...

Annie

I just posted a recipe for easy gluten free French bread so I wouldn't hijack this thread.

"Sweet
potato "buns" are a hit. The taste was great if you like sweet
potatoes....and they held up as a bun! I sliced them (on a diagonal to
try to get more surface area) about 1/4 inch thick, brushed with melted
coconut oil (on both sides), seasoned with salt, pepper, cumin and
smoked paprika and put in the oven at 425 - then 450 for about a half
hour - flipping half way through."

Compumom, I'm with you on missing sourdough toast the most. In fifteen GF years, that's the one thing I simply can't replicate easily. Nancy, thanks for posting your GF French Bread recipe. I'll try it once my kitchen reno is done. Hopefully in 3-4 weeks.

I've learned to make quick breads, cakes and deserts that most people can't tell are GF, but yeast breads--bah to so many of them. I do like the Against the Grain rolls, but if you can't eat dairy, those are out. I get most of my rice flours from Authentic Foods because they're soft grinds. Do any of you have a good source for finely ground organic GF flours?

I never liked soft white breads (including burger buns and dinner rolls), void of any fiber and nutrients, before going gluten-free, and I REALLY don't like the gluten-free versions I've tried.

I made Cloud Bread once --- thought I was eating scrambled eggs because of the flavor of it. It's interesting all the bread recipes I've tried, especially early on after going gluten-free.

In January I made "Gluten-free Sourdough Oat English Muffins" using starter made with quinoa flour (recipe from Cultures For Health: http://www.culturesforhealth.com/gluten-free-sourdough-oat-english-muffin-recipe). They were actually very good, but don't keep well (even frozen), which is another problem with a lot of gluten-free breads - poor keepers, and they also crumble easily the older they get, or after being frozen - yet another characteristic of many gluten-free breads. The next time I make this recipe I will only make 1/2 a recipe.

The bread we like currently is a yeasted, dense, seedy bread (more like a traditional steam-baked pumpernickel - looks more like a brown brick kind of bread) which works best toasted. I remember my mother (who had celiac disease) would crave something with yeast in it, so that's why I gave this recipe a try.

I find making gluten-free pancakes, waffles, and muffins far better, and more convincing baked goods, than sandwich-style breads. I serve those all the time to family/friends who are visiting and they can't tell the difference.

-Grainlady