New Frontiers in Flavor . . . with Flour!

I’ve always been a big fan of baking expert Alice Medrich. A businesswoman who founded a chain of chocolate shops in the San Francisco area called Cocolat in the 1970’s, she went on to write a number of terrific books covering everything from chocolate to the art of baking cookies.

Several years ago Medrich published the fascinating PURE DESSERT*, which explored baking with unique flours and sugars. The book was very popular (and yielded possibly my favorite shortbread recipe ever, bar none!) Now she’s taken those experiments a step further in FLAVOR FLOURS*, which uses alternatives to traditional wheat flour to create amazing cakes, cookies and puddings.

These recipes are gluten-free—but that’s almost beside the point.

As I baked my way through this book, I knew that, regardless of personal need, this was a book that would’ve been on my shelf no matter what.

For a baking nerd like me, the intro notes are not to be missed (and really, they bear careful reading as the information they contain is pretty important if you want good results for your recipe!)  Medrich explains—in exhaustive detail–the differences between wheat flour-based baking and GF baking; why a blend of flours is nearly always necessary for best results; why resting batters or doughs can be necessary for hydration of certain flours for best texture before baking, and more. I spent days reviewing this section before moving on to the recipes.

And what a trove of recipes there is! Chapters are arranged by flour (not counting the recipes for pancakes, waffles and crepes in the introduction.)   This makes it fairly easy to decide what you want to bake, based on what kind of flour you happen to have on hand (and if you are a Passover baker, the section on nut flours will seem like gluten-free manna.)

I did bake a lot of things, had some interesting surprises crop up.  Desperately missing traditional pound cake, I jumped into the book with the oat-and-rice flour Ultimate Butter Cake. 

The batter was gorgeous, the same sunny yellow as my old standard pound cake, and it smelled so buttery-good while baking I could hardly stand the wait! (I didn’t have to—luckily, a little edge broke off when I flipped it from the pan onto the cooling rack. Cook’s privileges and all that, you know.)

I’ll admit that Day One, I was a little underwhelmed. The cake did have a nice buttery, toasty undertone while not tasting “different,” but the texture seemed a bit off to me. I wrapped it up and figured I’d overbeaten or underbaked it. When I tried it again a day later, it seemed the rest had worked a bit of magic—the texture was spot on what I would have expected from a pound cake! Now, this could also be because of my beastly oven, so while my plan is to bake and rest this cake for 24 hours next time, you certainly don’t have to. This cake also toasts up beautifully, if you’re into that whole toasted pound cake thing.

I baked the Molasses Spice variation of the Ginger Cookies, and just loved the spicy, sugar-crackled flavor.

Again, though, I found the texture much crisper than I would have expected—perhaps a standard side effect of GF baking, but a dunk in milk softened them up and only enhanced the spice, so who am I to complain?

The Dark and Spicy Pumpkin loaf, made with rice and buckwheat flour, is so good I see no reason to ever make another version again. My only tweak was to substitute cloves for the nutmeg, since I don’t love nutmeg (then I felt guilty and grated a bit into the batter anyway.)  

This batter can also be baked in muffin cups—perfect if you like pumpkin muffins for breakfast.

The Bittersweet Teff Brownies made a perfect SuperBowl party dessert—all teff flour here, and no one realized they were GF—they disappeared before I could take a photo!  Finally, I decided to try one of the book’s savory recipes (I needed a break from all the sugar!) and made the Walnut and Buckwheat crackers.  These were easy to put together, baked up very quickly, and tasted fabulous with cheese.

In fact, they had such a deliciously wheaty flavor that I honestly wouldn’t have known they were GF if I hadn’t baked them myself.

This is a great book for anyone who wants to expand their baking horizons, gluten-free or otherwise. Even if you’re not on a GF diet, it is worth trying out these flours to see what kind of flavors you can work into your baking. I’ve got a bag of corn flour sitting here destined to become Crunchy Corn Fritters. Who’s coming over to sample?

Connect with Susie on Twitter or Instagram or check out other books by Alice Medrich here*.  

What kind of flours do you cook/bake with?  What’s your go to baking book right now? 

Disclosure:  There are Amazon Affiliate links (noted by *) within this post.