Go Gluten-Free -- With Kids

posted March 2, 2009
  by Christine Gable, Kiddie Chow

Imagine no birthday cakes, hot dogs, apple pie, spaghetti or pizza. Hey, that’s like you might as well forget eating with kids! If you, your child or child’s friends must eat a gluten-free diet due to health reasons, there is help to be had. Yes, it really is still possible to enjoy food and have it taste great. And no, life does not have to be restrictive when you must avoid all foods that contain gluten: from wheat, rye and barley to spelt, triticale and kamut. Not when you have a great cookbook to reference, that is.

And in Incredible Edible Gluten-free Food for Kids: 150 Family Tested Recipes, by Sheri L. Sanderson, there are loads of great gluten-free recipes. Think snacks, crackers and breads to casseroles, salads, cakes and cookies. Published in 2002, this book is 333 pages of pure gluten-free enjoyment (And who can often say that about living without wheat, eh?). After discovering it at the library several months ago, it’s one book that I’m going to add to my permanent cookbook shelf.

While I’m always on the look-out for great new cookbooks, when the words “gluten-free” are in the title, that’s one two-word combo that guarantees I’ll take a second look. For not only does my mom eschew wheat for health reasons, but several of daughter’s friends must also eat a gluten- and dairy-free diet. So whenever I can find some inspiration (read: quick and delicious recipes) for gluten-free foods, I’m there. I find it especially sad when I see hungry kids who have to turn down food after food since it contains an offending ingredient.

And most traditional baking recipes rely upon wheat flour as a main component—for without that gluten, the necessary chemical reaction for the resultant chewy or light texture goes null. Gluten-free baking and cooking relies on rice flour, potato flour, tapioca flour, bean flour, sorghum flour, soy flour, nut flours and arrowroot starch. Many people also use amaranth, buckwheat, millet, quinoa, and teff flours, although people following the diet for celiac disease will want to follow dietary guidelines from their doctor.

One funny thing about recipes is that you can’t just convert or exchange one ingredient for the other. Oh, if only it were as easy as replacing wheat flour with rice flour—or butter and milk with oil and rice or soymilk. Not quite. For that’s when the chemistry of cooking really comes to light. Without that natural gluten to bring height to baked goods, formerly delicious cakes and breads can go nowhere fast.

It’s this flour component that I’ve found most challenging when doing gluten-free baking. For there are other types of flours, but they all have different characteristics and components—from barley to rice to quinoa and nut flours. They each have their pros and cons. And they interact and intermingle in ways that create new and different results. This can be good and bad. Good when it turns out the way that you’re hoping. Bad when you find a flat-as-a-pancake dessert that tastes bland and gritty. Then it’s back to the drawing board.

But armed with the recipes in this book, living the gluten-free life can be less harrowing.

Kids get very hungry! Kids need to eat well! And books that can help make that easier for us to meet those needs are winners in my book. Check this one out … are there any other gluten-free cookbooks with “kid-friendly food” that you would recommend?

Next week: Sleepovers … Eat-overs

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