Bake Gluten-free Bread Yourself

Of course you can also buy gluten-free bread. However, it’s healthier to bake it yourself – and not as hard as you think.

Some bakers offer gluten-free bread. You know it doesn’t contain gluten, but you only know what’s not in it. You don’t know what ingredients your baker uses for his bread. If you bake your own gluten-free bread , you have full control over the ingredients.

Who should bake gluten-free bread?

Gluten-free bread only makes sense for people who suffer from gluten intolerance, also known as celiac disease. Eating gluten-free is becoming more and more popular, so it now seems to be a trend and gluten is demonized.

Many products are gluten-free – and there are more and more. And more and more people believe that gluten is unhealthy and that it is healthier to eat gluten-free. While hardly anyone knows what gluten really is and for whom a diet without gluten is useful and for whom not. So before you start baking gluten-free bread , find out if it makes any sense for you at all.

What exactly is gluten?

Gluten is often equated with “gluten,” although this is not entirely true. Correctly, gluten is the name for a certain mixture of proteins, i.e. proteins, carbohydrates and fats. This mixture of substances ensures that flour turns into a sticky mass when combined with water.

If cereals contain gluten, they can be used to bake higher baked goods such as bread in the form of a loaf of bread or high-rise rolls and cakes. The dough can “rise” with yeast or other raising agents without losing its structure.

Only flat baked goods such as flatbread can be baked from grain with little or no gluten.

Gluten is therefore not harmful, it is naturally contained in a high proportion in the following types of grain:

• Spelt
• wheat
• Kamut
• Emmer
• Einkorn
• Durum wheat

Those who suffer from gluten intolerance cannot tolerate this protein mixture. This leads to inflammation of the small intestinal mucosa in those affected. The disease is also called celiac disease and there is no cure.

It is only necessary for those people to eat gluten-free. Those who do not have celiac disease will not get a single benefit from eating a gluten-free diet and baking gluten-free bread!

Is there any gluten-free flour?

Of course, to bake gluten-free bread you need flour. However, the classic wheat flour fails because wheat contains a lot of gluten. But there are flour mixes on the market that are ideally suited for baking – completely without gluten and still with good baking success!

You can usually get these flours in stores as a mixture, so you won’t be able to bake bread from just one type of grain. This turns your gluten-free bread into a “mixed bread”. Ideally, you should therefore buy a light and a dark gluten-free flour mixture for your gluten-free bread. You will find something in every health food store.

Gluten-free bread recipe

If you want to bake your own bread and have no experience, you should first start to bake your own gluten-free bread with yeast and not with the classic, German sourdough. If you succeed in doing this, you can make sourdough yourself and use it to bake your own gluten-free bread as an advanced bread baker. Our recipe is therefore without sourdough:

• 250g light gluten-free flour mixture
• 250g dark gluten-free flour mixture
• 1 cube of fresh yeast
• a teaspoon of salt
• 1 pinch of sugar
• 450ml water

Dissolve the sugar in the water, then stir the yeast into the water. Let the mixture stand for a moment, then stir in the salt. Then press a hollow in the flour into which you pour the yeast water.

Then knead a dough with the dough hooks or hands by working flour from the outside into the moist center of the bowl. The longer you knead the dough, the better!

Cover the dough in a place that is not too cool and wait for the dough to double in volume. It takes about an hour. During this time you can grease a loaf pan with oil and sprinkle with a little semolina or flour and preheat the oven to 200 ° C.

Knead the dough well again and pour it into the loaf pan. If you are braver and have a feel for the right consistency of yeast dough, you can also freely shape a loaf of bread. Let it rest again under a cloth for about 15 minutes and then leave your imagination free when you decorate the bread.

Sprinkle the surface with oatmeal, flax seeds, sunflower seeds, or just a little flour. Anything that tastes good is allowed! Bake your own gluten-free bread for around 50-60 minutes. Good Appetite!