Pumpkin Scones: Grain Free, Egg Free, Sugar Free

Hi Guys! Glad to be back after the hectic Labor Day. It seems like everyone I know was born at the beginning of September and I've been to more than my fair share of birthday parties so far this month. More than I can count on one hand. And one of them my own. Yes, I'm a year older. But as far as I'm concerned I'm still 29. And will always be 29.

For my birthday this year I was craving the fall. The cool weather, the smell of pumpkin, and the color orange everywhere. Of course, it's still 90 degrees here but that didn't stop me from attempting these totally luscious Pumpkin Scones.

To call these scones is a bit of a stretch. Scones often have a biscuit-like texture. These came out a bit more soft, almost creamy. And based on their bake time can be more or less moist. Shorter bake time = moister. Longer bake time = drier. I've had them both ways and both are delicious.

Just so you know how delicious, check out this closeup of the moister scones.

Yes, those are chocolate chips you see. I know, I know. Chocolate chips are not SCD legal. But it was my birthday treat. Cut me some slack.

So let's get to it. The recipe, adapted from the Veganomicon.  These scones are completely grain free, egg free, and sugar free.

Ingredients:
3/4 cup of almond flour
3/4 cup of coconut flour
1/2 cup of honey
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp cardamom
1/8 tsp cloves
1/8 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup of butter (can also use margarine)
1/2 cup cashew milk (can also use almond milk, any other nut milk, or cow/goat's milk)
2 tsp ground chia seeds (can also use flaxseed, or 1 whole egg)
3/4 cup pumpkin puree
1/2 cup of chocolate chips (or golden raisins, cranberries, pecans, walnuts etc.)

Instructions:

• Heat the oven to 350 degrees and line a pan with parchment paper.
• Mix the flours and spices in a large bowl.  Cut the butter into pieces and mix it into the four mixture until it's crumbly.
• In a separate bowl mix the ground chia seeds with the almond milk until thickened.  Then add the pumpkin puree and honey and stir until fully combined.
• Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix thoroughly.  The batter will be moist and slightly crumbly.  Add the chocolate chips or other mix in and stir until incorporated.  Be careful not to overmix the dough.
• Squish the dough together into a large ball and flatten it onto your parchment lined pan.  You want the disc to be about and inch thick.  Then take a sharp knife and cut the dough disc into slices.  This pre-scoring will help when they're finished backing.  Or you can drop the dough onto the pan and make individual rounds.
• Bake for 15-17 minutes for moister scones.  Bake for 18-20 minutes for drier scones.  Let them cool before you make the final slices.  

Makes 8 large scones depending on shape.

If you give these a try let me know what you think!

Light White Bread Redux

Okay, so I've been doing a lot of baking with the almond flour over the last two weeks or so. And in general I'm really pleased with it. Does it taste like wheat? Not really. Is it pretty yummy anyway? Definitely. I've made bread, muffins, biscuits, and cookies and everything has come out more than satisfactorily. At this point, all errors lie with me.

That being said, I took another pass at the light white bread recipe found in Healing Foods. This bread is supposed to light in color and moist. I substituted some banana flour for some of the almond flour in my first attempt at this recipe. That experiment yielded a surprisingly dense bread but one that was super with butter and jam - my favorite way to eat bread. This time I executed the recipe as written. I won't reproduce the recipe for you here. You'll have to buy the book for that. But behold! Light White Bread.



This version of the bread came out golden and beautiful. It was light and moist. Tastewise it would have made excellent sandwiches although the bread is very fragile. It breaks easily, I expect due to the whipped egg whites that are called for in the recipe to give it it's lightness of texture. As before, I've consumed the entire loaf with butter and jam. It's one of my favorite things.

Will I be making this again? Oh, yeah!

Light White Bread

My first SCD baking experiment was the Light White Bread from Healing Foods. Sorry no pics this time. I'm having some trouble with my camera software. I chose this recipe to do first because I thought it might make a nice option to have with sandwiches. Unfortunately, the recipe didn't come out as light or white. This is probably due to the fact that I was using a coarser grind of almond flour instead of a fine grind. I also substituted plantain flour for half of the flour called for. I substituted the plantain flour because I wanted to cut down on the amount of almonds I'm taking in and because I wanted to add extra moisture to the bread. Plantain or banana flour is really soothing to the gut and is very moisture absorbent so it makes anything you bake really moist. If you're going to use it in your recipes you should really add a little extra water to get the consistency just right. I just eyeball it.

The bread was dark and dense and super moist. It didn't rise very much but that's to be expected. It has a really mild flavor. If the texture were lighter and fluffier it would make an excellent sandwich bread flavor wise. Right now it's super delicious with butter and jam. I can't keep from eating it. I'm definitely going to try this recipe again with a finer grind of almond flour. And maybe some coconut flour. I hear coconut flour bakes up very similar to wheat - lighter and fluffier than almonds. I'll also increase the recipe slightly. Since the bread doesn't rise a great deal you'll need a bit more batter to have sandwich size loaf.

Next up: Muffin Mix Muffins from Everyday Grain-Free Gourmet