It's Gluten-Free Week over at the Kitchen Overlord's place, which was a tough theme for me - I'm neither celiac not gluten-intolerant, thus I've never been overly motivated to research this particular branch of cooking.
Closest I ever got was half-heartedly baking a couple things for a colleague who is mildly sensitive to gluten (and doesn't even love sweets that much, I might add), but in those instances I merely bought the outrageously expensive specialty "flour" that comes with starch and metyl cellulose and stuff already mixed in.
Buckwheat flour, though - it's a waning ingredient, yet it is rooted deep enough in the Italian tradition (in Piedmont especially) that even I have done a bit of experimenting with it in the past. I love it because of its distinctive, very rustic quality - absence of gluten notwithstanding!
This cake uses buckwheat as its main "grain", plus almond meal and chopped, toasted almonds for added body and texture. Although whipped egg whites are folded in the batter for a bit more volume, it doesn't rise much - but if you like your cakes dense, hearty and nutty, you'll enjoy it for sure. Even if you're no celiac, I promise!
(I gave my cake a stenciled stag/buck head in honour of Harry Potter's Patronus btw. Cheeky, or what?)
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