BBC Good Food christmas magazine gluten-free test

Those of you who have been reading this blog will know that I have been preoccupied with making my step-daughter's wedding cake. Now that the wedding is over and the couple off on their safari/beach holiday in Kenya I find myself at a bit of a loose end.

I bought the Good Food magazine to see how recipes were written up. It occurred to me that working my way through some of these classic recipes over the next six weeks would amusing and possibly useful to those of you wanting to put on a traditional feast.

I went through the recipes quickly this morning marking those that were already gluten free, and there are quite a lot. There are also several where the only gluten is in the soy sauce or sausages, so the substitution of gf soy sauce or gf sausages is very straightforward. The recipes where flour is called for are where testing looks possible and useful. Several recipes call for breadcrumbs, so I could try with the bread I make myself, though I usually just make bagels. Others call for puff or filo pastry, or croissants or pannetone as a base, and I will have to think hard about whether it is even worth trying them.

I notice they have included a gf Christmas cake, though it does have xanthum gum in which I won't use. The chestnut chocolate cupcakes are also gluten-free, so can be made without any modification.

I will start with their Chocolate fruitcake, which they use in their decorated cakes. I may amend the fruit a bit as I only use fruit without sulphites, and I have large supplies of some dried fruits already. Only the flour needs substituting; all the rest of the ingredients are naturally gluten free but do check if you are buying things like glace cherries as some do, surprisingly, come with gluten in them.

I'll post recipes and pictures and comments for each recipe I test.

I am also going to be doing a testing of some easily available mince pies from the supermarkets as well as posting two recipes for mince pies shortly.