Gluten free apple strudel recipes - testing pastry

It became a irresistible project - to try making apple strudel with four versions of pastry quite late this evening.  So, a quick look on the internet and the second hit was  a review of strudels by  Felicity Cloake in the  Guardian.  No doubt it would have been better if I remembered to check the recipe when I came to making the strudels - I forgot to brush the pastry with melted butter and then wondered how I was supposed to get all that butter on top of the rolled strudels.  Butter before filling would make the filling less likely to make the pastry soggy and help it to be flexible.  Buttering the baking sheet or using baking parchment would have made it less likely that the strudels would stick too.  This is what I get for making tests too late in the day.  I found a lot of liquid spilled off the baking sheet so it would be better to make this in a shallow tin like a swiss roll tin rather than a flat cookie sheet.

The flour used is my usual 40% urid lentil, 40% tapioca and 20% cornmeal.

I made four versions so I could test my usual flour, and then flour with some tapioca gel that I made for the purpose, some dry prejel tapioca and some Solanic Potato protein. In the past I found that the gel tapioca made it much easier to make very thin pastes for pasta, though I also found that these worked better without egg.  I didn't try a non-egg version this evening.

I mixed the egg and butter into the flour and then divided into four.  One portion was used plain, one had 7g prejel tapioca powder, one five g potato, and one a couple of teaspoons of the gel I made myself (enough to work into a dough).

The doughs handled very differently.  The gel I made myself gave a lovely flexible dough once the gel was worked into the flour mix.  The dry pre-gel tapioca and the plain flour took a bit more work to get a soft dough.  The batch made with the potato starch, which is excellent to reduce slumping in risen breads, was very different; I needed to add more flour as the amount of water I used with the others produced a slurry.  I must have used far too much in this test as it also made the pastry taste weird.

All four pastries rolled easily to a stage where I could see text through them - I didn't struggle to get a finer pastry by using clingfilm to avoid sticking.  I was aiming at a reasonable pastry that I would be prepared to make on a normal day rather than one which took a lot of preparation.

We liked the two pastries made with the gel/prejel tapioca best. The were light and crisp rather than hard.  The potato pastry cut the cleanest but was tough and tasted odd. It is a while since I used this and I am sure that I put too much in - when the strudel was cold it held together very well but was too hard to be inviting. The plain one was good enough that I would make this again without any additives, but compared to the prejel pastry it was a bit harder rather than crisp.

note very neat cut on pastry on left - potato starch

The tapioca versions also seemed to bring out the apple flavour compared to the plain flour.

I don't think the butter on top of the pastry improved the strudel much if at all so I wouldn't bother in future, especially since I keep my dairy intake very low.

I didn't sprinkle the top with nuts or sugar as I wanted the pastry to be easy to judge.  Flaked almonds on top would make the whole thing crisper and more flavoursome.

Overall I would say if you really fancy a strudel the plain flour will make an adequate pastry.  Of course it is years since I made a strudel or even ate one, so I may be making something that bears little resemblance to a proper wheat flour strudel.  However, if you want a rolled fruit filled thin pastry these are fine. If you can't get hold of pre-jel tapioca, which I got through a LinkedIn contact, making it yourself is easy and almost as good in this recipe.

To make tapioca gel
10g tapioca flour
100ml cold water
stir together then cook on a low heat stirring constantly until a clear gel.  Use this for flatbreads to make them easier to roll and more flexible when cold, to make pasta, particularly where you need to handle it such as ravioli.

Recipe
200g flour
1 egg
10g melted butter
water to make soft malleable dough

700g Apples - I used half granny smith and half braeburn, peeled and chopped
50g raisins soaked in 40ml liqueur (soak for a couple of hours if possible) drained
zest one lemon
50g sugar
1/2 tsp mixed spice

Method
Mix egg and melted butter into flour.  Add water (or gel) to form a dough.  Mix well - running dough through a pasta maker works very well or letting it bash in a food mixer, but I just squished it for a couple of minutes in my hands.  Wrap in clingfilm and let it sit for fifteen minutes at room temperature if possible to ensure the flours have absorbed the liquid.

Roll thin, using plenty of flour to stop it sticking to the worktop.

Mix filling ingredients together.

Place the filling along one edge and roll into a log.  Slide onto the baking sheet/tin.

Bake at 190C for 20-40 minutes depending on how large your strudels are.  I made four small strudels and they were cooked after twenty minutes.

Gluten free aduki and parsnip pie

It's time to clean my fridge and freezer so instead of going grocery shopping I am using up tag ends of foods. Today I found three slightly tired parsnips and a tub of aduki beans.  I had soaked and cooked a whole bag of beans a while ago and frozen them in tubs.  With a beautiful crisp and chilly day outside I thought a pie would be nice .  I used garlic, ginger and chilli in the vegetable mixture but also put half a teaspoon of madras curry paste in the pastry to give it a bit of zip.

These amounts serve three.  I made double the pastry needed and rolled and froze one portion (oh no, the freezer filling up again!).   You could make a double pastry pie rather than just a topping or halve the ingredients.

I served this with steamed savoy cabbage and pineapple cooked with cumin, chilli and soy.  Pineapple is another thing I usually have in my freezer.  When I buy a fresh pineapple I can't eat the whole thing in one go so freeze it in tubs.  In this dish it added a sweet/sour note which worked well with the spicy earthy flavour of the beans.  Pineapple can be chopped with a large knife while it is still frozen.

Ingredients
3 parsnips, peeled and chopped
1 cup cooked aduki beans (1.5 cups/one can)
1 tbsp chopped ginger
3 garlic cloves
1/2 tsp garam masala
2 tsp oil
1 tsp madras curry paste is wanted
1/4 tsp chilli

Fry parsnip and spices briefly then add water to cover and cook until beginning to soften.  Add beans and continue to cook, stirring regularly.  Once the beans are in the pot there is an increased tendency to catch and burn so I don't put them in at the beginning.  When cooked use a slotted spoon to fill your pie dish.  Keep the cooking liquor to make a gravy if you want.  I left some of the vegetables in the give a thick sauce and added a dash of soy to lift the flavour a little. Leave to cool while you make the pastry.

Pastry (use half quantities if you just want single layer of pastry on top and no leftovers)
100g flour (40% urid, 40% tapioca, 20% cornmeal)
50g butter
approx 1-2  tbsp of cold water
1/2 tsp curry paste

Rub butter into flour.  Rub in the curry paste (or stir in curry powder if you prefer)
Add water and mix until you get a soft dough.  Don't leave it too dry or it will crack when you roll it.  Form a ball and leave the pastry to rest at room temperature for the flours to absorb the water. If you put it in the fridge it will be too hard to roll.

Roll pastry, cut around pie dish shape (I have two the same which makes this easy) and place on top of the bean mixture.  Bake for 30 minutes at 180C until crisp and just browning around the edges.

Cabbage side dish
Shred savoy cabbage and cook in very little water with the lid on.  Add 1/4 tsp cumin seed, dash of soy (make sure gf), pinch chilli and some pineapple if wanted to the pan at the start of the cooking so that the flavour permeates the cabbage.

Make a gravy with the cooking liquor by mashing a few of the vegetables into the stock and adjust seasoning if wanted.

Gluten free mince pies: M&S, FreeFrom and Hale & Hearty

It is nearly Christmas and the stores are full of red and green-wrapped seasonal food..much of which is unsuitable for people who cannot tolerate wheat and gluten.  However, there is an increasing range of gluten free food readily available so I decided to run some comparisons.  Today I tested three mince pies, two bought from a speciality store - the kind that sells both rice cakes and vast arrays of vitamins, and the other from Marks and Spencers.  I have been increasingly impressed with the efforts MandS are making to minimise allergens where they really are not needed in a recipe. In doing so they are making many prepared foods available to people like me, so that we don't always have to cook from basic ingredients.

For readers outside the UK, a mince pie is pastry filled with a rich spicy mixture of dried fruits, traditionally eaten at Christmas.

We tested the three mince pies both hot and cold, and considered flavour, texture and ease of handling. All three, I am pleased to say, would be acceptable both hot and cold.  However, they did differ quite a bit, on these three characteristics and also in their packaging.

Prices for a box of four:
M and S £2.49
Hale and Hearty £3.85
OK Foods £2.25

cold pies cut in half

hot pies cut in half

These three mince pies looked quite different, which made it easy to remember which was which in the testing.  The MandS one is an open tart with a small spice-dusted marzipan star on top.  The HandH one is also open, but has a pastry star dusted with icing sugar.  The OK one is a closed tart with a full pastry lid.

The flavours and handling characteristics of these tarts differed when they were hot and cold.

M&S mince pie

MandS: these tarts looked pretty though the filling looked a bit stingy.  They had a soft almost pliable pastry which made them easy to handle, and a rich spicy filling.  The flavour of the nutmeg was quite strong, and it might almost be too much for people who don't like spice - I found my own homemade mince one year, made to my taste with lots of spice, was not enjoyed by my sister.  Given the strong flavour of the filling the tarts did not need any more filling to be balanced.  The marzipan star was firm and gave an interesting contrast to the light pastry and the gooey filling.  These were good hot and cold, but the tart citrusy flavour didn't come out in the cold tart.

These tarts are presented in a cardboard box without an interior cellophane wrap.  They had a shelf life of about a week from when I bought them.  They can be frozen and used within a month.

Other allergens: nuts, cow's milk and eggs.

Hale & Hearty mince pie

Hale andHearty
These mince pies are not only gluten and wheat free but also contain no soya, milk or sulphites and are suitable for vegetarians.  While they say gluten free they also say tested to below 20ppm, which suggests they are possibly made in a facility which also handles wheat and so might not be suitable for super sensitives.  I haven't had any reaction yet and ate these half an hour ago, so judging by my delicate system they are ok.  Update from company Just to assure you that our mince pies are made in a dedicated gluten free facility and are milk free too!
20ppm means we comply Food Standards.
These tarts come in two separate cellophane wraps inside the cardboard box, so would be excellent for slipping into your bag to take to a party.  They have a shelf life of five months from when I purchased them.

These tarts were the prettiest, I think, with the pastry shell filled to the very top with the mincemeat and a white dusting of icing sugar.  They held together very well both when hot and cold. If you were having a party and didn't want crumbs all over the place these would be the ones to go for. The filling was mellow and well balanced- it didn't have the punch of the MandS one but I think anyone who liked mincemeat would find this acceptable,  My tasting partner, who isn't gf, said these were what he would expect from a mince pie.

OK foods mince pie

The OKfoods mince pies are also dairy free.  These lidded mince pies were firm and succulent, but crumbled especially when hot.  It was difficult getting the pie out of the foil, and the lid came off. They would be good as a hot pudding with custard or cream.  The fruity mixture was treacley with no pronounced spikes of flavour. They were the cheapest as well, though not much cheaper than the MandS tarts.

Other allergens are nuts and sulpher dioxide and may contain traces of egg and peanut. They had a shelf life of three months from when I bought them.



In general I was very impressed with these tarts.  They are vastly superior to anything available in the stores a few years ago.  I would be happy to be served any of them.  My personal favorite was the Hale and Hearty as it was the perfect mince pie in texture and flavour, and was so easy to handle.  For a bit more drama the MandS one was a close second, but I think more people would find it over-spiced and might be startled by the flavour.  As a fresh food it also takes more organising to have available for an impromptu party.

.......

and after I got posted this I got sent  a link by Living Streets charity to a mincepie calculator ( how many have you burnt off by walking)  ...and if you enter soon you get a chance to win a Kindle..easier to read when walking than paperbacks as you can make the text big.

Piecrust; New gluten free flour mix - tapioca free

I have been trying my first attempt at a tapioca and corn free gluten-free flour.  The one I am using at the moment is one third each of urid lentil, brown rice and buckwheat.  It makes good pancakes, but they are very easy with almost any flour.  Pastry is more of a challenge, and I wasn't expecting much from this mixture - I thought it might not hold together and it might not be crisp, or it might taste so strongly of the buckwheat that it would affect the flavour of the fruit filling.

I made a tiny amount of pastry to test, just using the scrap of butter I had to hand.  It made enough for two small pastries, made in a cupcake tin.  One was double crusted, the other open.  The filling was some frozen gooseberries, defrosted and mixed with sugar,

30g butter
60g flour mix (1/3 each urid, buckwheat, brown rice)

Cut butter and flour together then add chilled water to make quite a damp dough.  I thought I had added too much water to start with but after a little further mixing the dough became well behaved.  I didn't even leave it to rest before rolling.  I took slightly more care lifting the rolled dough than my usual recipe, but in general it was well behaved.  It kept its shape well in baking and when cooling, not shrinking away from the tin or the joins.

The piecrust was delicious, crisp and light and suitably complemented by  the tart sweet filling.

For those of you not used to English gooseberries who are shocked by the sight of prickles on the fruit in the first little pie - don't worry, they go soft and so aren't noticeable when eating.

Venison and mushroom pie

I had a bit of venison left over so made it into a pie with mushrooms.  This is a double crust pie; if you want to make life easier or the meal less calorific just put a top crust on.

Make the filling ahead of time so that it has time to cool - though you can speed this up by putting it in a metal bowl in cold water.  The pastry needs at least fifteen minutes to absorb the water, but unless you want to make it the day before don't put it in the fridge.  If you try to roll this pastry when it is chilled it is very hard to work.

Filling
125g venison (this was already cooked, but raw would be fine)
250g mushrooms
1/2 small onion
1 clove garlic
1 tsp umami paste or other flavouring like tamari
1 tsp ketchup (I thought it needed a bit of brightening)
pepper
water
oil

Finely chop the onion and cook until translucent in oil.  (If the venison is raw remove onion from pan and brown venison before continuing with other stages). Add the chopped garlic and the chopped mushrooms and cook until beginning to brown.  Add the venison, cut into bite sized pieces.  Add water and flavourings and cook until the mushrooms are soft.  Add some cornflour mixed with water to thicken the sauce, or, as I did, use a small lump of the pastry mixed into the sauce.  Don't make this as thick as you would like the gravy to be in the pie as it will reduce and thicken more in the baking.

Check flavouring and adjust as needed.  Put aside to cool.


Pastry
250g flour (40% urid, 40% tapioca, 20% cornmeal)
125 g chilled butter
water to mix to dough

Cut and rub the butter into the flour until it is evenly dispersed.  You can do this in a food mixer or by hand - which is harder, getting out the machine and washing up or rubbing gently for a couple of minutes?

Add water a little at a time and mix with finger tips until you get a slightly damp dough that holds together well.  Wrap in plastic and leave to rest at room temperature for at least fifteen minutes.


Put the oven on to heat - 170C fan, before you start assembling pie.

When the pastry has rested, roll out 2/3 of the pastry on floured board or just press into place in pie dish.  Place cooled filling into pie dish and top with the rest of the pastry.  Make a hole in the middle for the steam, brush with egg wash if you want a shiny top.

Bake at 170C, for about half an hour.  If you have kept the filling in the fridge allow a little extra time for the filling to get piping hot and the lower pastry to be cooked.  You may also need a little extra time if you use a ceramic dish rather than a metal pie dish.  The filling is already cooked so it just needs to be hot and the pastry crisp.

Serves two hungry people or four with modest appetites.

Venison, Ale and Mushroom pie

I based this recipe on one from  UKTV Food.  This pie has a crisp golden pastry and succulent rich filling.  Pureed beans and onion thicken the sauce.  If you don't want to puree them just add them to the rest of the ingredients at the start of the slow cooking stage.

Serves 6-8

Ingredients
1 pack diced venison (c340g)
1 pack mushrooms (c 200g)  I used chestnut
1 bottle beer - I used Nick Stafford's Hambleton Ales GFA Gluten and Wheat Free Ale
2 onions - chopped
2 carrots- diced
3 cloves garlic - squashed
vegetable oil
1 tsp fresh thyme leaves or 1/4 tsp dried
stock / water - I used chicken as I always have that available in the freezer.
1 small can beans -  cannellini / borlotti or gf baked beans
1 tbsp tomato paste
pepper


Pastry
500 g gf flour (40%urid, 40% tapioca, 20% cornmeal)
250 butter
water to bind
egg wash for pastry top if wanted (an egg beaten with a little water, brushed on to pastry before cooking).


Trim any cartilage from the venison pieces. Dry with paper towel.  This will make it spit less when you fry it.

Cover the bottom of your pan with a thin layer of oil.  Place individual pieces of meat in this oil when hot and allow to brown.  Don't over-crowd the pan; you may need to do it in two batches.  When the meat is brown set aside in another dish.

Put the onion and whole squashed garlic cloves in the pan and cook slowly until translucent.  Add extra oil if needed. Remove from the pan.

Cook the carrots and mushrooms for two or three minutes then add the meat back to the pan.  Add the stock, ale, thyme, tomato paste and pepper, and also salt if you want to.  The liquid should cover the meat. Put the lid on and simmer gently for 1.5 hours, checking the levels of the liquid every half hour or so.  If it is getting dry add some water.

Meanwhile, put the cooked onions, garlic and the can of undrained beans in a blender and puree. This will form the thickened gravy for the pie. You can leave the onions and beans unpureed if you prefer.

When the meat and vegetables have cooked for the hour and a half, add the bean and onion puree.    Check for seasoning.  Cook for a few minutes, stirring, until the gravy is the texture you like.  This stew is now ready to be eaten by itself, frozen for another occasion, or used as the pie filling.  Leave to cool before making the pie.

To make the pastry: cut the butter into the flour either by hand or in the food processor.  Add water a little at a time until the dough coheres in a slightly claggy ball.  Wrap in cling film and set aside for at least fifteen minutes for the flours to absorb the water.  If you make it ahead of time, keep it in the fridge but allow it to come to room temperature before rolling out or it will be too stiff to work.

Roll pastry out on a floured board to fit your pie dish or dishes.  This recipe is enough for two 1 pint /  half litre pie dishes.  If you aren't sure of the fit of your dishes, measure how much stew you have and see how that much water fits into your dish.  Place a layer of pastry in the bottom of the dish and put the cooled filling in.  Dampen the top edge of the pastry and place on the top layer of pastry.  Crimp or fork the edges together.  Brush egg wash on if you want a deeper golden and shiny pastry.  Bake for 35 minutes at 170C until pastry is golden brown.

Left over pastry can be made into jam tarts, or rolled out and frozen between greaseproof paper sheets until wanted.

Pastry - frozen uncooked and used as needed

I froze some of my pastry in little circles, placed between sheets of greaseproof paper.  I rustled up some mini-quiches the other day using these.  I let the pastry discs defrost for a few minutes, so that they would be flexible enough to press into the tartlet tins.  If I had been placing apple slices or brie on top I could have used them frozen.

Into the little tart cases I put some chopped ham, cheese and beaten egg.  Served with salad these made a pleasant lunch.  TT says the pastry tasted and felt the same as if it had been made fresh.

Raspberry tarts with chocolate pastry

One of the highlights of skiing trips used to be stopping at the service stations on the way down through France, and buying a raspberry tart.  They were always delicious, with a crisp pastry, unctuous filling and firm tart raspberries on top.  The two I had each year were enough, but no, of course, I wont be buying them even if I do manage a trip to France.  I have been intending to make a version for myself, and now I need  the recipe for to complete my Fruit Pies, Cakes and Puddings recipe book, I am running some tests.

First question - shall I stick to plain pastry or do a chocolate pastry.  I like chocolate with raspberries.
If chocolate pastry, then shall it be an ordinary shortcrust with added cocoa and sugar or shall I add some egg?  Shall I try my new coconut fat instead of butter?  How strong a chocolate taste? I can see myself with a sequence of about twenty pastries to try.

To start with, a simple enriched pastry, and if I don't think it works I'll try the other varieties.


150g flour (40% urid, 40& tapioca, 20% cornmeal)
100g ground almond
125g butter
50g caster sugar
20g cocoa
1 egg

Rub fat into flour, stir in cocoa and sugar, mix in egg.  Form into a ball, wrap and leave to rest at room temperature for fifteen minutes.  Don't put it in the fridge or you wont be able to shape it.

Cut pastry into four.  Press into small tart tins with removable base or whatever shape you have / like.

Bake for fifteen minutes at 180C

Leave until cold.  Fill with cold plain or chocolate pastry cream and top with raspberries.

You can make these in advance, freeze, and just make your dessert with bought pastry cream and raspberries for an almost instant fancy desert.

250ml milk
60g sugar
10g flour
3 egg yolks
tsp vanilla

This amount of pastry cream filled two tarts.  I put the others in the freezer for later.

A punnet of raspberries gave a single layer of fruit on top of each tart.

This was quite good, but the balance of pastry to cream to fruit wasn't quite right.  Either the pastry needs to be a bit thinner or I need to pile the raspberries up higher, never mind the elegance.  The pastry was a good texture, holding well but not giving much resistance when chewed.

Almost instant sausage rolls - dairy-free, gluten-free

sausage roll, gluten and dairy-free

Usual thing, had the TV on to see a programme about artisan beer and they started eating sausage rolls.  Immediately I wanted one for lunch.  I had some gluten and dairy-free hotdogs in the fridge.  I had some of my flour pre-mixed (40%urid, 40%tapioca, 20% cornmeal) and I had a block of hard white vegetable fat.

I grated some of the fat into a bowl.  As it turned out to be 60gm I added 120gm flour, stirred them together, then added cold water until the mix stuck together.  I didn't knead it at all as I wondered if it would produce a flaky effect.

I rolled this out and wrapped pastry around each hot dog.  Cooked sausages would have worked fine too.  I placed these on a baking sheet, brushed a little egg yolk mixed with water on top - I thought the pastry would be unlikely to brown by itself as it didn't have butter or egg or sugar in it.

I cooked these for about 15minutes at 180C until they were golden and the pastry firm.  You can see the pastry has slightly shrunk away from the hot-dog because it hadn't been kneaded at all.

These were crisp and amusing to eat.  The pastry holds together well enough for them to be finger food or taken on a picnic.  From seeing the initial sausage rolls on TV to eating them for lunch took about 20 minutes.

Gluten-free cheese, potato and onion pasties

cheese, onion and potato pasties - gluten free

Ate the last one of these a week after baking.  It was still good and held together well.  

I had kept it in the fridge.

Savory picnic type food can be hard to find if you can't eat gluten.  I made these pasties to test the new standard flour mix...how strange to ladle a single type of flour out of a jar rather than grinding, assembling, mixing a bespoke flour for each project.

Pastry
250g butter
500g flour (40%urid, 40%tapioca, 20% polenta)
2 eggs
c100-150ml cold water to mix

Filling
1 onion, cooked until soft and golden in olive oil
1 large potato, peeled, diced and boiled until nearly soft
100-150g cheese - I used mature cheddar, and added more until I thought the flavour balance was right
pepper

Cook the onion and potato ahead of time so that they have a chance to cool before you need them.

grated cheese, sauteed onion and diced cooked potato

Make the pastry by cutting the butter into cubes and blitzing in the food processor until the butter is finely dispersed.  Add the lightly beaten egg and blitz until evenly dispersed.

You can do the next bit in the machine but I like to mix the water in by hand so I can feel how wet the dough is getting.  Tip the mix into a large bowl, add cold water a little at a time.  I use a whisking action with my finger tips, and keep adding until the dough will just hold a lump when squeezed lightly.

Form into two balls, wrap in clingfilm, and put in the fridge to rest while you assemble the filling the filling.

Roll the pastry out to a medium thickness.  Don't aim for a very thin pastry as it needs to be able to hold the filling in place when cooking.  I made my dough too thin for this and some of the cheese escaped. Aim more for the thickness of a £1 coin rather than a ten penny piece.

Cut out a circle.  I used 25cm 8 1/2 inch side plate, which produced a good meal sized pasty.

Egg wash around the edge of the pastry and place a large handful of the filling in the middle.  The potato, cheese and onion mix holds its shape well so that you can put a big lump in the middle and it stays in place while you shape the pastry around it.

It is easier to make a flat pasty, where you bring one half of the pastry over the top of the filling and press it down onto the other half.   As I was testing the performance characteristics of this pastry I did the version where you bring both sides up and seal them down the middle.  It was a little difficult to do this neatly as the pastry did tear a bit, but a little patching fixed that.  Egg wash for a shiny golden finish.

Cook for 20 minutes in a hot oven, 180C, until golden brown.

These are good hot or cold.  They survived carrying around in a box without any sign of falling apart.

a slice through a mini test-pasty - had to be sure it tasted good!

Perfect pastry pies

Using week-old gluten-free pastry from the fridge:

mini butternut squash pie

A while ago I posted about making mince pies.  I had meant to make a large batch and freeze half of the composed but not baked pies, so I could pull a few out whenever I wanted.  Two large patties of pastry sat in the fridge for a week...

Today I wondered if it was still good to use.  I have frozen pastry and used it before but never just kept made-up pastry in the fridge for more than a couple of days before. I took a little bit and baked it - it was still light and crisp and hadn't any strange flavour.

I had some chilli beef in the freezer, and a portion of the steak in gravy I use for steak pies, a good dollop of the butternut squash and chilli mix I used as a ravioli filling yesterday, and some apple sauce left over from breakfast, and blackberries in the freezer.  I didn't mix them all together, for any of you who have started feeling panicky.

By slicing the pastry I could roll it without having to wait for it to warm up.  I made one steak pie, mini chilli beef pies, butternut squash pies, apple and blackberry pies and a strawberry jam tart with the last bits of leftover pastry.  I hate to throw pastry away, and often use the last trimmings for a single mis-shapen jam tart - I love the way the jam goes chewy.  The jam is some made by with the grandchildren - a trip to the fruit farm is one of our standard summer holiday activities.

The pastry is a mixture of urid lentil flour, tapioca and polenta.  The full recipe was posted a few days ago: http://blissglutenfree.blogspot.com/2010/12/finally-gluten-free-mincepies.html

mini chilli-beef pie

Some of the pies were eaten for lunch, the rest are in the freezer for easy meals some other day.

 I couldn't resist adding this picture - the sunlight shining through the pastry is so warm and inviting.  The weather here has been freezing for a couple of weeks and the last two days have been freezing fog.  This shaft of sunlight was the first I'd seen this week.

Finally – the gluten-free mincepies

So, I made the candied peel.  I made the mincemeat.  I have now made the mince pies and delivered them to Revill’s farm shop and Number8 Community Art’s Centre.  I have a great big jar, the kind sweets were sold in, full of mincemeat which should only get better as it matures.

Pastry Ingredients

200g butter

(400g flour) 

150 urid lentil flour

125 fine polenta

125 tapioca flour

1 egg, lightly beaten

approx 100ml water

1/2 tsp sugar

Method

Whisk or sieve the flours together.  Cut butter into little lumps and stir into flour so that they are all coated. 

Either rub in by hand until they resemble breadcrumbs (I must think of a gluten-intolerant descriptor for this stage, suggestions welcome) or blitz in a food processor.  Don’t keep going until it gets claggy, just pulse until all butter lumps are tiny.

Stir in a little sugar to help the pastry brown and give a slight sweetness.  I tried the mince pies with sweet pastry and didn’t like it as much, but a teaspoon of sugar wont really be noticeable.

Stir in the egg.  I use a flat silicon scraper to avoid over working the mixture and to keep the noise down in my metal bowl, but just use whatever tool feels right to you.  Try to mix without squashing too much.

You should find that your dough doesn’t easily form big patties yet.  Add cold water and stir until you find that a handful of dough squidges into a lump of dough that stays together easily and doesn’t split along the edges if you roll it flat.  The amount of water you need will depend on the flours you use, the humidity of the day and the size of the eggs.

As I was making a big batch of pies for a customer I ran a test just to be sure I hadn’t made any dreadful errors.  I have been know to make cake without the sugar – it is usually the sugar I forget, but it has been butter, one of the flours…so now I try to test the dough or taste the batter before I get to the point where I can't fix things.  It also means you get (hopefully) a treat to eat before you carry on with the work, and is made and eaten before the pastry has had its twenty minutes in the fridge.

Wrap in cling film and putting in the fridge to chill a bit.  If your butter gets to warm it is harder to roll out the pastry neatly.

I rolled out the pastry using tapioca flour to dust my work surface and rolling pin.  You can also roll between two sheets of Clingfilm/plastic wrap or parchment paper.  I rolled this straight onto the board to show how the pastry does work easily and isn’t really any more trouble than a plain wheat pastry to handle.

I rolled the pastry so thin that you could easily see the pattern of my tablecloth through it.  I could still handle it but it was a bit fragile. This is too thin for these tarts, which need to be able to cope with handling in a store.  

I used a 78mm cutter to go in the little foil trays.  I placed each round on the tray and gently squeezed the pastry in place – ok, so it does take a bit more care than I recollect wheat pastry to need, but it isn’t too hard.  

If you get a tear just take a little piece of dough and press it into the gap.  I have done a little video of this but it is my first attempt and the sound pick-up was poor – I posted it a couple of days ago just to get me started.

repairing a hole in the pastry

When you have cut out your circles, cut out any smaller pieces you want for toppings.  

Take the remaining pastry and lightly shape it before rolling out again.  You can do this three  or four times with the pastry still being acceptable.  

Place a heaped teaspoon of mincemeat in each tart.  I put little pastry stars on top as I like to be able to see the mince and I like the slight caramelising that takes place when the mincemeat gets direct heat.

I cooked these little tarts at 170degreesC for 8-12 minutes depending on where they were in my irregular old oven. Cool and sprinkle if desired with icing sugar or caster sugar.

holding together!

Enjoy.  I don’t know how well they will keep yet but the mincemeat frangipane tart I made last year stayed good for weeks.  I’ve kept some to test over the next month. I will post results.

I made a bigger tart with all the bits of pastry that had already been rolled out and re-squidged three times.  I just compressed it into the tart tin rather than rolling it out again.  It still tasted good and wasn’t tough, but the pastry was definitely a little less crisp and light.

I tried mince tarts made with Bob’s Red Mill flour but I didn’t like the slight chickpea flavour, though my Tolerant Taster said he didn't notice it.  The pastry was also more difficult to manage so I made it thicker, and it was more stodgy.