Sourdough bread is one of the tougher challenges for people who follow a gluten-free diet. Finding reliable replacement ingredients that also perform well under this unique challenge can be difficult.
Because there are so many factors at play with sourdough baking, the building blocks have to all support each other; the culture has to be active enough, but also have adequate plasticity, the flours have to be strong enough, but also light enough, the moisture has to match but not overwhelm the dry ingredients.
Experimentation
The amount of experimentation this required was more than typical for me. But I have developed a combination of indredients, timing and techniques that deliver a near-perfect loaf of tasty sourdough bread safe for many types of food sensitivities and very little compromise. Without going too deeply into the rabbit-holes of each possible error, I will just share my learnings:
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The foundation of sourdough bread making is the starter – unfed, discard, warm, cold, active, starved – so don’t skimp or short-cut.
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Don’t listen to warnings against using Xanthan Gum or another stabilizer in an established gluten-free starter. Binders make a huge difference in the starter’s plasticity and strength.
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Psyllium is an excellent substitution for gluten in this type of baking, but many of us are unable to eat it. Xanthan Gum works.
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The right about of some form of sugar is necessary to get an active fermentation, whether it’s in the starter or the core ingedients. This can be flour types higher in carbohydrates, such as white rice, honey and other sugars are beneficial.
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Use a combination of flours that give taste, body and lightness to your bread. Tapioca and arrowroot are excellent replacements for potato and corn starches.
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Pay attention to the baker’s math (aka baker’s ratios). In sourdough bread making pay especially close attention to the starter relative to flour.
About the Recipe!
As I mentioned above, this recipe required more experimentation than is typical for the way I approach recipe development and testing. Changing flours, playing with baker’s proportions, adding sugars in one stage versus another, adding or taking out moisture, covering or not covering your dutch oven – the options are dizzying.
The result of all of the trials and learnings is what I would call “a great loaf of gluten-free sourdough bread”: it’s close to perfect, but we all know there’s no such thing as perfect. This recipe brings a great balance of rise, open crumb, crust, moisture and flavor. In one my trials I used a trusted off-the-shelf brand of all-purpose gluten-free flours, but found the potato starch in that blend to produce a pasty texture and flavor.
Finally, here’s the bread recipe!
