Gluten-Free Grain-Free Baking

 

I was so excited to be able to get a chance to write a review for Stephanie Brandt Cornais of Mama and Baby Love's e-book, Gluten-Free Grain-Free Baking.

I especially love the book's tagline: A healthy baking cookbook for mamas who don't like to bake!  I bake but I do not love it.  And I am not very comfortable with grain free baking…all those different flours confuse me!  😉

While my family doesn't follow a strict grain-free diet, we do enjoy eating clean, healthy, real food.  Food that tastes delicious and makes our bodies feel great!  I was delighted to read in the introduction “I live by the 80/20 rule, so we are not strict grain-free, pale or gluten-free in our house.  I just like to do more of what makes me feel good and less of what makes me feel not-so-good.”

My family has the same type of philosophy!  I knew this e-book was going to be a hit for me!

This cookbook gives you the basics for baking….Little tips and tricks that make baking easy, especially for people who don't love baking!  She explains a bit about why reducing gluten and/or grains can be beneficial to our health, even if you are healthy.  She even gives you a nice list on how to build a gluten-free and grain-free pantry…wonderful!

As I scrolled through the e-book, I could not decide what recipes I wanted to test…everything looked A.MAZ.ING!

So, I started with the first one…'Healthy Almond Joy Cookies.'

I can't tell you how easy these were to make and how delicious they tasted!  There are even options to dehydrate or bake in the oven (or even just chill in the fridge) so you have a variety of options.  My daughter LOVED them and I gave them to several neighbors and friends who all gave the thumbs up.

Then I moved on to my husband's favorite, carrot cake.  Yes, he was the little boy who would have carrot cake at his birthday parties…that no one ate except him.  Well, I am pretty sure his friends would have loved Stephanie's Walnut-Pineapple Carrot Cake.

I actually made these as muffins instead of the whole cake because I wanted my daughter to share them with her class.  Because her class is nut-free, I left out the walnuts.  These were delicious plain and topped with her cream cheese icing recipe.

I was nervous about sending them to school with my daughter for her lower elementary Montessori class to try, but the tray came home clean and the teacher said they were a hit!  I am going to send the recipe to the teacher as they do baking in her class a lot.  These would be a nice, healthy treat for the students to make!

After the carrot cake, I moved on to something more decadent…The “I Love Chocolate Chocolate Cake.”

Again, I made cupcakes but this recipe can easily be baked as a cake.  We are a small family of 3 and rarely need a whole cake.  Cupcakes are great because they can easily be shared with friends.  I topped the cakes with her Honey and Coconut Oil Frosting and they were delicious!  She has a recipe for Chocolate Almond Sprinkles, but I did not get a chance to make those.  I am betting they were good.

These cupcakes were moist, rich and delicious.  I am thinking about using this cake recipe as the base for my favorite “Better Than Sex” cake that I am trying to ‘real foodify' for Oh Lardy!  Don't worry, I will keep you posted on that recipe!

There were so many other things in this e-book I did not get to try yet…her chocolate chip cookies, grain free pie crust and twice baked grain free pizza crust are still on my to-do list.

I suggest you head over to Mama and Baby Love's website and check out her Gluten-Free Grain-Free Baking e-book.  At $9.99 it's a great price point and has many recipes you are sure to love!  And, bonus, she offers it in a hard copy version if e-books aren't your thing for $19.99.

Happy Grain-Free baking!

 

All photos courtesy of Mama and Baby Love!