What Is Gluten?

Yesterday I was talking to a friend and she asked me what gluten was.
I gave her a pretty simple answer- what causes bread to rise.
But, it is really more than that.

It is what makes dough stretchy.
It's what gives cookies structure.
It is why bread rises so much. The yeast helps, but it needs gluten.

If your flour doesn't contain gluten, the results are different.
To get the same effect, you may need to add more eggs or use a flax seed slurry, xantham gum, or guar gum to mimic the effects of gluten.

In Going Gluten Free part 1 & part 2, I gave you a general idea of what you need to know to be gluten free.
Now,I am going to tell you what gluten is.

Gluten is made up of two proteins- the gliadins and the glutenins. When they come together, you end up with the texture you want in breads, cookies, and cake.

The protein gliadins is the major trigger for celiac disease.
There are three subtypes of gliadins.
They are a/B-gliadins, y-gliadins, and w-gliadins.

Glutenins are basically what causes the rising or structuring effect.
It adds in air and is why the crumb in your baked product is the way it is.

Wheat is the major producer of gluten.
The amount of gluten does vary from strain to strain of wheat.

The ancestors of modern wheat, emmer and einkorn, contain far less gluten.

Gluten is also present in barley, rye, bulgur, kamut, or triticale.
Oats do not contain gluten, but may be cross contaminated if processed in a facility where gluten products are being processed.

Going Gluten Free

Many people are sensitive to gluten found in many foods.

This is also known as celiac disease.

It used to be that not eating gluten meant giving up so much.

But now, there are so many different gluten free flours that you can eat baked goods that you may have thought you'd never have again.

Gluten is a protein found in wheat, barely, and rye.

Gluten helps with the rising in baked goods when a leavening and liquid is added. It also helps develop structure.

If you are unable to have any gluten, you need to read all labels on food.

The FDA states that if a certain gluten is removed from a product it can be labeled gluten free. So, it could still contain small amounts.

When eating or cooking with anything that needs to be gluten free, make sure you look at all labels for certain things that could give you a clue there may be gluten in it.

Here is a list :

malt vinegar

malt or malt flavoring

hydrolyzed vegetable protein

modified starch or modified food starch- unless it specifies it comes from one of the sources listed below

monoglycerides and diglycerides

products that list "natural" or artificial" ingredients

red or yellow food dyes

vegetable gum or vegetable protein- except for xanthum, cellulose, carob bean,locust bean, guar, gum arabic, gum aracia, gum tragacanth, or vegetable starch

if it contains flavoring, stabilizer, or emulsifier

Here are gluten free flours and starches that you can use:

Corn flour

Corn starch

Potato flour and potato starch flour

Rice flour

Pea, bean, lentil flour

Millet

Soy flour

Tapioca

Arrowroot

Carob

Buckwheat

Amaranth

Quinoa

Oat flour can also be used as long as it was not processed on a machine that also processed wheat.

You can find many recipes that a gluten free, but you can also just try adjusting your own recipes with a mix of different flours.