The secrets to keeping gluten free bread fresh

A Gluten free bakery, once found, can become the cornerstone of a celiac life. Once upon a time, celiac disease was unheard of, then as it became more wide spread the need for gluten free products increased. Unfortunately one of the most sought after gluten free foods is bread and pastries that often can’t easily be found fresh at supermarkets.

In this case people then often search in vain for gluten free bakeries. The problem is that because of the niche nature of a gluten free bakery and non celiac resistance to the health or disease connotations of such a bakery, it has been difficult for bakeries to consider making gluten free bread.

And then there is the issue of gluten free bread often tasting dreadful or gluggy. This article looks at what you need to be aware of when you get your bread from a gluten free bakeries (or other source) and how to treat your bakery products when you get them home.

Gluten, is found in many grains used for basic baking. Some of these are wheat, barley, rye. Gluten free flours  can contain (rice, tapioca, potato) or the more exotic bean or sorghum flours, buckwheat and brown rice breads. In this case it can easily be seen how the inclusion of the substitute ingredients can easily overpower the standard bread (wheat) taste that you may be used to.

The rest of this article looks at what you need to do to protect your precious gluten free bread investment.

How to store your gluten free bread

Fresh bread doesn’t often stay fresh that long, and the debate rages over how to keep it the longest. The two major conflicts are that freezing bread can keep it for a long time (up to three months) but you need to store it in plastic, and if not sealed properly, it can get freezer burn. Then there is the whole issue of how to defrost it properly so that it tastes good. Will just ambient temperature defrosting or microwave defrosting work best?

Option two is putting your gluten free bread in the refrigerator. While it slows the growth of mold, it will usually dry the bread out. If you put the bread in air tight plastic it will promote mold, so there is a very fine line of how to store gluten free bread in this method.

The most preferred method is to keep the gluten free bread at room temperature. This works well as long as it is kept out of a humid environment. This means you need to be aware of the natural room humidity and if moisture has been increased or decreased due to rain or air conditioning (refrigerative and evaporative work at opposite ends of the humidity spectrum) and so on.

FRESH BREAD SOLUTIONS

If you need to keep bread for more than a few days, the best idea is to freeze half the loaf or whatever is left in air tight plastic. Defrosting it can be tricky, so this method is recommended. Use the defrost feature on the microwave to ensure low power thawing, or defrost slightly on high for 10 to 30 seconds (depending on your power level). As the microwave is likely to remove too much moisture it is suggested that you should then give the slice a light spray or water before resting it or putting it in a toaster.

For gluten free bread stored at room temperature the main thing is to keep it out of the light. The other thing to remember is to allow it to breathe, but not too much. This usually means either storing it in some form of breathable sack or brown paper bag or maybe a mid-sized cupboard. As long as your room has a stable temperature (not too hot or too humid) this can work fine. Surprisingly the best solution seems to go back to the old days when people used specific purpose bread boxes. It is thought that having it made out of wood or clay is the best material and any form of metal or plastic (no breathing) is not so good.

What a gluten free bakery can offer

Most chain bakeries do not offer home deliveries, however some small businesses do. Some bakeries are so large that they don’t actually have a store front and you need to have their products shipped to your house or store in bulk.

The addition of Iodine to bread has become a large issue of the last few years. Unlike controversy surrounding the inclusion of fluoride in water, it is believed that Iodine is inherently good for people and the vast majority of people do not receive enough iodine in their diet. For this reason some countries have mandated that pre-packaged bread should include a given level of this element. Note however that this may not cover bakeries, so it may be worth while if this is the main source of your bread, that you check if locally baked bread does include it.

Cross contamination is an often misunderstood problem with gluten free foods. In restaurants and cafes it is usually caused by cooks using gluten (wheat) covered utensils or using gluten contaminated oils. With gluten free bakeries the biggest problem is with utensils (rollers, mixers etc) as well as the baking trays, cooking sheets and preparation surfaces. With such long hours and early starts it is easy to understand that a non-exclusive gluten free bakery could easily mix things up.

Cost is a major hurdle to most people eating gluten free, but if you are a celiac, high prices is a hard thing to avoid. Unusually while supermarkets used to be known for the cheapest prices around, that no longer seems to be the case on many product lines. Similarly gluten free bread is often placed at a premium over similar non gluten breads. So this is a case where bread prices from a specialist store such as a specific gluten free bakery may not be any dearer than buying elsewhere. For an example of how much more expensive gluten free foods can be, you may like to look at our gluten free expenses article .

When home baking, it should be cautioned that gluten replacement grains can behave quite differently from their regular flour counterparts. This is because of their chemical difference, the different way they interact with pans as well as how the ingredients interact with the other ingredients. For these reasons it is easy to understand how some gluten free bread still tastes like play-do.

If you know of bakeries that should be listed in the Gluten Free Pages, please send us an e-mail via the gluten free pages contact page.

Bread image is courtesy of FreeFoto.com images