Deerfields Bakery: Gluten-Free

Deerfields Bakery: Gluten-Free

Last week, I received a gift package of gluten-free baked products from Deerfields Bakery, which has several locations in the area, including (not surprisingly) Deerfield.

Having no known allergies, I don’t seek out gluten-free items, but The Wife and daughters got big-eyed when I opened the box and found a few bags of cookies and two cakes.

The cookies were soft, which I understand is the preference of some and perhaps the expected texture with gluten-free baked goods. I prefer crisp, but I thought the flavor of the cookies was very good. Still, when I bite into a cookie, I like a crunch; if I couldn’t eat gluten, however, this cookie would be a quite acceptable snack.

The Blueberry Cream Cheese Coffee Cake was just what I wanted for breakfast this morning:



I need to review the science behind gluten-free baking, but this was pretty much how I like cake: firm and not fall-apart; dense without being dry. The taste was very…clean, with the richness of the cheese balancing the slight tartness of the berry, with nuts for crunch. Though the number of ingredients exceeded Michael Pollan’s golden (and largely unattainable) mean of four, all ingredients were easily recognizable: cream cheese, butter, eggs, organic blueberries, etc., except for Sucanat, which I was pleased to google is basically SUgar CAne NATural and unrefined, which used in moderation yielded a cake that was sweet but not too sweet.

As I’m not careful about whether I eat gluten or not, I’d be interested in what others (especially those who do watch out for gluten) think about this stuff.

In what seems a very healthy trend, this food purveyor is working with carbonfund.org to reduce carbon footprint through offsets (http://www.deerfieldsglutenfree.com/carbonoffset.aspx) – when you’re a baker, you got a big footprint, and if you’ve reduced all you can, I think the offset route is a good way to go…and not only for bakers.

Deerfields Bakery
813 N. Waukegan Road, Deerfield
847.520.0068
http://www.deerfieldsglutenfree.com/home.aspx

There is a definite gluten-free trend happening here in Chicago...Yea! In Manhattan, I could eat gluten-free every night for a month, never going to the same place twice, never asking for a chef, all at places that have obvious, GF offerings. I could go to several bakeries and get delicious GF offerings, too.

Until recently, the same was not true here; not even close. In the city, there was one place to get GF cupcakes, and maybe four restaurants with dedicated GF menus. But, in the last year, we have at least four or five GF bakeries and several new restaurants with GF menus, including one with GF pizza! Mr Hammond said, he seek gluten-free; nor would I except for Mr Views. Since he has celiac, he must seek or stay home. I tend to eat what he eats, so I want it to taste as close to the glutenous products as possible.

Another LTH member and I, she needing to be gluten-free, are planning a GF bakery tour this coming Monday. We'll definitely hit Rose's in Evanston, maybe Swirlz in Lincoln Park, maybe the new vegan/GF bakery/cafe (can't think of the name), and Deerfield's. I think we may have one other on the list.

The science behind GF baking is pretty similar to baking with gluten, with a few exceptions. Cakes, cookies, and pies are relatively close, with cakes being the easiest. Gluten free flours have no gluten (duh!) so they can't get tough - you can't develop the gluten in them. They tend to make tender cakes with a lovely texture - almost like cake flour. I've actually found that they can get too tender, so I sometimes need to be careful and use less sour cream, dairy, or other items that made things tender. Extra eggs or egg whites are often used to help provide missing protein as GF flours tend to be low in that area and to add extra leavening. Because there is no gluten, there is no structure to "hold" the leavening gases in the cake, so they can tend toward being heavy. Almond meal is lovely in GF baked goods, imparting a nice flavor and lightening the texture. The starches and rice flours that are most commonly used have little flavor, so the hard part is imparting more flavor, such as doubling the vanilla or adding nuts. Using alternate flours, such as teff, sorghum, quinoa,or amaranth, can help but have to be used in moderation in certain recipes or they begin to impart too much of a different flavor that you're not looking for.

Cookies are a bit trickier, simply because of the softness factor. You do have to work harder to get a crispy, crunchy cookie. It can be done, but they often still soften more than you want after they are cooled. Veloute and I have both worked hard to come up with a chocolate chip recipe that has a lovely crunchy edge, but a soft interior. It's also close to impossible to make cookies that rely primarily on flour. Between the missing flavor (or off-flavor) and the stickiness of gluten, it's hard to make things such as shortbread...but not impossible. Last year at a gluten-free holiday baking event, Veloute and I engineered several cookie recipe, including one for a shortbread-based version of a Girl Scout cookie. The shortbread was divine.

Without gluten, you are missing a key component to keep everything together. In cakes and most cookies, it's less important to add that in, but it's still needed most of the time. Using "sticky" starches and flours such as glutinous rice or tapioca starch helps a lot. Eggs help, too. Mostly, though, a bit of gum is needed, usually in the form of guar or xanthan.

Pie crust needs the xanthan (in my experience) or it will shatter when you cut it. But too much can make it tough. Pie crusts also need a very careful selection of flours so you get some taste. Rice flour is exceedingly tasteless and some of the other flours lend too much flavor. The blend used helps determine how easily it browns, how it tastes, how hard or soft it is, etc.

ViewsAskew, do you have a local source for buying xanthan gum? I've seen it for sale online but haven't seen it at my local stores. Perhaps I haven't been looking in the right places however.

Thanks!
Jen

Hammond,
Your report on Deerfields Bakery is very timely as ViewsAskew and I have planned a tour of GF bakeries for next Monday. I'm now looking forward to the trek to Deerfield just to try that cake and will definitley let you know what I think of their products.

Views Askew has of course done an excellent job explaining the basics of gluten-free baking. I'll add that in my opinion, one of the things that causes gluten-free cookies to be soft is the amount of xanthan gum. It seems to me the more xantham gum added to cookie dough the softer the baked cookie. A crisp cookie is something that I strive for, but it takes some trial and error to get them just right.

Jen,
Whole Foods sells xanthan gum in the area where the Bob's Red Mill flours are displayed. It's not by any means inexpensive though at $12 for 8 ounces.

I've also purchased it at Jewel (not in the city) under the Bob's Red Mill label before.

Thank you Veloute, I really appreciate it.

Jen

JenDath, hope you found your xanthan. Guar might be an acceptable substitute, depending on what you are doing, is cheaper, and can be found at the Vitamin Shoppe in a large container.

Veloute and I along with two other celiacs started our trek by having brunch at Rose's Bakery in Evanston. The omelettes were creative and tasty. The French Toast looked excellent, but I forgot to taste it, unfortunately. The breakfast sandwich was very large with a lot of egg -- too much for Veloute - but she promptly ate all of the bread. We also tried an almond square and we all proclaimed it delicious. To go: one raspberry bar, one chocolate cookie, and one apple pie slice. The chocolate cookie was very crunchy and crispy. It reminded me of a much better tasting version of a Maurice Lenell cookie, courtesy of the coconut flour. The others are awaiting their fate.

Next, to Deerfield Bakery. They have a lovely selection and will also make GF cakes for birthdays, etc. Their whole Schaumburg facility is GF, so there is no worry of cross-contamination. One of the helpful employees allowed us to try some cookies and a cupcake. The cupcake was very delicious, though a bit small. The cookie, a lemon cookie, was immediately coveted by Veloute. They were unfortunately out of them. The employee still had two of the cookies left and gave them to her. What a lovely gesture. There were two coffeecakes, brownies, and something I must be forgetting.

We purchased brownies and two coffeecakes to split between us. As of yet, I have not tasted ours. I hope Veloute will share her experience. I did notice, however, that the pecan coffeecake was not completely cooked in the middle. We thought it might be almond, but it was uncooked dough. It was a relatively small spot, but they may need to work a bit on their timings.

Next, we drove to the Gluten Free Store on Waukegan Road. They had many varieties and types of baked goods all at prices similar to those fresh at the bakery. The cupcakes were slightly larger here, but we didn't try any to compare taste. The best part about being here is that you can pick up many items needed for a well-stocked GF home, including packets of gravy mix!

To date, while I have found many GF products that taste good, nothing compares to home made. I imagine that the items we bought will fall into the same category - good in a pinch if you don't have time to bake, great if you don't bake. And, wonderful to have these as options...something anyone needing to follow a GF diet didn't have until very recently.

Another source for gluten-free products is A Way of Life in Niles. This is a health-food store with a large grocery section emphasizing gluten-free foods and whole grains. The staff is very friendly.

A Way of Life Natural Food & Nutrition Center
9359 N. Milwaukee Ave., Niles
(847) 966-5565
10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Mondays through Fridays, 9:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturdays and noon to 5 p.m. Sundays

David Hammond wrote:The Blueberry Cream Cheese Coffee Cake was just what I wanted for breakfast this morning:

David, that coffee cake looks very good. After my "eh" experience at Rose's in Evanston, I haven't sought out any more gluten-free experiences, but I think the cake route may hold something for me...

David Hammond wrote:In what seems a very healthy trend, this food purveyor is working with carbonfund.org to reduce carbon footprint through offsets (http://www.deerfieldsglutenfree.com/carbonoffset.aspx) – when you’re a baker, you got a big footprint, and if you’ve reduced all you can, I think the offset route is a good way to go…and not only for bakers.

Yes, bakers do leave big footprints. Another way I've seen this done, which is also a growing trend among prominent yogis and yoginis who are constantly traveling the world to give workshops and lead teacher trainings, is to pledge a regular donation to Go Zero. One of my gurus, Kino Macgregor, does this to make her travel schedule carbon neutral.