January 6, 2013 - 8:44am
Grain substitution in multi-grain loaves
I am allergic to oats, corn, eggs and other things. This hasn't hampered me too much in baking in that there are egg substitutes out there which work in many situations. But oats and to a lessor extant, corn. I would like to make a multigrain loaf but I'm not sure how to adjust the recipe when either deleting or substituting for oats. Can I just bump up the quantity of the other grains and keep the liquids about the same?
Mike
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Oats can soak up a fair amount of water and can generate a lot of starchy gel in a dough so it depends on the characteristics of both the ingredient you are substituting and how the oats contributed to the loaf in the recipe you use. For example, oats can be added dry to a dough at the end of a mix (like you add nuts)and it will absorb some water but not contribute a lot to the dough, starch-wise. If used like this , it will tend to draw water from the crumb and dry the loaf out quickly over the next day-best eaten soon! If you add it at the beginning or cook it before adding, it contributes a lot of starch and absorbs a lot of moisture. So don't just look at the ingredients, look at what it contributes to the loaf. Same with the grain you want to substitute.
There are a lot of different grains out there that you may tolerate just fine. Bob's Red Mill has a lot of different choices in the organic section of many grocery stores or even on their site.Quinoa,teff, spelt (if no wheat allregy),kamut (same),rye, barley,buckwheat,sorghum,rices,just to name a few. Then there are the starches-tapioca,potatoe. And seeds-endless!
Have delicious fun!