I recently tried baking with quinoa flour- and it was .....interesting. Quinoa flour has quite a pungent odor-very earthy; and it looks like a taupe powder-not completely appetizing. I first used the flour to thicken a chicken stew-brilliant; however, I was curious-how would it bake in a sweet treat? I decided to try and make Raspberry Coconut Bars as I am a sucker for anything with raspberry jams (hmmmmmmmmm, think shortbread cookies with raspberry jam centers).
The recipe (which I will post separately below) was quite easy to make, and took only 20 minutes to prepare. The only change I made to the recipe was to cut the recipe in half as a 9x13 pan of treats is a little too much for my husband and I to eat (or we could stuff ourselves stupid and gain 5 pounds). The quinoa flour defiantly has a presence taste-wise, which is why the recipe calls for almond extract, to mask the taste a bit. The center is gooey -to the point where the bar fell apart a bit too much. I recommend making the bar the day before and storing it in the fridge, as it will firm the bar up a bit.
My gluten friends thought the bar was okay, and commented that you could defiantly taste the quinoa flour as it had "an earthy taste" but was overall enjoyable. The only problem with asking your friends their opinions of your cooking/baking-are they being honest or trying to be kinds???
Would I make this again? I think so but with one change-I would cook the base on its own for 10 minutes (similar to a lemon bar) before adding the raspberry filling, as I think this would help firm up the bar overall. Not bad for my first attempt.....
No comments:
Post a Comment