Project Baguette - Part I

Project: Baguette

Bread is not something that I really miss much most days.  Yet there are days when I dream of a delicious french baguette to eat with a dollop of butter, jam, nutella...whatever it may be.  So I decided to take on the task of making french baguette.  I tested several recipes and have discovered that unlike replicating baked treats, it is very hard to replicate gluten-free breads with the intention of making them taste and feel similar to the real thing.  

I am the type of girl who likes to follow directions to a T.  So it was difficult for me to create french bread without the french bread loaf that each of these recipes recommends.  However I tend to skim directions prior to creating them and thus missed the part about the pan.  Perhaps I would have had better results had I utilized the correct pan, but perhaps not.  What I can tell you is that after creating four french bread variations this week I have found gf baguettes to be very dense.  

Two of the recipes that I tested were somewhat promising (the other two aren't even worth mentioning).  I thought that they both had good flavor even though they were not perfect in the texture department.  The first comes from the gluten-free goddess who utilizes Pamela's Bread mix in her recipe.  I had some Pamela's in the house so I gave it a shot.  While the texture wasn't what I remembered baguette to be, I thought the flavor was delicious and I thoroughly enjoyed it after it came out of the oven.  The next recipe comes from the gluten-free diva.  This one has a yummy sea salt and rosemary topping that makes it the prefect savory bread.  While I loved this bread, it didn't quite evoke the feelings of the french bread I was looking for.  Although I would definitely make each of these recipes again, my hunt continues for the perfect baguette.  

The good news is that with so much bread lying around we were able to use it for french toast this week.  My kids are huge fans of french toast and in the past we frequently created this weekend special out of french bread.  Brian (my husband) is the king of french toast in our house and keeps it simple with mixing milk, an egg, and cinnamon together and then soaks the bread in the mixture prior to frying it in the pan (he really doesn't have specific measurements or I would share those).    

The results were an awesome french toast that we were not able to detect as having been made on gluten free bread.  Yum! 

And what could be better than some pint-sized satisfied eaters???

I hate wasting so I am planning on attempting a few more recipes with the leftover baguette this week...stay tuned.