I have an order for a gluten free cake and I have much, much experience with special food needs as my son has many, but I haven't tasted much in the line of gluten free cake. I picked up two mixes today and will bake them tonight but I am interested to see if anyone has a favorite. I know this is the place to go for wonderful advice.
Thanks in advance.
Kym
I am interested as well as I will need to make a cake for family members who have gluten allergies.
From experience I can tell you this:
If you are using a cake mix - the batter will feel grainy. Like sand!!! 
They are normally thinner than a normal cake batter, this is normal. 
The other piece of advise will cause you to gain weight!!!! 
Taste the batter and DOCTOR, DOCTOR, DOCTOR.
If the batter is foul, 
the cake wont taste much better. I constantly add flavouring, sometimes as much as half a bottle!!!!! 
I find the best cakes are made with a ground nut base, made from scratch. (not much good if you have a nut allergy as well though!!)
Hope this helps
Sorry forgot to add, make sure the icing is gluten free also as well as any baking powder etc that you add.
Good luck and let me know how you go with it.
I have a heck of a time getting my 14 year old to eat gluten free!! Its much easier with the 2 1/2 year old (undeveloped taste buds) the upside is that he doesnt ask for a lot of sweets especially lollies because a lot of time the glucose is made from wheat, hence he cant eat it.
Just a side note to those not familiar with gluten free baking and cooking-depending on the level of the allergy, some individuals require completely separate utensils, baking pans, everything. Even a complete cleaning will not take care of it. Has to be separate and untouched by anything with gluten!
Here is some info and also if you search for gluten and free with me as the author several other threads come up.
http://forum.cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-34744-gluten.html+free
http://forum.cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-153111-gluten.html+free
Kymscakes,
Please keep us posted. My co-worker needs to follow the gluten free diet. She used to be an art teacher & loves that I'm decorating cakes. She probably would have signed up for classes if it weren't for rheumotoid arthrytis ('scuse spelling). I would love to make her a pretty or funny cake for her birthday July 4th - that she can eat!
Is fondant usually gluten free? I have Wiltons & Satin Ice.
Jasmine
Sorry I didn't check back on this thread sooner. I asked may people and tried may mixes and Bob's Red Mill was hands down the best!!!
http://www.bobsredmill.com/gluten_free_info.php
The cake tasted delicious and I can honestly say that you could not tell the difference. I made BASIC buttercream, crisco, conf. sugar, vanilla (gluten free of course) and covered it in mmf. Unfortunately, my camera died and I have no picture!!!!
I made cake balls with the scraps and a woman I work with who has celiacs started to cry out of happiness and called her mom immediately.
She has suggested that I advertise locally for gluten free because apparently it is an untapped market around here (Buffalo, NY).
I, like many of you, get extra pleasure out of providing a safe special needs cake as my son suffers from a laundry list of allergies!
Kym
I am glad you had such success with Bob's Red Mill. I recommend that line. I usually make different goodies for my cousins kids [2 of her 3 have celiac]--she doesn't bake. I even have a scratch cake recipe that turned out so good as cupcakes that her son requested it to make for his Boy Scouts for a badge. I got lucky with the recipe and simply substituted rice flour for the all purpose flour. I say lucky because there are several kinds of flours that you can substitute with and some work better for other recipes and all.
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