Hi all..... So, a customer has requested gluten-free cupcakes for this weekend. AHHH! I'm not gluten intolerant so I need major help! I made 2 chocolate batches yesterday and am not happy with either. The first batch had rice flour, cornflour and bicarb soda instead of SR flour. It also had eggs and milk. They rose beautifully and looked great, but they were powdery/chewy and not very nice on the palate.

The second batch used rice flour, cornflour and bicarb soda also, but had oil as the fat and no eggs or milk. They tasted better, but they didn't rise properly. The sides rise nicely, but the middles caved in.

What I'm really hoping for is a tasty GF recipe that is quick & easy, much like my regular cupcake recipes. And it needs to contain ingredients that I don't have to travel the earth to find :/ Thank you SOOOOO much

This is my go to gluten free vanilla cake recipe - comes out so good you don't even believe it's gluten free!

http://www.landolakes.com/recipe/1312/vanilla-pound-cake-gluten-free-recipe

Hope it works for you!

In your case I'd just grab a Betty Crocker GF box mix and use a recipe from The Cake Doctor Does Gluten Free. It's easier than trying to figure out flour blends and the science of gluten free baking if you are only doing it for one cake.

Be careful about cross contamination. Be sure to wash down your kitchen and don't bake with regular flour within a day of doing gluten free or the flour particles will still be in the air and coating your kitchen. Don't use wooden utensils. I'm not trying to be a pain, I have celiac disease and I know how easy it is to get sick from well meaning people who don't know what precautions need to be taken so I'm just putting that out there in case you weren't aware.

Notes
1. rice flour, cornflour and bicarb soda = starch and starch = powdery
2. not very nice on the palate means not nice on your "glutened" palate
3. rice flour, cornflour and bicarb soda with no eggs or milk = starch and starch with no structure = caved in.
4. GF recipe is never going to be like a "regular" recipe.

The Land O'Lakes GF recipe is fine. Just remember that they are US cups not AU cups ... Rice flour, potato starch and tapioca starch is a standard mix, and you do need the xanthan gum.

Coles and Woolworths have pre-mixed GF blends - Orgran, White Wings etc, Choose one with Xanthan gum included ..

Betty Crocker GF cake mix is not available in AU - Try one of the Macro range from Woolworths - the mud cake is good ..

"The Cake Doctor Does Gluten Free" does not appear to be available in AU. Remember that US and AU cake mix sizes do not match. Doctoring a 99 cent gluten cake mix is fine - but doctoring a $4-$6 GF mix is something completely different ..

Careful - AU definition of what constitutes "gluten free" does not match US. As it says "To date, the FDA and USDA have not defined the term "gluten-free." We have.

i'm a fan of the harry eastwood recipes i really like her mint choc chip cupcakes these use no gluten (or dairy if you ignore the buttercream).
The less usual ingredients are courgette, rice flour, and ground almonds if you want i can post the recipe.

HTH

your aye
Puss

Thanks for the help everyone! I think I'm half-way to perfecting the GF recipe. Yesterday, I took my fail-safe chocolate cupcake recipe (which happens to be egg & dairy free). That recipe calls for Plain Flour (all purpose) but I swapped that for 2 parts rice flour and 1 part almond meal. I also added 1 egg. They tasted HEAPS better than my other attempts, very moist and chocolatey, but they were just slightly sunken in the middle. Last night, I found the White Wings GF Plain Flour in Woolworths, so I'm going to try that with the same recipe today.

Auzzi - would you recommend that I add another egg?? That was my plan anyway, to see if it helped the rising issue. I still want something moist and more on the dense side, rather than light and fluffy. I find the fluffy cakes don't keep as long.

I bake from scratch GF normally, I just suggested the mix because it's a lot cheaper to buy one or two mixes than lots of bags of GF flours that you will only use parts of to make 1 cake. The recipes in the book are decent, I've tested them, but I don't prefer them over my blends.

One blend I use is
1 1/2 cups sorghum flour
1 1/2 cups corn starch
1 cup tapioca flour

Then I use 1/2 a tsp of xanthan gum per cup of the flour blend.

I've also had luck adding pectin or gelatin to help firm up my cakes.

There are 2 brands of GF AP flour that I get great results from, but I doubt you can get them in Australia, Better Batter Flour and Tom Sawyer Flour. Those I actually substitute right into traditional recipes without any other modifcation and they turn our great.

My current favorite flours are the Better Batter and a blend using sorghum, white rice, tapioca stach and xanthan gum. It depends on the recipe which I prefer. I used the blend posted above for a very long time though and it was good. I believe it is Carol Fenster's recipe, I got it out of a cookbook a long time ago.

sweet_tooth85 - I rarely use white rice any more, so I can't advise you as to your blend. You can add another egg [4 total?] but you will need the xanthan gum to provide structure.

Coleslawcat - I have use Carol Fensters New Flour Mix also ..It is my preferred mix [in conjunction with a very good commercial one we like]. I add besan flour as the optional ingredient as it adds fibre and protein to the mix.

AU cups are larger than US cups, so the usual amount of xanthan gum is approximately 3/4 teaspoon per AU cup depending on what I am baking.

We may add gelatine to bread recipes and some pastry recipes, but rarely to cake recipes.

Neither Better Batter Flour and Tom Sawyer Flour is available in Australia. GF flour blends are rarely exported - too expensive.

sweet_tooth85 - A general statement applicable to US. Sorghum flour can be found at Indian supermarkets at very good prices - Health-food stores stock it at exhorbitant prices. Maize Cornflour [cornstarch], Rice flour and tapioca starch can be found at most general supermarkets and any asian supermarkets and cost considerably less than the price of wheat flour.