My husband is a huge Star Wars nerd. For his birthday this year he has requested a Death Star cake. That's fine. I have the round pan. I can use fondant. I'm just stuck on the cake itself. He has celiac so it has to be GF. Is a gluten free cake going to be too heavy for this kind of sculpted cake? Any suggestions/recipes?! I have some Bob's Red Mill baking flour and prefer to use that instead of using 5 different types of expensive flour. I have baking experience but not that much GF baking experience. 

I've been gf for eight years.  Doctor thinks it's celiac, which runs in my family.  

I understand your reluctance to mix a gf flour blend; it's a pain in the neck and expensive.  Despite baking several times a week, I only recently started baking gf and only pie crust and cookies so far. I haven't had much luck with pre-made flour blends, so I blend my own.  I hate the expense of blending multiple flours, but the results are much better.  

If you are going to use a pre-made gf blend, I recommend you check out Gluten Free on a Shoestring.  Nicole Hunn tested and reviewed several gf flour blends in cakes.  I used her information on flour blends as a guide to develop my own blend.  I feel she's a pretty solid source for gluten free baking.

Forgot to mention King Arthur Flour makes gf boxed cake mixes.  I haven't tried it, but there gf pancake mix is pretty darn good.  

good stuff, siftandwhisk2 --

i too blend my own and i really like using the sorghum flour in there -- i use a one part protein, two parts starch and two parts grain if memory serves -- and in keeping with my studied ability to over think :) i use three different flours in each of those :) :) it works! ha! but that was also me wanting to make use of all the stuff i bought too -- and you have a ton of flour too -

it is expensive to buy all the different flours but overall it is more expensive to buy the ready made -- i bought ready mades while i researched and over time bought & gathered up the different flours i use in my mix --

i also love oats in there -- i whir oats in my ninja blender then sift --

it is quite an adventure but i enjoyed the ride and the results --

oh but i bought some gf biscuit mix because i had seen a recipe for dumplings -- it's pricey too -- i'm not in any hurry but i've got it when i need it -- doesn't chicken & dumplings  sound great on a cold winters day -- i'm talkin myself into this -- hahaha

Good morning - while this is slightly off topic I'd like to add that the King Arthur gluten free chocolate is the best chocolate box mix gluten full or gluten free!  I add a little espresso powder into all my chocolate mixes.  Everyone loves this one and no one thinks it tastes or looks gluten free.  It's not a particularly sturdy cake for sculpting tho.  I think you need a good gluten free pound cake for sculpting - sorry don't have that - but when I make a pound cake I swap out some of the water for the juice of one orange and add the orange zest and it is very yummy!  I don't think King Arthur makes a gf pound cake but I hope/wish they do!

Good luck!

T

Theresaf, I don't think you're off topic at all.  It's good to get feedback on alternative flour products.  Gluten free baking is a complicated area.  Good to know KAF gf cake mix is a good one.  I'm going to try it.

k8memphis, your comment raises a critical issue about gluten free baking, that being a need to mix starch and protein.  I found the all starch pre-made gf flour blends to be the worst.  I was traumatized by Cup4Cup when I baked chocolate chip cookies.  They were like cardboard!  I then read the ingredients list and not only is a starches, the first ingredient is cornstarch.  Geez...that's when I started researching gf flours to make my own blend. I discovered though that what works for one product, do not work for another.  My blend that I use for pie crusts makes a chocolate chip cookie so bad I'd rather eat a dozen made from Cup4Cup!