How to Make Gluten Free Flour Blends and Store for Easy Baking – With Video
This post and video are designed to teach you how to make gluten free flour blends at home. In general, making your own blend is much cheaper and yields much better results. It’s important to use a blend if you want the best gluten free flour for baking. If you want the best gluten free all-purpose flour, learn how to make your own!
When I first started baking gluten free there wasn’t a lot of GOOD store-bought all-purpose flour options. If I wanted the best gluten free all-purpose flour I had to make my own. As I continued baking I went on to develop even more gluten free flour blends for different baking needs. Even though store-bought flours have improved, I continue to make my own because it’s inexpensive, easy, and has amazing results in my baking.
Today I want to show you that making your own gluten free flour for baking is just as easy and often much more delicious than buying store-bought flour.
I’m not against using store-bought flour and have used it myself on occasion. But through my own recipe testing, I have really come to love the texture my flour blends produce.
The Best Gluten Free Flour Recipes for All Your Baking Needs
Here’s the list of all of my gluten free flour recipes. I have created different blends for different needs.
Basic Gluten Free Flour Blend – If you want the best all-purpose gluten free flour blend, this is it. It’s a great texture that really emulates all-purpose flour.
Self-Rising Gluten Free Flour Blend – This blend is very similar to my basic gluten free flour blend but it already has the raising agents and xanthan gum mixed in.
Gluten Free Cake Flour Blend – This blend emulates traditional cake flour. It’s a light and airy blend that will give your cakes a nice soft texture.
Gluten Free Cookie Flour Blend – While you can make cookies with the Basic Gluten Free Flour Blend, I love the way my cookie recipes taste with this blend. This is the blend I use in most of my cookies in my allergy friendly cookie monster e-cookbook.
6 Common Questions About How to Make Gluten Free Flour
Let’s get into some common questions you may have regarding making your own gluten free flour blend.
1. Is it cheaper to make my own flour blends?
Yes! The majority of the gluten free flour blends I make are cheaper than some of the big-name 1-to-1 flour blends. Let’s look at a comparison to Bob’s Red Mill just as one example.
Here’s the breakdown:
*All of the prices you see below are from vitacost.com. I am not affiliated with Vitacost, I just really enjoy their online store.
Bob’s Red Mill 1-to-1 Gluten Free Flour 44oz (about 8.5 cups) costs $7.49
Now let’s look inside my Basic Gluten Free Flour Blend:
One batch makes 6 cups and contains…
4 cups superfine brown rice flour costs $3.12 –
The Vitacost brand of this costs $4.29 for approximately 5.5 cups
1 cup potato starch costs $0.74 –
The Vitacost brand of this costs $4.07 for approximately 5.5 cups
1 cup tapioca starch costs $0.73 –
The Vitacost brand of this costs $3.99 for 5.5 cups
Conclusion
6 cups of my flour blend = $4.59 (approximately)
6 cups Bob’s Red Mill = $5.29 (approximately)
This difference may not seem huge but if you can get a better flour blend for cheaper, it seems like a no brainer to me.
I also think it’s worth noting I never pay full price for my individual flours. I always wait until there are sales on Amazon or Vitacost and stock up.
So with a 20% discount taken into account, my total cost for 6 cups winds up being closer to $3.68. This means baking gluten free really isn’t all that expensive when you’re making your own blends.
2. Won’t my baking take longer if I’m using my own blends?
Nope! Not if you make and store them ahead of time. As you can see in my video it’s so easy to find cheap containers, cute containers, or really any type of container to store your flour blends in. My flour blend recipes yield around 6 cups so you’ll have plenty of flour for a while. When you run out just don’t wait until you want to bake to make more. Make it ahead of time and your baking will be quick and easy.
3. How do I store my Gluten Free Flour Blends?
As stated above storing your gluten free flour blends is key to keeping your baking quick and easy.
I always make big batches of my gluten free blends and store them in airtight containers. The following are some great containers I found on Amazon.
OXO Pop Container – this is one of the ones I shared in my video.
Progressive Flour Keeper with Leveler
Acrylic Canister Set
Some other great places to look for containers – Target, Walmart, Marshall’s, Home Goods, T.J. Maxx, and yes the Dollar Store too.
4. What’s the best Gluten Free All-Purpose Flour?
If you’re looking for just an all-purpose gluten free flour I suggest using my Basic Gluten Free Flour Blend. This is what you’d call your 1-to-1 flour replacement. Although please note, no 1-to-1 flour will always work perfectly in traditional recipes (not even Bob’s Red Mill).
If you’re new to baking gluten free I suggest following gluten free recipes. They usually call for a different ratio of ingredients than a traditional gluten-full recipe. Once you’re more confident baking gluten free you’ll probably have a better understanding of the tweaks needed for converting a traditional recipe to gluten free. But in the beginning, it’s best to stick to recipes designed for gluten free.
5. Do I need different types of Gluten Free Flour Blends for different types of baking?
Most big-name brands are only making “All Purpose” or “1-to-1” gluten free flour blends. But I have found, just like traditional baking, different blends create different tastes and textures. That’s why I have 4 different gluten free flour recipes (look above for a list and description of each type).
However, I have used each one for different things with tasty results. For example, I’ve used my gluten free cake flour blend to make doughnuts, and my basic gluten free flour blend to make cupcakes. So it does work, but with a different texture. It’s less about what you’re making and more about the result you want. For a light and airy texture, you’d stick with cake flour. If you like a denser cake you can use basic gluten free flour blend.
6. Do I need to use Xanthan Gum?
The only flour blend recipe of mine that already contains xanthan gum is the Gluten Free Self-Rising Flour Blend. That blend is designed to be an easy drop and go flour that doesn’t require any rising or extra binding like xanthan gum.
If you are using one of the other blends and the recipe calls for xanthan gum you will have to add it while you are baking.
What does Xanthan Gum do?
For those who don’t know, xanthan gum is a binding agent with some rising properties. Since gluten free baking is lacking the gelatinous gluten protein, xanthan gum helps add that necessary stick so your baked goods aren’t crumbly. Not all baked goods require it and I have many recipes where I don’t use it. But a finicky recipe like cupcakes or muffins can get very crumbly without the presence of xanthan gum.
Please note, some xanthan gum can be produced from being fed wheat or soy. Now and days that’s not the case since it’s so often used in gluten free baking. But it is worth checking. I use Bob’s Red Mill Xanthan gum and theirs is fed Non-GMO corn.
I hope these Q&As were able to give you more information. If you still have more questions about creating and using your own gluten free flour, please leave a comment down below!
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