GF Baking Class.

For my mom's 65th birthday, my two sisters and I decided to surprise our Mom and give her an experiential gift, along with some time spent with us.  We decided to attend a cooking class together at a cooking studio in uptown Waterloo. You can check it out here.  

Before I go any further, I must pause and give all credit to my sisters who came up with the idea.  If it were up to me, I would have chosen something predictable like pedicures.  And here's the thing, our Mom LOVED it.  It was something that she would never (and I mean never) normally do and it was super fun for us to do together.  We laughed lots.  Hopefully we didn't distract the other 4 members of the class.  Who am I kidding?  I'm sure we did.  They probably hated us.

The funny thing was that this particular class was a gluten-free baking class.  To be totally honest, we picked it based on the day that worked best for us, more than on the focus of the class.  However, it completely worked out to my benefit as I am (mostly) gluten free. :)

Our menu consisted of:

Pumpkin Cornmeal Pancakes with Blueberries and Cinnamon Maple Syrup

Gluten-free Strawberry Scones with Lemon Curd

Roasted Heirloom Tomato Tart

Chocolate Souffle Cookies

Everything was delish.  One of my favourtite take-a-ways from the class was learning how to make my own batch of gluten-free all-purpose flour.  I can't wait to make it and substitute it in my favourtie recipes that call for wheat flour.   Not to mention, it's way cheaper than buying gluten-free all-purpose flour already made up and packaged.  I'll be making a trip to Bulk Barn this week :)

Here's the recipe:

1 1/4 cups of brown rice flour

1 1/4 cups of white rice flour

1 cup tapioca flour

1 cup sweet rice flour

1/2 tsp. xantham gum

Turns out the day was a total success.  Even my nephew loved it!

p.s.  the homemade lemon curd was to die for!

- Carrie