Gluten free christmas

[ILikeBirds]

First Christmas since going gluten free.

Main meal is fairly straightforward, just need a stuffing substitute.

Not sure what to do for desserts or alternatives to mince pies and things like that.

Any tried and tested suggestions?

We do Nigella's pomegranite pavlova and a gluten free Christmas pud.

If you got to M&S you should be able to get things like stuffing balls, sausages, etc, which are gluten free, but they are not seperate so just check in the general section. GF mince pies usually available in the free from section of Supermarkets. We've made GF Christmas cake which works fine - just use a regular recipe and Doves Farm flour - possibly an extra egg if you like, but there is so much other stuff in Christmas cake that the flour isn't really a major incredient. Christmas puddings reasonably easy to get hold of too.

M&S do a decent gluten free mince pie too.

Does rice flour contain gluten? You can make nice pastry with rice flour, so could make mince pies with that. You can make nice shortbread biscuits with rice flour too. You could add nutmeg/cinamon/ginger etc to make some nice christmassy biscuits for nibbles, which you could also ice.

How about a nice sherry triffle for desert? (Or does cornflour contain gluten too?)

Chocolate mouse?

Ooh good thread. DH is coeliac.

One year he made mini baked Alaskas using mrs crimbles GF macaroons as the base. They were lovely.

He's also made mini lemon meringue pies (and with other filings like blueberries and Nutella...) although GF pastry is a bit hit and miss

Cornflour is gluten free :)

We often have Eton mess (use bought meringues for that though)

Waitrose have some cute gluten free mini Xmas cake things that taste good, if sweet

The village bakery usually do a great GF Christmas selection, they deliver and Able and Cole also stock their lines at Christmas.

Pudding and Christmas cake are easy enough to substitute GF flour for normal flour, especially if there are ground almonds in the recipe.

Harry Eastwood's recipes are good for other cake things. I cannot eat maize either so many GF flour blends are out for me, as is butter so I can honestly say, I have never made a successful Gluten and maize free pastry but there are plenty of people who would beg to differ and may be able to point you in the direction of a recipe that works for mince pies but many of the supermarket free from ranges do mince pies.

Rice flour and corn flour both gluten free.Will have to do some pastry experimentation.

Thinking chocolate roulade good for dessert but more than one option would be nice.

Prefer cook from scratch over store bought.

I have some fuddles (buffet) to go to as well so savoury snacks, e.g. alternatives to sausage rolls, sandwiches, cheese straw type things welcome

You can substiture rice flour for wheat flour in most recipes - you can tell the difference in cakes and pastry, but the outcome is just as nice.

My straight flour substitutions have been a bit hit and miss so far.

Partly why i'm asking now as need to try some stuff in advance before giving it to other people.

My pastry is always rubbish, so I buy mince pies (my preferred are Sainsburys iced ff), and I buy the M&S stuffing, mini sausages etc.

GF christmas pudding turns out fine, as does any fruit cake recipe - I use Delias with Doves Farm gf flour.

For a buffet, crustless mini quiches, sushi rolls (I do things like chinese duck and plum sauce, roast beef and horseradish, roast chicken and sweet chilli sauce), spring rolls in rice flour wrappers, sausage wrapped in bacon, slices of warburtons gf wrap with a filling

Do you have a recipe for the crustless mini quiche?

What are rice flour wrappers?

I struggle to get things like rice flour, xantham gum and other stuff used in a lot of gf recipes. I've been searching for buckwheat flour for about a month!

BTW Yorkshire puddings are fine with a straight substitution of flour (as are pancakes which we have for Xmas breakfast)

My Mum has coeliac disease and we make our own stuffing (3 kinds usually, as we love it). We use pork mince squished up (as cheaper and easier than finding gf sausage meat) and no flour, although cornflour would be ok if you wanted something to glue it together.

We do sage and onion, mushroom and bacon, pork and apple.....M&S do a lush cranberry & orange one if you need a back up option.

Good luck!

No yorkshire puddings at Christmas in this house.

I've managed american style pancakes no problem but can't get crepes to work, they just fall apart. They're traditionally made with buckwheat so thought i'd try that but can't find it anywhere.

M&S have GF Christmas puddings .

If you are in an area that Ocado deliver to, they have a couple of different buckwheat flours. Lakeland do some gluten free cake and pudding, I've not tried the cake, but the pudding gets the thumbs up from my gluten free grandson.

Amazon sell buckwheat flour too.

I think amazon only sell it in large quantities. Not sure i need 5kg.

If ocado sell it do waitrose carry it in their stores?

Thanks for all the suggestions so far.

Amazon sell 500g single packs of buckwheat flour, also some other interesting types of gluten free products.

I'm going to do a pavlova and a baileys and toblerone cheesecake for desert, maybe I'm being naive but hoping GF digestive type biscuits will work for the base?? My Mum is Coeliac so I try but don't have the day to day experience she has --hit and miss-- have bought mincemeat and hope to find a good GF pastry recipe so she can have mince pies too.

Mum loves Florentines which are naturally GF and fancy fudge too, this year I'm doing a salted caramel and pecan fudge.

I need to put some thought into the stuffing situation, previously I've just bought some and its not been GF but a good recipe would be fab.

I have done individual cheesecakes in ramekins with no base at all before.