Blackbird Bakery Gluten-Free by Karen Morgan from Chronicle Books (review)

I just made the tallest gluten free, (almost) casein-free cornbread I have ever made. From scratch. And it is delicious! The recipe is one I adapted (I made my own "buttermilk" using casein-free milk-substitute and lemon juice; I did use the real butter called for in the recipe) from Blackbird Bakery Gluten-Free This recipe for southern-style corn bread (page 31) is among our favorites.

Blackbird Bakery Gluten-Free by Karen Morgan is a beautiful 224-page hardback cookbook that gives readers and bakers 75 recipes for desserts and pastries that are gluten free and made from scratch. The photographs inside are so gorgeous, I want to try almost every one of them. (I am not a fan of the savory caramelized alsatian onion tart.) I have blueberries in the refrigerator for the cobbler recipe, and I'll make that cobbler if there are enough blueberries left after my family has been nibbling at them. That shortbread on the cover has me thinking about strawberry shortcake, too. Or a mix of strawberries and blackberries with shortcake. (We have no organic strawberries in the supermarket at the moment; I looked for them all weekend.)

In addition to an intro, notes on ingredients, a resources section, index, and table of equivalents, Morgan gives us seven chapters covering "biscuits, muffins & sweet breads; cookies & bars; tarts, pies & cobblers; cakes, big & small; crepes & pâte à choux; custards, puddings & ice cream; and dinner-party showstoppers".

Blackbird Bakey Gluten-Free is another cookbook that we girls oooh and aaaah over together; it's quite the backdrop for relationship building in our autism intervention. Looking together at the recipes and pictures and dreaming about what we want to make and for what occasion is a wonderful experience. The fact that we can make something that ALL of us can eat makes it even better. ;)

Check out some of the photos here. You'll want to own the cookbook when you see the photos. ;)

Morgan uses a different blend/ratio of flours for each recipe, which sets her recipes apart from the folks who develop a blend that you mix, store, and have ready to use in any recipe. While having that one blend ready to go is convenient, (and I do like convenience!), having recipes that are developed individually is attractive, too, because I trust that they've been tested and tested and that the recipe developer knows the recipes are better for the flour blend having been individualized for each recipe. I think there's room for both kinds of gluten-free cookbooks on my bookshelf.

I seem to be stuck on blogging about the topic of cornbread recipes. I have a one recipe that is good fried on the stove in a little oil, like johnnycakes, yet I keep searching for a baked cornbread recipe that is a little more like what I grew up with. This one's closer to the one my grandmother makes. (We never put a can of whole kernel corn in our cornbread growing up; the corn adds something special.)

No, this is not an allergen free cookbook. If you, like me, are more than gluten-free, you'll need to know how to make your own substitutes. Gluten-free recipes are a great starting point, though, when the flour substitutions have already been made for me. I sense myself becoming braver than I used to be; I am ready to try Morgan's strawberry tartlets with vanilla pastry cream using coconut based milks instead of cream and half-and-half.

My friend Amy made the lemon bars from Blackbird Bakery Gluten-Free. Click here to read about the lemon bars.

Check out the Blackbird Bakery web site here; follow on facebook here. Morgan provides readers hints, tips, and recipes, and offers an occasional giveaway.

Blackbird Bakery Gluten-Free is a fantastic cookbook for gluten-free baking. I look forward to baking my way through it.

Chronicle Books sent me a copy of Blackbird Bakery Gluten-Free for review purposes. I am not paid for this review and am not obligated to provide a positive review.

Cake Pops

I am not the most creative person on the planet. Before one of my children needed a special diet because of food allergies and intolerances, I'd have just purchased food pretties for special occasions from a bakery.


I would still purchase food pretties from a bakery for the sibs on their birthdays, except that I have an added complication. My GFCFSF+++ girl is a twin. And if I buy her twin's cake and make and decorate her cake myself, the purchased cake is beautiful and the one I made stinks by comparison.

Buying one cake and making and decorating the other is nothing but a glaring advertisement for how much help I need in the decorating department.


So, I took a cake decorating class. That helped. But still, I need ideas.

This cake pop craze is too cute, and I need ideas that I can use as I play with homemade coatings (is there a gluten free, milk free, soy free candy coating? I haven't found one yet) so that I can make some cake pops that all of us can make and enjoy together.


Angie Dudley's Cake Pops ($19.95 list price) is a *wonderful* mix of recipes, how-to, beautiful photos, hints and tips to all things cake pops, cupcake bites, and cake balls. Our book arrived in the middle of a busy CHRISTmas season, and we haven't had time to try to make every bit of them from scratch, yet (I can't use canned frosting in the balls/pops because they all contain milk or soy or sunflower oil and I can't use candy coating discs, either). The girls and I have browsed the book, studied it, ooo'ed and ahh'ed over the pictures, and dreamed of what we'll try first.


Angie Dudley blogs at Bakerella.com. Check out the Mrs. Pots cake pops here.

No, the recipes are not allergen-free. If you're baking for an individual with allergies, you'll need to know how to create the cake and other ingredients that are safe for the person you're baking for. (Sidebar FYI: There is a GFCFSFEF recipe here.)


The best part, I think, about Cake Pops is the way Angie Dudley makes my girls and me feel like we can do this, too. She got the creative gene; hopefully, I can try to channel that from her ideas, combined with my (very) little bit of experience with some icing tips, I can come up with a homemade icing that will cover and harden on my cake balls, and we can decorate with another homemade icing. Melted chocolate chips will work. (I wonder if fondant would work in place of candy coating?) She certainly encourages my desire to be creative. (I almost drooled over the photos in the book - they're gorgeous.)

We've gotten quite a bit of time to experience share over the photos in this book, dreaming about what we want to make, ooooing and ahhhhing over the cute treats.

The book is spiral bound under a hard cover, which means it is quite sturdy and lies flat. I don't have to weight it down on the kitchen counter to hold it open to the right page.


Cake Pops is a must have, especially for a mom who has the allergen-free recipes and needs ideas for creating allergen free treats at home.

Chronicle Books sent me a copy of Cake Pops so that I may review it on my blog. I received no financial compensation and am not obligated to provide a positive review.