Best Ever Gluten-free Flatbreads
Photography by Simeon Crofts
DIETARY – Gluten-free, Vegan, Vegetarian, Nut-free, Dairy-free
I don’t know about you, but my husband and I have a real gripe with gluten-free flatbreads and wraps. Until this recipe, we hadn’t found a single one that didn’t immediately fall apart the moment you tried to fold it around food, or that wasn’t so dry it was almost impossible to eat without a glass of water. It’s happened with every brand we’ve tried, and every homemade recipe I have attempted in the past.
I’m a bit of a bread nerd, so I was determined to put my knowledge and experience from making regular bread, as well as gluten-free pizza dough, breadsticks, bagels and the like, into developing a tasty flatbread that had enough elasticity to fold without tearing, whether served hot or cold. It was important to me that I made a flatbread that wasn’t dry but instead had a good, chewy texture that worked well with everything from Lebanese food to curry.
But first, a bit of gluten education…
Gluten is formed as soon as wheat flour’s two proteins come into contact with water. The gluten is responsible for trapping gas bubbles produced during fermentation, which allows the dough to rise and expand in the oven, resulting in an open, light texture in the baked loaf. Gluten-free flours are heavier than regular flours and, of course, they don’t have the gluten development to help the dough rise and form an elastic, stretchy consistency. Gluten-free bread has an entirely different structure, so when we make bread dough without gluten, we no longer need to knead it as there is no gluten to manipulate. With no framework to trap the gas, the finished texture is often denser, and a decent rise much more challenging to achieve.
To help gluten-free bread dough rise, you need to use a substitute for gluten, which is nearly always xanthan gum. Xanthan gum a natural food additive that helps to thicken and stabilise ingredients in gluten-free foods. It is sometimes pre-blended into gluten-free flours along with tapioca starch. Tapioca starch is made from the root of a cassava plant and lends a thick, chewy texture to gluten-free bread and helps it to retain moisture. These two ingredients are usually balanced with a mixture of other gluten-free flours, such as rice and maize, in a typical bag purchased from the supermarket. However, if you check the ingredients and xanthan gum isn’t there, you will need to add it in yourself, as I have done with my recipe below.
I find allowing the yeast to activate with warm water and sugar (its food of choice) before you mix it with the flour achieves a better rise. The gluten-free dough needs all the help it can get after all! If you avoid working the dough too much and let it rest and rise as much as possible before you make your flatbreads, the result will be a soft, pillowy bread that holds together and has a delightful chewy consistency. You really can’t rush gluten-free bread if you want to end up with anything close to regular bread, so have patience, and I think you’ll be pretty happy with the results!
Best Ever Gluten-free Flatbreads
Ingredients:
- 250ml warm water
- 1 tsp sugar
- 1 packet (7g) instant dried yeast
- 280g gluten-free plain flour, plus extra for flouring the surface
- 1 tsp tapioca starch
- ½ tsp xanthan gum
- 1 tsp salt
- Olive oil, for brushing
Method:
- Measure out 250ml warm water in a jug then add the yeast and sugar. Stir, then cover with clingfilm – don’t worry if the water mixture is a little lumpy after stirring, it doesn’t matter. Leave for 15 minutes until the yeast forms a foamy head on top of the water.
- In a clean bowl, measure out approximately 200g of your gluten-free plain flour and add the tapioca starch, xanthan gum and salt.
- Mix well then pour over the yeast water. Stir roughly with a spoon until the water has covered all of the flour. Cover with oiled clingfilm and set aside for 1-2 hours until the mix has doubled in size – mine took 1 hour.
- Add your remaining flour (approx. 80g) and mix in with your hand. Bring together to form a dough - it will be quite sticky. Tip out on to a floured surface and continue to bring the dough together until you have a soft, manageable dough, but be careful not to overwork it as it can become quite tough and dense.
- Now you’re ready to make your flatbreads. Divide your dough into six equal pieces. One at a time, roll them out to around 7 inches in diameter.
- Pre-heat a dry pan and brush the top of your flatbread with a little olive oil. Put the flatbread into the pan, oil-side-down, and cook for 3-4 minutes until starting to puff up. Brush with olive oil then flip and cook for another 3 minutes. Repeat until all the flatbreads are cooked. You can keep them warm under some foil or a tea towel or reheat in the oven later on.