Flour. The foundation of many recipes, meals and desserts. Today I thought I’d share how and why I created the specific gluten-free flours we use in our goodies. For those living an allergy-safe lifestyle, the choice of flour is essential for health, but that does not mean you have to substitute that for taste and texture. So often we have to endure the crumbly, dry paper-like alternative. However, here at Melinda’s Gluten-Free Goodies, it’s important to provide gluten-free desserts and treats that satisfy and delight.

Whether you’re wanting to fill your home kitchen or gluten-free bakery with these treats, flour is paramount to the recipe. It has been a long process of trials and tribulations to create the perfect gluten-free flours that offer allergy-safe consumers delicious taste and texture. 

Our gluten-free flours 

Self-raising gluten-free flour 

I developed our SR Flour 17 years ago (when soy wasn’t a declared allergen OR issue with anyone we knew!!). It’s the base of our mainstream baking mixes (Choc Fudge Brownie, Red Velvet, Vanilla Bean for gluten-free food service only, Gingerbread Loaf etc). The soy gives a wonderful texture and mouthfeel to the finished product. The SR Flour is so popular we sell pallet loads only for gluten-free food service. Not to retail anymore, except on one website. Basically due to competition and price we were driven out of the retail market – fine with me!

New self-raising gluten-free flour

We are about to release a new SR Flour blend using sorghum instead of soy as it removes the soy allergen factor. This is important for our school camps (like the ones we cater in Sydney) and a few other gluten-free food service clients. I’m planning to release a few mixes (but keep the soy in the current). Sorghum is packed with protein perfect for vegetarians and vegans, fibre rich and full of minerals and antioxidants, as well as good for diabetics with its ability to control glucose and insulin levels.   

Wholemeal lupin flour

My neighbour believes low-carb people learn to accept faux products (eg. called a low-carb bread, the photo looks like bread, it’s definitely not the taste & texture of bread!!) but it’s not what I wanted to create. Some of the ingredients I choose to use, like our wholemeal lupin flour from Western Australia, is a superior low carb, high protein ingredient. However it is very tricky to create a good texture. So, it’s taken many hours of trials to create our four products using this amazing ingredient.

When I developed the low carb range we couldn’t use the same flour blend as too high in carbs so discovered lupin flour and all its wonderful benefits. However, it cooks like coconut flour so I use arrowroot and raising agents to make it lighter. And it keeps the carbs down. We used to sell this as a straight Low Carb SR Flour however we were before our time. It’s very yellow and it didn’t sell quick enough to keep in production (it would these days!!) so we dropped it a few years ago.

Our new keto pudding mixes use wholemeal lupin flour. They were by far the trickiest I’ve created in our 17 years of business. I really wanted to properly emulate a sticky date pudding and the chocolate pudding. Minus the carbs, sugar and chemicals, of course. I also wanted to avoid asking our customers to add expensive and complicated add-ins that they wouldn’t already have on hand. All I can say is ‘you be the judge’ but feedback so far has all been positive!!

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With almost 20 years in the business, I think we’ve come pretty far. I’m proud of the development of our gluten-free flours, but there is still much more to do and learn. After all, we want to create the perfect recipe to make tasty and textural goodies, and the foundation of gluten-free flour is what holds it all together.