Popovers – Gluten & Dairy Free – Ratio Rally

It is time yet again for another episode of…

Yeah!!!  Sing with me boys and girls… oh boy de hee, oh girl de dee, we are baking for you an’ me!

What is a ratio in baking?  It is keeping the ingredients to specific proportions.  Why weigh your ingredients?  To keep that ratio balance!  Gluten free flours are vastly differing weights size for size.  By keeping to a specified ratio for a particular baking item AND weighing out your flours and other ingredients you can count on consistently successful results!  So what’s NOT to like about that?!!  But a rally…??  It is a group of gluten free bloggers who will all work on developing a gluten free ratio recipe based on the chosen baked-good-of-the-month.  This month is… Popovers.

Did you ever wonder how a blog or blogger got to be the host for some kind of rally or contest among a group?  Well let me tell you a secret… shhh… all a blogger has to do is unthinkingly um with fear and trepidation do what the Patriarch says the Navy taught him to NEVER do… volunteer yourself!

Yet I volunteered to host… [g-u-l-p] AND of all the silly things for something I have never baked in my life.  Popovers.

Then I discover that I will be out of town for an entire week near the end of the trial baking month!!  With tons of pre-trip preparations that NEED attending to before I can think about baking a popover.

Can you say panic boys and girls?

So what is a popover and how do you serve it or what do you serve it with anyway??  So I went to find out.

First I learned that the best pan for baking popovers is… cast iron.  I ? my cast iron pans!  The best cast iron popover pan is from Griswold.  So I purchased one on eBay.  Isn’t it pretty?!!

In case you need to know how to properly season a cast iron purchase you can read the science behind all that here.  I do NOT endorse any other content on her blog.  But this cast iron seasoning science is spot on!  My purchase was already nicely seasoned, but I am so glad I have this information!!

Since I was out of town for a week and trip preparations took much longer than they should have, I was not able to even bake my first popover until… 4 days ago.

My first batch was a complete flop.  The popovers didn’t even peek over the edge of the pan!  They did rise… but they did NOT have that tall, rounded, dome top.  I believe it is because I used my whole grain mix for part of the flours.  Despite adding additional starchy flours the whole grains kept them from rising much.  Add to the non-risen pop’unders’, I tried making spiced ones and didn’t get enough spice on my first go around.

My second attempt was last night and I met with terrific success!  I relied upon my trusty 1963 Joy of Cooking cookbook for the method, using Gisslen’s ratio with more eggs.

Ruhlman’s Ratio – 2 : 1 : 1 / liquid : egg : flour

Gisslen’s Ratio used more eggs – 2 : 1.25 : 1/liquid : egg : flour

My ratio – 2 : 1.5 – 2 : 1 / liquid : egg : flour

Had I baked them for about 5 additional minutes they would have had a bit crispier outside and not deflated, but they tasted great!  The Patriarch said they were a bit egg-y, so next time I would use 3 eggs instead of 4.  But I have 8 dozen eggs in the fridge!!  He also  said that they would be great with a scrambled egg mixture served inside of them.  Maybe in the morning??!!

POPOVERS – Gluten & Dairy Free

makes 12

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.  Place your cast iron (or other) pan in the oven while it heats up.  You want your pan or pans to be HOT when you pour in the batter.

8 ounces coconut milk beverage

Eggs & Coconut Milk Beverage

4 eggs, at room temp (I place mine in a bowl and fill it with hot water).  My eggs are free-range, cage-free, organic and those yolks are such a deep golden yellow!  And the color of the shell is determined by the variety of chicken.  There is no nutritional difference between a brown or white egg.

Warming the Eggs

1 ounce Earth Balance, soy free buttery spread

2.5 ounces rice flour, superfine (I get mine at the Asian store)

1 ounce tapioca flour

1/2 ounce organic non-GMO corn starch

1 tablespoon evaporated cane juice (or sugar)

1/2 teaspoon salt

Weigh your non-dairy beverage of choice and pour into Vitamix blender.  Add warmed eggs and Earth Balance.  Turn Vitamix on  Variable 1, then turn to 3 for 30 – 40 seconds until completely blended.

Weigh out rice & tapioca flours, corn starch, evaporated cane juice  and salt in a bowl.  Whisk or stir to combine, add to blender.  Select variable 1, then turn to 3 for another 30 – 40 seconds.  Stop Vitamix and use a rubber scraper to scrape down any flours stuck to the side of the blender container.  Resume blending at variable 3 for 30 – 40 more seconds until well combined and there are no longer any lumps.

Take your popover pans from the heated oven.  Make sure to close the oven door as quickly and safely as possible so you don’t release too much of that heat taking out the pans.  Oil pans with grape-seed oil, olive oil, coconut oil or other oil that will take high heat.  I CAREFULLY used grape-seed oil on a paper towel.  BEWARE!!  Those pans are very hot!!

Carefully pour the batter into the popover pans about 1/2 – 2/3rds full.  The batter should be the consistency of cream.  Return the pans with batter back into your oven, trying to keep the oven door open as little as possible.

Bake for 15 minutes at 450 degrees.  Then reduce heat to 350 degrees and continue baking for another 20 – 25 minutes.  Do NOT open the oven door during baking!!  You will NEED the heat to produce the steam to get those babies to “pop over” your pan!  Err on the side of a little more baking time instead of opening the oven door to ‘check for done-ness’.

Along with the steam needed to make them rise, your popovers will need a crispy shell in order to hold themselves up and not fall.  I will also let you know that the cast iron pan worked GREAT!  One tiny bit of help and each popover slipped right on out of that pan!  Not so with the ramekins shown above, despite pre-heating and greasing.

I served mine with butter (or non-dairy buttery spread for me) and jam at dinner along with my homemade soup.  The guys loved them!Another benefit to baking by ratio and weighing out all your ingredients… you can EASILY half or double the recipe!  In my first popover baking attempt I discovered that the recipe made more batter than I had popover pan space.  I could easily have baked 12 if I had 2 popover pans.

Blessings,  ~Mrs. R (aka Aunt Mae)

Here are the links for other Ratio Rally Popovers!

Brooke | B & the boy! – Chocolate & Sweet Potato Popovers – http://bellwookie.blogspot.com/2012/02/ratio-rally-popovers.html

Charissa | Zest Bakery – Lemon Vanilla Popovers with Minnesota Raspberries – http://www.zestbakery.com/fruit/lemon/lemon-vanilla-popovers-with-minnesota-raspberries

Claire | My Gluten free home – Chai Popovers – http://www.myglutenfreehome.net/2012/01/popovers-3-claire-0.html

Erin Swing | The Sensitive Epicure – Popovers – http://thesensitiveepicure.blogspot.com/2012/01/popovers.html

Ginger Bardenhagen – chive and black pepper; toasted onion and aleppo pepper – http://freshginger.org/2012/01/27/the-gluten-free-ratio-rally-popovers/

gretchen  |  kumquat – strawberry cream cheese popovers – www.kumquatblog.com/2012/02/gluten-free-ratio-rally-strawberry.html

Heather | Discovering the Extraordinary – Basic Popovers – http://www.discoveringtheextraordinary.blogspot.com/2012/02/basic-popovers-for-the-gf-ratio-rally.html

Jenn | Jenn Cuisine – Chocolate Popovers – http://jenncuisine.com/2012/02/gluten-free-ratio-rally-popovers

Jonathan  |  The Canary Files – Cinnamon & Star Anise Popovers – http://thecanaryfiles.blogspot.com/2012/02/ratio-rally-gluten-free-dairy-free.html

Mary Fran | FrannyCakes – Gluten-Free Honey Coconut Popovers  – http://wp.me/p1HfLM-l4

Morri  |  Meals With Morri – Little Bitty Popover Bites – http://mealswithmorri.blogspot.com/2012/02/little-bitty-popover-bites.html

Rachel/The Crispy Cook – Corny Popovers – http://wheat-free-meat-free.blogspot.com/2012/02/pop-on-over.html

TR | No One Likes Crumbley Cookies – Sweet Cherry Popovers – http://tcrumbley.blogspot.com/2012/02/gluten-free-popovers.html

Williamsburg Orange Cake

Tagged as: baking, cast iron pans, cast iron seasoning, dairy free, gluten free, Griswold, popovers, ratio rally, recipes