When You’re Gluten Free Your Freezer is Your Best Friend

Newly gluten free?  You’ll likely soon find out you’ll probably need a second freezer.  Been gluten free for awhile? You’ve  getting that second freezer may have crossed your mind a time or two. And if you already have a second freezer, you understand where I’m coming from.

Gluten Free Breads Don’t “Keep”

For gluten free folks, a freezer is your best friend.  Why?  Because it saves your expensive food from going bad!  This was one of the absolute first lessons I learned some 11 years ago when Emma was first diagnosed with celiac disease.  I hadn’t figured out the bread thing for her yet, so I made a her a pan of corn bread.

Gluten free bread that became moldy only after 4 days on the counter

Now keep in mind I made this in the heart of a muggy Minnesota summer as well, but that bread was bad within two days!  I remember opening it up and seeing mold everywhere — because I left it on the counter. AHA!

That’s when I found out that not only does wheat or all purpose flour offer the springy texture, but it helps the bread “keep” on the counter!  My early hunch is supported by Suzanne Bowland, a gluten free expert who was interviewed for an article in Today’s Diet & Nutrition, “Freeze gluten-free bread immediately,” the article said, “‘because it doesn’t contain preservatives and will go moldy faster at room temperature than will wheat-based breads,’” Bowland explained.

I recently tested a piece of gluten free bread by putting it in a folded baggie in my kitchen.  It took 4 days for the mold to be apparent (the black specks in the middle of the bread pictured upper right).

Ever since that day in May or June of 2000, I have frozen all of Emma’s baked goods.  I often make bread, cake, banana bread, corn bread and when we have leftovers they go right in to the freezer.  Many times they are individually wrapped, but always cut and easy to take out piece by piece and warm up.  Many people even freeze the flours.

Finding a Freezer

As we got into gluten free food and cooking more, I knew my little refrigerator freezer was too small.  Any human or animal standing at the base of my refrigerator when we’d open up the freezer door was risking serious injury because food would come flying out! We finally decided it was time to invest.  We found one on the cheap just through a newspaper want ad.  That could be an economical solution for you too.

We also did a standing freezer versus a chest.  My parents had a chest freezer and I always thought it was a pain to lean down and get something.  Plus stuff could seriously be buried in that for years because it shimmied it’s way down to the bottom.  But they tend to be colder, more energy efficient and a better price if buying new*.

Then with our new freezer I found myself buying meat from a farm so we always had a good supply, as well as making more holiday sweet treats.

*Source:  About.com – Housewares

Tags: celiac, cooking, food, freezer, gluten-free