Nut-Free, Gluten-Free, Low-Carb Quick Brown Bread
October 2020
This is a dense brown bread similar to a soda bread. It has plenty of flavour, fibre and cooks quickly if you keep the various shapes shallow in depth. The dough can be made into baps or sticks of focaccia. It can also be flavoured with nuts, seeds, herbs, chopped sundried tomatoes, olives and cheese to give you some ideas.
Do try and find golden flaxseed and blonde psyllium husk for a good colour but the flavour will be the same if your flaxseed is dark brown and your psyllium is brown. This recipe uses coarse psyllium husk, it is cheaper to buy and comes in larger quantities than the powder packaged for medicinal use. If you only have the fine powder use the same weight.
Ingredients - Serves 4
Makes 4 baps or 2 flat focaccia sticks
20g coconut flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
Half a teaspoon salt
1 medium egg
2 tablespoons seeds such as pumpkin, sunflower or sesame, optional
Olive oil for greasing
Heat the oven to 200oC fan. Grease a baking tray with a little oil.
Mix the dried ingredients together thoroughly in a large bowl. Crack the eggs into the bowl and add 160ml cold water; stir through with a large spoon. When the dough is well combined use your hands to bring it into a ball. It will thicken all the time as the water is absorbed. Now divide the dough accordingly and shape the loaves using lightly oiled hands.
To make the baps
Roll the dough into 8 balls between your palms, then flatten them into baps around 8cm across and no more than 2cm in height and lay them onto the baking tray spaced at least 4cm apart. Press a few seeds into the top of each bap, if using.
To make the focaccia sticks
If you are making the focaccia sticks divide the dough into 4 and roll each one out to form a 3cm thick and approx. 24cm long sausage on a greased worksurface. Lay the baps and sticks onto the baking tray at least 4cm apart and flatten them to a depth of around 2cm.
Cook the loaves for 18 to 22 mins or until golden brown and they feel firm to the touch.
Additions:
Add one or a mixture of these to the dough before shaping.
Cheese – add 60g grated Parmesan or other hard cheese
Walnut – add 100g chopped nuts
Herb – add 4 teaspoons finely chopped or dried herbs such as oregano, thyme, rosemary
Rosemary – Add sprigs of rosemary and a little flaked salt to the tops
Sundried tomato and olive – add 60g drained sundried tomatoes and 40g stoned, roughly chopped olives
Learn more great recipes by joining us on one of our low carb cookery courses. See HERE for a list of upcoming dates.
