[Sca-cooks] Re: Different flours, was Cookie Exchange

[Ruth Frey]

Marged wrote:
> I'd love to hear from the food chemists on the list about the 
> difference 
> between wheat and rice flour behaviors in this context.

      There will probably be about 50 other folks jumping in, but at the risk of duplicating, I don't believe that rice flour has any gluten in it; gluten being the substance that makes kneaded wheat doughs "springy" and elastic.  It acts as a binder to give wheat baked products their coherence (and, if overkneaded, toughness, since the strength of the gluten increases the more it's "worked").  I believe rye has gluten too, but I don't think corn or barley do.  

      Using flours without gluten gives a very fragile product, because the dough lacks a natural binding agent.  I also seem to recall they work poorly for raised breads and the like, because without gluten, the dough doesn't trap the bubbles created by the leaven, and the dough doesn't "rise" properly.

              -- Ruth