Going Gluten-Free? Get This Mix, Save Breakfast!

I love breakfast. Breakfast is an awesome meal. My typical breakfast before going gluten-free was a hearty bowl of oatmeal with cinnamon, sugar, and raisins. I love pancakes. I love biscuits. Bacon, eggs, sausage, all are delicious. Sometimes I’ll eat some fruit and some yogurt. The bottom line remains: I love breakfast.

Going gluten-free meant serious breakfast adjustment. I haven’t yet taken the plunge into the world of gluten-free oats (though I will soon). My typical breakfast is usually polenta. Sometimes bacon, sometimes fried or baked eggs, sometimes sausage. But polenta is the big standby.

One gluten-free mix has saved breakfast. It’s Pamela’s Baking and Pancake Mix. I bought the product at that link, meaning I got a ridiculous 12 pounds of it. But I have no regrets. Why? Because it’s so versatile and it has made breakfast such a pleasure again!

I can use it for pancakes so good my gluten eating sister can’t tell. I can use it for biscuits so good they don’t need gravy, but if I want gravy the mix makes an awesome roux and a delicious gravy in no time. I can use it for quick breads, for cookies, even for pizza crust in a pinch. Though I adore Annalise Roberts’ book Gluten Free Baking Classics and I love her brown rice flour mix for cookies and quick breads and muffins and pizza, Pamela’s mix makes quick, delicious gluten-free goodies.

This morning I had biscuits and gravy for the first time since going gluten-free. I missed it so! My gravy was a bit thick (my own fault for not adding more milk when the time was right!) but so delicious. I fried my bacon and whipped up the biscuit mix. It was so simple. I just cut in some shortening and stirred in some milk, then dropped my biscuits on a greased cookie sheet and sent them on their merry way into the oven. I’ve made gluten-free biscuits before from Whole Foods’ gluten-free biscuit mix, but what I got were entirely too white and entirely too sweet to satisfyingly call “biscuits.” The Pamela’s mix biscuits were full of flavor (like the pancakes!) and so tasty I could have skipped gravy. No weird sweet taste. Just delicious.

After draining my bacon and pouring off some grease, I used the remaining drippings with a couple tablespoons Pamela’s mix to make my roux. It cooked up quickly and I added milk. I’ve had mixed results with roux before, but I hadn’t tried Pamela’s mix until I brought it over to my parents’ house for Thanksgiving. There, the mix contributed to delicious turkey gravy. Today I used it to make a fabulous bacon gravy. It thickened up quickly… I should have added more milk but it was still so delicious. My biscuits and gravy longing is satisfied!

I’m so glad that I’m learning how to use gluten-free flours and mixes to keep on cooking. Life is different without wheat, but eating delicious food and feeling better make it all worthwhile!