Lucinda Bruce-Gardyne sets out to dispel the myth that gluten-free cooking is complicated in The Genius Gluten-Free Cookbook.

When her son was diagnosed with an intolerance to the gluten protein the author spent years painstakingly researching and experimenting until she finally created the first market-available fresh and tasty brown and white gluten-free bread.

It proved to be an education for Lucinda, and she starts ours with a comprehensive, easy-to-digest introduction providing simple explanations about gluten and its affects on people with an intolerance. It explores what can be eaten safely and what the alternatives are, many of which you will, surprisingly, find in your store cupboard anyway. If you don’t, it’s simple enough to source them.

The recipes themselves range from breakfast brunches to party food, from main courses to puddings and even baking, the enemy of those who are gluten intolerant. The secret here is in the flour, but Lucinda shows us how easy it is to replace standard self-raising with another flour ingredient, such as rice, buckwheat or corn. So there’s little to sacrifice – you can still have your Lemon Drizzle Cake and eat it.

Pies are even easier. Most supermarkets stock frozen gluten-free ready-to-roll puff, and sweet and savoury shortcrust pastry, but if you want to go to the trouble of making it yourself, this book provides recipes. How about buckwheat and almond pastry for a Cherry Lattice Pie?

Of course, it’s not just about baking. Recipes for main courses include breadcrumb coating for Pork Escalopes, homemade sausages (commercially, padded out with bread), sauce and casserole thickeners (usually made with flour), Asian dishes with rice noodles, Italian with gluten-free pasta, polenta, pizzas, buckwheat crepes, tortillas …

In fact, the 120 recipes in this book will do just nicely, gluten intolerant or not. That’s genius.

{ISBN:1785040707}

Vermilion – Ebury Publishing