Boxed Pre-Mixes

Life is good, and so is pizza.  I'd forgotten how good until yesterday, when I whipped up a box of Orgran's pizza dough.  I'd actually been given the mixture about 3 months ago but kept putting off making it because I'd read online a few times about what a sticky mess pizza dough can be.  In actuality, it was no problem, and it took hardly any time at all to make.  After mixing the rice milk, sugar and yeast I added the oil, threw in the premixed dry ingredients, and stirred with a fork.  I kneaded the sticky dough a bit in my large stainless steel bowl, and then after dividing into two balls, I kneaded some more on a cornflour dusted slab of marble (the marble because my kitchen counter is made of tiles and the thought of kneading bread over the grout grosses me out).  One thing I noted for the future is that once the dough is kneaded, pat it gently from a ball into a flat round.  Before flattening it into a pizza shell, I placed it on the oiled pizza pan, because otherwise it crumbled when moved.  Once ready, I topped it with homemade gluten-free pizza sauce and lots of veggies.  Although cheese is on my list of oks, I still used only a little bit, mostly to hold the veggies on.

Another boxed mix that I've enjoyed lately is the Orgran gluten-free bread mix that can be made by hand or in a bread maker. Before, I always enjoyed dark breads but at this point white is all I've got and I'm determined to love it.  The first time I made it I didn't add any extras and I cut the pieces really fat, and I wasn't too crazy about the texture or taste.  The second time I added some flax and it turned out pretty nice.  After a few 'from scratch' disasters, I went back to the boxed mix.  I added an extra egg and about 1/4 cup of ground flax, and when I cut it to freeze it, I sliced it as thin as I could.  This worked best when cooled.  I don't know that I'd use this when travelling because I really only enjoy this bread toasted.  It's especially nice when hot and loaded with melted butter, then topped with orange marmalade.  It takes me a long time to eat a whole loaf myself, but the next time I make one I'll try and add a few nuts and see what happens.

I'm looking forward to bringing some flours back from Canada that I can use to make from-scratch bread.  So far the flours I've found here are mostly stale, or else I just think that they are stale and that's the way that they always taste.  Soon to find out!