Baking with Almond Flour

I've been baking with almond flour the last few weeks. I had a bag of Trader Joe's almond meal in my freezer and had been wanting to try it for some time. Because of all the cooking I've been doing I decided it was time to give it a try. I had been reading recipes from Elana's Pantry a gluten free recipe blog and she uses it. I also saw some recipes on Trader Joe's recipe blog for it, so I tried a bread recipe and a Lemon Ricotta Almond Cake. I also bought some Bob's Red Mill finely ground Almond Meal/Flour and I tried some cheese crackers from Kalyn's Kitchen a South Beach Diet recipe site, she does low carb. I noticed on Elana's Pantry that she said these brands would not work for her recipes and she recommended these and talks about why almond flour. So I ordered the Honeyville brand on line. Another friend Paula uses it and say it is very good. I just got it this week and have been busy making pancakes, blueberry muffins and

pound cake. I found the new flour made a moisture and finer grain. So now I'm excited to try pie crust, cookies, more bread and crackers.

I haven't been able to bake for a number of year because of my diet restrictions and so I just feel like I've been let out of jail. The one thing I'll say is that almond flour is expensive. The one I ordered Honeyville seemed to be the cheapest and the mailing cost is the cheapest. If you're lucky they may sell in a store near you or one of the other brands Elana recommends. Bob's Red Mill is sold in several stores in my area and isn't quite as good, but not bad, but it actually cost me less to order the one I like on line. I've been using a lot because I was experimenting but normally I would bake less to keep costs down. It will be an occasional treat.

I googled almond flour and found lots of info and recipes, so if you want to lower your carbs or go gluten free there is lots of help out there and other types of nut flours that people use like cashew. It still amazes me that they rise the way the do. I expected them to be as flat as a pancake.

For those that don't have diet restrictions almond flour has a very nice taste and is considered very healthy. I use agava for my sweetener because I don't eat sugar.

The next thing I want to try is Coconut Flour. I already have some and plan to make a Citrus Cake my dd has told me about.