FOOD LAB -- Brazilian (GF) Cheese Bread Edition

Finally migrating this post over from social media.   In the months since I first wrote it, I have located both standard and mini sized muffin tins which serve to bake pao de queijo very well indeed.

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I fell in love with a GF product called BraziBites -- mixed and frozen cassava (tapioca) - flour batter based on Brazilian Pao de Queijo. One thing I loved was the variety of flavors. Cheddar. Parmesan. Asiago and garlic. They're not cheap, and not easy to find (Costco used to have them for a while, otherwise it's Whole Paycheck or Wegman's), but they scratch a particular "warm bread" itch for me.

brazibites.com

I had also discovered a baked and frozen product called "Against The Grain" which has a similar recipe. Those (larger) rolls NEARLY scratched the same itch, but they got tough sooner than wheat-flour bread. Reheated in the oven, they could quickly turn into rocks. They cost too much to pay for potential rocks. They do have other products besides the rolls. I may revisit them to try the wraps.

http://www.againstthegraingourmet.com/

I started looking for copycat recipes, and the first / only one I found (for a frustratingly long time) looked...insanely complicated, to be brutally honest. The author swore that the brand of tapioca flour made a tremendous difference, Bob's Red Mill would NOT do. The cheese must be low-moisture mozzarella. You MUST use a food processor. The rolls MUST be baked on parchment.
I never attempted a bread this tetchy when I was eating wheat, why would I start now?

Fortunately for me, I have since found a couple of other, simpler recipes which had simple proportions, could be made with whatever tapioca flour your store carries, could be mixed with a blender (or a stick blender), got poured into mini-muffin tins and LET YOU CHOOSE THE CHEESE! The author has had good results with feta. I used the sharp cheddar in my fridge. When mixed, it's like slightly thick pancake batter.

Then I remembered I have no mini-muffin tin.

No biggie. Muffin batter can be baked in a cake pan, those I have. I lowered the temperature and added baking time in case of oops.

The corners rose and the middle did not. Fortunately, the thing was cohesive enough to flip over, and the center baked until it caught up with the corners.

It's better than the frozen ones. I won't need to make a special trip for the commercial brands. Go me 8)

The author of the recipe I used mentions the batter will keep up to a week in the fridge. I am experimenting with creating my own "bites" with an ice cube tray in my freezer. Will update.

UPDATE: They freeze, thaw and bake with little to no impact on taste and texture. Win!

http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/easy_brazilian_cheese_bread/