The beginning (or, gingersnaps and strawberry shortcake)

I ordered 6 pounds of the Authentic Foods Gluten Free Classical Blend from Amazon. I received 50 pounds of it. Oops.

From Amazon:

"Hello,

I'm so sorry about the problem with your item "Authentic Foods GF Classical Blend - 3lb". I understand receiving incorrect item in the shipment can be disappointing, I apologize for it.

[...bla bla bla.....]

There's no need to return the wrong item you received. You're welcome to keep or donate the incorrect item--whichever option is most appropriate and convenient for you."

After some thought, I decided to see if I could use up all of the flour before it goes bad. 50 pounds of flour is about 180 cups. An average recipe uses two cups, so I will have to make 90 batches of gluten-free baked goods within a year. Doesn't seem too hard! (famous last words)

One of the bags of flour I received from Amazon

So, today is the beginning. I made a batch of vanilla cupcakes, which I used to make mini strawberry shortcakes. And my coworkers insisted that I bring some of my gingersnaps in, so I made a batch of those as well. These recipes were both from Annalise Roberts's Gluten Free Baking Classics.

Vanilla cupcakes:

These were very simple. It's actually the recipe published on the back of the bag of flour and it makes 12 cupcakes:

1 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
1 1/4 cup Authentic Foods GF Classical blend
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon Authentic Foods Xanthan Gum
1/2 cup canola oil
1/2 cup milk
1/4 teaspoon Authentic Foods Vanilla Powder (I used a teaspoon of regular liquid vanilla)

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Position rack in center of oven. Place cupcake baking liners in a 12-cupcake baking pan.

Beat sugar and eggs in large bowl of electric mixer at medium speed for 1 minute. Add flour, salt, baking powder, Authentic Foods Xanthan Gum, oil, milk and Authentic Foods Vanilla Powder; beat at medium speed for 1 minute. 

Pour batter into prepared cupcake cups. Place cupcake pan in center of oven and bake for about 20 minutes or until center springs back when touched and cupcakes are lightly browned. Cool on rack for 5 minutes. Remove cupcakes from pan onto rack and cool completely before icing. Top with your favorite frosting.

I then cut them in half and layered them with cut strawberries and fresh whipped cream -- yummy, but definitely messy! This would probably work really well as a parfait of some sort.

The freshly baked cupcakes....

...and the finished mini-shortcake!

Gingersnaps:

I like my cookies, including gingersnaps, to be a bit undercooked. So these don't snap in the traditional sense, though you certainly could bake them for a bit longer so they do. I use an insulated cookie sheet on the second-lowest rack in my oven to make sure that they crackle a bit on top. You can play this effect up by rolling them in powdered sugar before baking them, as I did with one of the batches. If I plan to ice the cookies, I roll them in Sugar in the Raw instead.

Because I don't have permission to post the recipe (and I don't want to overstep my bounds!), I will just post the Google Books page with the recipe on it! I made my icing by brewing very strong chai tea (6 teabags!) and mixing it with powdered sugar until it had the right consistency.

All of the wet ingredients

The finished dough, before chilling

You can see how nicely these cookies crackle!

Here they are drizzled in chai icing...

...or you can roll them in powdered sugar!

And so begins my baking adventure. 3 cups of flour down, roughly 177 to go!