One morning last week I was cosied up on the sofa with a big mug of spiced apple and camomile tea (I’m really into spiced herbal teas at the moment) and a warm snuggly blanket, whilst flicking through cookbooks for soup inspiration for the coming weeks.

I happened to come across a ridiculously simple recipe for flatbread.  So simply I could barely believe it could actually work and to top it off, it was also gluten free.  I was intrigued and hurried off to make a small batch straight away. The original recipe comes from BBC Good Food: 101 Soups and Sides, I made a few modifications (primarily substituting the natural yoghurt in the recipe for soy yoghurt so that it is vegan- but feel free to use natural yoghurt if that’s more your thing).

I am not very experienced with typical GF breads, so it is difficult to compare, but for me I would not have questioned this bread as being anything other than made with regular ingredients. I'd be interested to hear from others who have more experience in this area if you do try this recipe out! I have since made another batch to go with my spicy lentil and chickpea soup that i'll be posting shortly, this time I used wholemeal spelt flour to get a comparison. The spelt made for a slightly lighter, fluffier bread, but im not sure if that was in part due to the ratio of baking powder used since the GF flour in the original recipe was self-raising so I did not add baking powder separately.

The original recipe states that the bread should be served straight away whilst still warm.  I would emphasize that this is important since the GF bread did become tougher after a few hours once cooled and less fresh, though you could by all means freshen up in the oven. Since the flatbread is so simple to make- 15 minutes tops, there is no reason why you wouldn’t make these fresh whilst you are preparing the rest of the meal. 

When freshly grilled, the flatbread has a lovely crisp outer crust and a soft and quite dense inside…perfect for ripping and dipping into a hearty warming soup. Also, feel free to jazz up the seasonings however you wish.

The flatbreads would also make a great base for mini grilled toasties, hummous or nut butter open sandwich creations. 

Recipe: Gluten free flatbread

Makes 4 small saucer sized flatbread

Ingredients

• 200g gluten free self-raising flour mix (I used Doves Farm mix which contains rice, potato, tapioca, maize and buckwheat flours)*
• 1-2  tsp toasted cumin seeds
• 150g soy yoghurt (or natural yoghurt)
• 50ml water
• ½ tsp salt to taste
• 1 tbs nutritional yeast (optional- I added this but it was not in the original recipe)

* you could alternatively substitute the GF flour for spelt flour plus 3tsp baking powder.

Method

Heat the grill to medium and dust a baking sheet with a little flour. Toast the cumin seeds in a dry pan for a minute or so to release a better aroma. Mix the flour, cumin seeds and salt in a bowl then add the yoghurt and water and stir through, using your hands at the end as necessary. This should result in a lovely soft dough.

Divide the dough into 4 equal pieces and form circular patties with your hands approx. 5mm thick. Dust lightly with a little more flour if they are quite sticky to touch. Lay on the floured baking sheet and sprinkle with salt and pepper if desired.

Grill for approx. 3-5 minutes on each side (depending on the strength of your grill) until lightly golden and puffed up.

Note: for a future batch, once laid on the baking sheet I may brush the top surface with a little soy milk before sprinkling with salt and pepper to achieve more of a golden glazed finish. This hasn’t yet been tested so feel free to experiment.