Is A Loaf Of Mozzarella Cheese 'Bread' The New Gluten-Free Savior?
I've spent at least a hundred bucks sampling, oh, 10 kinds of gluten-free bread this year. They pretty much all suck, and I realize they're not meant to be compared to wheat bread, but compare I do. There must be a way for the gluten-sensitive to get back to their regularly scheduled sandwiches.
Enter the one bread I really enjoy, if I defrost it just right, don't put too much stuff on it and eat it within 20 minutes of defrosting. Hey, nobody said it was going to be a picnic, apologies if the sandwich part implied otherwise. Against The Grain baguettes are chewy, moist, flavorful, slightly crisp and full of yeasty umami flavor. They also have 24 grams of fat per medium-sized baguette (which I consider to be normal sandwich-sized), because it's literally bread made out of mozzarella. The ingredients listed are tapioca starch, milk, eggs, mozzarella cheese, canola oil and salt. Here's the great part: there's no soy, corn or rice either — three culprits responsible for the crumbly, dry excuses sold to suckers for $8-10 a loaf.
Unfortunately, the baguettes are on the thin side, making stacked sandwich-crafting damn near impossible and, like their regular gluten-free counterparts, they are still apt to stiffen up or dissolve entirely under the wrong conditions. That said, if you're avoiding gluten but ushering in the fat, this is the bread for you. They make super-amazing grilled cheeses because you're grilling cheese inside cheese, and while they don't exactly "toast," you can let your imagination run wild in bruschetta-land because the mozzarella's already there.
Gluten-free home bakers have also used this humble secret ingredient to pretty good success, from what I've gathered. If you can't have bread, you might as well double down on the cheese, right?
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