Eric, Thanks for giving us space here to share all this information.

it’ll need some fiddling about to get it working to a way she likes, but it’s a lot cheaper to experiment with than the 8$ a pound (plus shipping) specialty flours that do nothing for taste, texture or anything else, and winds up with an ingredient list reading more like a science project than something you’d want to eat.

With the right ‘other’ flours (I highly recommend buckwheat, not just because of the flavor, but because it’s relatively inexpensive as well) you can use a sponge as the basis for such delights as cinnamon rolls, almost any dessert bread, pancakes, etc etc.

btw, my regrets and condolences on your losses, recent and otherwise.

Mr Breadtopia, I apologize for the topical drift, and I appreciate your patience and forbearance in letting this sidetracking continue as long as it has.

just add the www before it.

as for the starter, I started with unbleached, unbromated wheat flour, and instead of pineapple juice, I just add a tsp of white vinegar.

I use ap flour and water for the loaves.

I use the nyt no knead bread recipe, replacing an equal amount of flour and water with the starter. I add a sprinkle of sugar to the dough as I’m mixing, and then I put it into a lubricated crock, and ignore it for 24 hours minimum. longer tends to be better.

pour the dough out into a greased loaf pan, and be warned, this is going to be the most relaxed, slack dough you’ll see in your life. you couldn’t knead it if you wanted to. bake in a hot oven (450) for about an hour. If you temperature test, your dough’s center should be about 205. the loaf itself should have a crackly crust and sound hollow when rapped.

I’m by no means an expert here, so I’m having to do a lot of this by ‘feel’.

for the sponge, I just mix the entire dough batch at once, and let it all ferment. If I add flour after that, I have to leave it for another 24 hours minimum, or it bothers me.

if your friend wants to do a more traditional method, then simply use 30% of the total flour as the wheat for a sponge, then later add the non-toxic flours (buckwheat, etc) at the same time you’d work in the rest of the flour.

I’m sorry I’m not more help, but I’ve cooked for so long that it’s one of those ‘measure by touch and texture’

I’ll give you the nyt bread recipe I work with, and your friend, I’m afraid, will have to experiment, but even the absolutely worst loaves were better than a lot of commercial loaves.

this is the core recipe.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/08/dining/081mrex.html

this is an article afterwards that covers more about it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/08/dining/08mini.html

your mileage may vary, and like I said, I do NOT recommend this, so while I’ll answer whatever questions I can, I’d say that anyone who follows in my footsteps might be a bit crazed.

Thanks for the articles, Aubrey. They are interesting. Unfortunately, the middle link wouldn’t work for me. Sometimes web addresses on forums are automatically shortened which leaves dots in the middle and then the link won’t work. Could you just post the words between Science…and…en-tolerance for me and I’ll paste it in? I found lots of celiac articles there, but I don’t think I found the one you meant to link to.

I have some questions for you, if you don’t mind. What kind of grain flour do you use for your starter and for your bread? Could you give your recipe and the time table you use for the sponge and loaves? I hope that isn’t too many questions and too much trouble but I know my friend would appreciate any such details. Thanks.

When in doubt…. check the “Urban Dictionary”….!

http://www.urbandictionary.com/

Very “educatiional”…. lol

here’s some links to the study

Bless those Italians….

I apologize for the lab-ese heavy document, but this is very very promising…

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18680953

here’s some commentary about the subject written in a slightly more understandable form..

http://www.foodnavigator.com/Science…en-intolerance

and for you lab-rat types, here’s the aem abstract

http://aem.asm.org/cgi/content/abstract/70/2/1088