This book was a real team effort, combining the work of my testers, the input of three food scientists, and generous donations from several companies that produce or sell gluten-free flours.
The first thanks go to the testers who worked without compensation for over three years. They not only tested my recipes but sent variations, improved the originals, and brought forth suggestions for more mixes or other shapes or uses for the recipes. Two testers, Virginia Schmuck and Genevieve Potts, tested over three hundred recipes and supplied many variations; Vicki Lyles, Karen Meyers, and Eleanor Westling took on extra recipes after they had finished their first twenty. The other seven testers worked under difficult conditions, often with very short deadlines, and I thank them for their quick responses: Debbie Duncan, Mary Gunn, Sheryllyn McClintock, Brigitte Opfermann, Wendy and Elizabeth Percival, and Louise Streule.
When I began this book, although my bread recipes were successful, I had very little understanding of why certain combinations of flours and other ingredients worked and others did not. The cereal chemists Sam Wylde II and Sam Wylde III of Ener-G-Foods spent time at the plant and on numerous phone calls to teach me. Steven Rice of Authentic Foods not only added to my knowledge of the properties
and nutrient values of the basic flours but contributed the nutritional analysis for every recipe. Without the generous and invaluable help of these food scientists I would still be tossing in a little of this and that and hoping for success.
In creating new recipes, I figure I average four and a half attempts for every successful recipe. I make between three and nine sets of changes myself before I send a recipe out for testing. Several companies have been generous in supplying the ingredients for these attempts. I want to thank them not only for the many contributions but also for the moral support for this work: Ener-G Foods, Authentic Foods, El Peto Products, Jowar Foods, Inc., Dietary Specialties, and The Gluten-Free Pantry.
This is a book about breads, so unlike my former books, I didn’t include much medical information, but I want to thank Cynthia Kupper, R.D., chief executive officer of the Gluten Intolerance Group (GIG) for the medical and nutritional review of the manuscript and for her detailed editing. And special thanks go to Peter H. R. Green, M.D., of Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center, New York, for writing the foreword.
Finally, I have to thank Beth Crossman, my editor, for putting her magic touch to the manuscript and bringing order out of my chaos.
My thanks to all the bread team!