Rant of Lamb, or the Gluten-Free Lunch that had some Glaring Glitches

We had a lovely birthday lunch for Louise out on the patio, but it did not unroll as smoothly as I'd hoped.  All of us brought our dietary parameters to the table:  Louise and Joel are going gluten-free, Reeves had his usual limitations, and I was on day 1 of the low-fiber diet for my upcoming colonoscopy.  I had planned to do rack of lamb, cottage cheese bread, cauliflower with plum sauce, and a cake for Louise.
I made the cottage cheese bread out of Bob's Red Mill Gluten-Free bread flour. 

I used the recipe on the bag, substituting roasted almond oil for melted butter and eggbeaters for eggs.  The recipe called for proofing the yeast in the 1 3/4 c. of milk called for, heating the milk to 110 degrees.  In the interests of making it a little tastier, I substituted cottage cheese and yogurt for 1 1/2 c. of the milk called for, and substituted hot water for the remaining 1/4 c. of milk so that I could proof the yeast.  I added 1 c. of onions.  I realized to my dismay that I couldn't add sesame seeds or dill seeds, as I am forbidden seeds.  Happily I saw on my recipe the note that Jody had substituted wheatberry.  I started cooking the wheatberry and realized that I was losing the whole gluten-free idea.
By this time, I was getting a little exasperated.  Gluten-free bread seems like an oxymoron anyway, since I thought that the dough traps the carbon dioxide produced by the yeast with the sheets of gluten that build up from kneading.  Indeed, Bob adds guar gum and xanthan gum to his flour to perform this function.  I think it also gummed up my bread machine:  I can't get the pan out anymore.  It had been leaking a bit into the spinner underneath, and now it seems like it's permanently glued.  The bread was ok. 
Undaunted, I went on to make birthday cupcakes out of Bob's All-Purpose Baking Flour. 

The recipe I found for gluten-free cupcakes mentions using Namaste All-Purpose Gluten-Free Baking Flour.  It has xanthan gum.  Bob's All-Purpose Gluten-Free does not.  I just loaded the recipe with baking powder and hoped for the best.  Again, I used roasted almond oil and eggbeaters.  I think the chocolate glaze carried the day.
The lamb was very docile.  I discovered that I was nearly out of garlic, but then I found the mustard mixture I'd left on the countertop at Easter (see following post).  (Yes, it had returned to the frig on Easter.)  The only alteration was using bread crumbs from the gluten-free bread, and that worked fine.
My main takeaway about gluten-free cooking is never, never taste the dough.  If you had a bad habit of enjoying dough as you cook, you will be cured.  Cooking seems to help the taste.  Compared to the dough or batter, the products are divine.  Enough said.

Update:  The FedEx guy "dropped off" the new breadmaker on Tuesday.  I could hear it land on the front porch.  Right before leaving for my colonoscopy on Wednesday, I got it going with a whole wheat, wheatberry onion loaf.  Forget low fiber!  Forget gluten-free!  (Just put in yeast, 1 t salt, 1/2 chopt onion and 1/2 c wheatberres w/ 1 c water, warmed on power level 5 for 10 min in the microwave.  Then add King Arthur Whole Wheat, maybe 3 c or until it looks right.  I forgot the oil.)  When I got back, ravenous, my bread was 8 minutes away.