Food: Try making these gluten-free popovers for brunch

My last two trips to San Francisco ended with breakfast at the Cliff House. The popovers are a signature offering there and my traveling companion, who isn’t troubled by gluten issues, was obviously relishing eating them.

The lulling ocean view from the restaurant and my own delicious breakfast were enough to distract me from feeling sorry for myself, but last weekend I had friends over for brunch and I thought, “popovers can’t be that hard, even gluten-free. It’s all about the eggs, after all.”

And I was right. The results were much appreciated, and I got over my popover envy in one fell swoop.

The tricks to successful popovers are:

To have all the ingredients at room temperature.

To have the oven hot; to heat the greased muffin pan in the over before pouring the batter

To have the rack in the lower middle of the oven so the tops don’t over-brown.

The ingredients and mixing process are fairly simple. This recipe is adapted from glutenfreecooking.about.com.

Gluten-free popovers

1/2 cup brown rice flour

1/4 cup sweet rice flour

3 tablespoons potato starch

1 tablespoon tapioca starch

1/4 teaspoon sea salt

1 cup half and half

2 large eggs

Butter to prepare popover pan

Have all the ingredients at room temperature. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Grease the popover pan (I used a regular muffin pan).

Combine the flours and salt and mix thoroughly. Combine, in this order: cream, eggs and flour in mixture in a blender pitcher or food processor. Blend at high speed for a minute, then scrape down the sides and pulse briefly. The batter will be very thin.

Place the greased popover pan in the oven for three minutes, then immediately fill the cups to half or two-thirds full. Bake for 25 minutes at 450 degrees, then reduce the temperature to 300 degrees and back for 5-7 minutes longer. The popovers should be golden brown. Serve them warm.

Makes 1 dozen popovers.

I served them with a frittata and fresh strawberries for an easy but tasty brunch. Bon appetit.

The next meeting of Carson City’s gluten-free discussion group will take place Monday, April 14. Contact me for details.

Susan Hart has been cooking gluten-free for 17 years. She can be reached at glutenfree.hart@gmail.com.