Experiment Using gluten VS gluten-free flour I want to manipulate the size of cookies and the consistency. How might I affect those characteristics? The gluten in wheat flour helps the dough to hold water. Therefore, cookies with gluten can be round, soft and chewy. Removing gluten makes cookie dough less springy, so the cookies with almond flour could more likely spread when they bake.
Ingredients
2 cups all purpose flour VSalmond flour
¾ cup white sugar
¾ cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup softened butter
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
½ teaspoon salt
2 cups chocolate chips
Preparation
Preheat oven to 375
In a large bowl combineflour, both sugars, baking soda and salt
Next add the rest of your ingredients to the dry mix including: butter, egg, vanilla
Once all of your ingredients are evenly combined, pour in your chocolate chips
Separate the dough into the sizes of your choice being sure to make all the same size in both batches
Bake for 10 mins
TipsTo create the same sized cookie, use a spoon or container to scoop.
Why Gluten is created when two different proteins called gliadin and glutenin bind with the help of moisture and heat, allowing for dough to be fluffy. Without gluten, the dough would rip easily. Flour holds ingredients together in baking and acts like a binder. Different flours have different levels of protein. My wet ingredients are very important to my experiment:
Butter adds the necessary moisture, with a melting point just below body temperature, this is why cookies can “melt in your mouth.”
Eggs add the necessary moisture, but also contribute to the volume. Eggs contain proteins which are a binder keeping the dough together.
Gluten in the cookie dough helps hold in the melted fat and sugar. This stops the cookie from spreading too far. The gluten also helps dough hold water. Gluten cookies become thicker and fluffier because the flour expands when combined with moisture, unlike the much denser almond flour, creating flat and larger cookies. Almond flour cookies spread because the fat in the cookie dough melts in the oven. If there isn't enough flour to hold that melted fat, the cookies will over-spread.
Results Gluten-free flours are heavy, dense and have strong flavors which can lead to baked goods that are heavy, dry and bland. B shows gluten-free/almond flour A shows glutenous cookies. The photo above shows how the different flours controlled the shape, size and appeal of my similar cookies. I can clearly measure my qualitative data when looking at the size differences. My almond flour cookies spread due to the fat in the dough, which melted in the oven without enough flour to hold it together. Zero gluten created a thinner, less dense cookie in comparison to thicker and fluffier gluten cookies. A more appealing cookie is created with gluten, which my survey supports when 100% of people said cookie A was more appealing. My taste test survey also concluded that cookie A (gluten cookie) created a softer cookie with a preferable taste. This is because cookie B melted when the fats spread and therefore burned slightly. When cooking with almond flour or a gluten free flour, it is advised to replace that gluten binder. I choose to ignore this in my experiment, creating very different cookies with a very similar process.
Reflection
A
I thought my gluten free cookies would spread and be a lot thinner which showed well in my results. I thought that the textures of the two would be a lot different, they were in some ways but many people said both were chewy and soft.
I altered the ingredients with my gluten free cookie to create the best differences and to see if the cookies would spread less
My measurements where all accurate, I created same shape cookies and used the same amount of ingredients
My choices were relevant for the desirability of the food, I wanted a better consistency and look for the cookies.
My questions were relevant to my cooking. I could further investigate how different flours affect cookies and what you need to substitute to make them similar.
B How does the ingredient you experimented with affect the food’s overall characteristics? My ingredients affected the cookies' characteristics a lot. My almond flour cookies spread due to the fat in the dough. The fat melted in the oven without enough gluten in flour to hold it together. Zero gluten created a thinner, less dense cookie in comparison to thicker and fluffier gluten cookies. Gluten is created when two different proteins called gliadin and glutenin bind with the help of moisture and heat, allowing for dough to be fluffy. So this is why the cookies with the regular flour were more fluffy.
C In what ways are cooking and doing science similar and in what ways are they different? How are a cook and a scientist investigating food similar or different? Heating, freezing, mixing and blending are all used in science and kitchen. When food is cooked, physical and chemical changes take place to transform your food. Culinary science plays a role in product development when creating different foods. In both cases, people try out different things to experiment and see what the outcomes are. You also have to be safe and follow safety precautions. And in both cases, people collaborate, like sharing their ideas and do science and make food together. They both go through trial and error. They use different senses to conclude their findings. Cooks use their mouths and smell and touch. They always eat their food. Scientists doing experiments on food probably use sight the most.