Without eating gluten and most grains, bread becomes difficult to make. Not impossible just challenging. For a long time, I stopped eating bread altogether. But I confess, I missed the occasional sandwich. While I have figured out how to make bread, it is a dense bread made from heavy flours which I enjoy a slice at a time. Not great sandwich material. It is better as garlic toast or an accompaniment with soup.
Rather than a traditional sandwich, I now make wraps or rolls with potato tortillas. They are straightforward to make, contain no unwanted ingredients, hold together beautifully and have a neutral taste that pairs well with just about anything.
The ingredients for potato tortillas are the same as my pizza crust, only I roll them out as thin as I can. This batch makes 8, 20-22cm tortillas which are delicious fresh or can be frozen flat for later use.
Potato Tortillas
Ingredients
2 cups steamed, peeled and blended organic potatoes
Flour mixture
1 1/2 cups organic cassava flour
3/4 cup garbanzo and fava flour (or 3/4 cup chickpea flour)
1/2 cup tapioca starch
1/2 tsp Himalayan sea salt
Method
Scrub 2 medium to large potatoes. Peel and steam them until they are tender. Add the potatoes to a twister bar or small jar fitted for a high speed blender. The smaller jar will enable you to run the blender and be able to move the potatoes down the jar while it is on rather than continually stopping and scrapping down the potatoes. Due to potatoes being thick and starchy, it is hard on the blender so if necessary, run for as short as possible just until you reach the desired consistency and/or add a little bit of water. It works best with potatoes freshly steamed as they have more moisture.
Scrape the potatoes in to a mid sized bowl. In a separate bowl, mix the cassava, garbanzo/fava flours and tapioca starch. Combine well.
Add the salt and 1 cup of the flour mix to the potatoes and combine. Keep adding flour until you have a MOIST but not sticky dough. Add the flour slowly so you don’t end up with a dry dough. You want only as much flour as you need to bind the potatoes together. I find I need about 1 1/2 cups of the flour mix. Every batch will be slightly different depending on the type of potatoes you use and how moist they are. Knead the dough so that all the moisture from the potatoes is thoroughly combined with the flours.
Once you have a smooth, elastic dough, cut in to 8 equally sized balls. I like to weigh them so they are equal in size but you can eye ball it.
Put a damp paper towel or dishcloth over the dough balls so they do not dry out.
Press each ball in a tortilla press between two sheets of baking paper rotating 4 times to flatten them as much as possible.
Then carefully and slowly peel off the parchment paper. On a clean counter space, sprinkle your flour mix on the surface and lay the tortilla down on the counter. Carefully peel off the second piece of baking paper. You may need to dust the flour on the top so your hands won’t stick and tear the tortilla. Dust both sides of tortilla liberally with the flour mixture as well as the counter and rolling pin. Place a wide non-stick ceramic frying pan on a medium low heat.
Roll the tortilla to an evenly, thin circle about 20 to 22 cm in diameter. Carefully lift the tortilla with both hands supporting opposite sides of the tortilla and drop it flat on to the frying pan. Let it cook for several minutes until the edges start to lift slightly. Flip and cook another few minutes or until the tortilla puffs up. Cool on a rack. Repeat this for all eight tortillas.
Use right away or cool to room temperature and store flat in a zip lock storage bag.Seal and freeze flat until you are ready to use.
They defrost in several minutes on the counter in the sun. Alternatively, put them under the broiler, in a warm oven or on a heated frying pan for 1-2 minutes.