How to Cook the Best Gluten Free Pasta

On our families search for great tasting gluten free pasta we tried many pasta brands. Our favorite is Tinkyada gluten-free pasta that tastes just like real pasta noodles. We tried many types of pasta substitutes and sampled a variety of tasty gluten free (GF) meals. Join us for a talk about the secret to cooking GF pasta, our list of the top 3 gluten-free pasta manufacturers and some easy, delicious gluten free pasta recipe resources.

The first thing I did with GF Pasta is cook it like regular spaghetti, boy was that a mistake! The secret to cooking gluten free pasta is not to overcook it. If you overcook the pasta it comes out mushy. Cooking times and cooking methods vary depending on the grain of the pasta. Most GF pastas have directions on how to cook them right on the package. Follow the directions because they vary and a little mistake in over cooking can ruin your meal.

Here are the cooking times and methods of different types of gluten-free pastas:

Tinkyada (brown rice pasta) Cooking directions: boil water, add pasta, cook, rinse with cold water, drain well, serve hot.
Spaghetti - cook 15-16 minutes
Elbow - cook 16-17 minutes
Fusilli - cook 12 minutes
Fettuccini - cook 16 minutes
Lasagna and large shell - 2 minutes less for oven cooking

Hearthland (corn & rice blend pasta) Cooking directions: boil water, add salt, add pasta, cook, drain, and serve hot.
Spaghetti - cook 9-11 minutes

Ancient Quinoa Harvest (corn & quinoa blend pasta) Cooking directions - boil water, add pasta, cook, drain, and serve hot.
Elbows - cook 6-9 minutes

Top 3 gluten-free pasta rewiewed by taste.

# 1 Tinkyada http://www.tinkyada.com product of Canada made from brown rice & rice bran. Tinkyada is 210 calories per serving. The taste of Tinkyada is excellent.
Spaghettis - brown, white, spinach
Shells - large, small
Shapes - elbows, fusilli, spirals, penne, kids shapes, vegetable spirals, lasagna and fettuccini

# 2 Hearthland http://www.heartlandpasta.com/ a product of Italy made from a corn & rice blend. Heartland is 200 calories per serving. Heartland has a good texture and comes in spaghetti, penne, rotini, elbows, fusilli and egg noodles.

#3 Ancient Harvest Quinoa http://www.quinoa.net/ a product of California made from a corn and quinoa blend. Ancient Harvest Quinoa pasta has 205 calories per serving.It has a good taste and is available in elbows, garden pagodas, linguine, rotelle, shells, spaghetti and veggie curls.

There are not a lot of gluten free pasta recipes on the web but other wheat pasta recipes can be modified using gluten free pasta and adapting the cooking method required for GF pasta. We have made many of our old pasta favorites from recipes that we changed and you can too.

Here is our favorite gluten free pasta website:

http://www.heartlandpasta.com/recipes.asp - Hearthland Pasta has a pick a shape GF pasta recipes finder.

Here is our favorite pasta recipe websites for GF pasta recipe modification ideas:

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes-and-cooking/index.html - The food network has all the famous chefs and the best recipe collection I have found.

http://allrecipes.com/ All recipes is a community of free recipes from home cooks who submit reviews, photos and recipes.

http://www.epicurious.com/recipesmenus/ - Epicurious features recipes from Bon Appétit, Gourmet and Self magazines as well as community created recipe submissions.

Remember that when cooking gluten-free pasta the secret is not to overcook and you can create pasta dishes that are truly delicious. Modifying recipes with GF pasta is easy using some of the links in the recipes modifications section. We have only tried 3 brands of gf pasta and hope to find more so we can share more brands and recipes with you. If you have a favorite brand of GF pasta or a favorite GF recipe please share it on our blog so others can read it. http://www.simplifymyfoodchoices.com/healthyideas/

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