Gluten free bread or gluten free polystyrene?

UPDATED

I recently bought a loaf of gluten free bread that was so utterly revolting (like eating crumbly polysterene) that I immediately put the whole thing in the bin. I know! That smarted … a LOT. I should have turned it into breadcrumbs but I was having a tantrum.

Luckily for them I can’t remember which brand it was. But that also means that I might make the same mistake again. So I thought I’d do a quick round up of the gf breads available in Coles and Woolies. I know we all like to think we only shop at local, sustainable farmers’ markets but, admit it, that just ain’t true all of the time. Sometimes you just need to buy a loaf of bread in a hurry.

Coles Simply gluten free bread

There are loads of gf breads on the market these days – these are the main culprits

• Burgen – UPDATE: a good product, soft and moist if a little cakey in texture, but I’d buy it again at that’s the main thing!
• Helgas – very good, a go-to product. A good texture, soft and moist
• Coles Simply – good, a slightly underdone texture (which I love – it’s certainly not dry!), makes great toast. UPDATE: Had another loaf, sort of wish I hadn’t … it was dry, dry, dry. Gives me concerns about about the consistency and QC of this product …
• Country Life – I think this might have been the offending brand. I’m not quite sure but I’m sure as hell not prepared to take the risk
• Genius – untested, in the frozen section … and at nearly 10 bucks a loaf, pr’lly not going there!
• Purebred – my go-to for burger and finger rolls. A fairly good, soft, palatable texture, perhaps a teeny bit dry. The burger rolls sometimes (usually!) have a big bubble of air at the top, but I can forgive that if it means I get to have a burger!
• Woolworths Free From – quite, quite excellent! Soft and springy, robust enough to make sandwiches and, get this, moist enough that you don’t even need to toast it! I know you don’t believe me, but I wouldn’t lie to you.

However, if you are on the east side of Melbourne I must insist that you make a special point of going to this place:

Just Yummy

It is an entirely gluten free bakery (whoop!) Their bread is so good that the first time I ate it I was a bit scared it wasn’t gf. I don’t know how they’ve done it. Some kind of dark magic perhaps? Don’t question, just eat!