This was my mom's recipe. In those days flour was sifted before measuring and as I recall scant meant about 1 Tb. less than level with the top of the measuring cup. She was a stickler for preciseness so the 300 F. baking temp. is correct. Date Bread 1 c. boiling water 1 tsp. soda 1 c. dates butter, size of a walnut 1 c. sugar 1 egg scant 1 1/2 c. flour 1 c. chopped walnuts Preheat oven to 300 degrees; Grease 5x9 loaf pan. Combine water, soda & dates in flat bottom bowl; set aside. Mix other ingredients in order. Mash dates in water; add to dough. Bake for 1 hour.

I would just use my regular recipe for bread pudding and put slices of banana and dark chocolate chips between the layers....and perhaps top it with a rum sauce. Ann T's recipe would work...and just add some rum extract ( stronger flavor than real rum) to the sauce. Linda C

The following is from Mary Frances PickettÂs website http://www.glutenfreecookingschool.com She has Q&A section about baking gluten free bread on her blog at that you might find helpful (e.g., get more rise by beating dough mixture for a few minutes with the paddle before adding it to the bread machine); read more at: http://www.glutenfreecookingschool.com/archives/gluten-free-bread-tips Really Good Sandwich Bread 1 Tbsp. active dry yeast 1 Tbsp. sugar 1 ½ c. water (105 degrees or a little less than hot) 2 ½ cups "Gluten Free All Purpose Flour Mix Recipe" (see below) 2 tsp. xanthan gum 1tsp. salt 2 eggs (or 6 Tbsp. water and 2 Tbsp. ground flax seed) 1 ½ Tbsp. oil 1 tsp. cider vinegar 1. Start by combining the yeast and sugar in a small bowl (I use the smallest in my set of three nested mixing bowls). Add the water while gently stirring the yeast and sugar. Let this mixture sit while you mix the rest of the ingredients - bubbles and foam should form if the yeast is happy. 2. Combine the flour mix, xanthan gum and salt in the largest mixing bowl and stir well. 3. In a third bowl, whisk the eggs, oil and vinegar until the eggs are a bit frothy. 4. By this point the yeast mixture should be foamy, so you can pour the two liquid mixtures into the flour mixture. Stir until all ingredients are well mixed and then dump into your bread machine. Cook on the 80 minute setting  the stirring paddle is not necessary. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Gluten Free All Purpose Flour Mix (Note: this mix can be used for a variety of baked goods and things like pancakes as well) 3 parts brown rice flour (I use BobÂs Red Mill) 3 parts corn starch 2 parts soy flour 1 part masa harina

The canola oil is important to the recipe. This was the answer to the same concern about canola oil, from a website that I get sent to Disney for trying to post. The canola oil story is a HOAX!! And that's all there is to it. Any "warnings" from an e-mail are 99 percent certain to be lies and hoaxes. Don't buy into it. "What we have here is a bit of truth about a product's family history worked into a hysterical screed against the product itself. There is no earthly reason to give any credence to this rumor -- Canola oil is not the horrifying product this widely-disseminated e-mail makes it out to be, nor has the FDA turned loose on the American public a health scourge worthy of being named one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. An appreciation of what this scare is based upon begins with a better understanding of what canola oil and how it came into being. The rape plant (Brassica napus) is a member of the mustard family, as claimed in the e-mail. However, before associations between rape and mustard gas set in too strongly, it should be noted turnip, cabbage, watercress, horseradish, and radish are also members of this family of plants. Rapeseed oil has been used for cooking for centuries in Europe, India, China, and Japan. As modern science is finding out, its previous use wasn't necessarily a guarantee of safety. Cooking at high temperatures with unrefined rapeseed oil now appears to be related to an increased risk of lung cancer because at high temperatures cooking oil gives off chemicals capable of causing mutations in cells. Unrefined rapeseed oil is particularly notable for this, but other oils also have this association. Those intent upon doing large amounts of wok cooking with any sort of cooking oil should therefore lower their frying temperature from the 240C to 280°C called for in Chinese cooking to 180°C. Rapeseed oil naturally contains a high percentage (30-60%) of erucic acid, a substance associated with heart lesions in laboratory animals. For this reason rapeseed oil was not used for consumption in the United States prior to 1974, although it was used in other countries. (Americans chose to use it as a lubricant to maintain Allied naval and merchant ships during World War II.) In 1974, rapeseed varieties with a low erucic content were introduced. Scientists had found a way to replace almost all of rapeseed's erucic acid with oleic acid, a type of monounsaturated fatty acid. (This change was accomplished through the cross-breeding of plants, not by the techniques commonly referred to as "genetic engineering.") By 1978, all Canadian rapeseed produced for food use contained less than 2% erucic acid. The Canadian seed oil industry rechristened the product "canola oil" (Canadian oil) in 1978 in an attempt to distance the product from negative associations with the word "rape." Canola was introduced to American consumers in 1986. By 1990, erucic acid levels in canola oil ranged from 0.5% to 1.0%, in compliance with U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) standards. This light, tasteless oil's popularity is due to the structure of its fats. It is lower in saturated fat (about 6%) than any other oil. Compare this to the high saturated fat content of peanut oil (about 18%) and palm oil (at an incredibly high 79%). It also contains more cholesterol-balancing monounsaturated fat than any oil except olive oil and has the distinction of containing Omega-3 fatty acids, a polyunsaturated fat reputed to not only lower both cholesterol and triglycerides, but also to contribute to brain growth and development. In other words, it's a healthy oil. One shouldn't feel afraid to use it because of some Internet scare loosely based on half-truths and outright lies."