GF Crunchy Tuna Turnovers

I DID IT!!!! I finally managed to find an all purpose GF biscuit dough that's actually WORKABLE!!!

One of the biggest frustrations with learning to bake gluten free, is overcoming the problems of not being able to mold and shape GF bread doughs like you would expect with normal doughs, because most of the time they end up with the consistency of a thick cake batter.

But I finally managed to find one that not only tastes REALLY good, but is also versatile for many recipes (or just regular biscuits), AND it's much more like the texture and consistency of a regular, non GF, bread dough that you can roll out, cut, and shape into whatever you want!

Which means some of the family favorite recipes I thought were a lost cause can now be back on the menu! [Ignore the awful hair above, it was an at home day and I'm desperately overdue for a decent haircut!]

One of those such recipes, is my Crunchy Tuna Turnovers, which I used to make every once in a while as a nice change from regular tuna sandwiches.

But I haven't made it GF, so this was a great experiment with my new dough. After separating the dough into small balls, I lightly floured my countertop and used my rolling pin to roll out the dough flat.

Then I moved them onto wax paper so it was easy to pick up again.

The original recipe calls for a can of big flaky biscuits that are already made, and of course not GF. After making up the dough I came up with 12 flat biscuits.

I added a third can of tuna, some more cheese, and lemon pepper to the mix to have enough filling for this many turnovers. The original recipe for the filling is here.

Since the dough is actually movable, you can fold the dough over the filling, and crimp the edges closed.

It is still more fragile than regular dough, so be careful, but if it does crack or break, simply push the dough back together.

The next step on these turnovers is to lightly coat them with a beaten egg, followed by sprinkling them with crumbled potato chips.

Again, because the dough is fragile, I found it worked best to use 2 bowls to pour the egg over the dough from one bowl to the other.

Above you can see a small crack in my turnover, but that's okay here because you end up cutting a couple of slits in this dough to help with the baking, so don't worry about them.

Once coated, place on an ungreased cookie sheet. I wasn't sure exactly how this dough would bake, so I did actually spray just a very light coating of cooking spray on this sheet before placing the turnovers on top, but I'm not sure if that's really necessary.

Cut 2 slits in the top of each turnover with a sharp knife. Then bake at 375° for 18-21 minutes or until golden brown.

My turnovers turned out PERFECTLY! Dough fully cooked and lightly golden brown on the bottom.

We like to dip these in mustard and serve with a side of chips and fruit.

Awesome! The recipe was a HUGE success, and now I have this really great dough to use to make any kind of biscuits, and shape them however I want!

What's the dough recipe? It's the same one I used to convert my Ham Potato Puffs to GF, I quadrupled the amounts as follows:

GF Biscuit mix:

• 2 cups GF flour blend (2 parts white rice flour, 1 part tapioca flour, 1 part potato starch)
• 4 tsp. xanthan gum
  
• 4 tsp. baking powder
• 2 tsp. salt
• 8 tbsp. shortening
• 12 tbsp. milk
• 2 tbsp. melted butter

Dump all dry ingredients into a large bowl. Blend shortening into dry ingredients with a mixer until it turns into small, fine crumbs. Then slowly add milk until soft, workable dough forms.

I have a feeling it's all that extra xanthan gum that's holding the dough together that makes this work. It's really expensive, but worth it!