Rice Flour

If you are looking for a superbly elegant, gentle dish, look no further. In a long line of meats and seafood grilled after they have been marinated very simply in a paste of fresh ginger, garlic, and chilies, this dish is a great family favorite. Have the fishmonger remove the halibut skin. I like to serve this with Karhai Broccoli and a potato or rice dish.

Called knafe by Syrians and Lebanese and kadaif by Greeks and Turks, the dough for this pastry that looks like soft white uncooked shredded wheat or vermicelli can be bought in Middle Eastern stores. There are several traditional fillings. The one with nuts is what you find in Arab pastry shops. The one with cream is my favorite. The one with the cheese is the easiest. The last two are meant to be served hot. They make a marvelous after-dinner dessert and teatime pastry. The quantities given below for the syrup are the usual large amount. You can pour only half over the pastry and serve the rest separately for those who want more.

This Turkish cream with ground almonds is one of my favorite milk puddings.

This is the most common and popular Arab dessert. It is a milky cream thickened by cornstarch or rice flour (in the old days the rice was pulverized with a pestle and mortar). In Lebanese restaurants it is usually made with cornstarch; at home rice flour is used, or a mixture of both. In Turkey they call the cream sutlage.

Turkey has a very wide range of milk puddings. I once spent much of one night watching specialist milk pudding–makers at work, endlessly stirring creams in giant copper cauldrons. They said they had to work at night because that was when the milk arrived, which was why, they complained, they could not recruit young people to do the job. I don’t blame them. This pudding, made with ground almonds, is my favorite.

Supposedly whoopie pies get their name from the fact that Amish women would occasionally pack these treats in the farmer's lunchboxes and when discovered the men would yell "Whoopie!" Traditionally whoopie pies are two round mounds of chocolate cake with a creamy frosting sandwiched in between. For a twist on tradition, I love to make Red Velvet Whoopie pies.

Editor's note: Use this Sweet Rice Flour Blend to make Carol Kiciski's Red Velvet Whoopie Pies . No single flour can replace wheat flour in gluten-free baking. Gluten is a sticky protein found in wheat, rye, barley and other grains. It is what makes pizza dough stretchy, cakes rise, and baked goods hold together. Gluten-free flours need to be combined with starches and gums in order to react the same way that wheat flour does. Most gluten-free cooking and baking failures occur when the flour blend they are using does not contain enough starch and gum additives to make up for the lack of sticking power found in gluten. When I first went gluten-free I shied away from traditional baking because it seemed like too much trouble to combine various flours. I soon found that in reality it takes only a few short minutes to mix up a batch of gluten-free flour blend. After much trial and error I finally came up with a flour blend that works perfectly in gluten-free baking. This is my preferred flour mix and can be substituted for wheat flour cup for cup. You are going to love this flour mixture. Believe me when I say no one can tell the final product is gluten-free. I taste tested this flour blend on many, many people who customarily eat wheat and quite a few who shy away from “alternative foods”. The comments were unanimously very positive; people either could not tell the desserts were gluten-free or in fact preferred the dishes to those prepared with wheat flour. I make up a batch of this flour blend and store it in a canister so it is always on hand when the mood to bake strikes me. You can also store it in a large plastic storage bag in the freezer. This sweet rice flour blend is so fine it does not need to be sifted before use.

These flavorful frites are not only a clever riff on a fried standard, they're also lamb's best friend. The Middle Eastern accents in the za'atar spice blend pair well with the gamey meat and intensify the eggplant’s flavor. After many experiments, Terzo Piano chef Meg Colleran Sahs discovered that a rice-flour coating resulted in the highest crunch factor.

Rava dosas—savory, crisp-edged crêpes popular in South India—are typically made from semolina and rice flours. Stuff them with hearty vegetables cooked in a blend of spices, chile, garlic, and ginger.

This crowd-pleasing recipe was developed by Susan Baldassano, Director of Education at the Natural Gourmet Institute for Health and Culinary Arts in New York City. For moist, tender muffins, use finely ground yellow cornmeal, such as that made by Arrowhead Mills. You can replace the blueberries with an equal amount of cranberries and increase the sugar to 2 tablespoons, or replace the blueberries with 3/4 cup of raspberries.These muffins are delicious on their own, or try them warm with butter and jam. Cooled muffins can be wrapped in plastic and stored at room temperature for up to three days or frozen for up to three weeks. Thaw and reheat muffins in 350°F oven or microwave (unlike those made with wheat, gluten-free baked goods won't get tough in the microwave). See our related story for more information and sources for gluten-free ingredients.

Crisp on the bottom and chewy in the center, this gluten-free pie gives pizzeria fare a run for its money. Feel free to vary the toppings to suit your taste (keeping in mind that processed pepperoni and even some brands of pre-grated cheese may contain gluten, so read ingredients carefully.) This recipe makes two 10-inch pies—perfect for two very hungry people or two to three pretty hungry people. For easy weeknight meals, make a double recipe of the baked crusts and freeze some to top and broil when you need them. See our related story for more information and sources for gluten-free ingredients.

Crispy calcium bites by Janine Doran, chef at Cafe Flora in Seattle.

In Mexico, a quesadilla is more like what we think of as a grilled cheese sandwich, but with tortillas instead of bread. In Guatemala, these sweet little cheese things are like buttery cupcakes, and they are baked as special-occasion treats for children who've had a good report card or lost a tooth.

These crisp golden crêpes, filled with shrimp, pork, and vegetables, are both delicious and fun to eat. Simply wrap each crêpe in a lettuce leaf, tuck in fresh herbs like mint and basil, and dip it in the sweet-and-sour sauce.

Once a favorite breakfast of the Chinese, this dish might more accurately be called a daikon scramble. But the Chinese words for carrot and daikon are almost the same, and "cake" refers to the way the rice flour binds the ingredients.

Start preparing this one day before serving — it needs to chill overnight.

If any cake could be called refreshing, this would be the one. Rich but light, it loses absolutely nothing from the absence of white flour.

Pla Phad Phrik Khing The pummelo salad makes a nice first course with this dish.