Tips & Tricks: "Blond" Psyllium Husk

[runpunkrun]

Psyllium husk can add great structure and chew to GF breads, turning bread batter into an actual bread dough that you can knead and shape, but it can also turn your baked goods a sad purple. I discovered this the hard way the first time I used psyllium husk when the Yerba Prima I bought because it was a local company turned my hamburger buns a dismal purple grey. They weren't purple in the cookbook, so obviously this could be avoided, but how? A mystery.

Then, literal years later, A CLUE: I read about "blond" psyllium husk at The Loopy Whisk (UK), but I can't find anything for sale in the US labeled that way.

A few weeks after that I'm scrolling through a recipe for a GF flour blend without rice flour and, through sheer luck, find A LEAD. Based on a recommendation from Fearless Dining, I buy a bag of Anthony's Whole Psyllium Husks, use them in a loaf of sandwich bread and tears, tears (metaphorical) on the side of my face because my bread comes out a lovely yellow color with not a shade of grey to be seen. It looks just like normal bread. Praise the husk!

Anthony's Whole Psyllium Husks are organic, batch tested, and verified gluten free. I bought mine at Amazon.

Do you use psyllium husk in your baking? Do you have a favorite brand that doesn't turn your bread grey? Please share in the comments!

Late Breaking News!

Sources at Wikipedia report:

Seed produced from Plantago ovata is known in trading circles as white or blonde psyllium, Indian plantago, or isabgol.

Which is what Anthony's contains while my Yerba Prima just says it contains "Psyllium." I've cracked the code!

Comments

[mific]

Yes, I use it in low carb bread and bun recipes, which I've posted here before. And yesterday, faced with 5 blackening bananas and a sad history of too-dry banana cakes, I invented a recipe incorporating psyllium designed to be a cross between cheesecake and actual cake. It worked, so I'll post it to the comm soon! I've never encountered any purple psyllium, only blond, and the types I've used are plain metamucil (it works, but not as powerfully as pure ground psyllium husk), and more recently, ground psyllium husk from a company here called Sana Direct, who package their own. https://www.sana-direct.co.nz/product/psyllium-husk-powder/

[runpunkrun]

Banana cheesecake cake! I've never heard of using psyllium like that, but I'm guessing it works like chia seeds in a pudding, creating a jelly-like thickening, so it totally makes sense.

[panisdead]

can also turn your baked goods a sad purple

!!!!

What an unwanted miracle of chemistry!

[runpunkrun]

It turned me off psyllium husk for YEARS.

[elainegrey]

Thank you. I think i can use the rest of the purple stuff some how, but yay for understanding the color!

[runpunkrun]

Yeah, I have two cans of the purple stuff left, but I'll use it in this focaccia bread where the color doesn't matter as much.

[nerakrose]

i've never seen purple psyllium husk! i didn't know that was a thing.

i used to use it a lot, but i don't know where to find it here in the UK. the gf aisles in the larger supermarkets don't have it. (they'll have xantham gum but i don't like using it, and i avoid flour blends that have it in.) i suppose i'll look on amazon eventually. generally the gf aisles here don't seem to carry much for home baking besides a few different bag of Doves brand flours (usually plain white, a bread mix, and one other). i don't know where to get plain oat flour or sorghum or buckwheat or anything else, it just isn't in the supermarkets. :( and i live in fricking London!

this is the brand i used to use: fiberhusk it's ground psyllium, kind of beige in colour. depending on what I was making with it, it could sometimes add a taste to the baked good I wasn't a fan of, so I wound up eventually only using psyllium when doing sourdough based things, or other strongly flavoured bakes that would mask the taste of psyllium.

[runpunkrun]

I'm shocked London doesn't have a better selection of GF flours! Is there anywhere near you that carries Bob's Red Mill? They have a huge line of GF products.

Another source of psyllium husk is "fibre supplement"

[jesse_the_k]

It's sold as a dietary supplement in the United States under the brand Metamucil, which is listed on Amazon.co.uk and may well be available at your local chemists.

It was cheaper here in the U.S. to buy a generic version of Metamucil and open up the little gelatin capsules when I first tried Snixy Kitchen's GF Focaccia.

[teaotter]

The purple psyllium also has a stronger flavor than the blond, as far as I can an tell.

I use Herba Organica Plantago Ovata Husk, available on Amazon here in the US, but it was just the first one I could find. It works fine, though.

[runpunkrun]

Interesting! I haven't noticed a difference, but I'm not against psyllium husk having a milder flavor.