I'm new to gluten-free baking. I'm finding that my cakes (I've only made yellow cake, to be used as a layer cake, so far) have a distinctive flavor (I've made one specifically gluten-free recipe and one regular cake recipe using gluten free flours). I've used the same combination of flours in both cakes (Bette Hagman's gluten-free blend). When I tasted the flours straight out of their packages, I noticed that the tapioca flour was the culprit. Has anyone else noticed this and been put off by the flavor? Does anyone know of any decent substitutions for the tapioca that would add the same (non-flavor) benefits that tapioca starch adds to baked goods? Thank you so much in advance!

What flours are in the Bette Hagman blend? I haven't found tapioca starch to taste funny, but I do really hate the taste of sorghum, soy, garfava and other bean flours. Brown rice flour also sometimes tastes funny to me, but not as much as the others. I imagine if its the tapioca starch that tastes funny to you, you could probably just use potato starch instead.

I have never thought tapioca starch tastes funny, but cornstarch would be a good replacement. I think soy and garbanzo bean flours taste horrible.

I didn't think the tapioca had any flavor at all. Tapioca is what gives Chebe bread such great flavor.
I ground up my own toasted garbanzo beans and made gravy with it, and it tasted great. I did read that it goes bad quickly and must be refrigerated, so maybe that's why it would not taste good. Just a thought.

I agree, soy and bean flours make certain things gross, I only use bean flour in savory baking and never soy. Arrowroot starch would be a good, tasteless baking sub. I personally enjoy the mild flavor tapioca starch gives food.

I too am dealing with this, I thought it was the xanthan gum. It seems it depends on what I am making. Cornbread tastes normal but when I made Irish Soda Bread UCKY, so which thing tasted weird? It feels like when something tastes good then I got lucky, if it tastes weird then I don't make it again. So far I have NO IDEA what it is!!!

I would acquire another package, perhaps another brand of tapioka starch flour and taste it. If the taste doesn't agree with you, I would try using a combination of potato starch, corn starch, and arrowroot starch.

I use a combination of white rice flour, brown rice flour, sorghum flour, bean flour, tapioka starch, potato starch, and corn starch for all my baked goods. Approximately half flour and half starch.

best regards, lm