After getting a haircut in the morning I swung by my local grocery store and picked up a beautiful roast which my wife had made plans for in advance to make a lovely pot roast. I got the local carrots and potatoes to go along with it and it looked as if we were going to have an incredible dinner. We had a nice side dish of red cabbage in the pantry and my mouth was already watering just thinking about dinner.
Everything was going smooth until my wife asked me if we were going to try out the coconut flour instead of the wheat flour. Yes, I purchased coconut flour with the intentions of finding a way to thicken the gravy without the glucose spikes I get with regular bleached wheat flour. As she placed one and half table spoons of the flour into the shake bottle along with the juices from the pot roast and shook it up and placed it in the saucepan I could already picture the smooth, tasty gravy of my cuts of that roast. The problem came when she noticed that the gravy wasn’t thickening up enough and wondered if there was a difference in the ratio of gravy to flour when using coconut flour. Mr. brainiac over here decided to take over the task and dumped (who nows how much) more coconut flour into the saucepan and whisk it. The results were instant coconut and beef pudding. It was horrible and destroyed the flavor of everything we put it on.
Lessons to be learned today: Stay out of the wife’s kitchen and Research the differences between things when making changes.
As an update I have still been eating low carb, my body weight has gone down another pound, I started taking 5000 IU of Vitamin D3 daily, I have moved up to 15 minutes on the treadmill each morning, and best of all – My blood sugar continues to go down.
Simple Living Over 50 
I’ve used Nestle’s ThickenUp (low carb) with not too bad results: https://www.amazon.com/Nestle-Thicken-Up-8oz/dp/B002B5DXD8/ref=sr_1_6_s_it?s=grocery&ie=UTF8&qid=1490530585&sr=1-6&keywords=thicken+up
I don’t mean to make light of your pain, lol, but I had to chuckle at this post ;). You’ve come to one of the biggest perplexities in low carb cooking, making the gravy without flour or cornstarch, lol! Some use Xanthan gum for this purpose but it can be tricky to work with and possibly not gluten free (if that is important to you.). Some use sour cream to thicken gravies. Me? I gave up “gravy-like” gravy a long time ago and just settle for the juices. Still yummy! Best wishes on your next roast, lol 😉
Sometimes things are just “Good Enough”. LOL
Glad for the good news but sorry about your Paleo gravy. I could send you some info if you like. 😊
I would love that.
I too have been experimenting with coconut flour. It is definitely different. Thanks to you I will not try using it to make gravy!
LOL. Yea, the texture is different for sure.
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Oh dear, what a shame! Coconut flour is a bit hit and miss. Ground almonds can thicken sauces and gravy without spoiling the taste too much, as can double cream (I believe it’s called heavy cream in the States).
One of the things I have to avoid is dairy, but I will try the almond flour.
Try coconut or almond milk and arrowroot flour.
Sounds interesting.
LoL.. I feel your pain! 😉 I’ve used wheat and corn starch in the past, but due to ‘gut issues’ and allergies, I’ve needed to find other ways to thicken my gravy. One way is to puree some of the veggies from my pot roast. I just toss them in the blender, blend until the desired thickness, then add them back into the roasting pan! Very easy to do AND I don’t have to worry about the addition of potential allergens in my dish. This also works well when I want to thicken my soups!
Yes, I thicken my soups this way too! Excellent!
Great news on the health front; not so much on the gravy!
LOL. And life goes on.
My brother uses oats…doesn’t take very many to thicken up a loose grave….and doesn’t mess with the flavors either….just a thought…kat
Not allowed
that’s what I thought…I like using vegies for thickeners…purred carrots, or any of those root vegies would work…you can buy taro root already in a powder form and it should work fine…unless its considered a carb..??
So great to hear you are winning the battle with Type II diabetes. How empowering for you. Keep it up. 🙂
Thank you Naomi 😄
I’m not a gravy fan but my husband is. Do you think it was the amount of coconut flour that was the problem or was it just the coconut flour?
As it turns out I should of used less. It takes longer for the juices to absorb into coconut flour. After seeing that it wasn’t blending right I just assumed that I didn’t put enough in. Wow! Was I wrong. LOL
I will bear this in mind when I’m advising my husband how to make a gravy. He is gluten free too.