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Gluten-free Diet

Nikijad4210

Nikijad4210

Member
Veteran
How many of you are on gluten-free diets? We're considering going gluten-free for a trial diet in this house to see what kinds of positive differences we may encounter (health-wise) verses what we normally eat.

I'm interested in hearing about what the pros & cons are from you folks following gluten-free lifestyles. Care to enlighten me?
 
G

Guest

I wanted to learn more about this my self niki. Anybody got some info?
 
G

Guest

I am...but I'll write you alot of info about it later...canning jam right now..mmmm Strawberry and Triple Berry Jams.

There's a trick to this diet, not easy to start and maintain until you get the hang of it.
 
Pure MoFo

Pure MoFo

Member
Just freshly diagnosed with celiac. been about 3 weeks without gluten !! I am dying for real bread /pasta.

lots of meat
lots of chicken
need to start fish
LOTS OF RAW VEG FRUITS JUICED !

lets see how it goes..... cant give any pros cons yet. mind you i am doing this because i have to !
 
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marx2k

marx2k

Active member
Veteran
wheat gluten is a good meat substitute for me. I really dont like red meat or pork, but I do like a little bulk in my scrambled eggs or sandwhiches so if I dont use turkey, I use wheat gluten.
 
K

keetypoo420

Member
The doc thinks I'm gluten intolerant/allergic/a celiac.

Basically, it's like the Atkins diet.
Click to expand...

They told my friend that also, after a month of being miserable from not being able to eat his favorite food he found out the doc made a mistake
 
fr33th3w33d

fr33th3w33d

Member
gluten is a natural protien, and it makes up alot of a persons non-meat protien intake.. i honestly don't see a point in it. its as pointless to me as vegeterianism, but thats a whole nother topic..
 
marx2k

marx2k

Active member
Veteran
Dont get me started on vegetarianism. I can go into countless reasons why you and everyone else should be eating lower on the food chain
 
A

_angst_

Member
Friday posed an interesting test for me with this.

Normally, curry (or the curry dishes I typically get) doesn't contain gluten (skipping the naan of course).

The place I normally get my curry from screwed up and gave me the wrong order on Friday (at being 1 week off gluten I was feeling good, no cramps, gas, diarrhea, or nausea; all well formed stools)... that night I became horribly sick... called them back up to ask if there was any soy in their paneer masala (I'm allergic to soy), they said no, then I asked if there was any wheat gluten in it. They said they use it to thicken the paneer.

Not to mention this girl I'm dating witnessed a strange skin reaction upon eating breadsticks all night with my friends while playing poker.

Either I'm allergic or I'm a celiac. At this point the doc isn't sure (and since I avoid gluten I can't get the test for celiac disease). If I wanted to get the test for celiac disease, I'd have to pound down gluten for the next few weeks every day. I don't like nausea, skin irritations, and throat irritations that much to try it. I'll just shy away from it.
 
Pactivist

Pactivist

Active member
My Mrs. is working in a natural foods store and she encounters a ton of people looking to remove gluten, dairy, sugar, caffiene, etc. from their diet. Some have celiac disease, others (like myself) are just looking for an alternative to grasses of any sort, since we realize that as omnivores - Humans aren't designed to digest grasses. I'll use corn as an example. When a human eats corn very little is digested or absorbed the proof is in your toilet bowl. Well corn is essentially a very large grass, similiar to wheat, rye, oats, barley, etc. and without a large amount of mechanical or chemical processing grasses are devoid of nutrients for anyone who is not an herbivore. There are many alternatives to eating grass, root veggies are excellent! I have not totally eliminated all grasses from my diet yet, but I am in process. FYI I currently use no dairy (dairy is baby food for an entirely different species) for I am not a cow, I eat no grains(grasses) unless it is whole grain and then it is just for the fiber since there are no real nutrients available in it. and no wheat. I'll be 39 this month and other than a nagging backache from an old injury I feel better than I have since high school.
peAce,
pacT
 
marx2k

marx2k

Active member
Veteran
In my line of work, I meet a lot of older people (60s, 70s, 80s, 90s +) - Almost everyone is suffering from some sort of ailment. Intestinal, muscular, skin, joint, obesity, diabetes, whatever.

All of these people lived a life where they ate pretty much anything they wanted, all the time, with an emphasis on meat and sugars. Zero exercise. These are the people who earlier in life said "Well, you're going to die anyway... may as well enjoy it." These are the people who laughed at anyone choosing to eat lower on the food chain. Yes, old man, you're going to die.. but now you get to suffer through years and years of your body breaking down.

Then I meet people from the same age group who are as lively and happy as any 18 year old. The difference? Nutritious diet and moderate exercise as a lifestyle. They're going to die too, but they're not going to live the next 10, 20 or 30 years as though they're already dead and spending most of their time hanging out in hospitals.
 
Nikijad4210

Nikijad4210

Member
Veteran
WolfSpider said:
ok. whats this we shit. she wants to go one this diet. i just want to eat.
Click to expand...
Don't get me started on why I think it might improve what you leave in the crapper, sweetcheeks. And I'll leave it at that so I don't embarass you or piss you off.

I'd been curious about it since reading an article somewhere (MSNBC, maybe??) about how gluten's one of the worst things someone with CFS (like me) can eat. Either way, a few weeks worth of a trial period might do all of us in the house a little good, for all we know. Ya don't know til you try it.
 
G

Guest

Well, first of all, I guess I don't need to go through all the scientifics about it. Gluten doesn't seem to do the body good anymore. There is nothing out there totally concrete. However, there is alot of speculation relating to mercury and other pollutants and our stomachs inability to process gluten, canida yeast, and even casein very well anymore.
I'm not even going to go into that, I leave that up for another thread's debate and one's own research. After all, if you're reading this, you have google at your finger tips.

Okay. If you're curious about going gluten free, you're already aware there's a problem with gluten. So, I'll just give some advice about going gluten free, as it is not easy. The world around you is NOT geared for it. In fact, it's very hard to go gluten free. Last week, I picked up a box of flax seed flour. On the front of the box, it proudly displayed how the flour was gluten free and included a recipe. I read the recipe on the back and it called for wheat gluten!!! Wait a minute, the reason I got the flax seed flour, was to avoid gluten. Anyways, you get the point.

The problem with gluten free diets is the fact, we love bread. I know I do. Bread rocks. However, when making bread, the key part of what binds the bread together and makes it elastic is....gluten. So here lies the biggest problem in the foods you know and like. They depend on gluten. This is one of the biggest stresses and complaints about a gluten free diet. No breads are available to you, without hardcore searching in health food stores - if they even have it and don't charge you 10 bucks for half a loaf of gluten free bread.

So, the easiest way for someone to go gluten free is to bake much of this yourself. If you're not prepared to do your own cooking, you're going to have an extremely hard time going gluten free. Unless you're lucky and some local store stocks these things for you (gluten free bread, pancake mix, bisquit mix, etc..). For the majority of us, this isn't so.

To go gluten free is to get off wheat and other cereals that contain gluten and go to the ones that don't have it. The easiet way is to go rice and rice products. If you are not asian, the first reaction to this is...eeew. I like rice, but not all the time. That's only because you're not used to it yet.

Most things you can purchase at the local store made from rice are bland to say the least. And there isn't any gluten free breads or bread-like products. So this is where purchasing a bread machine would be an investment of choice. You CAN have bread without gluten, you just have to know how. Gluten can be substituted with xanthan gum or guar gum to give the bread the binding elasticity we all know so well. I prefer xantham gum as my substitute. In addition to using rice flour, there is tapioca flour, potato starch, corn starch, and a few others - I am able to bake bread with the exact texture and flavor as regular home baked white bread (I have kids, this in an important thing to accomplish - they are picky as hell).

So basically, to keep the same type of diet, with foods you are used to, you must become a baker and learn the tricks of the gluten free rice flour art and science. I know I'm breezing through this without making any real sense to most. I'm just trying to give a heads up of what changes have to be made to do this.

I'd like to also add, it's also best to wean into it. Most people don't like the dramatic change at once, until they get used to the new foods. But I can assure you, once you get off the crap, you'll prefer it. Now, when I eat commercial foods, I can seriously taste the difference and do not like them anymore at all. They gross me out and make me ill. even though the flavors in my foods are the same - I just don't have all the extra crap, nor gluten or casein.

How good is it and deceptive is the comparison? Today, my sister came to visit and had her son with her. They were hungry and her son asked if he could have a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Upon agreeing to make him one, she asked for one as well. I went into the kitchen and made them both a sandwich and they began eating. Her son was scarfing it down - you know how hungry boys are. She suddenly piped in, "I was worried what you were going to bring me." "I know you used to be on some kind of fruitcake diet, refusing to eat preservatives and all and not even eating bread." "I'm glad you decided to drop that diet and eat bread, peanut butter, and jelly."

I almost let her go thinking that, but decided to go ahead an enlighten her. So I informed her, "The bread you're eating is not from the bread store, I made it and it's gluten free, made from rice flour which I also ground into flour myself. I also made the peanut butter and the jam I made last night." "You, my sister, just ate and loved, foods from a fruitcake diet and it's probably the healthiest thing your body has had in it in a long time."

As you can see, you can go gluten free and not change much. Or go hardcore like I do and get away from gluten, casein, proservatives, and all kinds of other ingredients you can't even pronounce and wonder why it's in your food. The bread took me no longer to bake then any other kind of bread made from scratch. I don't have a bread machine, but one of those would cut that time down drastically. The homemade peanut butter took me a whooping 5 minutes to make. And I'm sure many of you have canned your own jellies and jam and know it doesn't take very long to do that either.

So where I'm getting at I guess in my fragmented way of writing that's sometimes very hard to follow, is contrary to what alot of people think, gluten free diets and foods do NOT suck and are not bland unless you make it that way. To go gluten free successfully, you WILL have to start making alot of your own foods. They simply are not available in many places. Especially at a reasonable price.

I make my own rice flour due to the fact, there is none available in this redneck backwoods town I live in. But I should point out, many stores DO carry rice flour - even though making your own isn't as hard as it may seem - just need a blender.

Now, for those whom are serious about doing this. I'm not stingy, I'll share my recipes and how-tos. Most of everything I do, doesn't take long at all. Even making your own bread, rolls, muffins, etc..

Any anyone whom claims they don't have time for any of this....what's your big hurry? Life is too short to be rushing around all the time in a big hurry to die. When you're eating better, you're feeling better and your short stay in this life becomes ever so much more pleasant. It's not all the gadgets and goodies you work yourself to death to get...it's the small things in life that seem to really give us the most pleasure. Something to think about.
 
G

Guest

I see this thread has died as probably the interest in such a diet. However, just in case, I thought I'd post again on it.

To give you an idea of GF and GFCF cooking, here's a typical GF recipe (I made some alterations to it to make it casein free (GFCF) - it is also Vegan friendly with GFCF alterations.)
Strawberry Banana Muffins
Recipe excerpted from:
Moosewood Restaurant New Classics
by The Moosewood Collective

Yields 12 muffins
Preparation time: 25 minutes
Baking time: 25 to 30 minutes

1 1/4 cups rice flour
1/4 cup potato starch
1/4 cup tapioca flour
1/2 teaspoon xanthum gum*
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup butter, softened (use Margarine (Oleo) to make it casein free or vegan)
1/3 cup sugar
2 eggs
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/3 cup milk (use Rice Milk to make it casien free or vegan)
2 bananas, peeled
1 1/2 cups stemmed and coarsely chopped fresh strawberries

* Xanthum gum is a binding agent, found in health food stores and well-stocked supermarkets. In this recipe, in the absence of wheat gluten, it holds the muffins together.

Preheat the oven to 350°. Lightly oil a muffin tin and fill with paper liners.

In a large bowl, sift together the rice flour, potato starch, tapioca flour, xanthum gum, cinnamon, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Stir to mix. In a separate bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until smooth. Beat in the eggs and add the vanilla and milk, stirring well. The mixture will be quite lumpy.

Mash the bananas and fold them with the strawberries into the wet ingredients. Mix the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients to form a thick batter.

Spoon a generous 1/3 cup of batter into each muffin cup. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes. After about 15 minutes, turn the muffin tin to ensure even baking. Insert a paring knife into a muffin; when the blade comes out clean the muffins are done.

Place the muffin tin on a cooling rack for a few minutes, then remove the muffins from the tin and place them on the rack or a platter. Serve warm or at room temperature. Cool completely before storing in an airtight container.

Per 3-ounce serving: 197 calories, 2.8 g protein, 9.2 g fat, 26.6 g carbohydrates, 5.3 g saturated fatty acids, 65.2 mg cholesterol, 341.5 mg sodium, 1.5 g total dietary fiber

Source: http://www.gardenguides.com/how-to/recipes/breads/muffins/strawberrybananamuffins.asp
Click to expand...
I am a muffin junkie....this recipe is good :)

Here's a place you can order things in this recipe that are probably not at your local store - unless it's a well stocked store.

Barry Farms
http://www.barryfarm.com/our_store.htm

To give you an idea of pricing:
Rice Flour, White GF - $1.99/# (5% off 5# / 25% off 25#)
Tapioca Flour - $2.59/# (5% off 5# / 25% off 25#)
Potato Starch - $2.29/#
Xanthan Gum - $3.06/ per 1/4 # (you don't use much of this - tsp and tbsp amounts - you can also use guar gum instead, but amount is different)
 
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