Taking the GF plunge...

[GeishaGirl]

So I had my endoscopy the day before yesterday, but won't know anything until two weeks from tomorrow (my gastro doc only works Thursdays, and my plane to CA leaves tomorrow (Thursday) and returns NEXT Thursday, so I have to wait until the FOLLOWING Thursday to find out my test results). Anyway, I've been doing some reading, and decided that, no matter what, I want to give gluten-free a ride, whether I have celiac or not. If I don't have celiac, I already know he's just going to dump me into the IBS/undiagnosable pile, so I can treat however I want anyway.

All the reading I'm doing suggests that gluten intolerance can cause ALL of my symptoms, yet not leave enough evidence to be diagnosable. That really sucks. But my husband has manfully agreed to help me do GF through the month of September as an experiment. I'm also going to try to low-carb it as much as possible, so those weird GF concoctions -- ie, quinoa pasta -- are out for the most part.

So... any suggestions? Cookbooks? Regular books? Websites?

[Ray4Rick]

I was dx with Celiac last October and been eating gluten free ever since. It's an ajustment and will take you a while to get use to, but don't give up. I have my own shelf in my cupboard with all my GF foods and snacks. As for a great cookbook, get "You Won't Believe It's Gluten-Free" by Roben Ryberg. It's fabulous and give you alot of variety, especially for Baking. As for every day eating, stick with Natural foods, fresh meats, fish, Potatoes, Rice, Vegies, Fruits, cheese, eggs. It's so easy to eat this way when you are home. It's when you go out to Restaurants that it gets tricky. I always ask the waiter to check with the chef it there is gluten in what ever I order.

You have to be careful with Marinades, salad dressings, beef/ chicken cubes or flavorings, potato chips (Lays Regular are guaranteed GF), Yogurt, Ice cream, soups. YOU HAVE TO READ THE INGREDIENTS ON EVERYTHING YOU BUY. That is the key to this disease.


I tried many GF pasta's and the one I like the best is the corn base pasta. You can hardly tell it's GF.

We have a great GF company based here in Quebec called GLUTINO. They make really good GF foods. I eat their Corn bread for toast. The only bad thing about GF bread is that you can't really eat it without it being toasted because it's very crummy.

You will feel so much better once you start eating GF. Do not worry to much about eating gluten my mistake, be careful about it, but if you do eat something that you weren't sure about, it won't kill you. You'll feel it during the next few days, but that's it. I've been eating gluten free since November and yes i've been glutened here and there, but last week I really did a test. I figured, I haven't eaten gluten in 10 mths, so my intestine must be better, so I had pizza. Yep real pizza, boy o boy was that a mistake. 1st of all, It was so greasy that I didn't really enjoy it, 2nd I got pain & D the next morning and for 3 days after that I was extremely tired. So no more gluten for me.


Feel free to sent me PM is you have any questions at all.

Good luck,
Rachel

[foxl]

Heck, there may be some "hidden" gluten in foods I eat, but by (moderate, really!) low-carbing, there is really very little, already! Interesting thought ...

Anyhow, cheer up -- bet it is not that hard!