Gluten

I’ll shortly be starting an experiment. My husband and I have decided to reduce the amount of gluten in our diet. We’re not allergic to it, at least not in any obvious way. But wheat has become a ubiquitous food item, one of those otherwise innocent and healthy ingredients that has fallen victim to the food industry’s penchant for cheap calories.

It’s in processed food – dishes it has no need to be in, but is used as a filler or binder or to add protein. We don’t eat very much processed food and I don’t think we get an unreasonable amount of gluten. But I adore bread and will often snack on it and I love cakes and pies, too, although we seldom eat them. I eat the waffles I wrote about last week. And I use flour as a thickener and don’t get me started about crackers. I could eat crackers all day. My husband has the waffles or cereal for breakfast and he has a sandwich at lunch. He’s better than I am about not snacking, but if I serve a dessert, he’ll eat it.

I sometimes have clients who ask about gluten-free diets and I’d like to have the experience to make them good food. Baking is the hardest part and the main issue to tackle. It’s easy to avoid gluten if you just eat meat and vegetables, but people seem freaked out at the idea of not having muffins or bagels or cookies. So I want to start experimenting with other grains and seeing if I can come up with waffles and pancakes without using wheat flour. I know I can buy gluten-free bread for sandwiches and I’ll probably do that to see what the loaf is like and how it tastes. I’ll be a tough customer, that’s for sure.

I’ll never be satisfied with a purchased food item that uses chemicals or sugar or gums to make the product work. I’d rather give up drinking soda than drink the sugar-free stuff with those horrid fake sweeteners. I’d rather use real butter than the chemical-laden stuff they call margarine. So I’ll be looking for a loaf of bread that uses good, whole-grain flours that don’t contain gluten, without adding some strange ingredient to hold it all together.

This should be interesting. I’ll keep you posted!