The challenge for April was to go gluten-free. I learned a lot during this challenge. I do not have celiac disease or a gluten
allergy, so I wasn’t as strict as I would have to be if I had either of those
issues. If I went out to eat, I would
consider myself “gluten free” if I got a burger and just didn’t eat the
bun. In some cases, I would eat foods that
were made in a facility with gluten products, so it could have traces of gluten,
but no gluten ingredients (Ben & Jerry’s Phish Food ice cream, for
example).
People who have celiac disease cannot have any traces of
gluten, or it messes up their stomach for months. A co-worker of mine says she hardly ever goes
out to eat, because if the restaurant prepares her food on the same counter as
they prepared other food with gluten, she suffers. Also, I found that a lot of servers and
people taking orders at restaurants don’t even know what has gluten and what
doesn’t.
I started out with two mistakes, but after that, I made it
the rest of the month with no problems.
It wasn’t easy, by any means, but it was doable.
On April 3rd, I was walking by one of our Admin’s
desks and saw an open box of Samoa Girl Scout cookies. Not even thinking, I picked up one of the
cookies and ate it. I then went to a
meeting, and it wasn’t until I returned to my office that I realized what I had
done. There is no doubt that cookies
have gluten in them. But I was so used
to being able to eat them because the month before was vegetarian month, and
they don’t have meat. That was my first
fail.
On April 5th, I was eating dinner at my in-law’s
house. We were having burgers from the
grill, fruit salad, and chips. I knew I
could have the fruit salad, because there is no threat of gluten there. I looked at the Cheetos Puffs bag, and they
are gluten free (made from corn instead of wheat). And I thought that if I ate a burger without a
bun, I would be okay. Well, I like
veggie burgers, and had been eating them a lot the previous month for Meatless
March, so I brought them along, not even thinking to look to see if they were
gluten free. I mean, they’re veggie
burgers…they’re supposed to be healthy, right?
I ate it without the bun. The
next day, I thought to myself…hmm…maybe I should look at the package and see if
that burger was gluten free. Sure
enough, they are not. Second fail.
After those two mistakes, I made a point of looking on every
package. If I was going out somewhere
that wouldn’t have a package to look at, I looked it up online.
I actually traveled for three days for work, and told them
about my gluten-free diet. They were
able to accommodate, but I had to constantly ask what was in various foods, as
they often forgot and gave me the normal meal.
For example, they gave us boxed lunches to go on the last day. They supposedly made a gluten-free boxed
lunch for me. But when I opened it up,
there was a cookie that was packaged just like everyone else’s. It may have been gluten free, but it sure
didn’t look like it. So I avoided it,
along with the (possibly gluten-free) bread that was on the sandwich just in
case.
Kroger was a big help in going gluten free. They have little brown indicators on all of
their price tags that will tell you when the food is gluten free. I hadn’t really been much of a Greek yogurt
fan until this month. It is much
creamier and has way more protein than regular yogurt. Greek Yogurt was pretty much the only yogurt
I could find that was labeled gluten free, and I typically eat yogurt every
week day. Chobani Greek Yogurt is gluten
free, and very yummy.
A few great things that I found during this month include
Sally’s Bakery and Pamela’s baking mix.
Sally’s Bakery is located on Roswell Road near Whole Foods and not far
from I-285. The Bakery is completely
gluten-free, but makes delicious bread, frozen pizza, cupcakes, cookies, cakes,
pies, and other goodies. The bread is
very good…the first couple of days.
After that, it starts to smell and taste funny. The cupcakes were delicious – very moist and
chocolaty. The cookies were okay, but a
little too crunchy for my liking. It is
a little pricey, but not too bad. Pretty
much what you would expect if you were buying bread from an actual bakery.
Pamela’s baking mixes was a find at Kroger. They are located in the Natural Food area of
the store and are in black packaging. I
tried the brownie mix. There are several
ways to make it listed on the package, and I made it the fudgy brownie
way. They are the best brownies I have
ever tasted! In fact, going forward, I
may just make those instead of regular brownies (for me…I know Rob loves my
regular brownies). I never tried the
other baking mixes, but after the delicious brownies, I would be willing to try
anything else made by the same company.
Some things that I tried that I didn’t like are gluten free
bagels, gluten free pizza (if you like thin crust, it tastes fine, but I prefer
thick crust), gluten free bread (after about three days), and gluten free
pasta. Gluten free pasta isn’t bad as
long as you cook it about 2-3 minutes less than regular pasta. I made the mistake of cooking it the same
length of time as I normally would, and it was mushy.
So, I had two mistakes in a 30-day month, and I learned a
lot. I would call that a success. Thankfully, I can let my diet get back to
normal, as May is Conscious Cardio month.
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