Gluten-Free Food

Have you been diagnosed with celiac disease or gluten intolerance and you’re seeing all your favorite comfort foods pass before your eyes, taunting you because you can’t have them anymore?  Well here is some is good news!

Gluten-Free Food is Just Food

I’m hoping to take the mystery out of this whole gluten-free food thing and make it just a little less scary.  Gluten-free food is not something mysterious or weird or special.  Most healthy whole foods, the ones you see in the outside aisles of your supermarket like fresh fruits and vegetables, whole fresh cuts of meat, dairy and eggs are naturally gluten-free and you can have all of them. 

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Foods to Avoid

That’s it.  Four things Barley Rye Oats* Wheat

*Three things really because oats are technically gluten free but because they are often grown and processed along with wheat, you need to get certified gluten free oats if you’re going to eat oats.

Wheat by another name

Of course, it couldn’t be quite that simple, wheat actually goes by several alias’s so you need to know what they are:

• Farina
• Farro
• Spelt
• Triticale
• Bulgar
• Durum
• Einkorn
• Emmer
• Farina
• Couscous
• Bran
• Atta

And wheat is rarely eaten in its natural form.  Wheat, and to a lesser extent, rye, barley, and oats, are ground and refined and turned into flour and then transformed into a whole slew of products that fill our diets, not the least of which is my beloved pasta. 

Did you ever stop to think how much of the supermarket is taken up by wheat products?

The most obvious is the bakery section.  There you find:

Bread Buns Wraps / tortillas Cakes Cookies  Croissants Bagels Muffins Tarts  Pies

Continue on and you’ll find full aisles of:

Crackers  Breakfast cereal  Granola bars Energy bars Pretzels Baking mixes Pancake mix Pasta Couscous

Tricky things to watch for*:

• Soya sauce
• Worchestershire sauce
• Some steak and barbeque sauces
• Seasoning mixes

*Many sauces, soups, seasonings and other packaged goods have gluten.  If a food has a label, check it to be sure.  

Gluten-Free Foods

Happily, soon after that day that I sat staring at my test results mourning my loss, I found out that there is actually more that I can eat than what I can’t.  And even more to celebrate, gluten-free pasta exists!  It’s real, and it’s pretty good!  Pizza too!

Here are links to more info about your favorite gluten-free foods

Gluten-Free Pasta

Gluten-Free Pizza

Buying Gluten-Free Sauces

You're welcome!

Naturally Gluten-Free Foods

Naturally gluten-free food is simply food that, in it's natural form, does not have the gluten protein in it, and that is really the bulk of all food that is grown on planet earth.

The word “natural” can be a bit difficult to define.  Various regulatory agencies have created definitions for food labelling.  Here is what the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) has to say.  For our purposes I think of it as a continuum.  Whole foods like fruits and vegetables are in their most natural form.  Some foods have been mechanically processed like grinding grains into flour.  I would consider that to be minimal processing.  Other foods have been significantly chemically altered or even created entirely in a lab.  Those I would consider highly processed. 

You'll see this graphic throughout NaturallyGluten-Free as a way to illustrate where on the continuum a particular gluten-free food may sit.  There is nothing scientific about it, just an approximation based on the amount of processing or processed ingredients a food contains. 

Focus on Whole Foods

Have you ever heard the advice given by many doctors and nutritionists to stick to the outside aisles in the supermarket?  That is sound advice for us too.  Bakery aside, the perimeter of the store is where the “whole foods” are generally displayed and most of these will be naturally gluten-free food:

• All fresh vegetables
• All fresh fruits
• All fresh cuts of meat, fish, poultry, seafood.

Gluten-Free Meat

Gluten-Free Fruits and Vegetables

Gluten-Free Grains

Gluten Free Grains

What do you think of when you think of grains?  What about whole grains?  Is wheat the first thing that comes to mind?  Whole wheat bread, whole grain crackers, rye bread, bagels, croissants. I think I knew there were other grains, but didn’t really give thought to the variety until I had to take wheat, rye and barley off the table.  Gluten free grains include:

Rice Corn Millet Buckwheat Quinoa  Sorghum Teff Oats*

Millet and Amaranth cereal with nuts and berries

Items made from gluten free grains

•  Gluten free pasta
•  Rice noodles
• Soba noodles
• Rice crackers
• Corn tortillas
• Gluten free crackers
• Gluten free bread, buns, wraps
• Gluten free cookies, granola bars
• Gluten free breakfast cereal
•  Gluten free oats and oatmeal
•  Other gluten free grains you can use in recipes or cook as a hot breakfast cereal

The Refrigerator Section

Most of what you’ll find in the coolers and the dairy case is naturally gluten-free.  Just check the labels to be sure. Of course if you are lactose intolerant or casein intolerant you'll be looking for gluten and dairy free substitutions. 

• Eggs
• Butter
• Milk
• cream
•  Fruit juice
•  Plant based milks (almond, soy, coconut, oat*, rice)
• Most yogurt
• Most cheese
• Most ice-cream

When you get into the center aisles you can still find a lot that is naturally gluten-free

• Nuts
• Seeds
• Beans, peas and legumes
• Dried fruit
• All the other grains…wait, what?  There are other grains?  You bet, and they are versatile and delicious and naturally gluten-free.  

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Frozen Food

The frozen foods section has oodles of gluten-free food choices.  Of course the days of keeping a few frozen pizzas in the freezer for emergencies are over.  There may be gluten free ones, but they’re expensive and frankly quite gross. But if you steer away from the processed prepared meals and focus on whole, frozen vegetables and fruit you’ll find lots to choose from.  Frozen is much healthier than canned. It’s convenient, you don’t have to worry about buying more than you can eat, and I love the frozen berries with yogurt - it's almost like ice cream. Don’t forget to check the packages.  And remember, choose organic if you can.

Frozen peas Frozen beans Frozen broccoli Frozen cauliflower Frozen squash Frozen brussel sprouts Frozen strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, black berries Frozen melons, bananas, grapes, cherries Frozen fish, meat or poultry.

Things to watch out for:

Stay away from anything breaded or battered.  Be careful of anything pre-seasoned, or as in the photo to the left, anything that's had pasta or other gluten grains snuck in.  My husband recently pick up frozen veggies not realizing they had barley grains mixed in.  Always read labels to be sure the producers haven’t snuck any gluten-containing additives in there.

Cans, Bottles, Jars

When you get into these sections you start to get into more processed items, and since this is NaturallyGluten-Free I’d like to mostly steer you away from here.  Also, the more you steer away from processed foods and instead buy whole foods and ingredient that you cook yourself, the easier this gluten-free diet will be on your wallet. But there are some convenience products that have few ingredients and can serve as sides or as ingredients in your recipes.  Some that I keep in my pantry are:

Gluten-Free Products

17 Ways to Cut the Cost of Gluten Free Food

Is Chocolate Gluten Free and What Should Celiacs Watch For?

• Canned tomatoes
• Canned beans
• Canned corn
• Canned chickpeas
• Jarred salsa
•  Jarred jams and jellies
•  Peanut butter
•  Applesauce
• Salsa
• Hot sauces
• Ketchup
•  Mustard
• Vinegar*
• Pickles
• Oils like olive oil, avocado oil, coconut oil, peanut oil.
• Salt, pepper, spices*

Things to watch out for

Read all labels just to be sure.  Popular condiments that contain gluten are: soya sauce, Worcestershire sauce, teriyaki sauce, many barbecue sauces, some mustards.  You need to look for gluten free versions of these.

Most pure spices will be gluten free but spice mixes often contain gluten. 

Also watch out for ready made canned or packaged items like soups, broth or stock, stews, chilis etc.  Read the labels carefully. 

Packages, Boxes and Bags

Much of this is minimally processed as well as naturally gluten-free and part of a healthy diet:

• Dried beans, peas, lentils
•  Gluten free grains like: Corn, Popcorn, Rice
•  Dried fruit: raisins, currants, cranberries, apricots, cherries
•  Nuts
• Seeds

More highly processed and less healthy but still technically naturally gluten-free in that they don’t contain any gluten:

•  Sugar
•  Icing sugar
• Baking soda
•  Baking powder
•  Food coloring
• Corn and other starches

Packaged and Processed Gluten-Free Foods

These are items that in their familiar form contain gluten, but food manufacturers are producing gluten free versions.  Sometimes you’ll see these in a special gluten-free or “free-from” section.  These products in my opinion are a mixed blessing.  I’m thrilled that I can get gluten free pasta, wraps, bread, buns, cookies, cakes etc. but there are a few things to keep in mind:

	Gluten is the springy protein that allows baked goods to rise and gives them their structure.  Without gluten, other processed materials are often substituted like gums and highly processed starches.  I’m not going to tell you not to eat these things, but moderation is a good approach.
	Read the labels and try to choose products with as few ingredients as possible and avoid anything you can’t pronounce, or as Michael Pollen, food journalist and author would say, avoid anything your great-grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food.

The Organic Section

Gluten-free and organic are not synonymous, so don’t make the mistake of thinking that you can have anything in this area.  However, in the name of taking a more “natural” approach to eating which to me means avoiding a lot of unnecessary additives and keeping the ingredient list short, organic is a good choice.  These foods tend to use less pesticides in growing and fewer chemicals in processing.  They are just in general cleaner choices.  As always, check the labels.  

So was I right?  Do you feel better now that you know that gluten-free food is not weird or hard to find?  It's just food.  

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