If you have been following my blog for a while you might remember that last spring my kids went on a trial gluten free diet for a couple of months. If not you can check out my posts (2). It turned out that my kids are fine with gluten but had other issues. Now that I seem to have their diets mostly under control and they have not been getting as sick this year (fingers crossed to keep it that way), I figured it was about time to think about what I eat. I have had stomach issues for years, but I have not really worried about them lately as they seemed to get better whenever I was pregnant or nursing (ironically). That has been pretty much my constant state for the past 6 years but now that I am done having children I have been finding the problems coming back. When this problem initially started as a teenager the doctor gave me some pills for the pain but not much else was done. At one time I thought I had a chicken allergy but after taking that out of my diet it didn’t get any better.
I figured it was time to give the G-Free diet a try for myself. So far I have made it through one week with only a couple of slip ups. I figured I should start with a bit of inspirational reading so I picked up a copy of Elisabeth Hasselbeck’s The G-Free Diet (and also a copy of her cookbook). I am 60 pages into the book so far and have learned a bit – most surprising to me were the number of things with gluten in them that I would never have thought of (I read this after sealing a pile of envelopes that probably had gluten in them). My one slip up was at school on Wednesday when we had cupcakes for my teaching partner’s birthday and I ate one without even thinking. The biggest difficulty is snacking, especially when I am not at home. I use to often visit Tim Hortons for an afternoon snack before picking up the kids from daycare and can’t do that anymore. I haven’t yet, but this may lead to some weight loss due to less snacking. I have been trying to plan ahead packing carrot sticks or G-Free crackers but I am not normally the person who plans ahead (for myself anyway).
So my major focus is my own diet, I am not making the rest of my family go G-Free. Saying this they will be eating a lot less gluten as I am the one preparing the meals. Our meal plans for the week are all G-free and sometimes I give them an alternative (I had a rice wrap while they had ww tortillas) but most of the time their dinners are 100% gluten free. I even found a cool site with a weekly menu plan that we are going to try this week.
Sunday morning are our big breakfast mornings. Lately Kaitlyn has been asking for waffles all the time so I thought I would try to make some G-Free waffles for all of us. Using google I quickly discovered that most recipes called for tapioca flour or other strange ingredients that I don’t have but I did eventually find a recipe at Gluten Free Cooking School using ingredients I had in my pantry and fridge. They turned out pretty good, even if they had a bit too much butter for my liking. Kaitlyn kept saying that they were the best waffles she ever had and Michael ate his entire plate and seconds. They have already decided I need to get strawberries to try with them next Sunday.
The biggest problem I have going gluten free in my small town is getting ingredients. We have a pretty good natural food store and an aisle at the Superstore that I can get stuff at but the selection is limited. I did discover that our favourite pizza place now has a Gluten Free crust and I tried it on Friday – awesome!
We will see how this new adventure goes but if it makes me feel better it is all worth it!
Mommy's Lessons 