So, what is gluten????

Gluten is a protein found in grass related grains. That includes wheat, rye, and barley. Also included are kamut and spelt. However, gluten can be found in foods other than your traditional baked goods like bread, ceral, cakes, cookies, etc. Gluten is also milled down and added to to foods as a food additive. It works in foods to enhance flavors, stabilize, and thicken. Examples of this include soy sauce, beer, seasoning packets, ketchup, icecream, etc. Oats are also included in this list because they have been processed on machines that have processed gluten containing grains.

So, what is naturally gluten free??
Corn, rice, tapioca, arrowroot, quinoa, millet, sorghum, sweet potato, yams, buckwheat, chickpea flour, taro, chai seed, teff, montina, lupin, amaranth, to name a few.

5 months ago I thought this was going to be hard. I loved bread, cookies, cake...........

Today I would much rather skip the bread than experience the gastrotestinal distress it causes in my body. For example, this past weekend I ended up eating a protein bar for a snack and drinking a few beers. At the time I figured I might as well eat the french bread that came with the meatballs. Over loading on gluten wreaked havoc on my system. It took 36 hours for my GI system to feel like it was back to normal again.