TGIF

It has been an insane couple of weeks. Work is crazy, the pressure is on to finish my thesis for grad school, and my personal life and commitments - while lots of fun - are hectic as the new year is getting started. The nice thing is that as of today, I think things are slowing down enough to let me breathe some. It's a cold, rainy friday, and I was able to work from home today and take it easy. I haven't gotten out of my sweatpants, and I was able to squeeze in a nap to compensate for last night's fitful sleep. It's been a nice day.

One of the best things about working from home is the pace. I don't have to rush to get out of bed in the morning because I only have to walk a few steps to my computer. I can make a pot of coffee and enjoy it in my house, rather than at a desk with glaring fluorescent lighting. Same with my lunch. And an added bonus: Since The Hubby works from home every day, I get to see him, too.

Lunch today was another one of those "what-am-I-going-to-eat-since-I-haven't-gone-grocery-shopping" kind of meals. The end result wasn't terribly pretty, but it was tasty. I made a caesar salad out of romaine, caesar dressing (duh), parmesan cheese, sunflower seeds, chickpeas, a can of tuna, half an avocado that I had leftover from another day's lunch, and some salt and pepper.



Like I said, not terribly pretty (or pretty at all for that matter), but it tasted awesome. Rich, salty, crunchy, chewy, creamy, crisp...and packed full of protein and other good for me things. I must say, I was pretty impressed with what I threw together. Of course now I have to remember to replace the can of chickpeas for future emergencies. We'll see how that goes.

Tonight we're headed to a birthday dinner for one of our new friends. Luckily, the birthday boy chose mexican food (not surprising considering the majority of the population loves it here and we have lots of yummy choices), which makes my dining experience much easier. We're really looking forward to it.

Happy Friday!
Kelly

You would think...

...that after 2 years of maintaining a gluten free diet that I would learn not to assume.

I have gotten better about it, but every so often I catch myself forgetting to read labels before I buy something at the grocery store or assuming that a certain food doesn't contain gluten. I get comfortable and forget that I have to be careful.

Case in point - pie. My department at work does birthday pie instead of birthday cake, which I originally thought was awesome, considering I assumed I could just eat the filling of the pie, avoid the crust, and be fine. Which has worked in the past with cheesecake and other delicious deserts contained by a shell of gluten. (See - this is where my gluten line is fuzzy where others' are very black and white. Please don't hate me or judge me because I still eat pie out of a gluten-y shell and consider that okay for the most part.) Anyway, yesterday was birthday pie day for one of my beloved coworkers, complete with both chocolate cream pie and coconut cream pie to choose from. YUM! Being one to always find an excuse for eating something bad for me, I opted for the choice that was clearly the healthy option - coconut (hello, it's a fruit!) - and had my way with the absolutely to-die-for filling and perfect whipped cream topping. I even had a second piece today from the leftovers. Then it dawned on me that I ought to find out if the filling has gluten in it - and after lots of google searching and frustration, found out that I basically have a 50/50 chance of one of the ingredients being wheat flour...or cornstarch. Fingers crossed for cornstarch. I have a call into the bakery (who of course thing I'm nuts) and will hopefully find out tomorrow.

Ugh. I hate that I do this sometimes. I feel like there is still so much to learn! It's really hard to completely change your lifestyle after 25 years of living it one way. Maybe by the time I'm 50 I'll have all this figured out. At least it doesn't make me super sick - although that doesn't mean it's not doing damage or causing me a sweet rash on my elbows (more on that later).

Hope your luck is better than mine today!
Kelly

Amateur! Oh and I cooked...

So far, I'm loving this blog. Problem is, I'm a newbie. Amateur. Wannabe. I think of these great posts and then I forget to take pictures of what I'm posting about or even forget to post at all. There's a chance I should have thought about how horrible my memory is before attempting to document anything. :)

Anyway, last night I cooked for the first time in...well, I honestly have no idea when the last time I cooked was. The Hubby and I have been so busy (and on different nights, no less) that it just hasn't been worth it. So, last night I made pork tenderloin, white rice, and caesar salad. Sounds boring, but I jazzed it up. I coated the pork tenderloin (a Hormel tenderloin, to be specific - and it said "gluten free" right on the package!) in an organic dijon mustard that I had picked up a while back for another recipe - really globbed it on - with some salt and pepper, then baked it for about 40 minutes and let it rest for 5. It turned out perfect and had a really good, tangy flavor. The Hubby won't eat brown rice - as much as I try to convince him to - so he cooked up a batch of white rice in our rice cooker, which is my new favorite appliance. Easy! The caesar was just romaine lettuce, parmesan cheese, sunflower seeds, and a few chopped raw walnuts thrown in for a good crunch, tossed in Cardini's caesar dressing. Delish! The whole meal took very minimal prep and was super easy to clean up - it was about as friendly as you can get! I wish I had remembered to take a picture of it - I was pretty proud of myself once I plated it up. Oh well.

I promise I'll get better at this.
Kelly

Breakfast On The Go

I'm not a huge breakfast person - unless I don't have to go to work and can eat a big brunch - but this morning I was starving! The Hubby and I have both been incredibly busy with work, school, and social events over the past week, so we haven't gone to the grocery store in at least that long. After digging around in the refrigerator and pantry, I finally found this:

Yum! I put a few handfuls of this glorious stuff in a ziploc bag and headed off to work, eating it on the drive. General Mills came out with their new re-worked Chex recipes mid 2009, and I love it. I was a HUGE cereal person before being diagnosed with Celiac Disease, and was immediately turned off of a lot of the gluten free cereal options because they taste like styrofoam. The Chex cereals taste exactly like "real" cereal. Mmmm. Plus, it's at every grocery store, so I can find it without having to make a trip to a specialty store. I still want to try out some of the Chex Mix recipes on their website. Maybe Super Bowl sunday? :)

Have a great day - even though it's Monday!
Kelly

Clarification

After my last post, I got to thinking about how I haven't explained with any specifics my eating habits/situation. Yes, I have Celiac Disease, and yes, I have to maintain a gluten free diet, but those things mean different things for different people. I am fortunate in the fact that I am not as sick as some if I accidentally ingest gluten. I know there are Celiacs out there that get very, very ill if they accidentally ingest even a breadcrumb, or they encounter the slightest cross-contamination...and I feel for you. I can't imagine what that must be like.

That being said, my gluten free diet isn't as strict. I still eat things that "may have been processed in a facility that also processes wheat" and I eat oats. Heresy? Maybe. But I feel great and it works for me. I plan to post things that make me (and my tummy) happy, and hopefully they will work for others, including the ones following super-sensitive diets. Just please know I'm not trying to offend or come across lackadaisical in my treatment of the gluten-free lifestyle. :)

I love food! I love learning about food, eating food, cooking food, baking food, looking at food, watching food on tv (Food Network is my favorite) and talking about food. Mmm. On to that.

Kelly

I love Udi's!

If you're gluten free (or even if you're not) and you haven't tried anything made by Udi's...get on it. They have awesome products like bread, pizza crusts, muffins, cinnamon rolls, and granola. Yum. This morning I had their "Au Naturel" version (my favorite) mixed with some strawberry yogurt (Activia light to be exact). Doesn't seem like much but it is the perfect breakfast for me..and the granola is such a treat. It says "wheat free" right on the bag! Also - when I was looking on their website, I noticed that they also have a specifically gluten free version using certified gluten free oats, so I'll be checking that one out the next time I head to the grocery store. Everything I've had of theirs is delicious, so I'm looking forward to it!

So far, all I've used this granola for is mixing with my yogurt, but I'm determined to figure out other ways to use it since it's just so yummy.

This week has been crazy. Not exactly the best time to start a blog...oh well! I'm trying to figure out what I have in the fridge at home to have for dinner tonight. I'm on my own - tonight is The Hubby's class night.

Until later,
Kelly

Oh. My. Deliciousness.

I love Starbucks. I treat myself every Friday with some sort of beverage that would make me pack on the pounds if I had it every day. It's a glorious way to end the week. This morning I stopped by to get a chai latte for myself and for my boss, who is in town from Minnesota and I only see about once a year. I figured if I was getting it for someone else, I could go on a day that is not a Friday. And yes, I'm still going on Friday. Anyway, I heard that Starbucks had introduced some snacks that were gluten free, and they had them displayed right by the door...so of course I got some to sample. I tried the Sahale Snacks Pomegranate Cashews...and wow! They are a fantastic snack, and completely gluten free! They are a great combination of salty and sweet, chewy and crunchy...and they are all natural. Yum.

I looked on their website and noticed that they also have PB&J Almonds. Can't wait to try those!

It's a good thing I picked those up...my stomach was growling by 10:30. :)

Back to work...
Kelly

Why I Gave Up Gluten

The first thing that most people say when I tell them I eat gluten free (and after I explain what that means) is "Why?!" Well, the short answer is that I was diagnosed with Celiac disease in April of 2008 and immediately began my restricted diet. The long answer is...

I've had issues with food for a very long time. I remember my turning point very clearly: I was eleven years old, talking on the phone to my "boyfriend" (which sounds hilarious now) when somehow we started talking about our weights. (Maybe he had just had a physical or something? I have no idea why we would be talking about that.) He told me is - and as soon as I heard the number that was lower than mine (I was eleven, and a very mature eleven at that) I did what almost every female alive has done at least once...I lied about my weight. Right after that, my know-it-all self decided that it was time to go on a diet, because no girl weighs more than her boyfriend. (Did I mention I was eleven and clueless?) So that day, I started eating less. We're talking switching from mayonnaise to mustard because of the calories and eating nothing but Snackwell's products because they were "low fat". And I started to feel good. Really good. Lighter. More energetic. More confident. I didn't feel sick after meals anymore.

That trend continued off and on throughout high school. My mom cooked relatively healthy and always balanced meals that I picked at, and I was known to eat a sleeve of Saltine crackers for lunch and wash it down with a diet coke...mostly because I thought that eating big meals is what made my stomach hurt.

Then I went off to college, where my flexible meal ticket got me Chick-fil-A and pizza rolls (oh, heavenly pizza rolls) whenever I wanted, and I took full advantage. After a semester of gorging myself and feeling like crap, I went back to the dieting and felt better.

About halfway through college I started eating "normally". More well-balanced meals, more vegetables, more small meals every day rather than three big ones. My stomach started hurting again after every meal, and I finally got talked into going to a doctor - several different ones, actually, including a specialist after I graduated - who (all) told me that it was "stress". I was told multiple times to relax, get massages, slow down, do whatever it takes, but "your stomach must be where you're carrying your stress." Hmm. Okay. I was also told to eat more fiber...and I ate - you guessed it - lots of whole wheat.

Fast forward a few years...I was a newlywed and I loved to cook dinner with my new Hubby. He started noticing me complaining after most every meal we ate together that my stomach hurt. He started talking to me about it, and we got into all the fun little details about bowel movements and all the lovely, romantic stuff that comes with stomach issues...and he made me go to the doctor. Again. Another specialist. Ugh.

This one was different. He sat down with me and listened. To everything. Even the stuff I felt crazy for telling him. Then he ordered an endoscopy to check out my insides. (Yes, I had to ask what that was.) I was terrified. I cried before they put me out and they had to go get Hubby out of the waiting room. Ha. Anyway, he found it. The thing that had been bothering me for longer than I'll ever know (related to my eating disorder issues? I'm starting to think so.). I cut out gluten as soon as I found out, and I'm a new woman!

However, this self-proclaimed "new woman" was a WRECK for about the first six months of being gluten free. I went into withdrawals (did I mention that I'd been eating lots of wheat and other fibrous grains trying to clean out the ol' system?), then I panicked when I wanted my usual sandwich for lunch. I attempted to eat a slice from a loaf of frozen gluten free bread - and I almost cried. It tasted like cardboard. I thought my life was over...and then I got creative. :)

More soon. Have to go meet with my thesis committee chair. Wheeee.
Kelly

Hello!

Welcome to my new blog, Gluten Freendly!

I'm new to this whole blogging thing, but am really looking forward to putting my thoughts and information out there - and I hope it is helpful. Starting a blog came about just a few days ago when The Hubby and I were trying to figure out what we wanted to do for dinner. He really wanted to go see a movie (he's a big movie buff), but since I'd been at work all day I wanted to fit in a meal as well. We were chatting back and forth on gmail trying to figure it out, and after looking online at the local Movie Tavern's menu, I told him that particular place wasn't an option because they didn't have anything I could eat. He responded with, "yeah, they aren't very gluten free-ndly...ha!" Now, The Hubby is one of those that looooves to combine words and finds himself hilarious when he does so (and I usually roll my eyes and laugh at him) - but I immediately knew that this time it was pretty perfect.

What I've noticed about being gluten free is that eating, cooking and baking can be complicated and incredibly unfriendly - if you let it. Don't get me wrong - there are some really great recipes out there that taste exactly like "regular" food, it's just not my style to keep six different kinds of flour in the house since there's no telling how often I'll actually have time to use it before it goes bad. I tend to lean towards food that is easy and fast...emphasis on the easy. For instance, Semi-Homemade Cooking with Sandra Lee is more my speed. I grew up on comfort food like macaroni and cheese, fried chicken, corn dogs, and homemade lasagna (don't worry, there were vegetables mixed in there, too) - and it has been my goal since becoming gluten free to find replacement options that don't taste like cardboard to satisfy my comfort food cravings. My hope for this blog is that I help other newly-minted gluten free dieters make the transition without feeling absolutely helpless like I did...and to provide information to those who need it or who are just interested. I've learned a lot in the past year and a half, and I keep learning on a daily basis - and I want to share it with you!

That being said, I want to make it clear that I am only gluten free. I realize that a lot of gluten free diets are also casein free, dairy free, soy free, nut free or even more restricted, and I wish I could provide information on all types of restricted diets - but I hope the information I can provide will help, even if just a little. :)

Looking forward to it!

Kelly