Someone made the point today that there is a lot of whining going on about gluten free being so hard and not being able to eat anything.  Come on people, it isn’t that hard!  It is only as hard as you make it.  Sorry, but you can’t eat a ten course meal with everyone else and not tell the dining staff about it, but you can find simple ways to avoid gluten. I continually preach: Keep it simple! Especially, for those of you who are just starting out.  If you can stick to basic foods, whether you are at home, or out to eat, then it isn’t so bad. . Image from pattymemorial.org Think...

NO, NO WAY, NOT A CHANCE, DON’T TOUCH IT! This is the same for Miller Light, Budweiser, Coors, Coors Light, Corona, Corona Light, Corona Extra, Heineken, Natural Light, Busch, Busch Light, Michelob, Michelob Light, Michelob Ultra, Miller High Life, Guinness, Becks, Labatt Blue, Sam Adams, Fat Tire, Pabst, Stella Artois, Molson, Dos Equis, Sol, Tecate, Bass, Newcastle, O’Douls, Keystone, Milwaukee’s Best, many more, & BUD LIGHT! Please see my article on Gluten Free Beers and leave a comment about the ones you have tried.  Some examples of gluten free beer: Redbridge, Bard’s...

I figured it was time to give everyone an overall update as I am hours away from my ten month anniversary of being gluten free.  I enjoy, learn from, and get encouragement from other people’s stories, so I am going to share mine. It hasn’t been nearly as hard as I had thought.  It is all about mindset.  Once you have it in your head that you are not going to eat gluten, and you accept that you never will again, it isn’t so hard.  Like anything you do in life, you have to do it 100% to be successful! I was diagnosed a few years ago, but I was living a fast-paced life and didn’t...

Do you play in traffic, blindfolded? Have you ever played Russian Roulette? Do you pray for cancer? Do you eat gluten? Yes or No?  Simple question. - Terina, the author of Gluten Free Reality, recently wrote an article about cheating on a gluten free diet.  Check it out HERE.(I’ll call that one- Chapter 2)  To say the least… it got me a little fired up at 2:30AM, so I decided to write a Chapter 3.  Her recent article was actually a follow-up on one of her previous articles: HERE.  (Chapter 1) Here are a few excerpts from Terina’s articles: “I’ve been relistening...

Well, I’ve been 100% Gluten Free for 9 months.  I thought it was going to much tougher than it has been to eat gluten free 100% of the time.  I can’t recall a time when I have been a big inconvenience or not found something to eat.  Overall, I am eating much healthier than I used to.  I lost some weight at first, but quickly found ways to replace my old favorite foods. Like I frequently say, I don’t really buy the gluten free “imitation” foods in the stores, and rarely do I splurge and go to gluten free restaurants due to the high cost.   So, it may appear that...

Being diagnosed with a disease is never a good thing. BUT, being diagnosed with a curable disease is not something to be depressed about. With celiac disease, you can cure yourself by eating a gluten free diet. Not only be happy because it is curable without medication, but you are changing your overall life for the better! I frequently see, and used to do it myself, a bad attitude towards having to eat gluten free, especially from those newly diagnosed. There are two ways to tell people about being gluten free. DON’T Do This: “I have celiac… it sucks… I can’t...

Tonight my sister had to write a paper on something food industry related.  So she picked celiac at the last minute, because I was available to answer some questions.  One of the requirements for the paper was to interview someone in the industry (I guess you could say I am in the industry).  Well, the paper was due at midnight, and she gave me the list of questions at 9PM with some excuse about her previous interview falling through… procrastination runs in the family!  Below are her list of questions that cover almost all of my celiac experience, so I thought it was worth sharing. I...

A few nights ago, I went to a meeting for the Kansas City Cigar Aficionado Club.  I skipped dinner, because I had to leave at 5:30 to get there.  I guess everyone else skipped dinner also, because the organizer ordered a bunch of pizzas to be delivered.  When I heard he was ordering them, surprisingly I didn’t get all excited and thought this was going to be easy.  I was wrong.  Once everyone started grabbing pieces of pizza, I was still doing OK, but was starting to want some of that hot Domino’s pepperoni pizza, but I resisted!  30min later, I was starting to get hungry and...