I WANT BREAD!!!

The worst thing so far about being on a gluten free diet is that I cannot eat bread.  I never knew just how much I loved bread… until I couldn’t have it.

A friend of a friend told me today that I should stay away from the gluten free subs for bread because they were high in carbs and low in nutrition… and they weren’t very good, plus they are expensive.  Well, that just sucks!

I’m almost so desperate for bread that I’m willing to endure that horrible sick feeling!  ALMOST.

So now I’m in search of bread recipes.  Most of all, pizza crust recipes.  There is a frozen pizza crust that I read about today.  It’s a 10 inch crust that cost $12!  That’s the cost of an already made pizza, toppings an all. 

I’ve found a few recipes for pizza crust… but those recipes have about two million ingredients in them, all of which I own none of.  So… I now have to go back to the market and track down all these ingredients.  The plus side of it is, I’ll have plenty on hand for any time I feel like having a pizza. 

Now, there is a pizza place in Austin, named… Austin Pizza, that sells a gluten free pizza.  The cost… $12 for a 10 inch pizza.  Same as the frozen pizza crust, only this has sauce and two toppings!!!  The great part is that I won’t have to share my pizza with anyone, and I can get what ever toppings that I want!!!  That never happens when I have to feed two kids and a husband.  It’s always half extra cheese, half pepperoni and the other pizza is half pepperoni and onion, half pepperoni and bacon.  The question now is… what topping do I want? 

On another note, last night I made the best Tomatillo Chicken and Dumplings Soup for dinner.  It was quick and easy!!!  I was a bit nervous because I wasn’t sure if the Tomatillo sauce I used was gluten free.  I bought it prior to my gluten free lifestyle.  I took a chance and found that it was ok.  If there was gluten in it, it was such a small amount that my body didn’t mind… but I’m guessing that there was none.

The recipe came from the kitchen at my local grocery store, HEB/Central Market.  It was really good!!! 

One thing about me is that I hate to cook and will use as many short cuts as possible, as long as it cost about the same or less than doing it myself.  I took the recipe and changed it to include my short cuts. 

I used one already cooked rotisserie chicken, purchased at my grocery store.  This cost a tiny bit more than an uncooked bird, but I save time by not having to cook it.  I also purchased two boxes of chicken stock, organic and gluten free, of course.  (If you are doing this yourself, you could boil your own bird and use the water/stock from that instead of spending money on the boxed stock.) Two bottles of Tomatillo sauce.  I can’t remember which brand but it did not say gluten free.  I did find one that did say gluten free but it was quite a bit more in price.  Next time, I will make my own.  The recipe I found for it says it only takes 5 minutes to prepare and I’m sure that it will cost much less than the store-bought kind.  Pepper to taste, Bisquick Gluten Free Mix, 2 Eggs, Butter, and Buttermilk.

I de-boned the chicken and placed it into the pot.  I added the stock, tomatillo sauce and pepper.  I let that slowly come to a boil. 

I doubled the recipe for the dumplings.  The recipe for this came from liveglutenfreely.com 

3/4 cup of Bisquick GF mix

1/3 cup of milk (I used butter milk)

2 tablespoons of butter, melted (I missed the melted part and didn’t melt my butter.  I cut it up into tiny pieces and worked it into the Bisquick before adding the egg and milk)

1 egg

1 tablespoon of chopped parsley (I didn’t use this because I didn’t have it on hand)

I mixed up the dumplings and then dropped bite size pieces into the boiling stock.  I stirred up the dumplings as it continued to boil for 10 minutes.  After 10 minutes, I added 1/2 cup of butter milk to the soup and let boil for another 5 minutes. 

Let cook a bit then eat.  I must warn you, this was quite spicy… but very flavorful!  I can’t wait to make it again.  My husband loved it.  My kids thought it was too spicy.  Oh, and this made enough for two very hungry adults with lots left over… so maybe next time I won’t double everything.  Same amount of chicken, only one box of stock and one jar of tomatillo sauce and only one batch of dumplings. 

Another variation would be to add carrots and corn.  I felt that the soup could really use a bit “more” to it.

Every day I learn something new.  I wonder what tomorrow will bring?

Strawberry Cake!!!

I know I just blogged, but this was just too good to pass up.

As you may or may not know, I have a birthday coming up.  I was totally stressed about not being able to eat cake.  I’ve found box mixes for Vanilla cake and Chocolate cake (neither are my favorites) but hadn’t seen anything else.  I was about to go on a search of Austin to find a gluten free bakery… then I found this recipe online. 

http://glutenfreemommy.com/strawberry-cake/

Thank you, Gluten Free Mommy! 

I figured since I was going to go out and spend a million bucks on ingredients for pizza crust, I might as well throw in a few million more to buy the ingredients for this cake.  Her child “flapped his arms impatiently between bites!” How bad can it be? 

I’ll let you know what I think about it after I bake it. 

I’m so hungry now… I wish I had everything to make it.  I could totally go for some cake right now!

On another note…

I enjoyed a package of Sour Patch Kids with my kids today.  It’s always so welcoming when I get to eat something “familiar”.  There have been so many changes lately.  Familiar is so good right now!

Relief… at last!

For as long as I can remember, over twenty years now, I have felt sick practically every day of my life.  I never understood why.

Actually, to tell you the truth, I never realized that I felt bad practically every day.  My husband (we’ve been married for 16 years) got pretty tired of it.  He’s the one that pointed out to me that I was “sick” more days out of the year than the days that I wasn’t “sick”.  He thought I was just using it as a excuse to get out of cleaning the house.

Two months ago, things started to get really bad.  I don’t know if my body just had enough or if it was something more, but things were not good.  I went from my usual sick feeling to feeling like I was going to die.  A month later, I was wishing that I would die!

Then something amazing happened.  I was talking to my daughter’s teacher from last year.  She had been quite ill at the end of the school year and we were very concerned for her.  When school started back up this year, she was all better.  When we asked what changed, the commented that it was her DIET!  She had severe food allergies that were causing severe head aches and back aches.  Once she figured it out and changed her diet, her body got better.

I went home and started to do research on the diet that she told me about.  I didn’t know if I had the same food allergies as she did, or if what was wrong with me was even food allergies… but at this point, I was willing to try ANYTHING!!!

I began by eliminating certain foods from my diet.  My plan was to detox, then add things back in.  I know, I really should have just gone to the doctor… but I hate going to the doctor and it was easy enough for me to do at home.

Once I eliminated carbs from my diet, things started to get better, but not great.  Then I stumbled across a website that mentioned gluten and the all the symptoms that you could have from being allergic to gluten.  WELL… I had quite a bit of those symptoms.

The more I read, the more it seemed like that was my problem.  I went into the process of eliminating all gluten from my diet.  By the end of the week, I FELT GREAT!!!  After years of feeling sick, I finally knew what it was like to feel GOOD.

Then the real test came.  We went out to eat for dinner… and I forgot!  I ate a tortilla.  One tortilla.  (OK, it was a rather large tortilla, but still…)  I was so sick!!!  After that, I was certain that it was a gluten allergy.

I tested it again last night (total accident) when I ate some chili that wasn’t gluten free.  I didn’t read the label close enough… so I spent all night and part of today feeling sick.

This afternoon, I went to the store and stocked up on a bunch of gluten free foods.  It cost me a FORTUNE!!!  But I should have enough to last me most of the month.  I’ll have to continue to buy meat throughout the month, but I have all the dry goods and canned goods that I need.

Now I just need to find me a good cook book.

This is not going to be an easy road for me to travel on.  I’m used to things being easy!  But to feel like dying just because I ate food… That is not acceptable!

I’ll keep you posted on my journey through gluten free living.

Wish me luck!!!

Hello world!

Welcome to my blog about living with a gluten allergy.

It’s a total lifestyle change for me.  I’ve never been one for a challenge… until now!

Wish me luck!!!