How to grocery shop gluten free...

I was chatting a bit ago with a friend who has recently gone gluten free, she has been struggling, as I hear a lot of people do, when adjusting to a gluten free lifestyle. I say lifestyle because there is a huge adjustment one must make when becoming gluten free, so much of our socialization centers around going out to eat and consuming food with family and friends. When you suddenly find that your diet is restricted you need to make accommodations in a lot of places in your life. Many restaurants are becoming more sensitive to the needs of the gluten free consumer so luckily while eating out there may now be a few more options available. But lets talk now about  a basic trip to the grocery store, how do you feed yourself throughout the week? especially if you have a busy schedule and can't always spend a whole night preparing a gourmet meal from a gluten free cookbook or blog...

Vegetables: The good news here is when you are in the produce section you can go crazy! Think salads, stir fry, carrot sticks and other sliced veggies for munching on throughout the day. Fruit, lots of fruit! Apples, oranges, whatever is seasonally available.

There are also vegetables that make excellent substitutes, for example thinly sliced zucchini is wonderful quickly boiled and used as a pasta for any marina or cream sauce that you would typically toss a wheat pasta in. I have also heard of spaghetti squash being used for this purpose too but have not done it myself.

Starches: Potatoes, which can be prepared a ton of ways, boiled, mashed, fried, baked, potato salad... don't forget potatoes aren't just russets either. There are baby potatoes and fingerling potatoes, red and white potatoes, even purple potatoes and each is excellent. I love boiled potatoes (any variety except the russet) tossed with boiled green beans dressed in pesto sauce. Serve warm or cold its awesome.

Rice... white rice, brown rice, jasmine rice, wild rice. This is the time to become a fan of risotto. Saute garlic, onions, carrots and other vegetables in a pan, toss in a little white wine, simmer down, throw in your rice, arborio is the rice of preference as it become creamy but you can use short grain regular rice, now add vegetable stock (I'm vegetarian, this would work with chicken or meat stock too I assume.) Once the rice is cooked stir in a ton of Parmesan cheese. Salt, pepper... herbs, anything to taste.

Other excellent and easy uses for rice, make it like mac and cheese, use it as a base under a stir fry, rice pudding, or brown rice cooked up and served like a warm porridge.

Alternative grains like quinoa are great but are not always available at all stores.

Breading: right now my favorite way to bread things for frying or baking is corn. It is fairly easy to find Masa Harina and the grocery store. You'll find it in the Spanish section, it is a corn flour used for tamales or homemade corn tortillas. If you wish to make breaded mushrooms, zucchini or perhaps fried chicken I suggest salting and herbing some buttermilk and tossing the vegetable or chicken into the buttermilk and then rolling till covered in seasoned masa harina. By seasoned I mean salt, pepper, whatever you like. You can fancy it up by adding some garlic powder or paprika, personally I like adding this to the buttermilk and keeping with just a little salt added to the masa, I find it seasons the food but the spices have a tendency to burn. Fry your food in corn or canola oil till crispy and cooked through.

Baking: For basics it helps to have a few things around like butter, eggs, sugar but in place of wheat flour I always keep corn starch, brown rice flour and potato flour on hand, which I use as a blend as a flour substitute  I have an earlier post where I sing the praises of Bob's Red Mill products, if you are not able to find these at your local grocery store you can purchase them online (amazon.com) and also you can use gluten free instant potatoes ground finer as a replacement for potato flour.

If you are not a baker and want something instant I will confess its readily available and not bad, check out the Betty Crocker line of box mixes. http://www.bettycrocker.com/products/gluten-free-baking-mixes The cool part is Betty Crocker's gluten free line is actually way nicer than their other products with none of the weird unpronounceable ingredients. How ironic, eh?

Condiments: be wary of salad dressings and mustards, they can contain wheat... look for soy sauce, wheat germ things like that, do not buy those products. The good news is some very basic brands now clearly label themselves as gluten free. Hidden Valley ranch dressing, gluten free. :) My personal preference is to stick to things like oil and vinegar, toss a salad in a basic herb mixture and then some nice quality olive oil and balsamic vinegar, its very lovely.

Remember soy sauce comes from wheat but Tamari does not and is exactly the same thing. Some folks are using Braggs amino acids, which is a brown sauce, I've never used it but it is popular. I also like things like sriracha and sesame oil for seasoning my Asian style dishes.

You are pretty much safe with all pickles, olives and things of that sort. Heinz Ketsup... yup, its gluten free. http://www.heinz.com/glutenfree/products.html

Salsa, this is always safe, keep a jar in your fridge at all times, can't go wrong with some chips salsa and guacamole, but it is also great scrambled in eggs and topped with cheese in a corn tortilla (breakfast tacos.)

Cheese: Buy blocks of cheese, do not buy grated Parmesan cheese or shredded cheese, there are starches and powders and "cellulose" added that are not gluten free and questionable at best. This is used to prevent the cheese from sticking together, grate your own cheese fresh, it will taste better and be safe. Other than that you are pretty safe, there is some debate on blue cheese so I personally avoid it and don't eat cheeses with beer added, that goes with out saying.

Eggs: Of course eggs are safe... you can make omelettes with veggies and meats or scrambbled eggs to eat with potatoes. Or even breakfast tacos...

which leads me to...

Breads, etc.: I personally like Udi's gluten free white sandwich bread, its also reasonably priced at trader joes. Always keep some corn tortillas on hand. Easy to make a corn quesadillas for lunch or breakfast tacos for, well, breakfast. Also a warmed up corn tortilla makes a lovely side with any breakfast that you otherwise would have had toast with.

Beverages: You should be pretty safe to drink nearly anything. No beer though. Also none of those fancy wine cooler malt beverages. Stick to things like tequila, wine, vodka(potato vodka only, Absolut vodka is made with wheat)... non alcoholic things like juice are safe and all Hansen sodas are gluten free. Beware of carmel color in sodas.

Candies: Watch out for wheat hidden in candy, that means no more jelly beans. There is wheat syrup and gums used in a lot of candies, chocolate are pretty safe but also keep an eye out for things that contain malt. Skittles are gluten free though and you can see that they label clearly which always makes me happy.

Other snacks: potato chips, NOT BBQ, all pretty safe, just check the ingredients if you are getting the seasoned ones. Corn chips, cheetos, SOME but not all Doritos.

Things to avoid, if you see any of this listed in ingredients it either means the product does or could contain wheat or wheat products:

• Cellulose
• Glucose Syrup (can be made from wheat or potatoes, barley or rice, no real way to know if its "safe")
• Soy Sauce (in the US its made from fermented wheat, so if you see it listed as an ingredient its not "soy." Look for this in marinades, salad dressing, etc.)
• Triticum vulgare (wheat)

• Triticale (cross between wheat and rye)

• Hordeum vulgare (barley)

• Secale cereale (rye)

• Triticum spelta (spelt, a form of wheat)

• Wheat protein/hydrolyzed wheat protein

• Wheat starch/hydrolyzed wheat starch

• Wheat flour/bread flour/bleached flour

• Bulgur (a form of wheat)

• Malt (made from barley)

• Couscous (made from wheat)

• Farina (made from wheat)

• Pasta (made from wheat unless otherwise indicated)

• Seitan (made from wheat gluten and commonly used in vegetarian meals)

• Wheat or barley grass (will be cross contaminated)

• Wheat germ oil or extract (will be cross contaminated)

• Vegetable protein/hydrolyzed vegetable protein (can come from wheat, corn or soy)

• Modified starch/modified food starch (can come from several sources, including wheat)

• Natural flavor/natural flavoring (can come from barley)

• Artificial flavor/artificial flavoring (can come from barley)

• Caramel color (now considered a safe ingredient, but if you're in doubt, check with the manufacturer)

• Modified food starch

• Hydrolyzed plant protein/HPP

• Hydrolyzed vegetable protein/HVP

• Seasonings

• Flavorings

• Vegetable starch

• Dextrin and Maltodextrin (both sometimes made from wheat)

Also please be aware that the FDA does not presently monitor what food or standards a product must meet to be considered "gluten free." That means don't trust labeling because that can just be marketing. The industry accepted standard is that the food must fall below 20PPM (20 parts per million.) This means your "gluten free" food product may contain wheat ingredients, so check the nutritional list anyways, if you are like me you will avoid food with wheat in them at all not just 20PPM, that is a personal choice and depends on your sensitivity.

If you ever are not sure call the number listed on the container, most companies will be fairly educated and transparent when you say that you want to know if the product is gluten free. If they can not or will not give you the information don't eat it... companies should be proud of what they are putting in their food and if they don't know or won't tell you then to me that raises a red flag anyways. 

I may think of more things but this is it for now... safe eating, safe shopping and safe consumption. 

xoxo- Iris