Why gluten is hard to give up

 Make a list of all of the foods that you consider comfort foods. The food you make at 1 in the morning, food associated with holidays and family events, what you turn to after a bad day, what came out of Grandma’s oven during visits. These foods create what we call appetite….not hunger…. Appetite as I learned in nutrition class with my good friends Gabbi and Nicole, is the emotional attachment and the part of us that craves a certain food. Hunger is the physiological need for nourishment.

Here’s a couple examples:

Pie- Fresh from grandmas oven anyone?

Mac and Cheese- Kraft, homemade, take your pick…

Grilled cheese

Casserole- from Minnee-sooota don't ya know 

Stew or Soup

Chocolate Chip cookies and Milk- before bed?

Pancakes- (and waffles, and French toast, and donuts, and croissants)

Gravy (Happy Thanksgiving) oh and stuffing

Christmas cookies, girl scout cookies, GINGERBREAD

Takeout Chinese-boo soy sauce

Pizza-you can still eat the cheese and sauce.. anyone? 

Popcorn- THANK GOODNESS it’s GF!

Brownies

BREAD (don’t even get me started, the bread basket at restaurants kills me every time…. You can look, smell, waft, gaze, feel,  but can’t eat!) 

These foods can sometimes be make GF, but.    

1. they do NOT taste as good
2.   they cost a bloody fortune (I pay 6 dollars for 8 slices of bread
3. they do NOT taste as good

the repeat was on purpose… you get the hint.

 Those foods that most of us commonly associate with memories or childhood, contain the one thing us Celiacs and gluten-intolerants cant eat, and that is why eating gluten-free is difficult.

For me… it wasn’t a hard decision to stop eating it…...psht getting diagnosed was the best news of my life.. it explained why I was sick and was a path to getting better. No-brainer! The pro’s outweigh the cons by a million and one.

The hard part at first was making sure I didn’t accidently consume anything with gluten in it…. it was a foreign concept. I became a label detective, however after a couple months, eating GF became second nature.

But…. you never stop craving those comfort foods. 

Now don’t get me wrong, going gluten free doesn’t mean you automatically eat healthy, there are still chips and ice-cream to get you through the day. You just have to make more of an effort to re-create those comfort foods in a way that is both good and edible.

So I’m on a mission, a slow mission though y’all, I mean I am making my way through nursing school here. I want to find and create those foods in a way that I can enjoy, because watching people eat good gluteny things is it’s own kind of torture. 

So for now I’ll stick to popcorn, ice cream, and potatoes, but I am building up my recipe base slowly, but surely.

Happy (Gluten free) living

~M

picture retrieved from google images