Gluten Free Breeze (formerly Brendygirl) Blog

I broke down and paid $30ish for the downloadable gluten free food list. Last winter I got a used palm pilot online for $30ish, so I could try out this program and see how much easier my gluten free life could be. So, now that I finally did it and have been using it for a month or two, I'll tell you how it is.

Celiac.com Sponsor (A13):
It's not too great. It was quick and easy to download. The palm is easy to use. It lists restaurant foods, too. The foods listed show whether they have gluten or not, how they were verified, and are in easy-to-find category format. You can download a "trial" version for free. But, the bottom line is: lots of foods and drinks are not on the 2008 version I bought. Many items say "company did not respond in time to list". For example, when I was in a new Irish pub, I had my date run to the car to get the Palm Pilot out to see if this kind of cider alcoholic beverage was ok for me. I know I can have Woodchuck Cider, but it was a different brand. Well, it wasn't on there. Neither was another liquor thing. Neither were Cadbury candy products, and lots of stuff.

I think it might be better when I figure out how to ADD my own products that I've discovered to be gluten-free to the list. I don't use it as much as I hoped. I don't even bring it to the grocery store anymore. I just keep it in the car and go get it when I need it, which is about twice a month.

I still use the 3-ring binder I made with plastic sheet protectors. I have lists, recipes, and celiac articles in there, as well as wrappers and labels I cut out from products I really love, to help me remember what they look like so I can find them in one of the 4 grocery stores where I shop.

I also keep lists of where I ate in cities I've traveled to that I plan on going to again.

I keep a file folder in my car of gluten-free menus from restaurants I like and things I've ordered successfully.

"Coo-kee, Sill-ee, Glut-Free, Chef's Corner":

I marinated London Broil (cheap) in gluten-free soy sauce, spices, etc. per a recipe that was highly-rated online, and I hated it. Too salty. Too strong of a flavor. ugh

I LOVE Gluten Free Pantry's Decadent Chocolate Cake Mix. I used Buttermilk in it. Didn't frost it. Yum.

I tried Bakery On Main's gluten free Apple Raisin Walnut Granola. It's ok. Not the same crunch as gluten-y granola used to be, back in the carefree, spontaneous, nonchalance of my good-ol' gluten days of old.

Blue Diamond Nut Thin Crackers: Three of five stars. Edible, but not like a "real" cracker. Serves its purpose as a cheese barco to float into the lake that is boca mia.

Update on my Grandma: The six month prognosis is looming correct. She is on oxygen now, bed-ridden, and there is "nothing they can do", so she left the hospice care place and went home. I'm so lucky I had that long visit with her this summer, when she was still climbing ladders, gardening, and garage-saling like crazy.

Random Rants:Who on earth keeps buying that GROSS Food For LIFE fruit juice-flavored, dense, heavy-like-a-brick gluten-free bread on all the store shelves? Ewww. Stop buying that nastiness and then the stores can stock the good stuff!

AAAaahhh-NO-old! Arnold Schwartzeneggar is annoying the heck out of me! HE got elected (not my vote) by saying he'd ALWAYs pass the budget on time. YEAH RIGHT! Plus, the paper said he accounts for the goodies he receives from special interest groups "orally". Whaaa? Plus, he BLEW the huge budget surplus we had from our housing BOOM! And now my classroom budget isn't even enough to buy paper! Just to make copies, I literally have to carry paper (a five minute walk from my classroom in a trailer to the office) and load it into the copier, make copies, and then take the rest of my paper out so nobody else uses it and put it in my mailbox-where teachers 'borrow' it w/o permission, or take it back to my room. GIMMEABREAK.

Well, at least I haven't been complaining about gas prices.