Googles

Thank you all for the advice.

I don't have any slow cookers or pressure cookers or any other fancy types of cookers. I feel like an incompetent adult not able to cook for myself, whereas I used to be able to do this. I feel like I've taken a huge step backwards.

ahorsesoul- is that parmasan cheese in the recipe fresh or grated from the can? What kind of spices add good flavor?

I used to eat top raman (chicken flavor) w/ added chicken. I was wondering if anyone knows what I could use to replace the flavoring so I can still have this. Thanks.

sooooo frustrated.

Ok need to vent. I have gotten to the point of just eating the same three or so meals over and over again. I know I just need to try new foods, but I've always been a really picky eater so it is really hard. When I do try new things they end up tasting like cardboard. I've never been able to cook well so it makes it that much harder. Along with those things:

-I'm a student (first year in graduate school) and don't get back home until almost 9 four nights a week so cooking at that time is really hard have to be up early the next morning.

-I suck at cooking, my roommates used to make fun of me about how bad I was at it.

-As I'm healing (hopefully only while I'm healing) I can't eat anything acidic. (I was ok when I could eat rice pasta, but then couldn't eat sauce. I tried to make alfredo sauce and ruined it.- and it was really expensive)

-I'm on food stamps so can't go trying food unless I'm sure I'm going to be able to eat all of it. The special gluten free foods are pretty much out of my budget when they wouldn't be if I could eat the same foods w/ gluten. And those would let me eat things easier after I get home at night.

I was doing okay but I suffer from depression and it always gets worse this time of year and it has knocked me out. Everything just seems like it is too much and I can't seem to do this on top of everything else that is new this year.

It is just all too much! I hate food and I hate my stomach!

Hello,

I was invited by another student in my program home to her family's house for Thanksgiving. I have never met them. I have also not eaten over at someone else's house except for one pot luck since I was diagnosed (back in June). How do I do this? My friend was peppering me today with questions about foods I could eat. I'm still figuring it out myself. I told her if she knew what foods/brands her family would make then I could check before hand. I also offered to bring food and some dessert. I'm going to be about 2.5 hours away from home, so if I have any problems it would be bad as I will have to drive myself home in an area I don't really know. Any advice. Like I said I've never done this before. She knows about it and really wants to make it work well. I want to make it as easy and non awkward for her family especially since I've never met them.

Any advice would be great.

I have been gluten free since the end of June. For the last week or two I haven't had much of an appetite. Now everything tastes weird. It is not even a way I can describe how things taste different. They just taste bad. Has anyone else had this experience?

Thanks.

Thanks for all of these wonderful suggestions. I was only two months gluten-free when school started again and have found myself (who was never much of a cook in the first place) thrown for a loop as I had to move, live on my own for the first time, go gluten-free, and start classes all at the same time. Getting suggestions here helps so much. Sometimes it feels like my brain is going to explode and having your suggestions is one less stressful thing I need to think about.

Thank you sooooo much!

I was wondering if anyone had good suggestions for gluten free munchies. I know fruit and vegetables, but I have been eating so many apples I feel like I'm going to turn into one. I need cheap ideas since I am a grad student and don't have much money. Mostly I need easy to eat munchies I can eat while I am studying. Any suggestions would be great!

Thanks.

I just need to vent so I'm posting.

It makes me so mad when people who do not know about celiac disease and its challenges go and say that it isn't a big deal. I was at church on Sunday and was explaining why I needed to have communion special for me. One person popped into the discussion and said that it was sooo easy to be gluten free because there are more gluten free foods than there used to be. I agree with the premise that there are more foods that are gluten free and that it is easier to be gluten free than it has been at any other time. However, it infuriates me when they then go on to say that makes it "easy". I'm sure it will get easier for me as it goes on, but I have only been diagnosed for three months. I am still learning what I can and can't eat when it comes to foods that are not plain. I feel overwhelmed when I go to the grocery store and can't do very much shopping at one time. (I never liked grocery shopping in the first place) I find that the food costs more. I tried to find gluten free "bread crumbs" at the grocery store the other day so I could put it on my chicken, as I haven't had anything on my chicken in three months. But I couldn't find any. It is little things like this that make it hard. Not necessarily that things aren't labeled (though I never have time to shop during that M-F 9-5 period when I could easily find out). People went out after young adult group the other week, but I felt I couldn't because they were going to a sandwich restaurant and I didn't know anything about it. (I just recently moved). I just hate it when they tell me it should be easy for me. They don't know my life, and they don't know what I have to do and how careful I have to be. As if as long as I buy gluten free (which is apparently easy) I won't have any other issues or problems with it. I have been living on apples and peanut butter the last week. I would love to have the time to make everything from scratch, but that isn't realistic since I'm in school. I don't have money to spend on things! Why can't people just be supportive. I feel like people just want to treat it like it is no big deal. Maybe they should try it for a while and see how hard it is.

AAAAAAGGGGGHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!

Have you tried contacting the University? I spoke with a Endocrinologist the other night for two hours and she helped me immensely.......with education about celiac. She's from the U. If you haven't found anyone I could ask her who she recommends. If you want me to, email me....mlowler@bairdandlowler.com

Happy to help.!

Missy

I'm at Eastern so I have to go through their system. I was hoping I could get a name that they could refer me to as I don't know what their nutritionist knows (I assume they have one). But I do know that Us medical center is not in-network for Eastern's insurance. I just don't want to have to make multiple appointments at the health center to get it all worked out. (I hate going to the doctor).

Hi I was wondering if anyone knew of any good nutritionists in the Ann Arbor, MI area. The first nutritionist was of no help as the handouts she gave me were not up to date and she could not help me figure out what I should be eating. I have now moved and am finding myself eating less and less foods as I end up getting overwhelmed when I go shopping. I need someone who can help me figure out what I can eat that will provide me with the nutrients I need. If you know of anyone that would be great. Thanks.

Thank you everyone for your information. I will see when I can get into the student health center.

Age? Menopause maybe?

Not unless I'm getting menopause in my early/mid 20s. Though that is what my friends always teased me about.

I'm a little over weight but as I seem to be loosing some weight now that I am not eating gluten (some just bloated) I am putting more on with my exercise so I seem to be staying the same. I don't eat a lot of sugar either. And the little bit i do comes from things like fruit not candy.

I have come to realize in the last couple of years (about the amount of time I've been having digestive issues- just diagnosed a couple of months ago,) that I have been really hot and sweaty. More so than other people around me. I can sit in front of the window air conditioner and be hot still. If I am in the rest of the room for me to be comfortable everyone else is cold. I always feel hot. I used to sweat so much at night, but that seems to have decreased when gluten free, but it still happens during the day. Does anyone know what this is or if it is related to food issues? Thanks.

Kraft Catalina is also gluten free.

Thank you all for the responses and the ideas and the support. Sometimes I wonder if I am going crazy. I almost feel like it is a yo-yo. I'll burst into tears in front of anyone at the drop of a hat.

So after reading everyone's suggestions I have decided to go back to a basic diet and want people's reviews of my diet.

I am going to go back to a basic diet of:

Apples, PB (JIF), lactaid milk (never had this before), Rice Chex, green beans, and brown rice pasta (totally made of brown rice), and plain chicken. and frozen fruit, and frozen broccoli, and diet pepsi.

Assuming that I don't have a reaction to the cesian (spelling?) in milk is there anything I shouldn't be eating on this list? If you say PB, I just can't stop it unless it seems that something is still bothering me with this diet as I will be getting a lot of my protein there. How long should I do this diet before I start adding things back in? How long would it take for the mood swings to stop being affected by what I have already eaten? If I get regular BMs does that mean I can start adding things in again? How long do I wait before I assume that something (like cesian) is the trigger if I continue to have problems.

Other questions:

When people say to give up grains, they don't mean rice right? What exactly is tapioca, is it a grain? With this diet will I be getting enough carbohydrates? Am I going to become really tired like I did when I first stopped gluten, am I going to be hungry all the time and out of no where like I was when I stopped eating gluten?

Getting ahead of myself, but, what foods do I start adding in first? Are there ones that are less likely to cause problems or I can eat in a simpler form so I should start them first so I don't have a mix of new foods and can check them out? I.e. I don't eat soy by itself, but someone suggested the soy in the foods I was eating might be the problem. I don't want to cut out every ingredient in an item from my diet because I end up reacting to the soy that is in it.

Thanks for the responses and support. It helps to know that I'm not alone and not the only one who has gone through this.

Lynayah, Yes I have heard about the stages of grief, and actually joked about them with my boss (he's a clinical psychologist) right after I was diagnosed. I felt like I just accepted it for what it was then (maybe denial), but this anger just caught me off guard. I don't usually get really angry so this was a double whammy in that sense. Thanks for the input.

This is all so frustrating. If I originally didn't have trouble with diary can I develop it over time? Will I be able to eat it again at some point? When I was first diagnosed I was like, at least I don't have to give up my dairy. That is something good. I don't know which I love more, my diary or the carbohydrates I've already had to give up. I don't know if I can emotionally do both. I feel so alone. It's so hard seeing people eat things I can't or walking through the campus center and smelling all the foods I can't eat. I just want to be normal.

Why can they say they are gluten free if they aren't? I'm so tired it makes the rest of this so hard to deal with. I thought I had gotten past the exhaustion stage. On top of adjusting to graduate school. I hate my doctor (PCP) who said that the adjustment wasn't a big deal. I just want to be able to eat the foods I like again. I miss being able to eat whatever I want without having to think about it. I look at my cupboards and its like there is nothing there. I get home from class (9pm) and am so tired all I want to do is fall asleep. But I have to eat fist, and yet there is nothing i can just fix in two minutes to eat except cereal. Please don't suggest rice and beans. I have always hated beans and never been able to get them down.

You may have also developed a sensitivy to another food. Coffe causes me the physicial symptoms you described.

Is it the caffeine or the coffee? I don't drink coffee, but do drink Diet Pepsi.

So here are the things I've been eating. Yes I've been eating the same thing every day (at least this week) and still having the roller coaster but to a slightly less extent (or maybe I'm just better able to head it off). If anyone can think of what I need to remove or try changing that would be great. If you do suggest something I should remove, if you have anything cheap to replace it with that would be great. Thanks.

Fresh Green Grapes

Glutino breakfast bar

FruitaBu Fruit flats (raspberry)

Kraft Polly-O string cheese

Apples

Jif Creamy Peanut Butter

Diet Pepsi

Water

Bareman's skim milk

Betty Crocker's Gluten Free Yellow Cake (eggs, oil, water)

Betty Crocker's Rich and Creamy Milk Chocolate Frosting

Carnation Instant Breakfast

Meds checked by reputable pharmacist

Nature Made Multi-Vitamin (states gluten free)

Nature Made Calcium w/ D (states gluten free)

Nature's Bounty Liquid B complex (states gluten free)

Other

Crest Toothpaste

Dial Hand soap

Joy Dish Soap

(Some sort of hand foamy hand soap at school)

Thanks, I will keep a food diary starting with breakfast. I am having bloating and changes in my BMs. The reason I think it might be gluten is that this isn't the way I usually react to stress. When I get really stressed my mind races and my emotions take a second place.

I think I'm getting glutened but I'm not sure how. I am eating all the same foods. Unless I am just getting more sensitive as this goes on. The only other change is that now I'm taking my food with me to college to eat for lunch/dinner. I find myself on this emotion roller coaster and getting angry at almost everything. (very unusual). I just want to yell and scream at people who stress me out more than I already am. I'm trying really hard to be nice to people (and I think I'm succeeding,) but then I find myself bursting into tears (also very unusual). I don't know how much more of this I can take. Any advice would be helpful.

I have had a number of gluten filled nighmares. Either of being forced to eat gluten filled food, forgetting that I can't have it and then remembering after I ate it, or accidentally eating something with gluten in it. They all end up bad.

In the middle of a thread, Scoobydoobydoo asked about mixed kitchen advice, and I'm interested too, so I thought I'd start a new post under that topic. We can read books and old posts that say get a toaster oven and have some of your own gluten-free-designated kitchenware, specifically: strainer, cutting board, perhaps even cooking utensils. Also have a separate gluten-free/nevertouchbread tub of margarine and peanut butter and jelly. Any other advice from those of you who have developed shared kitchens?

What I did when I shared a kitchen was that I had my own cooking area. No one who was cooking with gluten products (in my case every one else) was allowed to cook there. We actually put the microwave between my area and their area to make a large delineation line. Also I had my own cupboards so as to not cc my foods. I also had my own sponges I used to clean my area and my dishes. Even though my cooking area was separate from everyone else I would wipe it down before I cooked anything. I hope this helps.

I recently checked (some time in the last couple of weeks) and called Centrum and they said their products were not gluten free (I asked because of a new formula). Good luck

Frosting is pretty easy to whip up from scratch if you have the time. If you have any cookbooks there should be some pretty basic recipes in the cake section. There are several premade ones you can buy also that are gluten free. Here are some links for you to look at.

https://www.celiac.com/gluten-free/index.ph...amp;hl=frosting

https://www.celiac.com/gluten-free/index.ph...mp;#entry534795

https://www.celiac.com/gluten-free/index.ph...c=58344&hl=

Also depending on where you are at I have bought GINGER EVANS RTS FROSTINGS - all flavors but coconut pecan - gluten free & dairy free (This information came from the Save-A-Lot quality assurance specialist back in Nov. 08). I have eaten the vanilla, chocholate and vanilla cream cheese without any problems. Hope this helps and good eats!

Thanks so much! I'm making gluten free cake for the first time tomorrow. So excited.

I have two stores, one for my brother and one for myself and my mom (mostly her fault).

My brother did a lot of baking when we were youth. One time he was making cinnamon rolls and forgot the eggs. Once it came out of the ove my mom and I came into the kitchen to check it out (and eat some). We looked at the cinnamon rolls and they had not risen at all. He was like what? Eggs? Oops.

My other story starts with my mom going grocery shopping. We have a recipe from an old cookbook that takes yogurt. My mom had gone to the store and asked me to make the recipe. We only had large tubs of yogurt around for this type of recipe as my mom was the only one who liked eating it by itself. So when she asked I reached into the fridge and grabbed the one large tub of yogurt. I added all the spices and other ingredients. We never usually stay exactly to the recipe because we flavor to taste. However, this time when I check, it tasted awful. I tried adding more mustard and garlic to see if that helped. But it didn't. I couldn't figure out what I had messed up. I asked my mom to come over and taste it to tell me what was wrong. She told me that it did taste off and hence I must have added the wrong amount of some ingredient. So I went through what I had added again. We got to the point where we decided we didn't know how to fix it and so we were going to have to throw it out. I lifted the lid off the counter to put it on the yogurt to throw out and looked at the label. She had accidentally bought Vanilla flavored yogurt instead of Plain flavored. I swore it wasn't my fault that it tasted bad (i hadn't messed up the recipe). We both got a good laugh after that. I don't think either of us at the time had thought about the possibility that the yogurt had gone bad.

So I know that I could check all the ingredients (but there were a lot) so I was hoping that someone would know what if any cake frosting are gluten free. I want to bake a cake, but don't know what I can put on it. Thanks.