Wheatglutennutfree’s Blog

This morning I make my cup of coffee and do not want just milk I want something extra tasty. I had bought a peppermint flavored coffee creamer by Bay Valley Foods before all of this started happening with the WGNF. I checked out all the ingredients on my safe list I got from celiac.com but some were missing. I started investigating on the internet which has been my reference world to WGNF. Sodium dioxide,dipotassium phosphate were on the list ingredients of gluten free foods. So felt this product safe to consume.

One thing I would like to find out is…if it is gluten free is it also wheat free? If anyone knows the answer to this question please blog me. As when I do my research I am checking out gluten free…

Have a healthy day! WGNF

When I checked out wheat free here is something I found that might help others:

Wheat-free eating
At first, avoiding wheat can be quite a challenge, but at the same time it can also be an opportunity to discover some new and interesting foods that you probably would not have otherwise. The following list is more than any one person will want to deal with, but it represents a wide range of choices for you to try. Do consider combining a few flours for different results. For example, oat flour is dense and can produce heavy baked goods by itself. Barley, on the other hand, is light and airy. Together they complement each other and handle much like unbleached wheat flour. Other enjoyable combinations include amaranth and bean, buckwheat and arrowroot, or buckwheat and tapioca. Experiment with proportions because different ratios will produce different results. And, above all, have fun playing with these new foods!
Most of the wheat alternatives on the following list will not be stocked by you local super-market, but the Ottawa/Gatineau area has a wide variety of health and ethnic food stores;
with a bit of searching, you should be able to find the majority of these foods. If no one stocks what you are looking for, many stores will special order for you. You will find most of these specialty stores on our resource list.
Wheat alternatives
Note: Items with a G and printed in bold contain gluten. Soy has a gluten-like structure and should be approached with the same caution as gluten-containing grains.
Almond – flour, meal
Amaranth – whole (as hot cereal), flour, puffed
Barley • G • whole hulled, flakes, flour
Buckwheat • whole groats (raw), kasha (roasted), cereal, flour (from either raw or
roasted)
Cassava • flour (whole root, dried, ground) Tapioca starch is refined from this.
Chestnut – flour’
Chickpea – flour
Flaxseed – flour, meal
Hazelnut – flour, meal
Jerusalem artichoke – flour
Kamut – G – whole, flakes, flour, pasta
Kuzu (also called Kudzu) – starch
Kudzu and sweet potato pasta (possibly called kuzu kiri pasta)
Legume flours – yellow or green pea; red or green lentil; white, lima or pinto bean
Malanga • flour
Millet – whole grain, flour
Milo-sorghum • flour
Oat • G – Scotch style, flour, out bran, rolled flakes
Pearled millet – whole, flour
Poi (dehydrated) – starch, flour
Potato • flour, starch
Quinoa – whole, flour
Rice (short, medium, long grain) – whole, flour, pasta, puffed, cakes, crackers
Rye – G – flakes, flour, WASA crackers (Light Rye has no yeast, only rye flour, water and salt)
Soy • G-like – flakes, grits, flour
Spelt • G • whole, flakes, flour, pasta
Tapioca – starch, flour, “pearls” (see cassava)
Teff – whole (for hot cereal), flour
Water chestnut • flour
White sweet potato • flour
Wild rice – whole, pasta
Yam (true yam) • flour
Lotus – flour, pasta
Gluten grass grains
Wheat
Spelt
Kamut
Rye
Barley
Oats
Non-gluten grass grains
Rice
Wild rice Millet* Teff» Corn
Non-grain flours
Quinoa
Amaranth
Buckwheat
Ground nuts and seeds
Arrowroot, tapioca, potato starch
Sweet potato, yam or lotus flour
* are not completely gluten-free or have not been proven gluten-free
Avoiding Wheat

You may be able to use oilier grains such as oaf in porridge, biscuits, muesli; maize (sweet corn), best on the cob but also frozen, tinned or as corn Hour, corn Hakes and popcorn (pop your own to avoid additives) and corn meal cooked like porridge to make polenta, and rice, not only boiled but also as rice biscuits; rice flour and rice noodles obtainable from shops specialising in Japanese or Chinese products. Rice may be better tolerated if fried until translucent, then cooked in water or stock as for risotto. Rye is very similar to wheat botanically but is much better tolerated; don’t eat it daily though (nor anything else), because you may lose your tolerance. English rye breads usually contain wheat and so do some rye biscuits, so take care to read the labels. German pumpernickel is safer. Spelt, an ancient ‘unimproved’ wheat may also be safe for you. Barley is good in soups and can also accompany savoury dishes as a replacement for rice. Millet can be used in (lie same way; cook it just like rice. Wild rice is not really rice at all though it is a grass, and so is sorghum, but they may be different enough to be tolerated and are worth trying. Wild rice is obtainable from delicatessens and some supermarkets but sorghum is harder to find. Note that semolina and usually cous cous are made from wheat. Occasionally French wheat flour is tolerated when English or Canadian flour is not Gluten free foods are not always wheat free. If you cannot have any grains at all there are substitutes. (For thickening sauces see sheet • Other Tips)

Quinoa (pronounced keenoa) is a South American seed with a protein content as high as that of wheat. It may need to be rinsed thoroughly to remove the bitter flavour; cook it as you would cook rice.
Buckwheat is not a grain but related to rhubarb. Buckwheat grits can be boiled in the same way as rice and served with meat. They come plain or roasted and taste better salted. They have a strong flavour and go best with something equally robust and spicy. Buckwheat flakes can be ‘ used as a muesli base or cooked like porridge. Buckwheat flour is rather heavy by itself but can be mixed with other flours such as potato flour to make a batter for pancakes, the blinis of eastern Europe; a pinch of sodium bicarbonate will make them fighter if you don’t want to use yeast. Buckwheat spaghetti sometimes contains wheat but a pure buckwheat spaghetti is
imported from Japan. Always check the label.

Tapioca and sago are highly refined carbohydrates with little mineral or vitamin content but are useful to prevent you from over-eating other carbohydrate foods that may be more appealing. Use them to thicken sauces and soups, in puddings and to coat food before frying.
Chestnuts contain more carbohydrate and Iess fat than other nuts. They can be used as a vegetable, to make puddings, and the flour makes good biscuits. French peasants used to make bread from it when wheat was scarce and expensive. Fresh chestnuts are available only in the autumn but dried ones can be bought in most health food shops and very superior shrink wrapped ones are sold in delicatessens: soak the dried ones overnight and simmer slowly until tender. Tinned puree can be bought unsweetened and used in a stuffing or to thicken soup, a classic with pureed Brussels sprouts.
Making bread from alternative flours is difficult, definitely for advanced cooks only. Buckwheat flour for instance needs an equal quantity of a light flour such as potato flour, about six times as much oil as you would expect and to be mixed to a wetter consistency than usual, a batter rather than a dough. You may find some gluten free bread-mixes in your local pharmacy and they are usually (not always) wheat free but they are expensive and do not taste like good bread. All these alternative breads can be frozen and make acceptable toast, or sandwiches for a child who is upset by being different. Bread crumbs in many recipes can be replaced by desiccated coconut very effectively, particularly as a coating before frying. Instead of making bread it is more practical and not difficult to make batten for pancakes and waffles (sweet or savoury) or to coat things to deep fry. Best results axe usually obtained with a mixture of flours winch includes one with a high protein content, such as soya, or finely ground almonds. Soya milk or water can be used instead of cow’s milk and eggs can be replaced by a puddle of oil. If the pancakes don’t cling together well and are difficult to toss try using a waffle maker.
Crumbles and biscuits made with alternative flours are more successful than bread and there arc some classic biscuit recipes that use only ground almonds or hazelnuts, egg white and sugar. Cornflour can be used instead of wheat to make small buns quite successfully though it doesn’t work well for large cakes. Be brave and experiment!

Pastry can be replaced by pancakes or by blanched leaves such as cabbage, lettuce, spinach or vine leaves to make little parcels. The Japanese make wonderful finger food with rice (you could use quinoa) well flavoured with fish or herbs for instance and wrapped in seaweed; dried seaweed is available in some healtlh food shops, a few supermarkets and specialist Japanese food suppliers.

Baking powder is usually made of three parts corn starch or potato starch as a filler, two parts cream of tartar, one part sodium bicarbonate (baking soda). It is the acidity of the cream of tartar that releases the carbon dioxide to make the bubbles. Cream of tartar is a by-product of wine-making and could be a problem for the yeast intolerant, but other acids such as ascorbic acid (vitamin C), malic acid (both obtainable from a good pharmacist) yoghurt or buttermilk, lemon or even rhubarb juice, will have the same effect. If you want to avoid cornflour take one-sixth the quantity stated in a recipe as pure sodium bicarbonate and approximately one-third as the acid of your choice (but obviously a bit extra if it is lemon juice or yoghurt etc. because of its water content; reduce the other liquid in the recipe to compensate).

Pulses. All the peas, beans and lentils are cheap and filling. Try sprouting some of them (but not the red kidney beans which must be boiled hard for ten minutes to destroy a toxin). Chick pea flour (gram (flour) and soya flour have a high protein content and this compensates for the inadequacies of some of the other suggested flour substitutes. Carob is a bean available as a flour (that improves the flavour of some sweet dishes. Some people will accept carob bars as a chocolate substitute. Poppadoms (the crisp ones) are usually made from urd flour, which is also a bean, or gram flour, but sometimes this is mixed with other flours, usually rice or wheat. Chappatis are made from wheat.

British root vegetables. Potatoes are the most versatile and the most easily overeaten. They are very useful as potato crisps when you are away from home. There are also carrots, parsnips, beetroot, turnips, swedes and celeriac. Cold roasted parsnips are a surprisingly good sweet nibble. Salsify and scorzonera have a mild and agreeable flavour but are not easy to find in the shops. It is worth growing your own if you have good soil.

Tropical root vegetables. Sweet potatoes have a nutritional value similar to ordinary potatoes hut they are in a quite different food family. They all have a pink outer skin but the insides may be sillier an apricot colour or white and the flavours are quite different. You can tell them apart by scratching a bit of the skin away. Cook as potatoes by boiling, baking or by microwaving, then mashing, or slicing and briefly frying until just browned. Use with savoury dishes as if they were parsnips. For pudding they combine well with stewed rhubarb or fairly sour fruiis. They are sometimes called yams, which is rather confusing. Yams look a bit like logs of wood, brown outside but while inside and they do not have much flavour but they can make a convincing substitute for potato chips; if you do not have a chip pan part-boil or micro-wave them and then shallow fry in an ordinary frying pan. Eddoes are little brown, oval hairy things two-to-three inches long, white inside and a bit like sweet potato but less sweet. Boil or bake in their skins but eat only the inside. Taro is another starchy root vegetable available in some shops near large immigrant populations but rarely found in supermarkets.

Bananas, These are so convenient and filling that there is a danger of eating too many and losing tolerance. Their nutritional value is better fresh so go easy on the dried ones and the banana flour.
Other fruits. They are most nutritious fresh of course but dried fruit is very useful for snacks, especially when travelling. Consider not only raisins and sultanas but also apricots, dates, prunes, peaches and figs; even dried pineapple and mango are available in supermarkets and delicatessens. Dried fruits are often treated with sulphur dioxide and may be coated with glucose (boxed dates especially) and various food oils. Untreated dried fruit is available from many healtlh food shops but, obviously, does not keep so well.
Other Tips
Thickening Sauces. We tend to use wheat flour routinely to thicken sauces but it isn’t always necessary. For instance, good gravy can lie made by simply adding water or vegetable juices to (the roasting pan and then pouring it from a jug that has the spout at the bottom to avoid the fat. Vegetable purees work well as sauces. Fruit purees or creamed coconut substitute for cream or custard. Tofu (from soya) can be used instead of cream or cottage cheese as a base for sauces and dips.
Hot drinks can be difficult if you must avoid tea or coffee though some people enjoy plain hot water if it is of a good quality. Home-made soup is the best substitute and not too time consuming to make with a blender or a juicer. Marmite, Bovril, miso and most stock cubes are too yeasty for many people. Unfortunately, most tinned soups are thickened with wheat but ‘modified starch’ is usually corn flour.
Some fruit juices are good hot but should be diluted a bit: commercial squashes all contain a preservative of some sort and that could be a problem. Elder-flower cordials are good hot as well as cold but check the label for lemon juice and preservatives. There are also some good herb punches such as Norfolk Punch but you are likely to lose tolerance to all of these if you have them regularly and they also may contain preservatives. You may do better with a spoonful of honey or black treacle or a good quality low-sugar jam, black-currant is a good choice, stirred into hot water
Herb tea bags are now a socially acceptable solution when you are away from home but fresh herbs taste better and many tea bags have been treated with formaldehyde. Some people find dried dandelion root an acceptable substitute for coffee. Barley Cup is another possibility, and Rooibosch tea another. It is very important not to have any of these every day.
Packed Lunches do not have to be sandwiches. A box with separate compartments that can be kept upright widens the range of possibilities. Thin pancakes made with alternative flours or a very thin, one egg omelette can be filled with most of (he things that usually go into sandwiches, and then rolled and sliced into bite-sized pieces Japanese style; or any broad leaves such as lettuce, cabbage or spinach dipped into boiling water long enough to make them limp but not too easily torn can be used like seaweed or vine leaves to make little parcels of rice or quinoa flavoured with almost anything, look at recipes for stuffings for ideas. Polenta (from corn) is good cold if well flavoured.
Try crudities such as small pieces of raw cauliflower, carrot, cucumber, chicory, to dip into hummus (from chick peas), mayonnaise, or avocado or cod’s roe blended with tofu instead of cottage cheese. A shredded salad can be made more filling by adding sweet corn (good with tuna), buckwheat grits (good with other tinned oily fish). In winter use a colourful variety of raw vegetables; red and white cabbage should be sliced very finely on a mandolin (especially for children because very chewy foods can be too tiring and they do not eat as much as they need) grated carrot and grated celeriac mix well, and add some chopped herbs such as parsley, coriander, mint. A dressing can be made from any oil and mixed with a little fruit juice if you need a substitute for wine vinegar, then poured over at the last minute. Add a piece of fruit and you have a very healthy meal.