Foods Containing Gluten– What Should You Avoid?

You’ve decided to go on a gluten-free diet… so now what? Unfortunately, it isn’t as simple as swearing off bread, pasta, cookies and cakes. It’s not just wheat; there are other foods containing gluten. As far as grains and flours go, you’ll need to cut out all wheat, barley, and rye. In addition, some lesser-known relatives of wheat will have to go: bulgar, farina, kamut, semolina, triticale, and spelt all contain gluten. So does matzo, seitan, and graham flour.

Unless you have other food sensitivities, rice, corn, flax, sorghum, millet, buckwheat, amaranth, tef, and quinoa are all safe to eat. There are also other non-grain flours which do not contain gluten, such as tapioca, potato, soy, arrowroot, nut, and bean flours.

You may have noticed a glaring omission in the previous lists: oats. This is because, while oats do not contain gluten, a large number of people with celiac disease and wheat intolerance or allergy still react to them. The vast majority of oats are contaminated with gluten during processing, making it necessary to avoid them. The good news is that some companies are now introducing certified gluten-free oats. So if you just can’t face giving up your morning oatmeal, check the label and proceed with care. Honestly, though, it’s probably easiest to just skip the oats, at least in the beginning.

Simplicity is really the key to a diet free of foods containing gluten. Processed food is a bit of a minefield– even if you check the labels obsessively, gluten creeps in to places where you would never think to look. Beer has gluten. Many processed meats have gluten. Canned soup and broth often has gluten. Soy sauce? Yes, it has gluten. Imitation bacon bits? Yup… gluten.

If this all sounds terribly scary and insurmountable, don’t worry. It’s not. It does, however, mean that you have to make a fundamental change in the way you view food. Instead of worrying about the things you can’t have, start making a list of the things you can have… then build your meals around those.

What do I mean by that? Look at it this way. A baked potato with salt and butter absolutely does not contain gluten. Neither does a salmon fillet from the seafood department, brushed with olive oil and sprinkled with salt, pepper, and dill. Nor a handful of steamed asparagus. In fact, those things together sound like a rather delicious meal, and one which can be cooked in about 15 minutes if you microwave the potato and run the salmon under the broiler.

What about breakfast, though? Missing that morning bowl of cereal? How about a two-egg omelet sprinkled with chives, instead. Prep time? Five minutes, once you get the hang of shaking an omelet pan.

All this is not to say that you won’t have some truly unpleasant cravings during the first week or two of a gluten-free diet. What’s important to understand is that those cravings are a result of a health problem; not a sign that you need wheat for nutritional purposes. Once the body has got its chemistry squared away, I defy anyone to feel unsatisfied after either of the meals suggested above– and there are literally thousands of such meals available.

The key is to use a gluten-free diet as a reason to add wonderful “whole foods” to your repertoire, instead of worrying about what you have to take away from your diet. Yes, there are many foods containing gluten, but there are far more foods that don’t, and as you experiment, you’ll find that most of those gluten-free foods are utterly delicious.

If you found this article helpful, you may also be interested in the following discussion about foods which commonly cause allergies and sensitivities:

• Dangers Of Artificial Sweeteners – How you react to certain foods is largely dependant on your genetic makeup, however in general you are most likely to experience health problems with man made foods. Here is a list of the most common causes of food allergies, food intolerance and the health problems they can cause.