Sometimes Eating Gluten Free is Frustrating

In this time of family and friendly togetherness, I wanted to offer a comprehensive guide to your celiac/gluten intolerant/gluten allergic friends/family members. This turned into part rant and part informative. My dad used to tell me not to have a "smart mouth", well, maybe that's more of a personality trait that could not be stopped. Plus, I think my dad appreciates my "smart mouth", as long as whatever I'm saying is directed at someone else (I'm looking at you Jan Brewer). I should note that no part of this post is directed at anyone. If you see yourself in here, please don't think I wrote this with you in mind because I didn't write this with anyone in mind. It may surprise you to know that I wrote this to help you.

So here it is, how to make your celiac friend feel comfortable in your kitchen.

Gluten is a protein found in wheat, barley, rye, kamut, spelt, and triticale. This stuff makes us sick, really sick.

Gluten is often used as a thickening agent (and in the case of soy sauce -- yes soy sauce has gluten in it, it's used to help ferment). Often labeled under the alias of "malt", "natural flavors", and other non-descript names.

Please don't regale us with how awful it must be to be on a gluten free diet, we know and you don't. After we've gotten the hang of our new diet, we really don't think about it and it's no big deal. We've mourned for our losses, and have moved on with our lives. You wouldn't remind a leg amputee how awesome walking is, please take the same considerations for us because we can't eat "real" bread. We know your bread is awesome, moving on.

Some of us become really amazing bakers and you'd actually genuinely like our baking. When you don't know what to do about the dinner bread or pie, chances are we'll volunteer to fix something to fill the void that'll knock your socks off.

We can't drink regular beer. Even though most commercial domestic beer is made with corn and rice (oh burn!), there's still a few grains of barley in there. There are four brands of gluten free beer that I'm aware of (in order of deliciousness); Bard's, Green's, New Grist, and Redbridge. Redbridge is nice because it's cheap and much more available than the others. The unfortunate truth is that a lot of the gluten free beers taste pretty similar. Oh, but if you live in Oregon, head over to Deschutes Brewery with an empty growler, they'll fill it with their seasonal, yes seasonal, gluten free beer (they also have a GF menu now).
Many of us turned to cider and wine to solve and create our problems. I've also turned to homebrew to solve and create my problems.

Udi's is the best gluten free bread available. If you get us bread, get us that kind (unless we have problems with eggs).

Don't put our bread in your toaster. Seriously, we're really sensitive, cross contamination can leave us sick for months. No joke.

Untreated celiac disease can be deadly.

We're gonna ask you a lot of questions about what you're making. We're gonna ask to read labels. Please know this isn't a reflection on you or your cooking, it's a reflection of us trying to not spend all night on your toilet.

Ask us questions, we know it's complicated, so seriously dudes, just ask.

The Quest for Gluten Free Pizza

So I've really done a great job creating gluten free cookies. I think they're delicious and, while I haven't eaten gluten (at least not on purpose) for two a half years, I think they're pretty much identical to their glutenous counterparts. There wasn't a whole lot of trial and error towards my quest for the perfect gluten free pie crust, cookies (of all sorts of varieties), and cakes. The first cake that I felt really good about was for my friend Wendy's birthday, she's not gluten free and thought it was delicious. It was a tres leches cake that knocked everyone's socks off.

So here's the thing. Before even knowing what gluten intolerance was, I used to practically medicate myself with pizza. If pizzavore was a thing, I was it. Pizza was my muse. I made pizza with love, I used my pizza stone at least once a week, and a long day's work was often rewarded with the best New York style pizza within delivery area. You get the picture.

Now my stomach writhes in pain when slight morsel of pizza graces my mouth, real pizza, the kind that's chewy and greasy and doughy...yeah...doughy.

The first gluten free pizza I made came out of a Whole Foods box. After letting the dough rise and mixing in egg (egg, weird right?), I literally pasted it into a large glass brownie pan. The taste was good, the texture was alright, the whole experience was both disappointing and exciting at the same time.

The best gluten free pizza ever goes to Picazzo's, a casual-yet-fancy-pants pizza chain that is based in Arizona (and have no stores in Washington...bumz). They take care to keep their ingredients separated and the pizza is good, real good, good enough to make me lazy in my quest to create the best gluten free pizza.

But Arizona is 1,500 miles away and I want pizza now. Really good pizza. So I'm going to keep updating this blog with my successes.

For now, I suggest you make a cast iron polenta pizza.
3/4 cups of dried polenta
2.5 cups of water
1 teaspoon of salt
A pinch of Italian seasoning
A pinch of crushed red pepper
one clove of garlic, finely minced

Combine all these in a sauce pan until the polenta is thick, pour into a greasy cast iron skillet (you may want to add some extra oil to the skillet before putting the polenta in). Bake for 30 minutes at 350-ish. Then add your pizza toppings when the center begins to turn solid.