gluten free familyA mum's blog about gluten-free living in Australia

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It is time to put down our blogging tools for the year and reflect on some of the new and intriguing developments of the past twelve months.

The biggest change our family saw was the GF freezer shelf in our local Coles supermarket swell from stocking only the Patties range of baked goods to include  ready made GF pastry sheets (from Pastry Pantry) and then gluten free chicken nuggets and fish fillets from Bayview.

Whether you are a diligent home baker or not, these developments were good news for those of us who find variety the greatest challenge when it comes to serving up yummy meals for fussy little eaters day after day.

Of course the flip side of this is that gluten free food prices remained way out whack with wheat based food equivalents, and we attempted this month to get to the bottom of why that was.

But it was not all bad news. Some important products did become more affordable, with Organ launching its Buontempo family size bags of pasta – which was certainly a welcome development  for those of us feeding more than one gluten free mouth at the dinner table.

This was the year I also discovered the advantages to making my own bread (from a packet mix) as opposed to buying the stuff from the shops, which meant I could finally send my son off to daycare with sandwiches in his lunchbox.

Gluten free treats were also in the spotlight as loads of companies finally came to the ‘party’ to produce delicious ranges of cakes, treats and sweets. There are too many to name here, but these guys were out on force at the Sydney Gluten Free Expo. Vitarium also launched a new pancake mix at the expo that passed the ultimate taste test (a thumbs up from the kids).

Of course among some of the great new products that lit up our lives were the usual medical doubters who valiantly tried to persuade us that we are paying through the nose for products we don’t need and that we should leave gluten-free living only for those with a formal medical diagnosis.

But we just ignored them and got on with our lives, enjoying our happy healthy children with fewer tummy aches, itchy rashes, behavioural anomolies or whatever problem it was that first led us down this path.

So happy Christmas to you all and we promise to come back in the New Year with our list of gluten-free new year resolutions for 2010 (which we promise will include the big bread bakeoff).

LH

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The merry season is in full swing and with it comes the inevitable parade of mince pies, gingerbread men, and everything else that I once enjoyed at Christmas time.

Other ghosts of my Christmas past include turkey stuffing and gravy, chippolatas, and please don’t anyone mention christmas pudding and custard.

Not only that, but with silly season socialising hitting top gear, the pressure is for our gluten detectors to be extra vigilant when deliciously tempting hors deuvres, canapes and assorted sweet treats drift past our hungry eyes.

Of course its not too difficult to conjure up most savoury Christmas fare with gluten-free indredients, but if you are dining out or a guest someone else’s home, you are probably out in the cold when it comes to tucking into all your festive favourites.

Lucky for me, I love all the gluten free parts of a traditional Christmas spread – the hams, the turkey, and the roast vegetables – just as much as the other bits. Even so, I think the time is right to put together a gluten free guide for those of us who are tired of ‘doing without’ on  Christmas day.

When it comes to the main course, things like gravy and stuffing can easily be replicated with a gluten free flour substitute – and no-one would ever know the difference.  Likewise gluten-free chippolatas and other sausagy-type foods are also easily located in most butchers and supermarkets.

But its the sweet treats that can be the most elusive. Lucky you if you have a good recipe for gingerbread and Christmas puddings (and we’d love to hear about it if you want to share it!). For the rest of us, it was pleasing to see the proliferation of gluten free Christmas goodies on show at the Gluten Free Expo.

So here is a little collection of products and ideas that I have put together that you can buy either in packets, part made or ready made that might ring in a little more yuletide sparkle to your celebrations.

Gingerbread: We love Artini’s gingerbread men, which we buy as a special treat from our local IGA, but there quite a few recipes online if you can’t get hold of these yummy little bites.

Mince pies: Check out a gluten free bakery in your city/town (eg Choices in Turramurra Sydney) and if you have no luck there, try making your own with Pastry Panty shortcrust pastry sheets - which may be available in a local Coles supermarket (in the gluten free section of your freezer section) or can be ordered directly from the company.

Christmas cakes/puddings: Vitarium (who brought us realistic, yummy pancakes) has created a gluten free fruit cake mix so look out for that on supermarket shelves or on their website. If you don’t want to get your mixmaster dirty then Pudding Lane has come up with a gluten free pudding that you can order from its online shop.

Custards/cream: Orgran has a custard mix that does a pretty decent job for those of us who must live without dairy, and Carnation has been advertising soy cooking milk as a cream replacement for those non-dairy people who can tolerate soy products.  So Good makes a tasty vanilla soy icecream that contains some wheat, but the company has told me the product is gluten free.

Happy hunting!

LH

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I probably won’t shock anyone by noting that gluten free products cost nearly three times as much as their gluten-based equivalents. 

A recent Canadian study found that gluten free products on average cost 242% more.

Today I poked around my local supermarket on a mission to put these stats to the test and found that a couple of the basics actually cost five times as much.

At Woolworths, an unbranded white loaf of bread costs $1.10 compared to $5.70 for the gluten free equivalent.

And while you could bag 500g of no name pasta for a mere 60c, the cheapest gluten free pack – found in the family unfriendly size of 250g – is $1.50.

And these are just the basics. If you want specialty items from far flung suppliers, whack shipping costs on top. 

Why is this so? We at GFF asked this question of some of the local manufacturers. This was their combined response:

1. A smaller customer base means lower production runs, a smaller scale of manufacturing, less automation and therefore higher margins

2. The main gluten free grains, corn and rice, are more expensive – one supplier said three times as expensive – than wheat because they are not produced in anywhere near the volumes

3. Australia also saw its smallest rice crop in history last year, further inflating prices

4. Because production runs are smaller, these ingredients are also bought in lower volumes which means less discounting

5. Gluten free products require extra ingredients such as xanthan gum and guar gum to achieve the same texture as their wheat based counterparts

6. Also, to get the taste and texture right, extra production steps are needed, making manufacturing more challenging and complicated

7. To top this off, in order to declare their product gluten free, manufacturers must adhere to strict guidelines around storage and traceability so everything must be tested and certified

8. Some retailers may also mark up gluten free products, as they would niche gourmet products, however opinions were mixed on this.

So there you have it.

MB

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I admit it. I am a mudcake fan. But I am not a fan of slaving over a hot oven baking gluten free treats that my kids won’t eat.

For this reason, Woolworths’ Freefrom Chocolate Mud Cake Mix has become a bit of a fixture in our house when it comes to birthdays and school bake days.

Lots of kids we know love to turn their noses up at gluten free food on principle (it’s a kid thing) but they never even suspect they are being deprived of the stuff when they eat this cake.

I realise that there are plenty of delicious gluten free cake recipes that you can make from scratch. I have had great success with some in particular and plan to share my favourites on this site. Cakes really do seem to suffer less from gluten deprivation than many other food categories.

But this one is so quick, foolproof and tasty, especially when you are running late (which is almost always) that I always keep one in the cupboard.

You just add oil, water and eggs, fold with a spoon, cook for 40 minutes and it comes out perfectly every time. The chocolate icing (pretty much pure chocolate) is easy too.

And it is set off nicely by my handy stash of gluten free hundreds and thousands, made by Cupcake Mountain, which I bought recently at the gluten free expo.

Mudcake purists, though, will find this cake more spongy than muddy. Packet mixes do have their limits.

MB

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[8/12/09]   We have been chomping our way through Bayview’s new gluten free range which we’ve just found on the shelves in Coles this week nestled right under the Patties GF pies and the Pastry Pantry GF pastry sheets in the freezer section.

Crumbed chicken nuggets, fish bites and fish fillets are all up for grabs in some Coles and IGA alongside a veggie pattie selection for vegetarians.

With the first three in our possession, they proved a very popular dish in our household over the weekend.

We started out with the crumbed fish portions on Saturday night which have adopted the traditional triangular shape used by some non-GF frozen and crumbed fish fillets. Hidden inside the coating are ‘wild-caught’ flounder fillets and these proved quite tasty (for Mum and bub) and happily seemed quite low in salt too.

Last night we tackled the chicken nuggets and fish bites (photographed) and yes I know that means I served up fried food two nights running but please bear in mind that this blog needed to be written sooner rather than later and so someone had to sacrifice themselves.

So anyway, what did we make of these perennial kid favourites? Well the chicken nuggets were forged from real breast meat which immediately boosted their ranking in my book and they also tasted tender and light (if they had also been free-range then I would have been on cloud nine). Unfortunately their wholesomeness made them slightly less popular among the toddlers of the house, but we figure that we may be able to persuade them over time not to chew the batter off the outside, but to also enjoy the goodness inside.

The fishbites proved quite tasty, although I wasnt sure from reading the pack exactly what was inside other than white fish. Perhaps I am best left in the dark on this because they got thumbs up with junior.

This brings us to the gluten free coating. The box says its free of gluten, wheat, preservatives and lactose – which we like very much – but among other things it does have a little soy flour (digestible for us in smallish doses). Bayview has come up with quite a tasty coating with a pleasant texture, and does not seem to rely heavily on salt for its flavour.

So there you have it. Convenience food for the fussy gluten-free kid brigade has just taken some giant strides forward, and its hard to imagine back even to a year ago when we had to do it all ourselves only to suffer the indignity of our children telling us where to stick our pale, crumbly, homemade nuggets.

LH

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[6/12/09]  There is a new fad in town and it is not about what you do and don’t eat. Its about bagging out we people on gluten free diets.

TV3news in New Zealand wags its finger at us, warning that unless we have tested positive for coeliac, we are all wasting our money, and a USnews title has a similarly cautionary tale to tell about our fickle diet fancies.

Apparently we are all suffering from some hysterical delusion in which we imagine that we are actually benefiting from the stupendous amount of effort it takes to avoid gluten in our diets.

They have wheeled out the same type of doctors as our first GP and paediatrician who both assured me my son had absolutely no reaction to gluten after an apparently definitive blood test.

These people believe that only those with a positive result to coeliac testing are in any way responsive to gluten, and the rest of us are pathetic wannabes just trying to jump on their bandwagon.

These kind of misguided reports are not only shortchanging those poor souls that really do have a serious gluten sensitivity, but after testing negative to coeliac are left with no further medical support. They also do little to convince our own friends and relatives that we are not as balmy as they always suspected for removing one of the western world’s staple food from our diets.

Thank goodness for our current paediatrician who only needed one glimpse of my son’s faltering growth chart to suggest trialing a gluten free diet (I had honestly hoped he would not make that recommendation but in retrospect it was the nudge I needed).

Fortunately Dr Rodney Ford in New Zealand has also been studying affects of gluten on our minds and bodies and developed some very interesting ideas about why so many of us are starting to get sick from it despite what our doctors tell us. His research also indicates that the current testing methodology for gluten sensitivity might be quite deficient.

Of course I would never want to downplay the serious medical concerns of coeliacs, who unlike my son, can suffer devastating consequences from a trace fragment of gluten carelessly slipped into a pasta sauce. And when it comes to the food preparation business, there really is no excuse for ignorance about the distinction between the two conditions.

But I just don’t understand why those gluten-sceptic doctors think anyone of sound mind would take on a gluten free diet as a fickle, passing fad. Gluten free living is no picnic. It is a daily, difficult slog of deprivation and compromise in addition to the expense.

In fact the only reason I stick with it is that in return for my efforts I get a child that can actually sit down and eat a meal and gain weight from it, and no longer spends several hours most evenings grizzling for no observable reason. Oh, and I don’t get my own miserable, crippling stomach aches anymore.

But I probably  just imagined all of that.

LH

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[2/12/09] Vitarium reps recently told us that they spent a good few months tinkering with their gluten free pancake mix in order to make it yummy.

So confident were they in the product that they were handing out free samples at last month’s Gluten Free Expo in Sydney. I rolled my eyes (when they weren’t looking) based on my previous experiences with gluten free pancake mixes.

The results usually involved a heavy, rubbery pancake edible only in the first five minutes and only then when smothered in various syrups and creams.

This is why it has taken this long for me to muster up the enthusiasm to try Vitarium’s new offering.

But last night, after a lovely Monday roast, I whipped out the 100g packet, added 150ml of milk as instructed on the back of the pack and stirred. (I also tasted it and got a hint of that gluten free pancake fishy taste that I have encountered before).

The early result was a very gluggy mixture that would obviously have no spreading power in the pan. So I added another good slosh of milk and stirred.

Although still decidedly stiff, I decided to proceed so as to remain as true to Vitarium’s instructions as possible. Once in the pan, the mixture required a bit of encouragement to settle into a flat shape but cooked nicely into a small, fat but satisfyingly fluffy pancake. Not only was the texture great, but the pancake also tasted nice (happily not a hint of fish). One child even demanded seconds.

Well they were rather small pancakes and also the quantity made from a 100g pack was not enormous, but I managed to stash one away in the fridge to see if it passed the cold pancake in the playground test. Alas no. It was too heavy and the flavour too bland to be added to my lunchbox arsenal

However a quick refresh in the microwave and it was just as yummy as the night before. So now I just have to figure out how to get my hands on more.

MB

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[29/11/09] Feeling a little down after a fruitless search for gluten-free nuggets and fish fingers in my local Coles. Bayview said we should expect to find these in the frozen cabinet of Coles or IGA from November 26 at the recent Gluten Free Expo, but none of us of the GFF blog have yet managed to sniff any out.

I have just messaged Bayview to get the inside track, and I am also planning to flex my my people-power muscles and ask Coles for its own take on the nugget situation. I think its been long enough that we of the non-gluten persuasion have been without our fried favourites. Steamed fish has its place, but lets be honest here, sometimes you just want it smothered in crumbs and oven cooked. And of course it wouldn’t hurt to have a few extra items of convenience food in our arsenal of GF options for fussy children.

So fellow fish-finger fanciers, watch this space. [UPDATE: They are now available in Coles Freezer section. See our review.]

LH

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[26/11/09]   I just read this US article about the mother of a 9-year-old autistic child who asked a New Hanover County Judge to enforce her son’s gluten-free diet, something she says her ex-husband has not been following.

I am guessing this problem must be rife. In my own experience alone, the son of a friend of mine has had lifelong symptoms that suggest he may well be sensitive to gluten. However his mother can’t try him on a gluten free diet as her ex, who has the kids alternate weeks, would never comply.

Of course he loves his kids and wants the best for them but her as her son showed up negative on the test for Coeliac, she would have no grounds on which to convince him. (And its not like she has much sway with him these days.)

Even supportive partners can treat the gluten free thing as a bit of an indulgent whim, especially in the case of those not diagnosed as Coeliac but who are intolerant none the less.

In this court case, despite evidence from a gluten free naysayer from the medical community, the judge has forced the ex to comply (yay!) though I’d like to know how the court plans to police its ruling.

MB

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[22/11/09]  I have just survived another gluten-free weekend away from home, but sometimes I wonder if I wouldn’t have a better time just staying at home.

To illustrate, I will replay a conversation I had with non gluten free husband prior to departure. (note there were only very limited cooking facilities at our destination)

Him: “Where shall we eat while we are away?”

Me: “I can buy a hot chicken enroute and we can have that with salad for dinner, and on the second day a Chinese takeaway ought to suffice. We can pack plenty of snacks for other meals and the chicken should stretch to our second lunch. ”

Him: “I’d rather not. Lets try to have some proper meals over the weekend”.

Okay…. I wonder who is going to pack all the ingredients for those and cook them all in a single frypan then? I guess that will be me. Goodbye restful weekend.

Of course Chinese food was not the only fast food available at our destination. There were no shortage of pizza and pasta places too. But of course we of the gluten free persuasion can’t really easily digest the latter, and so that left us looking for a nice child-friendly restaurant that cooked something other than these. We drew a blank.

Sausages from the supermarket were our saviour (as they often are) because they are the one thing that everybody likes, are easy to cook up in a single pan (or thrown on barbie) and go well with almost anything, although beans and mash/toast are our most common accompaniments.

This experience has inspired me to come up with a list of gluten free friendly takeaway meals that you can get hold of in most towns. Would love some more suggestions if you can think of any . . .

-Hot chips (not always gluten free but we are rarely in a position to turn our noses up)

-Fish and chips (cooked without batter – although some small places get it in frozen batter ‘n all and cannot acommodate us)

-Noodles (rice) or rice dishes from an oriental restaurant. Some curry houses do gluten free curries, but not likely in out of the way places and not a very child friendly option anyway.

-Hamburger (throw away the bun) and stick the meat pattie on a plate with salad (must check patties are meat only). Not a very good option if you don’t have access to plates/cutlery.

-Gluten free pizza (some pizzerias are offering this now – but we are dairy free so its no good for us)

-Mexican – nachos/tacos are often gluten free.

-Delis – cold meat, salads, vine leaves etc.

-Sushi (if you are really lucky enough to run into one of these outside the city and your children have refined palates).

LH

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