Gluten-Free Pasta

In my attempt to be as gluten-free as possible (with a few slip ups for Pizza in the last month or so... I'm so not perfect), I have been trying different kinds of pasta that are wheat free... They are few and far between, my friend. Most recipes for gluten-free pasta dishes call for a rice pasta... Um, yeah... Not liking the rice pasta...

First, the texture is SO DIFFERENT from regular pasta. Normal tricks to keep pasta from gumming together don't work with rice pasta (as I learned when I tried to make rice-angel hair pasta to go with my gluten-free version of Chicken Marsala). I tried drizzling the pasta with a little EVOO to keep it from lumping together, but it just gave me an olive oil flavored lump of rice pasta... sigh... The flavor of the rice pasta was nice in my Chicken Marsala dish - so much so that I actually ate all my mushrooms instead of passing them over to my husband (I don't usually care for mushrooms, but combined with my rice blob, they were quite nice).

Other than my somewhat pleasant experience with Chicken Marsala, rice pasta is awful... just horrible. I love pasta and I would be a very depressed person if I had to eat rice pasta on a regular basis.

I did try another grain variety of pasta. I tried a quinoa/corn blend. Texture-wise, it was closer to regular pasta and it was way more flavorful than the rice pasta. I had it the other night paired with regular marinara sauce (from a jar) and it was nice. It would also go well with pesto. Not sure about alfredo sauce, but I can't eat that anymore anyway, so why punish myself? I'm going to try a recipe for mac & cheese that uses the quinoa pasta.

Another variety I need to try is spelt pasta. I have yet to find any at my local grocery store (which has a surprisingly good selection of gluten-free products). The next time I go downtown, I'll check and see if the "health food store" has it in stock. If not, I'm not going to worry about it too much. I've got my quinoa version.

Another plus? My husband actually LIKED the quinoa pasta. That means that I don't have to buy two different kinds of pasta and cook two different batches each time we eat spagetti. Nice, huh?

Progress!

I've been on a wheat-free/dairy-free diet for the month of February so far (at least, mostly wheat-free/dairy-free). I have noticed significant differences in my health. I am no longer hyper-allergic to things. I still sneeze now and then, but I haven't had one of my major allergy attacks at all this month. Not even when Aaron and I were cleaning the house last weekend in preparations for his parents to come visit us. Awesome!

Another change I've noticed is that I am not so bloated in the mid-section as I was before.

I have found additional bread that I can eat. The local baker makes a lovely sourdough spelt bread with sunflower seeds on it... Yummy! I foresee myself making more trips downtown to his shop to get a loaf...

I have also learned what I can and cannot eat at most of the restaurants in Juneau. There is a lot of variety out there for me!

Ezekiel Bread

So, I'm not doing so great on my no wheat/no dairy diet... I have been craving cheese pizza like nobody's business... I just keep reminding myself that my body is going through withdrawals and it will get easier (I speak from personal experience... I FINALLY stopped craving eggs a few months ago).

I've been trying to be good, but I think I took it a little too far yesterday... I ate only protein and veggies (no starch - primarily because I forgot to add brown rice to my chicken vegetable soup the other day). I went to bed with a headache last night and woke up with one this morning... Not fun.

So, today, I took myself to the grocery store for lunch and restocked up on Honey Nut Chex (gluten free!) and I picked up a loaf of Ezekiel bread. I have been a little wary of Ezekiel bread, expecting it to be a little too hippy-dippy-trippy for my tastes (kind of like my experience with freezer waffles). But, I have been longing for toast for so long now that I just had to try the one product that the doctor said I could eat... So, I dipped my toe into the Ezekiel bread world by buying the Cinnamon-Raisin variety, hoping that the sweetness from the raisins and cinnamon would ease me in to the hippy-dippy-trippy world.

I made a slice of toast with butter (I'm not giving up on my butter, just cutting back... I don't want to eat chemically engineered "butter" just because it's non-dairy)... It was so tasty! But, that could be because I haven't had bread in over a week... I'm still going to eat it! A slice with some peanut butter might be nice... Or I still have some apple-pear butter from Christmas that would be nice as well...

I guess what I'm saying here is to not be afraid of Ezekiel Bread... It is lower in glycemic index than regular bread and it is made with sprouted grain - not flour (according to the info on the packaging) - which makes it easier to digest than regular bread. I'm not sure if Aaron will go for it, or if he is going to stick with his buttermilk-white bread that he likes. Either way, I will have Ezekial bread on-hand in the future!

The weekend....

I thought I was doing very well this weekend... My office had a party at my favorite pizza place and I didn't eat the pizza, only salad. It was kind of depressing, though. The salad was good (it always is), but without the pizza skins (basically breadsticks), it wasn't very satisfying. Oh well... I also consumed the rest of my pop tarts (purchased before the Dr put me on the new diet and I wanted to remove the temptation as early as possible... I know, my logic kind of sucks right now) and some poorly baked sourdough bread... But that was it for the "wheat" products. The only other grains I consumed were either rice or oatmeal.

For today:

Breakfast:

• Coffee w/ sugar
• 2 Jimmy Dean Turkey Sausage patties

AM Snack:

• 1 Braeburn Apple
• a handful of raw almonds

Lunch:

• Garden salad with Tuna and peas, no dressing (Tuna was expired when I tried to eat it... so no tuna today)

PM Snack:

• Vanilla yogurt

Dinner:

• Lentil soup

Dessert:

• probably not going to have dessert...

On the menu for today:

Breakfast:

• Honey-Nut Chex (Gluten Free)
• Almond Milk

AM Snack:

• Fruit Salad with Low-fat Vanilla Yogurt
• (I know I said "No-Dairy" this month, but yogurt doesn't count. It is easier to digest than other dairies and has beneficial bacteria in it. So it's the only dairy on my list right now)

Lunch:

• Garden Salad with Chicken, Almonds, and Leftover Rice
• Apple

PM Snack:

• Wheat-free Granola Bar w/ Peanuts

Dinner:

• Lentil Soup (Lentils, Mixed Veggies)

Dessert:

• Not sure yet... probably some fruit w/ yogurt...

Off-Track

So, life has smacked me upside the head and my health has taken a back seat. I started feeling like crap and feeling extremely fatigued. Like, I felt the constant need to rest my head on my desk at work... Not really good for a productive work day... I was also having frequent migraines, several times a week... Not fun...

I decided that I needed to take a little break from school so that I could get to the bottom of my fatigue, especially since the overwhelming fatigue usually made it difficult to keep up with my school work. I still want to work towards my degree, so I just took a leave of absence for about a month.

I made an appointment with my doctor to get to the bottom of things... Where she promptly smacked me upside the head for overlooking my health due to the increasing stress in my life... Initially, she discussed the winter blues (SAD) and recommended that I get a SAD light (kind of expensive, though, so it might be a little while before I get one). She also put me on a medication to help combat my fibromyalgia and fatigue... It has also helped with my insomnia. I was told to reduce stress as much as possible and rest as much as possible (which means I need to go to bed at a decent hour and aim for 8-10 hours of sleep at night).

I saw my doctor today for a follow up to see how the meds are treating me. In addition to increasing my dosage, she wants me on a wheat-free/dairy-free diet for at least a month... She feels that my diet of pretty much nothing but carbs is making my allergies to other things (dust, mold, dogs, etc) worse than they should be. She also feels that the migraines are exacerbated by my diet (or lack thereof of a "healthy" diet).

So, armed with my new directions, I will be eating no wheat, dairy, or eggs (already a known allergen). She recommended that I follow the "Eating Right for your (Blood) Type" and stick to the foods listed for my blood type (and avoid the bad foods like the plague). Amazon has a Kindle version of the book, which has been purchased and loaded on my reading device. I'm ready to learn and prepared to focus on myself as much as possible this month... We'll see how it goes!

Has it really been three months since I posted last?

I guess so... I can only say that I've been extremely busy and stressed out... My personal health goals have been put by the wayside... I need to get back in the game, but it is now the holiday season... Pumpkin pie is my weakness (along with Mashed Potatoes and Gravy and Rolls and Turkey and.. and.. and...) My only consolation is to my egg allergy. I have adapted one of my favorite pie recipes to be egg-free and I posted the recipe on my main blog - Musings of the Wife of a Pilot.

I hope to be able to focus on myself soon and get back to posting my progress here.