Drinking a celebratory beer after climbing Mount Whitney. Beer is not gluten free.

When I first discovered I was allergic to gluten it took some time for me to learn what foods had gluten in them and what foods did not. I was constantly learning and often surprised by my findings as I began my gluten free diet plan.

I told myself to just eat lean proteins and vegetables, everything else is off limits. That made it easy for me to eliminate foods with gluten in them from my diet. I’m Italian so this was a hard adjustment for me.

Immediately I decided these foods were off limits because they are NOT GLUTEN FREE:

Cookies – Ugh. Chocolate Chips cookies have always been my favorite indulgence!

Cake / Cupcakes / Baked Goods– I had to learn to pass on all sweets that were offered to me at parties, events, and family get togethers. I could no longer partake in these activities and I had a killer sweet tooth. It was HARD.

Fried Foods – I didn’t eat many fried foods previously but I did engage in the occasional chicken tender or tempura. No more. I also avoided french fries at first. More on that later.

Spaghetti and Pasta – I didn’t cook pasta much at home, but I’m Italian and us Italians love our pasta. This was something I was just going to have to deal with.

Beer – Before I went gluten free, beer was my drink of choice. I enjoyed drinking a cold pint after a long day of snowboarding or meeting up with friends for a beer. I also enjoyed all the fun beer related games such as flip cup and beer pong. I enjoyed tried different kinds of beer at breweries. No more.

The above were the obvious foods with gluten. I quickly learned of the hidden gluten in foods such as soy sauce. Yes, soy sauce has gluten in it. Terriyaki sauce also has gluten in it. Many salad dressings have gluten in them. And even tea has gluten in it! Yes, some teas have gluten in them. This was all crazy for me to wrap my head around and I was constantly learning what was in my food through much research and sadly, a lot of trial and error.

The following foods have gluten in them:

Bread (White, Wheat, Rye, Sourdough) all of it has gluten
Pasta
Cookies. Chocolate Chip Cookies, Peanut Butter Cookies, Oatmeal Raisin Cookies.
Soy Sauce
Terriyaki Sauce
Cupcakes
Croissants

If a food has flour, it has gluten in it! The above is just a short list. Make sure you learn to read labels and make sure you ask a lot of questions when ordering foods at restaurants.

And if you’re not sure, stick with vegetables and a lean meat. Make sure you know what’s in the sauce because many sauces can have gluten in them.

This is just a small sampling of foods containing gluten. I will elaborate more in posts to come.

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