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Don’t get me wrong, cookbooks and recipes aren’t a bad starting point. <\/span>But they are only part\u2014and a relatively small part of the solution. <\/span>What’s more, they’re the easy part. <\/span><\/p>\n \n The fact is, there are TONS of wheat-free recipes. <\/span>They’re all over the place, including under your nose (and on your cookbook shelf): <\/span>think of all the stir-fry recipes, chicken recipes, meat dishes, vegetable recipes, bean recipes, fruit salsas, stews and soups and rice dishes, to name just a few. <\/span>A vast majority contain no wheat or gluten products. <\/span>I have lived wheat free for 20 years and am far from starving\u2014in fact I’m better fed now than ever. <\/span><\/p>\n \n The problem, of course, is that when we are newly diagnosed with a wheat or gluten allergy, we filter the news from our current eating perspective. <\/span>Likely as not, that eating perspective revolves around A LOT of wheat products: <\/span>pizza, pasta, tortillas, pancakes, toast, sandwiches, flour-thickened sauces, muffins, cakes, and so on and so forth. <\/span>Only when you are given wheat or gluten diagnosis do you realize how wheat-centric our diet is. <\/span><\/p>\n \n To begin with, I certainly viewed our wheat (and dairy) diagnoses as tremendous burdens, but it didn’t take long to see what a hidden blessing they were. <\/span>Being forced to think creatively about food, we had our eyes, minds and taste buds treated to a Technicolor world of wildly different and delicious new foods. <\/span>Thank goodness we haven’t been saddled with a myopically monochromatic diet for the last 20 years! <\/span><\/p>\n \n Making the shift from tremendous burden to tantalizing blessing, I discovered, was attributable to a whole range of things. <\/span>Yes, I found a few new recipes to help, but as important were things like:<\/p>\n –being organized enough to find those recipes when mealtime rolled around<\/p>\n –having the right ingredients in the frig<\/p>\n –being open to new tastes<\/p>\n –learning a few basic cooking skills to make decent meals<\/p>\n –knowing where to find gluten-free products at the grocery store<\/p>\n –being willing to invest time in setting up the kitchen for gluten-free cooking<\/p>\n –being willing to give meal making the attention and consideration it deserves, and<\/p>\n –being willing to exercise the parental vigor necessary to prevent a picky eaters from taking root in our house.<\/p>\n \n This last point is vitally important when kids are involved. <\/span>If a child is raised from Day 1 with a broad range of tastes, then you will have no problem feeding him well on a gluten-free diet. <\/span>But if, as so many children, he is allowed to dictate the food agenda and constrict his tastes to a narrow range, he will be consigned to a life of fighting his food limitations instead of reveling in the joy of all the delicious foods still available.<\/p>\n \n So that is why I encourage anyone newly diagnosed to inquire beyond recipes and cookbooks and examine the approaches and attitudes you bring to the table, so to speak. <\/span><\/p>\n \n Check out my tips on preventing picky eaters (email for a copy), look at how well your kitchen is organized for gluten-free cooking. <\/span>My book, Take Control of Your Kitchen<\/em>, can be a big help here. <\/span>Notice if you have good mealtime habits, like planning ahead for meals, always having gluten-free snack bags for car trips, a lineup of school lunch options, etc. <\/span>MOST IMPORTANTLY, develop a firm sense of purpose, i.e., that the time and effort you put into feeding you and\/or your child is indeed a valuable and worthwhile use of your time. <\/span><\/p>\n \n For families, remember that taising a gluten-free child will be most successful and cause the least amount of stress if it is a family affair\u2014and mom and dad will gain all the health benefits of the child’s good diet. <\/span>Many parents worry about getting their child into the right schools, pushing them to excel in reading and math, preventing their brains from being corrupted by X-rated movies, monitoring their friends, and so. <\/span>Yet we think nothing of racing through a fast food outlet and poisoning our children’s bodies with factory created food will few, if any, of the nutrients a growing body and mind needs. <\/span>As parents, we must dare to be different and take the time to nourish ourselves and our children\u2014body, brain and spirit\u2014with wholesome food. <\/span>Do not doubt that this is a valuable use of our time\u2014despite what the fast food ads blare out. <\/span><\/p>\n \n I hope these insights will be of help if you face a wheat or gluten-free diagnosis. <\/span>If you could benefit from some one-on-one coaching and assistance, I specialize in implementing wheat and diary free diets and we can work over the phone and Internet as well as in-person.<\/p>\n \n \n \n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" What do you do if you’ve been told to stop eating wheat or gluten? Cookbooks and recipes aren’t a bad starting point. But they are only part\u2014and a relatively small part of the solution. What’s more, they’re the easy part. Find out the deeper fundamentals that will lead to more lasting–and enjoyable–success.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"generate_page_header":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[11,18,20,8,14],"tags":[49,201,247,250,357,447,640,642],"class_list":["post-279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-what-is-healthy-eating","category-organize-your-kitchen-for-health","category-recipes","category-gluten-freewheat-free-eating","category-new-ingredients","tag-attitudes-for-healthy-eating","tag-feeding-children","tag-gluten-free-diet","tag-gluten-free-recipes","tag-kitchen-organizing","tag-picky-eaters","tag-wheat-free-diet","tag-wheat-free-recipes","masonry-post","generate-columns","tablet-grid-50","mobile-grid-100","grid-parent","grid-50"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cookhappylivehealthy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cookhappylivehealthy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cookhappylivehealthy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cookhappylivehealthy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cookhappylivehealthy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=279"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cookhappylivehealthy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2788,"href":"https:\/\/cookhappylivehealthy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279\/revisions\/2788"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cookhappylivehealthy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cookhappylivehealthy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cookhappylivehealthy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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\n “Do you have any wheat-free recipes?” <\/span>As a kitchen and healthy eating coach, that’s usually the first thing I’m asked by people who have been prescribed a gluten or wheat-free diet.\u00a0 It’s a completely understandable inquiry. <\/span>We think “recipes” when someone tells us we need to eat differently, whether it’s to benefit the heart, to ease arthritis or work around food allergies.<\/p>\n