A client of mine has been having some health issues albeit leading a moderately healthy lifestyle so I was very curious to learn what she was doing wrong or not doing that lead to the continuous health problems despite drinking herbal teas, keeping away from dairy and most processed foods. My instinct told me it might be a gluten intolerance and I immediately asked her to try avoid wheat (semonila for pasta), barley, oats, rye and guess what, she started to feel the health benefits immediately. This also challenged me to decrease my gluten intake and I have also witnessed increase in energy levels especially when I am training for the Nairobi Marathon.

After reading wide research on gluten I have learnt that it does cause many diseases, more than 35 disease going by the research documented in the New England journal of medicine. Yes this sounds scary, having to quit wheat and most commercially processed foods but anything that makes you healthier is worth trying out.

Some uninformed websites will try say there is nothing as gluten sensitivity but you should know better and read mostly from Natural News where they are strongly for the gluten free diet, for coeliacs and other people.

Gluten Free Alternatives

The best thing about nature is the availability of healthier alternatives for everything though gluten-free foods are not easy to hack especially gluten-free baking but I am getting there.

  1. Quinoa

Pronounced ‘Keen-Wah’, is a nutritional powerhouse and those people who know their food will tell you that it is one of the best pseudocereals to inculcate in your diet. It cooks in 15 minutes and can also be ground into a flour and made into pasta, pancakes, chapati. There are many grains that are gluten-free that can also be used in a pizza dough, e.g. millet dough pizza, I know it sounds funny but believe me, it tastes very good.

2. Gluten-Free Baking Mix

Mixing your own flours and condiments for gluten free baking might be tricky and expensive. As a chef I would not do this but for the busy person, it is very logical. You can get the baking mixes in your health stores and some supermarkets and also online.

3. Gluten-Free Flour Blend

I also prefer making my own blends but the ones sold at healthy U stores are well balanced and also have recipes on the back that are very hard to find on the internet. You can use it to make pastries, cakes and also thicken stews, broths and what not.

4. Xantham Gum

This is a natural binder of sorts, as you know gluten is a protein responsible for the stickiness in dough and batter. I have not tried it out but I have seen it in many gluten free recipes especially for pasta and baking, also available at Healthy U.

By the way, Novak Djokovic is strongly rising to the top seed in tennis, eating stars like Nadal and Federer for breakfast, thanks to a gluten free diet. Kim Kardashian is also crediting her nice booty to keeping off gluten, tafakari hayo!

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