Nutrition S'Mart - Worth the Trip

A few weeks ago, I was visiting family in Fort Myers.  While I was there, I was introduced to a new brand of gluten-free bread (which I'll be blogging about shortly).  When I got home, I decided to see if it was in any local stores.  I visited the company's website, and that led me to visit Nutrition S'Mart, out in Pembroke Pines.

It's a drive west for me, but I had an afternoon off, and it only took about 25 minutes from downtown Fort Lauderdale.  And boy, was it worth the trip!  They have the greatest assortment of gluten-free foods I have ever seen under one roof.

There are "gluten free" sections, as well as products in the shelves in the appropriate sections.  But don't worry, Nutrition S'Mart has clearly labeled the shelves, so it's easy to find GF foods in any section of the store!

Not only do they have a wide variety of GF baking supplies and pastas, they also have prepared foods.  I've been grumbling ever since Whole Foods stopped carrying GF pie crusts; well, I know where to get them now.

And you don't have to trek all the way to Pembroke Pines; they have locations in Palm Beach Gardens, Port St. Lucie, and will soon be opening a store in Miami Gardens.  And if you're on the Gulf Coast, there are locations around Tampa/St. Pete.

I'll be reviewing some of the goodies I found today; a lot of them are new to me, and I'm curious to see what they're like.  But don't wait on me; if you can't find a pasta or a bread or cookies that you like at Whole Foods, head out to Nutrition S'Mart.

Read more...

Hometown Hollywood Bakery

Doris Italian Market & Bakery started out in Hollywood, Florida, and now has 6 locations across South Florida.  It's hard to tell from their website, but they do have some gluten-free products such as polenta and Sam Mills GF Pasta.



But they also have a blog, At the Table...with Doris Italian Market.  And they post gluten-free recipes!

The Italian Timballo recipe looks intriguing (although the author mistakenly suggests Spelt as a GF bread).

Hopefully, this is a trend they will continue.

Read more...

Celiac; Cause for Alarm

According to Dr. Mark Hyman's article in the Huffington Post, Celiac Disease is a bigger problem than bloating and frequent trips to the toilet.

He writes as a result of reading a recent study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association:

This study looked at almost 30,00 patients from 1969 to 2008 and examined deaths in three groups: Those with full-blown celiac disease, those with inflammation of their intestine but not full-blown celiac disease, and those with latent celiac disease or gluten sensitivity (elevated gluten antibodies but negative intestinal biopsy).

The findings were dramatic. There was a 39 percent increased risk of death in those with celiac disease, 72 percent increased risk in those with gut inflammation related to gluten, and 35 percent increased risk in those with gluten sensitivity but no celiac disease.

Which is alarming enough, frankly, but there's more.

Another study comparing the blood of 10,000 people from 50 years ago to 10,000 people today found that the incidences of full-blown celiac disease increased by 400 percent (elevated TTG antibodies) during that time period.  If we saw a 400 percent increase in heart disease or cancer, this would be headline news. But we hear almost nothing about this.

He also lists other diseases linked to gluten:

A review paper in The New England Journal of Medicine listed 55 "diseases" that can be caused by eating gluten.  These include osteoporosis, irritable bowel disease, inflammatory bowel disease, anemia, cancer, fatigue, canker sores,  and rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, multiple sclerosis, and almost all other autoimmune diseases. Gluten is also linked to many psychiatric  and neurological diseases, including anxiety, depression, schizophrenia, dementia, migraines, epilepsy, and neuropathy (nerve damage).  It has also been linked to autism.

It should be noted that the stories of the effectiveness of a gluten free diet in treating autism are anecdotal; no study to date has found that there is a definite link between gluten consumption and autism.

Dr. Hyman's article is extensively footnooted, and well worth the read.  And it begs the question, is gluten a bigger problem than we have thought?

Read more...

Gluten-Free Beer

Carolyn Smagalski has created an extensive Celiac's Guide to Gluten-Free Beer on BellaOnline.com.  I'd be a fool to attempt to recreate it; and they do update it on a regular basis.

Not only do they list the beers, and link to websites, they've also reviewed quite a number of them.

My personal favorite is Anheuser-Busch's Redbridge Beer. It's made from sorghum, and has a crisp taste reminiscent of an India Pale Ale. The website has a great locator tool. Locally, you can find it at many Publix Supermarkets, several Total Wine & More stores, and  Whole Foods Markets.  Dining out, your options are more limited, but it is available at scattered restaurants across South Florida.

Of course, when I say "my favorite," it gives the impression that there are lots of options down here; there aren't. The only other GF beer with any real distribution is New Grist, from Wisconsin's Lakeside Brewery. I've only seen this in Whole Foods, and once in a while it shows up at Total Wine.  It's a light, sweet lager.

Read more...

Review: Kona Grill

The blog Living Gluten-Free in South Florida dined at the Kona Grill, in West Palm Beach.

We were spending the weekend in WPB and visited CityPlace for lunch.  The restaurant we were planning to go to was closed so we decided to check out Kona Grill.  Much to my surprise, they had a gluten-free menu!

Sadly, there haven't been any further posts at that blog since October 2009; hopefully they'll pick up in the near future.

Read more...

Hello, and Welcome!

I was diagnosed with Celiac Disease as an infant, back in 1964.  When my mother tried to start me on solid foods, it passed through my digestive tract without any noticeable change.

Back then, not much was known about the disease; it was believed to be a childhood illness, and the doctors told my mother that it was caused by an under-developed digestive system.  Don't worry, they told her, he should grow out of it.  They also told her that if I didn't, they'd admit me to give me the only treatment they were aware of; withhold all food for several days, so that the body would be so desperate for food that it would jump-start the digestive system when food was finally re-introduced.  Fortunately, I seemed to recover.

I was always small for my age, up until puberty.  In my teens, I was diagnosed with lactose intolerance following complaints of excess flatulence.  Overall, I was reasonably health, but occasionally would suffer cramps following pasta dinners.  This was dismissed as the result of over-eating, and it's true I did love pasta.

As I got older, other symptoms began to manifest, but all were treated as unrelated phenomena.  It wasn't until I was fooling around on Google one night, and recalled my long-forgotten childhood illness, that I was correctly diagnosed.

I went gluten-free in 2002, and it was a difficult road at first.  Not that I was suddenly starving; there really are a lot of gluten-free foods available in the supermarkets; since I prepared my own meals, it was a matter of leaving out bread cookies and cake, and forgoing some favorite soups.  Going out was harder, as was traveling. Gone are the days of hitting the McDonald's drive through and chowing down on a burger while driving down the road.

As awareness has increased, sources of prepared gluten-free foods have grown.  Many restaurants now have gluten-free menus, and store shelves have GF cookies and breads.  Even 'mainstream' vendors like Betty Crocker and King Arthur's Mills have GF products, and more companies join them every day.

Not a day goes by that I don't bump into someone who has learned they have Celiac Disease, or that has a friend living gluten-free.  Friends, cousins, co-workers, all have found themselves faced with making changes to their lifestyle.

This blog is dedicated to helping those of us in South Florida find gluten-free products in stores, and finding restaurants with gluten-free menus and options.  It's getting easier to live gluten-free, but that doesn't mean that it's easy to start the diet.  I will not be a replacement for Gluten-Free for Dummies, but I'll be a good place to look for local sources.

There will be a glut of articles as I get this blog started; eventually, I will probably publish two days a week, maybe three.  We'll see how it goes.

We're all in this together.  So relax, you're not alone.

Read more...