Easy Gluten Free Cooking: Over 130 recipes plus nutrition and lifestyle advice for gluten. Rita Greer
type of fresh fruit – bananas, grapes, apples, oranges, pears, strawberries, raspberries etc.
dinner
• Grilled lamb chop, pork fillet or small steak
• Boiled carrots or grilled tomatoes
• 2 plain boiled or steamed green vegetables – cabbage, spinach, French (snap) beans, peas, sprouts etc.
• Plain brown rice, boiled
If you feel the need for a gravy, save the meat juices from the grill pan, strain them off, discard the fat and pour in some of the water strained from the vegetables. Mix well with a wooden spoon and add half a ripe tomato, mashed. Season to taste. Do not use any kind of gravy mix or stock cube/powder.
snacks
Allow yourself up to 1 or 2 small ripe bananas per day, a few plain almonds or walnuts (English walnuts) and dried fruits such as apricots and raisins.
alternative main meals
Eating out is a problem and best avoided when you start the diet. At home, stick to plain, fresh ingredients and you will have no worries.
Other main meals you might like to choose from are:
• Cold ham (without breadcrumb coating) and served with salad, jacket potato
• Cold lamb, beef or pork (off a previously roasted joint without stuffing) and served with salad, fried potatoes
• Cold chicken (cooked at home without stuffing) and served with salad and jacket potato
• Roast beef or lamb or pork with roast potatoes (no Yorkshire puddings) served with boiled or steamed vegetables such as carrots, peas, spinach, green beans
emergency ingredients
Without bread, cakes and biscuits (cookies) your starch/carbohydrate intake will be too low. Eat plenty of potatoes and rice to make up for this.
Bear in mind that these are emergency menus and are a little narrow in outlook for a long-term gluten-free diet. However, with this information you should be able to get started immediately rather than continue with an ordinary diet until you have reorganized your eating regime in a broader way. No matter how tempting, do not eat ordinary bread, cakes, biscuits, crispbreads etc.
Here is a shopping list/store cupboard check for emergency menus:
• Almonds and walnuts (English walnuts), (plain)
• Bacon
• Black peppercorns
• Brown rice (plain)
• Butter or margarine
• Cooking oil (sunflower or olive)
• Gluten free cornflakes or rice cereal from Free-from section at supermarket
• Dried fruit, plain, without wheat fructose-sucrose
• Eggs, fresh (not egg replacer)
• Fresh fruit
• Fresh meat or fish (plain)
• Fresh vegetables
• Milk, plain, fresh or dried
• Pure fruit juice
• Salmon, tuna (tunny), sardines – all canned in oil or water (not sauce)
• Sea salt
• Sesame and sunflower seeds (plain)
• Sugar
• Tea or coffee (plain)
• Tomato purée (paste)
emergency menus for children
Use the emergency menus for adults, but omit the alcohol and add extra snacks such as:
• Fresh orange segments sprinkled with a little sugar;
• Home-made fish cakes (see here)
• Home-made chips – serve hot with a poached egg on top and grilled tomatoes instead of tomato sauce (see here)
• Savoury rice – fry a small chopped onion in a little oil. Add chopped cooked vegetables and 1 cup (1 1/4 cups) of cold cooked rice. Heat through while turning over with a wooden spoon. Season and serve
• Milk shakes – blend 2 cups of milk with any piece of stoned, peeled fruit. Add sugar to taste and blend (you will need a blender/liquidizer for this)
chapter five staple gluten-free substitutes
basic starchy foods (gluten-free)
As many starchy foods are forbidden on a gluten-free diet, such as ordinary bread, cakes, biscuits, buns, crispbreads, pastas and pizza, etc., other starchy ingredients must take their place in order to maintain a nutritional balance. Rice, potatoes and bananas are all easily available, high in starch and, mercifully, gluten-free. Other such ingredients are tapioca, sago, millet, buckwheat (saracen corn) and kasha, the toasted form of buckwheat. (This commodity is gluten-free in spite of its name, and is a member of the same botanical family as rhubarb.)
potatoes
Potatoes can be cooked in a huge variety of ways and there are always several types on sale all year round, which makes a gluten-free diet more interesting.
Boiled If the potatoes are new, cook them in their skins in boiling, salted water for 20 to 25 minutes, depending on size, until tender. Old potatoes should be peeled and cut into evenly sized pieces first, then cooked for up to 30 minutes, depending on variety.
Mashed Boil old, floury varieties such as King Edwards and Cara until tender, then drain. Mash them in the saucepan with a knob of butter, a little milk and a pinch or two of freshly grated nutmeg, salt and freshly ground black pepper. They can be kept warm for a while in the oven.
Baked (Jacket Potatoes) Scrub old potatoes really well, cutting out any eyes or blemishes. Prick all over with a fork and bake for an hour in an oven preheated to 425°F/220°C/gas mark 7 or for 2 hours at 350°F/180°C/gas mark 4. Cut open and insert a knob of butter to serve. Leftover baked potatoes can be sliced, including skin, and fried in a little sunflower or olive oil the following day.
Roast Potatoes Peel old potatoes and cut into even-sized chunks. Place in a roasting tin and sprinkle with 1 tsp sunflower or olive oil for each medium-sized potato. Turn over by hand to coat the potato chunks with the oil, then roast at the top of the oven for about 3/4 hour on a high heat or 1 hour on a medium heat until crisp, golden and tender.
Chips (French Fries) Many brands of oven chips are not gluten-free, so it is safer to make your own (see here).
Potato Spaghetti A useful, quick way to cook potatoes, especially for breakfast as they only take 10 minutes (see here).
Potato Patties Peel old potatoes, then boil and mash them. Season to taste.