Easy Gluten Free Meal Ideas: Making A Drastic Change To Cooking Habits

Easy Gluten Free Meal Ideas – Ever been forced to research and prepare gluten free recipes almost overnight?

We consider ourselves knowledgeable when it comes to healthy eating. However, all of a sudden, something is just not right with Mom.

You take her to the doctor complaining of various aches and pains.

Altering The Diet To Easy Gluten Free Meal Ideas

A complete blood workup reveals a serious diagnosis – her blood sugar is sky high, the blood pressure not far behind and her kidneys are screaming.

In this particular instance, it is not about Celiac disease. It’s about finding any and all ways to reduce carbs and sugar.

easy gluten free meal ideas - Sausage and Turkey Chili

Sausage and Turkey Chili

This is how, on a crisp fall afternoon, she walked into the doctor’s office after eating a regular breakfast and less than an hour later, food, cooking and particularly eating as Mom knew it was changed forever – on doctor’s orders.

Our elderly Maman was basically given an ultimatum by her doctor. “Think gluten free cooking” from this day forward, as well as dairy free and particularly sugar free…or else.

We proceeded to clear out the fridge and tidy up the pantry – a step which was relatively easy to do.

Should Everyone East Gluten Free?

More appropriately, should diabetics eat gluten free? Today, there is not much left in the cabinets or on the pantry shelves. Indeed, what I’ve have discovered is that gluten free really is cooking from a completely different point of view.

Here we are just before the Thanksgiving holiday and the Christmas season trying to desperately lower her blood sugar levels to avoid frequent hypoglycemic episodes, end the pain of diabetic neuropathy, and have Mom regain a certain level of natural energy…all in record time.

Since late September, we’ve been busily and completely converting a well established French kitchen to meet the requirements of a very strict diet.

We’re also learning how to convert all our favorite Thanksgiving holiday recipe favorites for everything from side dishes to guilt free desserts.

These must not only pass a fine tuned taste test but also fit into acceptable versions of a gluten free, dairy free and sugar free diet.

Tasty Bread or Mock Cardboard?

To date, the most difficult change has come in the form of finding tasty bread for breakfast and sandwiches.   Allow me to re-phrase it to “bread with an acceptable texture”. Not an easy task but it is nice to know that good bread for such a diet can now be made in the bread machine.


Let’s face it. For Mom, it comes as a shock to have to give up the basic foods she has relied on for years – many years.

It is also not easy for a person in their late eighties to basically flip their entire diet on a dime.  But we’re doing it!

Join us as we navigate from a regular, relatively healthy diet to a seriously restricted manner of eating – from one day to the next.

Developing Tasty Mom Approved Gluten Free Recipes

After a couple months, we are not too badly off in the main dish category. We are also well on the way to developing a varied menu plan of main dishes and soups.  While there are tasty ready made canned soups available, many still have a relatively high sodium content.

While we are just in the beginning phase of bread tasting, one readily available selection has sky rocketed to the top of the acceptable to Mom category when it comes to texture but above all – taste!  Mind you, Mom’s taste buds are the judge in this “best of” contest.

However, if ever we needed a testimonial as to the less than appetizing taste, texture and flavor of certain brands of ready made “gluten free” baked goods, I need look no further than the great outdoors.  Outdoors?

When Woodland Creatures Say No Way!

Coming in at the top of the list in the complete fail column is a variety of so called English muffins.  She took one bite of her favorite breakfast food and immediately labeled it inedible.

It looks as if my woodland creatures agree with her.  I tossed them out for the birds and my regular night time possum and raccoon visitors.

Let it be known that not a single bird has approached the English muffins or even pecked at them.

After nearly two days in the elements, the muffins look the same and were completely overlooked by the furry critters who visit every night.  Ouch.

Gluten Free Recipes Fill The Freezer!

To provide a continuing variety of choices on the new diet menu, one day a week is reserved for the preparation of gluten free meals.

Slowly but surely, these ready made meals are filling the freezer.   The easiest to prepare and freeze ahead are hearty soups and stews.  This type of recipe makes it easy for her to prepare.  Each meal is frozen (transported in my favorite new kitchen gadget – the freezable shopping bag).

All she needs to do is pull her choice of dinner out of the freezer, thaw out or simply pop that giant ice cube from its container and slowly reheat on the stove.

Some of the recipes which have already passed the taste test and fill the freezer include:

Wegmans© Brand Gluten Free Products
Katz Gluten Free Pizza Crust

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