Just a Gripe!

[Judy]

This is just a little vent...

When I find GF food for my husband WHY,WHY, WHY isn't it separated from other foods? It aggrevates the cr#p out of me when I pick up something that isn't GF and its sitting amongst the GF items. Yesterday I went to buy some bread for him and in the freezer along side the GF bread was other "natural" bread - not GF. Thanks for letting me vent.
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Judy

[paw]

That still sounds a step up from the Asian market I shopped at for flour. There was a little freezer that had Ice Cream Sandwiches in boxes, and raw fish on crushed ice all jumbled together. Ummm . . . we passed on those, LOL

I have decided not to buy ANYTHING but flours (maybe some tea or rice) that are labeled and wrapped in plastic from that store. The produce looks interesting, but I am concerned about safety. Also, the whole store smelled strongly of fish (not in a good way).

I think your husband's bread would be safe as long as it is plastic wrapped and the bag is not broken. I think that most GF products will be stocked at a store by an employee who has been handling "regular" stuff a few minutes before. You also know the cashier is handling all sorts of things before they ring up your order and they don't wash their hands or register belt before your turn. Someone let me know if I am wrong!

[Padams]

[Judy]

Sorry, I guess I didn't make myself clear - its not the contamination problem. I meant that sometimes you see a package of NON-gluten free bread or whatever sitting right beside or behind the GF items. You may pick up something thinking its GF when in fact its not. Several times I've picked up something and then realized its not GF. For instance, I bought hubby some GF cereal that was right beside some that looked the same but was NOT GF. I got it to the register and was about to pay for it before I realized it. Thanks for your responses!
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Judy

[Linda]

I buy my son's cereal at Superstore, and it's mixed in with the regular cereal and has a ridiculously long name. Something like "Too Good to Be True Ancient Maize Corn Flakes more words I can't remember Cereal". In small print at the bottom are a bunch of words all strung together like: organic-sugar free-low carb-gluten free-casein free-blah-blah-blah-blah. EVERY time I go there, I pick up the box and think, yup, this is the stuff, then I have to read every single word on the box until I see the words gluten free, because it's next to a box that looks exactly the same except green and it's NOT gluten free. Envirokids cereal (which my son hates) is like that--the gluten free is exactly the same picture and everything on the front except tiny words in the corner that you have to read every time: gluten free or chock-full of gluten. (or something like that )

My other store used to have a "natural market" section with everything that was organic or gluten free separated out in it's own section, now it's all mixed in, so if my son were to actually eat a gf pancake and I wanted a mix, I couldn't just go to the natural section anymore, I have to go to the pancake mix section and check 18 kinds of mix before I found the right one. Luckily, he'd rather die than eat a pancake gf or not--saves me the aggravation of looking, too.

KELLOGG'S! WHEN WILL YOU QUIT PUTTING THAT FREAKING MALT IN EVERY DARN THING YOU MAKE! MY SON WANTS RICE KRISPIE SQUARES!!

Okay, I'm done now .

Linda

[Wendy Oake]

Linda - I was so happy to find that Ancient Whatever Corn Flakes cereal at Superstore - it actually tastes pretty good and was the first gluten-free cereal I found that had anything approaching nutritional value. Superstore also has a Corn Pops type cereal marked "gluten-free" - it isn't great, but I prefer it to the EnviroKids stuff when I need a kid cereal fix.
I made rice crispie squares last night using Kinnikinnik's rice crispies - they are not quite the same as the real thing, but not bad at all. Being in Edmonton (go Oilers!), I am lucky to have Kinnikinnik here - it is really nice to walk into a grocery store with the feeling that I can eat anything I can find in there. I bought their iced chocolate brownies for me and the other woman with Celiac in my office this week when we were having birthday cake for another co-worker, and I have to say that everyone who tried the "special" brownies agreed that they were great.

Wendy

[isto]

Hi, Linda!

I get sick of the malt in everything, too! I ran into the same thing with Envirokids and it frustrates me!

Although it isn't the same thing as Rice Krispie Treats, you could make the treats with Cocoa Pebbles or Fruity Pebbles because they ARE GF. I called Post to be sure last week.

That could be even BETTER than Krispie treats!

Danita

[paw]

I did not get it the first time. Sorry. It would be nice if they had all the GF items in one aisle at the store and you KNEW the specialty brand of rice krispies was acutally safe to eat. One thing I want to fuss about is the tiny tiny words in the ingredients. I will have to bring a magnifier lens to shop!

None of the stores near me separate out the GF items, the health food stores do have nice labels though.

[Linda]

[Judy]

Wendy - how lucky you are to have a Kinnikinnik near you. I've just found the brand through this forum and my husband is so happy. He's actually eating bread again and loving it. We have a small health food store that has the brand, but they never have more than 1 or 2 loaves of bread. I've only been able to buy white sandwich bread once - she never seems to have any when I go there. She does have the dark bread which hubby likes, but never the white. Yesterday my daughter took me to a health food store in her city that carries the brand and they had nothing but english muffins and teeny bagels. I guess I'll just have to order the stuff on line.

Linda - I found two brands of "rice krispy" type cereals - Erewhon (pronounced Air-Wahn) crispy brown rice and Nature's Path Crispy Rice that might work well for rice krispy squares. I offered to make them for my husband, but since he has type 1 diabetes they would be way too sweet for him.
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Judy

[aklap]

Another Rice Krispy replacement we use is Barbara's Brown Rice Crisps is what I use for a Rice Krispy alternative.

I have not checked it for diabetics, but it is sweetened with fruit juice. Total carbs = 25g Sugars = 2g
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Al

“We cannot all do great things, but we can do small things with great love.” Mother Teresa

[Professor]

[Yasmine]

[Shiloh]

I really like the Ancient Quinoa speghetti and unfortunately the whole wheat and quinoa blend is always next to the wheat free blend and guess who almost cooked the whole wheat one! I never even noticed, just grabbed the box, paid and went home. Now I am so nervous I stand there reading everything! Whole foods mixes all their gf flours, crackers and whatnot in among the evil wheat bearing products and it frustrated me to no end! Why not just take a shelf and put all of our gf items on it, nicely stacked together. One stop shopping! We could go right to "our" shelf and be done with it.
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gf since 3/27/04

[Judy]

Amen! That's my gripe - the packaging all looks so much the same, so you have to take the time to REALLY look for the GF info. The cereal I buy for Charlie (hubby) is in a box EXACTLY the same as the non-GF, the only difference is the little GF flag on the box. It would be so much easier to have it all together in one place.
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Judy