On Special Diets

Well today I had to go to the lab, and like always I had breakfast AFTER that at the hospital's cafeteria. To say they have fine cuisine would be a huge lie. Yet, and this is what is interesting, finding something I can safely eat was not as easy as it should.

Gluten allergies suck, but believe it or not I ended up getting the ... back of chips to go with the eggs. Yes, it sucks, but potatoes O'Brian have what flour...

In mexico this is far less of an issue. Finding things I can eat is easy.

But here in the US... they hide the gluten in like everything.

Just a minor rant... it makes life that much interesting.

Just a point of clarification for those unfamiliar with the dish.

They do it to keep the taters separated and put it in the spice, They could easily use oh potato starch.

... for, well a number of things, and they finally diagnosed her as diabetic, but it was fairly difficult to order a diabetic friendly meal, even as a patient, and now that she is in a rehabilitation center, it's even more difficult.

One would think that hospitals and other health care providers would be more careful about the food they offer.

at the same place that the diet was meant to drum up traffic.

He thought I was being funny.

In fact, they do a fair job promoting positive eating habits, just not in what they serve.

in OTHER countries the aproach is different, or for that matter in a FEW hospitals in the US. If you go to the Cleveland Clinic, you will realize that they talk the talk and walk the walk. Other places, not so much.

I finally had to stop eating out at all, stop eating food that other people brought over
( that is a big habit in the South, anytime neighbors feel like sharing,
they drop food off, I have to give it to Mr. d, or the dog)
I had to stop eating all processed foods, for the most part.

We have saved a lot on the food bill, since we only buy "ingredients" now.
But for ages, every single thing I put in my mouth had to be checked out on the web for
wheat/barley, etc gluten,
and food dyes ( turns out I react very strongly to food dyes).
Lots of products DO say, on the label, "contains wheat". And the labels do list food dyes.
But, as you pointed out, cafeteria/restaurant foods contain invisible gluten.
Plus the staff are very poorly educated, impossible to get them to understand the problem.

for those who may not know, gluten allergy/celiac disease can produce very serious symptoms.
Mine hit within 6 hours and last 24 hours, the most mild includes very painful joints and flu like symptoms.

for me it is within oh three hours.

And tummy cramps...

I carry medication to deal with it but I was going AT A HOSPITAL?

Thankfully living in SoCal I can find Mexican food that is safe... and Thai Food and all that. But still.

On the bright side, I have become an even better cook.

She usually just ends up getting salad. Or a bugger and fries w/o the bun, but even that can be risky unless you ask the people working there.

When cooking for yourself, have you tried the Chebe mix?? It is SOOOOO good! I can eat gluten if I want and I think it's just as good as bread a lot of times. We find it at our local supermarket in the health food section but they also have it at Amazon -

http://www.amazon.com/Chebe-Bread-All-Purpose-7-5-Ounce-Bags/dp/B001ACNWY8/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=grocery&qid=1286942273&sr=8-2

We make calzones by just following the recipe on the package, adding sauce, pepperoni, cheese (except now wife is dairy free as well cause of new baby), and red peppers cut up or olives. YUMMMM!!!

Anyways, at another hospital when wife had baby recently, they did ok with the GF allergy, usually just leaving the bread items off of her meal tray so she would get a pasty, limp, piece of turkey with a small side of veggies. It is strange as gf is becoming more prominent that they don't have more options available most places now.

Good luck to you!

and I highly recommend Fenzer's 1000 gluten free recipes. The Almond apricot biscotti are just divine.

I fear I will be getting a new copy though. My sister has yet to do what she should do with it... so she should keep it.

my daughter has Celiac Disease. She was diagnosed 7 years ago, when she was 5.

I've noticed a big improvement in food labelling over the last couple of years. So many ingredient listings include allergens now, it's made food selection much easier.

And, we're lucky to have a gluten-free bakery open up close to us this year. :hi:

Sid

For 5 days, they could not manage even ONCE to bring me a meal that wasn't mostly dairy.

I'm allergic to dairy, and my chart says so.

Yet the only vegetarian meals they are able to create are basically cheese. So when you tell them vegan, they say, "oh, a stricter form of vegetarian, send the cheese plate."

3 times per day the nurses would send back my meal. 3 times per day they would send nothing back. Not even fresh fruit or a salad. Because the salads had egg and croutons (made with butter) in them, and fresh fruit was apparently too expensive to keep on hand.

Friends had to bring in food for me every day. Otherwise I would have been fasting for 5 days.


What makes this even worse, this is in a hospital that is within 2 blocks of the largest, best stocked farmers market in New York City, with very inexpensive fresh New Jersey farm produce in vast amounts once every week their nutritionist could buy for the hospital to save their food budget a hell of a lot of money versus industrial food.