While I was glad to find out the cause of my problems was gluten, at the same time, preparing meals became really, really hard. I’ve always been a foodie, looking for good food. I love to cook, always looking for new recipes, trying them out, and collecting many recipes.
But now, I can no longer use many of my favorite recipes. So many things have flour in them.
The list of things with gluten in them would be too long, but here are a few of them.
- Bread
- Pastries
- Cakes
- Sweets
- Pasta
Not only Western food, such as pasta but also Japanese food as well.
Almost all noodles
- Ramen
- Udon noodles
- Soba (Soba usually contains 30-40% wheat flour as a binding agent. Soba is usually made with more wheat flour than buckwheat flour. If it is 100% buckwheat flour, it is gluten-free)
- Somen (Skinny chilled noodles for summer)
- Hiyashi Chuka (Chilled Chinese noodles for summer)
- Yaki Soba
Deep Fried foods, in general
- Croquette
- Ebi-Fry (Deep fried Shrimp)
- Tempura
Wrapped food originally from China
- Gyoza
- Shumai
- Spring rolls
- Steamed meat buns and bean-jam buns
Made in a pot
- Oden (wheat flour is used for kneading)
- Curry (Flour in curry roux)
- Stewed Hamburg (bread crumbs in hamburger steak & flour in demi-glace sauce)
Cream type
- Gratin
- Cream Stews
- Clam chowder
- Creamy pasta
- Potage
Flour-based
- Okonomiyaki
- Takoyaki
- Chijimi
Drinks (yes, even drinks!)
- Barley tea
- Beer
- Happoshu (sparkling wine)
- Barley shochu
Japanese sweets (I thought Japanese food would be safe, but Japanese sweets also include flour)
- Taiyaki
- Dorayaki
- Manju
- Castella
- Karintou
- Fu confectionery
Other foods that are often overlooked
- Fu (found in sushi and miso soup)
- Barley miso
When I looked at this list, I couldn’t help but think, is there anything I can eat? You might even think, “What is there to eat?
Almost all ready-made items, such as frozen foods, pouch foods, and prepared foods, contain flour found at grocery stores. Even many sweets contain flour.
I was so sad that I was getting teary eyes while grocery shopping. I often felt depressed after going to a grocery store. This would continue for the rest of my life. I would be unable to eat these foods for the rest of my life.
Days went by when I didn’t want to go grocery shopping.