GF Gourmet

The lovely boy works from home most days. He's doing a phd in Logic/Philosophy and apparently the wunderkid of the university for the subject. I cannot tell you what he does, only that he loves it and seems to be good at it. My brain screams and runs away when he tries to explain. I guess I need the three plus years of training in the subject to start getting the phd.

Anyway, to the point, he works from home. Which is great, as I travel for an hour each way to work five days a week and am usually too tired and aggravated by public transport at the end of it to think about dinner properly. I confess that over the last two gluten months when asked what I want for dinner 9 times out of 10 I answered toast. So having a boy who likes to cook and is good at is absolutely fantastic. I highly recommend picking one up next chance you get.

Tonights menu was just emailled to me. Prosciutto wrapped chicken breast stuffed with feta served with a white wine reduction and home made potato wedges. Needless to say I am the envy of my workplace. While being gluten free.

This is the problem with labelling yourself/others as "gluten free." I can still eat! I can still have coffee, chocolate, coke, tofu, cheese, tacos, and a thousand other tasty tasty options. The fault is not with the gluten free people, it's with our culture of prepackaged, instant food. Why does Lipton Ice Tea contain gluten? Have people ever read the labels on what they're eating? Certain brands of bacon bits are suitable for vegetarians. Certain types of 'oreo' style cookies are vegan friendly. 2 minute noodles contain meat, even the non-meat flavoured ones. Then think about the preservatives, the flavour enhancers and all the rest of the chemicals....

The thing that most disturbed me about becoming gluten free? It wasn't that I couldn't eat certain foods (though every so often I pout a bit), it was the random things I craved. I could smell cheese flavouring on corn chips at 50 paces it seemed. I never realised how much I loved the stuff - I rarely ate it. But obviously something in the chemical mix appealed to me. But what? It's not cheese, it's not the salt, it's not the MSG. It disturbs me that I am addicted to a food I cannot even name. How many of the foods that we eat these days don't actually taste like the foods they are meant to be? Do burger rings taste like burgers? Tomatoes taste remarkably different to tomato sauce, tomato paste, etc. WTF?