You might not be aware of it, but you are experts in many aspects, and that is the reason why we are asking you for your advice! Custom Choice Cereal is in the middle of preparations for several gluten-free food shows, and in this context we are debating the background colors for a banner that we would like to print and display at our table. After a couple of days of internal discussions and very diverse feedback from friends and family we have narrowed the selection down to three options.

It then dawned on us: you are the decision makers and the best source of information that we have to improve Custom Choice Cereal, so we ask your opinion! It would be absolutely outstanding if you could have a look at the three pictures below and comment on this blog which of these options – orange, blue or yellow – you like the best.

Thank you very much for your feedback, your input makes a big difference!

The team at Custom Choice Cereal is overwhelmed by the flood of daily news on celiac disease, new research findings, information about new drugs under development, and the wealth of tips and tricks for living a gluten-free life. It is part of our mission to filter this information to some degree and pass on the bits and pieces that we find particularly interesting and or helpful.

As you can probably tell from the title of this post we want to share a couple of our findings in no particular order.

• The Philadelphia 76ers will host their 3rd Celiac Awareness Night on March 26th.  Their opponent that night will be the Atlanta Hawks.  We say “Thank you!” for helping to raise awareness for celiac disease!  A special discount for the game is available on the 76ers website with the code “CELIAC”
• Researchers from Columbia University’s Celiac Disease Center studied the Body Mass Index (BMI) of 369 patients proven have celiac disease from 1981 until 2007.  “Classical” femal celiacs were all revealed as predictors for low BMI.  Once on a gluten-free diet, over 50% of the overweight and obese patients lost weight, and of the group who initially had a low BMI, 42.4% attained a normal weight
• Triumph Dining’s Essential Gluten-Free Grocery Shopping Guide is now available as an iPhone application

These are just a couple of items we came across, please feel free to share your findings by commenting on this post!

Our neighbors to the North are also concerned about celiac disease and are researching potential drugs that celiacs can use to treat their condition. Custom Choice Cereal was very excited when we came across a pill that showed promising results in the first clinical trials.

Dr. Richard N. Fedorak from the University of Alberta has helped to develop a drug called Larazotide Acetate.

The drug comes in form of a pill and has shown to prevent some of the damage to the small intestine that gluten. While it is not meant as a cure for celiac disease it can provide some freedom and relief after an accidental ingestion of gluten. The drug could become available as early as 2012.

It’s a small step but at least a step in the right direction. As part of our customer service we will as always keep our ears and eyes open and update you in case we hear about any new developments!

Of course Custom Choice Cereal is also on twitter.com where we can be found under the name @CustomCereal. Some of the people we follow are very active tweeters, and we actually learn quite a lot of interesting news on celiac disease, gluten-intolerances, living gluten-free, and most of all new gluten-free recipes from them.

Our twitter friend @eadibleASH writes the blog the edible perspective with tons of delicious recipes and product pictures that make you want to bite your computer screen! She does not follow a gluten-free diet, so we were very excited when Ashley reviewed our custom gluten-free cereal. She had her gluten-free cereal mix on Friday when she unfortunately woke up with a “crazy pain in her neck” – we can only hope our breakfast treat provided some relief and that she feels better soon!

The mix that Ashley cerealized contained Good Morning Flakes as a base and to which she added apricots, goji berries, almonds, coconut and walnuts. She was “really happy with the amount of fruit + nuts that was in the mix”.

Thanks Ashley, we’re glad you enjoyed your custom gluten-free cereal!

Friday = gluten-free cereal name recognition day at Custom Choice Cereal!

We’ve seen your creativity come to play in past names for you gluten-free cereal mixes. Hopefully this post can serve as an inspiration and encouragement to think outside the box when it comes to naming your gluten-free cerealizations (more than listing the ingredients or giving it your own name). This week’s winners are:

5. Triple Berry Blend (berries are a top seller these days)
4. Fall Celebration Cereal (isn’t spring around the corner?)
3. Berries Plus (some “plus” to mix up the berries in that one…)
2. Leena’s Loca Lot (observe the alliteration!)
1. At the top of the list is Gin Tonic (Seriously? For breakfast?)

It’s finally getting warmer in North Carolina so it will be a good weekend. We hope all of you have a great and relaxing weekend as well!

Custom Choice Cereal came across a review of a book describing what seems to be a very interesting approach to a healthy diet. The book is called “Going against the Grain” and was reviewed by Liz Schau on the Tampa Gluten Free Examiner.

Author Melissa Diane Smith challenges the common advice that grains should be the foundation of our diet. She writes that quite the contrary is true as grains are connected to a variety of conditions, including celiac disease, gluten intolerance, obesity, diabetes, Syndrome X, autoimmune disorders, allergies, and digestive problems. She therefore takes a rather radical view, addressing the nutritional problems of grains and suggesting their elimination from our diets.

One of our New Year resolutions was to read a book every month, so we are very happy to have another candidate that makes it to our list. It will beyond doubt be an interesting read!

Custom Choice Cereal feels privileged that Dr. Stephen Wangen agreed to answer your questions on celiac disease, gluten intolerance, wheat allergy and anything around a gluten-free life once a month. The good news: you can still post your questions as comments to yesterday’s third Q&A session with Dr. Wangen blog entry.

We mentioned before that Dr. Wangen wrote the book “Healthier without Wheat”. Tina Turbin from GlutenFreeHelp coincidentally reviewed Dr. Wangen’s book on her blog yesterday. She writes that “My highest respect goes to Dr. Wagnen for his straightforward approach to clarifying the test available for determining celiac disease as well as the testing for non-celiac forms of gluten intolerance. In the end, anyone reading this book will have a full understanding of how wheat can affect one’s life…”

We think that this is a great encouragement to ask Dr. Wangen your questions. It’s a rare opportunity to be able to interact directly with such a high-profile expert, so please don’t be shy!

It’s time again for Custom Choice Cereal’s monthly Q&A session with Dr. Stephen Wangen. Dr. Wangen co-founded the IBS Treatment Center in Seattle and also blogs under the name of The Gluten Free Doctor. You are invited to ask anything you’ve always wanted to know about celiac disease, gluten intolerance, wheat allergy, or the gluten-free diet.

We are very thankful that Dr. Wangen has agreed to provide this outstanding service to you. Out of respect for his busy schedule and because Dr. Wangen informed us that he is traveling this week, we decided to limit the number of questions to a total of 4. Questions will be accepted on a first come, first serve basis.  Since he has only limited access to his emails, it will also take Dr. Wangen a little bit longer to provides his answers. Otherwise everything will work as before in three easy steps:

1. Post your question as a comment to this blog entry
2. Dr. Wangen will answer your question and post it as a reply
3. You read the answer. Simple enough

We hope for your understanding and encourage you to post additional questions at any time to Custom Choice Cereal’s facebook page. We aren’t doctors but will do our best to answer your questions as soon and as best as we can. Please join us in thanking Dr. Wangen for taking the time to answer your questions!

Not only do we believe that a healthy and balanced diet is important for one’s overall well-being, Custom Choice Cereal also experienced this first hand. When Zach from Gluten Free Raleigh gave us the great advice to shop only along the perimeter of the grocery store about one-and-a-half months ago we took his advice to heart. Some of the key improvements that we experienced are

• less trouble getting up in the morning (“better” sleep)
• more energy
• just the right weight loss (in time for spring )

A website that we wanted to point out in this context is Health by Gini. It states on her website that “Gini Warner has developed nutritional programs for [...] food allergies and overall nutritional balance.” Her allergy program specifically mentions gluten (wheat), dairy, eggs and nuts. She emailed us that she also covers shellfish and soy. Since we are not sure if “nuts” means tree nuts and/or peanuts this means she covers almost all of the “big eight” allergens (with the exception of fish and possibly tree nuts/peanuts).

Gini provides counseling over the phone to anyone who cannot come to her office. She also has a couple of impressive testimonials on her website, and if anyone has tried her services we’d be very curious to hear your feedback.

Custom Choice Cereal is very excited to be featured in a review on Foodcents’ Blog. But there is also excitement in it for you because if you create a gluten-free cereal mix on our website leave a comment on the blog entry about our custom gluten-free cereal by March 6, then you’ll have a chance to win a custom gluten-free cereal mix of your choice! There are a couple of further actions listed to increase your chance of winning, so go ahead and check it out!

Foodcents writes that “Custom Choice Cereal is the only 100% gluten-free cereal site on the internet which also operates a 100% gluten free facility.” She also states about the two gluten-free cereal creations she had: “I loved the abundance of nuts, seeds and fruit which are included. These are nice and fresh tasting ingredients, which are plentiful throughout the mix.”

Having had some bad experiences with customer service in the past ourselves, we at Custom Choice Cereal strive to provide outstanding service to our customers and answer any questions within an hour. It was therefore very pleasing to read the following recognition of our efforts: “I cannot finish this up without mentioning the FANTASTIC customer service that Custom Choice Cereal provides. These guys are on top of the products and there to help consumers with any questions they might have along the way. I can think of more than a few companies that could you a little customer service training for these guys!!!”

Thank you, receiving such positive feedback always feels great, and it encourages us to continue what we are doing!