Custom Choice Cereal works every day to satisfy your taste buds. It is therefore a true delight when we receive your positive feedback, and it makes us even happier if you share your enthusiasm with us (and the rest of the world).
We were therefore very excited when the winner of our giveaway from the beginning of this month wrote a review about the gluten-free cereal she customized. Tasha aka The Clean Eating Mama posted an outstanding review on her blog, stating that she “sent my mix in over the weekend and it arrived only a few days later! I was so impressed by their shipping and customer service – 5 stars all around!” So much for customer service, thanks Tasha.
Tasha’s feedback on her cereal is equally stellar: “The taste was phenomenal! The flakes have a wonderful crunch and lightly sweetened taste and the nuts and fruit go wonderfully together! Not too overwhelming and every bite was a surprise!”
Custom Choice Cereal is excited and happy for everyone on a gluten-free diet that more and more specifically gluten-free products are introduced to the market. We can literally see the gluten-free aisle in the grocery stores increase by the day. And to be honest – it does not bother us at all that some call the gluten-free diet a “fad”; it is definitely not a fad for those suffering from celiac disease! The increase in product variety – no matter what the reason behind it is – makes life easier for them, and that’s what we at Custom Choice Cereal are most concerned with.
A not so great side-effect of the “fad” aspect is that we also see an increase in products labeled “wheat-free”. You need to be really really careful because wheat-free does not equal gluten-free.
Several members of my family like to say that “Every lion is an animal but not every animal is a lion”. Sounds simple enough, right? Well, the exact same principle applies to gluten-free and wheat-free products – “Every gluten-free product is wheat-free but not every wheat-free item is also gluten-free”.
The protein gluten is also present in rye and barley as well as in most oats because they are usually processed in the same facilities. And if you have ever been in a facility that processes grains you know that the dust is everywhere so cross-contamination is the key here! These grains are however not included in the “Big 8″ food allergens and therefore FDA does not require a separate listing on the ingredients label.
Here are some tricky food items that are NOT gluten-free and that you should avoid on a gluten-free diet:
Beer
Blue Cheese
Bouillon and bouillon cubes
Brewer’s yeast (but regular yeast should be fine)
Caramel flavoring (double-check with the manufacturer)
Carob-soy flour (used in bread, can contain 80% wheat flour!)
Couscous
Curry
Durham
Instant flavored coffee
Kamut
Malt (extract, syrup, flavoring: watch for it in candy!)
Potato chips
Processed meats (again: read the label very carefully)
Salad dressings
Spelt
Spices and spice mixes
Triticale (a wheat-rye hybrid)
In composing this list we focused on the not-so-obvious items. Hopefully it helps you to be well and stay healthy though nothing replaces a careful reading of the label. If in doubt always call the manufacturer, and if the doubts remain - don’t purchase the product! Better safe than sorry!
Custom Choice Cereal found another proof besides our customizable gluten-free cereal that gluten-free can taste great. Even though competing in the regular category, Willy O’s Pizza from South Haven, MI, placed first in the US and second in the world in the non-traditional category of the International Pizza Challenge earlier this month. I had no idea that such a thing even exists but as Patrick usually tells me in these kind of situations “This is America, son!”.
Willy Olund developed his gluten-free pizza crust because his brother suffers from celiac disease. In addition, he encountered an incident on the opening day of his restaurant roughly 16 months ago when a little boy with celiac disease could only eat the toppings but not the entire pizza.
Custom Choice Cereal says a big “Thank you” to Willy O’s Pizza for contributing to making gluten-free life easier.
It is pretty significant that an NBA team recognizes celiac disease on this level, and Custom Choice Cereal was even more impressed that it is already their 3rd event. In a time where 97% of people with celiac disease remain undiagnosed and suffer needlessly, this quite an accomplishment and a great help in raising awareness for celiac disease! A plus: enter the promo code CELIAC and you get your tickets for a discount.
Dr. Wangen recently wrote on his blog about an interesting study covering the relationship between IBS and celiac disease. To some it might be “just another statistic” but we thought it was interesting to read that a recent study of 742 IBS patients found that only 3% of them also suffer from celiac disease. This does however not take into account the roughly 20% of IBS patients that are gluten intolerant.
In this context it is important to point out that IBS can be triggered by hundreds of causes, and gluten intolerance is only one of them.
“Customized cereal. Sounds fantastic, right? It is! Custom Choice Cereal gives you the freedom to make your own cereal just the way you like it. You can chock it full of ingredients or keep it simple — its all up to you.”
She continued to write that “What I loved about this cereal: It was delicious, fresh and I controlled the ingredients. What I loved about the website: For each ingredient you add, it calculates the nutrition ingredients right there for you.”
We thought that Emily’s choices of organic blueberries, strawberries, and walnuts added to the classic organic corn flakes base made an outstanding combination. Apparently she felt the same way, and this always makes us happy! Read Emily’s entire review of our exclusively gluten-free customizable cereal!
Custom Choice Cereal is as excited as many of you that more and more restaurants offer gluten-free menus. As a service to you, we figured that it was about time to list these gluten-free friendly go-out options. Just because you suffer from celiac disease or are intolerant to gluten fortunately does not mean that you can’t enjoy a night out!
Before we dive into the list of restaurants with gluten-free menu options we’d like give you a quick advice: since most restaurants handle foods that contain gluten in their kitchen it makes a lot of sense to go early if you want to eat out. It further helps minimize the risk of cross-contamination.
This list of 10 place with gluten-free menus is definitely not complete but we hope it gives a good starting point. Please feel free to comment with your experiences, all of us benefit from your insight!
Custom Choice Cereal often hears discussions on how a gluten-free diet can help to lose weight. Fact is that the “classic” celiac patient has trouble gaining weight since nutrients cannot be properly absorbed in the small intestine. It is often forgotten, however, that it is also possible to suffer from celiac disease and be overweight. This dilemma is just another reason why it typically takes a decade (!) before celiacs are correctly diagnosed.
You can watch the entire video below but the key take-aways are
Flattened small intestines prevent a proper absorption of nutrients, which in turn lowers the metabolic rate, resulting in weight gain
Stressed adrenal glands increase cortisol production, and cortisol causes weight gain (sleep quality decreases and fatigue increases, both typical symptoms for celiacs)
Gluten effects the thyroid function, which also dictates our metabolic rate
This explains why what at first seems a contradiction – weight gain as a result/symptom of celiac disease – can in fact be true.
Thanks to you it just never gets boring! We at Custom Choice Cereal must say that some of you get very creative and naming your gluten-free cereal mixes. To that we applaud you because it also makes our job even more fun! Here are the top five names of the past two weeks:
5. Gluten-free healthy mix (it’s doable)
4. Yummy Tummy (Gluten-free has never been so tasty!)
3. GLUTEN FREE OASIS (the ingredient selection made it an oasis)
2. March Madness (we really like this one!)
1. And our winner is Defend Manhattan
Have a great weekend with tons of March Madness and other fun things to do! It’s finally getting warm in North Carolina, so we’ll definitely spend a lot of time outside.
Elizabeth Barbone from the website GlutenFreeBaking.com brings “the world of gluten-free baking to your fingertips”. We at Custom Choice Cereal were therefore excited when she sent us an email that one of her readers had asked her if she had tried our customizable gluten-free cereal before. She hadn’t, and it was our pleasure to change this!
Elizabeth posted a review of two customized gluten-free cereal mixes that she created through our website on her blog. The mixes she created are shown in the picture to the right. She wrote that “both blends were a delight! The dried fruits were plentiful but didn’t overwhelm the cereal. Plus, it was a hoot to get bags of cereal with my name on them!” Thanks, we liked your cereal names, too!
Elizabeth must know, she started her review by saying “Oh, cereal, how I love thee!” and admitted to currently having eight boxes of cereal at home. We only like to add that our careful selection of only the highest quality ingredients obviously pays off. Gluten-free has never been so tasty!
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We were therefore very excited when the winner of our giveaway from the beginning of this month wrote a review about the gluten-free cereal she customized. Tasha aka The Clean Eating Mama posted an outstanding review on her blog, stating that she “sent my mix in over the weekend and it arrived only a few days later! I was so impressed by their shipping and customer service – 5 stars all around!” So much for customer service, thanks Tasha.
