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!
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:
Post your question as a comment to this blog entry
Dr. Wangen will answer your question and post it as a reply
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!
When Custom Choice Cereal was in the process of setting up our gluten-free facility and operations in June 2009, we posted about calling manufacturers of different cleaning supplies to make sure they are gluten-free. To our own shock we had to find out back then that a lot of them actually contained wheat, and it made us realize that “this stuff really is everywhere”.
We are not trying to sound too schizophrenic, but at the end of the day we need to ensure for your safety that our facility truly is gluten-free. Along the same lines your dish soap at your homes is in direct contact with utensils that you subsequently use to consume food. If your dishes are porous there actually might be a danger that the dish soap you use cross-contaminates the food with wheat (= gluten). Granted the likelihood of this happening is small, but if you or your child(ren) have an extreme case of celiac disease you cannot be careful enough.
We therefore only use Mrs. Meyer’s Household Cleaners. The following is an encouraging statement that we copied from the company’s website:
All cleaners work really well and are available through the website or at Target. Our conclusion: great product and highly recommended at least for dish soap if you want to be on the safe side. If this is a concern of yours or if you use another product, please let us know and leave a comment!
Dr. Wangen is also known as The Gluten Free Doctor, co-founded the Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) Treatment Center in Seattle, WA, and wrote the book “Healthier Without Wheat”. He is specializes in digestive disorders and food allergies and can answer all your questions on celiac disease, gluten intolerance, wheat allergy, and their respective symptoms, diagnosis, and treatment.
Here is how it works in three easy steps:
Post your question as a comment to this blog entry
Dr. Wangen will answer your question and post it as a reply
You read the answer. Simple enough
We are expecting great questions from you and hope we can learn in the process as well, so please don’t hold back!
Custom Choice Cereal has been wanting to write about this great social networking website for a while now. Adding this to our list of New Year’s resolutions apparently helped…
Gluten-Free Faces is a great website that allows anyone interested in or already on a gluten-free diet to connect with people from the gluten-free community. The functionality is obviously similar to facebook – by the way, if you have not done so already, feel free to become a fan of Custom Choice Cereal on facebook – but there is more. We especially like the very active discussion forum where members talk about food safety, gluten tests, celiac disease, symptoms, recommendations, etc. because it is a great resource for anyone new to the gluten-free lifestyle.
Other features include gluten-free recipes, resources with links to gluten-free information and products, events, and videos. We suggest you definitely check it out. Just click on the picture below, and you are directed straight to our presence on Gluten Free Faces!
Custom Choice Cereal is very excited to have Dr. Stephen Wangen aka The Gluten Free Doctor answer your questions on our blog today. Please ask anything you always wanted to know about celiac disease, symptoms, tips to avoid gluten, and what else comes to your mind by commenting on this blog entry. Answers to your questions will be posted shortly.
Dr. Wangen is an expert on celiac disease, wheat allergies, and gluten intolerance and serves on the Board of Trustees for the Gluten Intolerant Group of North America, a non-profit organization with local chapters across the country.
Gluten-free Cereal
Cerealize your Gluten Freedom! This blog serves to provide you with news on gluten-free food and updates at Custom Choice Cereal
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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. 
– but there is more. We especially like the very active discussion forum where members talk about food safety, gluten tests, celiac disease, symptoms, recommendations, etc. because it is a great resource for anyone new to the gluten-free lifestyle.