Headache Boy

Wade was down with a headache all day yesterday.  This is not typical of him at all.  We're fairly certain it might have to do with a cookie Ty says he ate while they were at the store with their aunt.

This sucks, because it could either be she forgot, or that she doesn't believe he has an allergy.

That might not be the case here, but I read all the time on the gluten websites that grandmas and well meaning folks will be like "one teensie little cookie won't hurt, will it?"  And then when the kid doesn't have a reaction right away it's like "see, he's fine!"

Except that Wade has delayed reactions, and will barf at 3 AM or have a headache all the next day.

I was like that with milk for a little while there, where it would be delayed.  Now straight milk--should I sneak half a cup for absorbing into cookies--will make me vomit.  Immediately.  And though I seem to be handling ice cream and some cheeses, sour cream and fake cheese (like the American singles slices or that which is found in the mac n' cheese) give me headaches.  So I always have to think out whether it was worth it.

I know slip ups happen every now and then.  Santa forgot that Wade cannot eat the big fat gingerbread cookie he brought.  And "natural flavoring" hides in things like juice.

On a lighter note, Sixlets are gluten free!  Yay for Easter candy!

I think we need to buy Wade one of these shirts when we send him with people. 

Chocolate Noms

Two awesome tips for getting delicious, delicious chocolate on the lactose and gluten free front.

Dark Chocolate Almond Milk by Silk. 

No, I do not like Silk.  They're the soy people and I hate soy in general because it's slimy, but somehow they made the almond milk slimy too.  So for plain almond milk I go with Almond Breeze.  But the dark chocolate almond milk?  Holy crap.  You know how when you mix chocolate milk just right you get a ribbon of unmixed chocolate in every sip?  THIS HAS THAT AND IT TASTES LIKE COCOA PEBBLES MILK!  That almondy aftertaste is reminiscent of cereal milk and that's the sweetest part of the damn bowl if you ask me!

And speaking of Cocoa Pebbles, I recently discovered that they're gluten free.  If that's not awesome enough for you, how about Cocoa Pebbles Treats!  They say they're gluten free right on the box, unlike the Rice Krispies Treats that do not say either way and for some reason contain mysterious "natural flavorings."  Of course you can just make the treats yourself and know what's in them, but as for sending snacks to school for field trips, it's nice to be able to grab a box of a sweet snack alternative to the cookies that will most likely be given to the rest of the students.

Wade's teacher has been giving him a nice marshmallow-Skittles mix on birthdays, which is great and he loves it, but he's going to the library twice this week across town where I know for sure they serve cookies.  Pebbles Treats are awesome.

Fruity Pebbles are also gluten free, just in case you care.

Really Cherry Limeaide? Really?

It's hard to remember everything that everyone tells you to "look out for."  Things that wheat can hide in, things that you would think are safe but somehow this secret ingredient slips in that makes these wheat-turd kids flip their lids and puke all night. 

And now that I think about it, I think someone might have warned me that juice was one of those tricky things that wheat can hide in. 

Thing is, I don't normally buy juice. 

Maybe once every 2-3 months I might buy a carton of juice for the kids.  We advocate water around here to quench thirst.  Soda is a special item that happens on the rare occasion that we go somewhere to eat, or we happen to have some root beer in the fridge--and root beer, I'm told, is another one of those things that wheat can hide in. 

Normally when I do buy juice we get something odd and something 100%.  Last one was watermelon juice, because I thought it sounded neat.  This time without really thinking, I grabbed a cherry limeaide. 

And he threw up.  All fucking night. 

He'd also had some of these amazing gluten free pretzels that day, and it could also be possible that he reached over to Ty's plate and ate a non gluten free pretzel.  But he's generally aware of the fact that Ty's food isn't always safe for him, and piggy as he may be he doesn't generally steal from other people's plates.  (He does, however, finish people's foods that are left behind if they give him permission to do so.) 

I looked at the Minute Maid Cherry Limeaide and found that yeppers, it lists "Natural flavoring." 

Mmm, the flavor of wheat? 

Fucking Limeaide. 

So fair warning, you have to check juice now too. 

Good luck. 

Gluten And Fevers?

So Wade's all of the sudden down with a fever after we switched oatmeal brands.  Is it related? 

He came out this morning complaining of a headache, and he was all heartbroken over this.  When Wade is sick or sad, the whole world is sick and sad with him.  In fact, Wade being sick is pretty much the saddest thing in the world. 

The question is whether it is in fact food related or if he's just caught something.  It's hard to tell with Wade, especially since I recall switching oatmeal brands just yesterday. 

At this point we're going with a liquid child's pain reliever (acetaminophen based) and a teddy bear.  I doubt he's dehydrated, the kid drinks gallons of water every day--full on chugs it.  Opens his neck up and just GULPS. 

I tend to think it's the oatmeal.  Then again, googling "gluten and fevers" leads to several different results. 

I think this whole celiac thing is pretty much an inexact science and nobody knows shit about it, is what I think. 

There's Been A Glutening

Sadly, Wade has thrown up twice now, both times after having gluten free macaroni for dinner.  It's very sad, and he's okay now, but I'm rather upset because these gluten free elbows were bought in bulk at Winco and I suspect that someone wasn't doing their job right and mixed the regular noodles in the bin with the Wade-friendly ones.  (The bulk bins are self serve--scoop and bag, self labeling.)

We've hooked up an awesome mac n' cheese recipe for Wade as follows:

Gluten Free Mac N' Cheese

1 1/4 cup gluten free macaroni
1/4 cup cheese powder
1/4 cup almond milk
4 tbsp. margarine

And it's great because those noodles are a little over a buck a pound, so buying 10 pounds of the stuff will last a month if not longer.  Now we've got a bag of tainted noodles that we can't use!  And Winco isn't exactly close by. 

So I call Winco.  Oh god.  Some lady with an accent answers and I ask to speak to the manager and she says "What are you griping about?"

"I'm sorry, what?"

"What are you griping about today?"

"What am I what?"

"Griping.  What are you calling to gripe for today?" 

I'm maybe thinking English isn't her first language and she doesn't quite have the right word in place.  Anyway, she tells me that she is the person in charge (I don't know if that was true) and I told her that I suspect someone in the bulk department switched the noodles because my son is having allergic reactions and she was like "Oh.  Oh.  Oh.  I'm sorry.  Okay.  Um...Just bring them back, okay?"

I'm not really sure if my message got across. 

Good gluten free macaroni that we have tried and had success with is Annie's Homegrown Gluten Free Mac & Cheese.  It's made from rice pasta, which is excellent in my book, except that it also does the weird rice pasta slimy water thing when it cooks but it evens out at the end. 

Trouble is Annie's is not cheap and it's somewhere around $4 a box.  The bulk elbow noodles were kind of a staple for Wade since he's not into rice.  I can't really do bulk Annie's and get the same amount of gluten free elbows that I was getting for the price I was getting them at, and I'm worried about ever buying the bulk noodles again. 

Was it a fluke though?  Was this a one time accidental thing? 

See, speaking of flukes we thought maybe Wade's allergy was a fluke because he demolished a gingerbread house about 3/4 of the way before David caught him and had no ill effects that we knew of.  No barf, no runny poop that we know of, and we thought "huh." 

But then he barfed up this mac n' cheese and it's like...what do we do? 

What is your opinion?  Should I buy the bulk gluten free macaroni again or should I avoid it now? 

Poor Man's Gluten Free Bread Substitute

Sorry for my absence.  I've been editing a MASS amount of pictures and I'm just now able to get the time to update any of my auxiliary blogs.  I also owe a gluten free pizza crust mix post to you and I will deliver it.

But for now, let's think back on that Bob's Red Mill Gluten Free Bread Mix I raved about in October.  Tasty is it?  Yes.  Cheap however?  Hell no.  Depending on where I can find the stuff, $5-$7 is way too much to pay for bread, even if it is just for one little gluten free guy.  Especially since we started finding that the bread would start to mold in just 2-3 days sometimes.  And yes, keeping it in the freezer is an option but again, see price.

Now, it was rather convenient that David happened to find a gluten free bread in the mark down bin at Stater's that we'd never seen before in our lives.  Food For Life Brown Rice Bread.  It says that it is wheat and gluten free and even sweetened.  The Food For Life Baking Co., Inc (located in Corona, CA) says:

This unique bread is designed to meet the needs of those who are not able to tolerate wheat or gluten.  

Ingredients include brown rice flour, filtered water, fruit juice concentrate (pineapple, peach and pear,) tapioca flour, safflower oil, yeast, xanthan and cellulose gum, rice bran, and sea salt.

It also warns that the facility that it is processed in also handles tree nuts.

As for taste, Wade says it's good but it's kind of hard--though that might be a result of it being slightly old, but it doesn't even have a date on it.  One of those mysteries of life I guess.  Perhaps this would be better for toast and grilled cheese.

Another alternative to bread that we've discovered, and it's sort of the "poor man's" gluten free bread substitute is corn tortillas.  We don't even do them "wrap" style, we actually just put everything between two tortillas and call it a super flat sandwich.  We've totally pan fried ham and (light) cheese, peanut butter and banana, or he can just eat it raw.

They come about 100 to a pack and they're anywhere from $0.50 to $3.  And he's not complaining.

The Gluten Free Wonderful Bread is nice, and I don't want to totally knock it, but for the price and for how it doesn't seem to last long, I think the corn tortillas do the trick for now.

By the way, have you seen the pretzel filled M&M's?  And there's no real way to tell them from regular non deadly M&M's.  This is a glutening waiting to happen to some poor kid.  Talk about death by chocolate.

Why Miss Lemon Lime Is Awesome

This is a great story that I just had to share...

I went to Wade's parent-teacher conference, and she told me the funniest thing.  In October the class went on a field trip to the pumpkin patch, and while we had packed a special lunch for Wade, they left it at school because nobody else had lunches and Mrs. Miss Lemon Lime didn't think there would be time to sit and eat anyway. 

And then someone broke out some cookies to share for a snack. 

"OH NO!" Miss Lemon Lime says, "Wade can't eat those!" 

So she sent one of the parents to the store to go buy Wade a gluten free snack, while her and Wade went off on their own little excursion by themselves so that Wade didn't see everyone else eating cookies and feel all excluded.  And yes, the parent returned with PRETZELS!

"HE CAN"T EAT THOSE!!!" she exclaimed.  So she went to plan B. 

Miss Lemon Lime quietly ushered Wade into her car and they drove to the store together to buy Skittles.  So while the other kids were doing whatever you do at a pumpkin patch, Wade was off at the store with his teacher. 

Was it totally legal for her to drive off with him like that?  Oh, I'm sure it's frowned upon.  But the fact that she went out of her way to get him a gluten free snack just makes me smile.  She's so darn cute, I just want to punch her or something, I don't know. 

And the best part is that Wade never mentioned ANY of this to us.  This is the kid who we ask how school went and he answers "Uh, I don't remember."

This made me laugh.  Best parent-teacher conference ever.