Gluten Always Ruins a Perfectly Good Evening- Jako Japanese Restaurant

I write this post as a warning to all those in Vancouver who love sushi, and follow a gluten-free diet, out of necessity, or otherwise.

Jako Japanese Restaurant, located on Davie St in the Downtown/Yaletown district is NOT a gluten-free restaurant. After eating what should have been a clean roll, I am now in bed, in pain, with a stomach swollen like a balloon!

It leads me to the suspicion that they do not use real rice vinegar to season their rice, but something else like a malt/barley vinegar.

Save your tummies!!

Bob's Red Mill Gluten-Free Pancake Mix- FAIL

To my lovely readers:

Please do not make the same mistake I did. I know it may be easy to do, and some of you may have already done it, but for those who haven't: Stay away from Bob's Red Mill Gluten-Free Pancake Mix.

Egh!

I've had some bad gluten-free products- and this is definitely a contender for one of the worst. On my transition to a more Paleo style of eating, I've been "cleaning" my cupboards- or, eating all the grains that are sitting around in order to rid my pantry of them.


One of these products was an unopened bag of Bob's Red Mill Gluten-Free Pancake Mix- so I thought, wouldn't it be nice to serve pancakes in bed to my honey! It was my special weekend plan, and I was up early to make them.


Their description of the product is "Produces perfect, very light, and fluffy pancakes everyone will enjoy". Well...

I followed the recipe exactly- 1 1/2 cups mix with one egg, coconut milk as my choice of milk, and avocado oil. I whipped it vigorously, and oiled my pan.

What happened next was pretty mundane- the batter turned into pancakes....they were INCREDIBLY thick if you just poured as you would "normal" pancake mix (completed pancakes about an inch thick), so I started thinning them out by smoothing the tops over as they hit the pan.

They definitely looked like pancakes, so I topped them with banana chunks, and maple syrup...

In I went to the bedroom, and presented breakfast in bed!

Unfortunately, the story doesn't end well.

As soon as I bit into my first pancake, I felt an overwhelming sense to drink every liquid I have in my fridge.
DRY AS DUST.

Egh. They were so dry, so dense, and so...blegh that I couldn't do it. I have a really hard time wasting stuff- including food- so I'm not one to throw out food. I normally just deal, and eat it and never make it again.
Not these.

These were awful. I can't say it enough- SO dry. In fact, a piece of this dusty pancake landed somewhere in the back of my throat and got stuck so I spent the next 20 minutes trying to dislodge it from where it had landed.

I told my boyfriend he didn't have to eat it, and he was thankful. Out of the bedroom came the plates, and into the garbage went the pancakes, and the remainder of the mix.

Sorry, Bob's Red Mill---this one's a failure.

Mentos...

This is a sad post.

To be honest, I don't know anyone other than me that buys Mentos, but they are one of my favourite candies to indulge in.

Until now.

Mentos have gluten, guys.
"Wheat glucose syrup"

What the heck, Mentos? Why do you need wheat? Change this! It can't be that difficult.

Body Awareness

Something I've mentioned through this process of becoming gluten (and allergy) free is my increased body awareness. Since gluten is a common ingredient in processed food--my intake of these processed foods and deep fried foods has decreased to barely any.

This post applies to everyone, whether they are gluten free or not, because it's about the changes in your body when you cut out processed and deep fried foods. Now, I haven't cut them out completely--I haven't even made a conscious decision to limit them...I've simply cut out my allergins, and processed foods are pretty much a main contributor of allergins into my body!

A few days ago I went out for lunch with a few of my girlfriends. I ordered a bunless chicken club sandwich (going bunless is always a great option- often you end up with a dressed up chicken breast for a fraction of what they charge for the entree), with 1/2 fries, and 1/2 salad. It had been AGES since I'd had french fries...and I decided I wanted to indulge (but my conscious only allowed me to order 1/2...).

The fries were delicious. Salty, greasy, comforting...I could have had a million of them. In the moment it was pure pleasure.

But here's the thing.

After, I felt awful. I noticed a change about 30 minutes after I had eaten. I felt sluggish, heavy, tired, lethargic...egh, just gross. I wanted to lay on my couch and nap for the rest of the day. ALL from a 1/2 order of french fries.

It's really unbelievable how my body was able to almost immediately tell me that I had given it something bad. It was upset with me, and just wanted to shut down for the rest of the day. My french fries had immediately told my body to be lazy.

I've found that eating healthier really does make you feel better...but you don't notice it until you've eaten junk. It's a more severe reaction- so you notice it more.

It's so obvious to me why weight gain is a vicious cycle. You would have to fight your every instinct to push against those awful calories and unhealthy fats...The junk food just wants you to sit down, be lazy, and eat more junk.

I think the only way to stop it is to start eating healthy. You eat junk- you feel like junk.
Start with the first step- eating healthy- instead of trying to fight against the current.

Oh no! Teriyaki and Soy Sauce!

Yeah, cross those off the list. I made the mistake of making what I thought was a gluten-free dish, but not...

Rice noodles, stir fried chicken and broccoli. Mixed in with a little worchershire, teriyaki, gluten-free soy sauce, and oyster sauce.
Delish, but my stomach gave me a little inkling that something wasn't right.

I'm a big fan of stir fries. I'm also a big fan of sushi. So what do we do when we can't have gluten?!

So far, I've successfully found a Kikkoman gluten-free soy sauce on the shelves of Safeway. Awesome! Unfortunately this isn't an option at any sushi restaurants I've been to, so I'll just have to go without, or bring my own, which takes some advance planning.

Teriyaki sauce...well, for me, many teriyaki sauces have pineapple which make them a no-no. Also, gluten. So I will be on the hunt for a great gluten-free, pineapple-free teriyaki sauce.

I'm also going to have to check that bottle of Oyster Sauce...might end up having gluten-too.

The list of foods to throw out grows! Oh, the pain!

Oh no! Beer!

So, I decided to start with a positive post, but here's the real deal:

Yesterday I had a beer. Today I'm really unhappy about that. For some reason, it just didn't compute that beer wasn't gluten-free. Beer is made with barley.

Barley = Gluten

Well, shit. I screwed up there. And after two weeks of feeling fantastic, I feel terrible again. Swollen around the middle, bloated, and unhappy. All after one beer.

So I've done some research about gluten-free beer, and it does exist.
Brands that I've discovered...but never tried (or know if they exist in Canada) include:

Bard's Tale Beer- USA
O'Brien- AUS
Messagere- CANADA
Nickel Brook-??
New Grist- USA

One day, I'll see if I can track some down, and see if they're even available in the "normal" liquor stores here in Vancouver.
I'll let you know.