The gluten-free and low carb things

I have labeled some of my recipes gluten free and low carb– the below is an expla­na­tion of what I mean by each, and why.

I try to eat low carb because I’ve got an endocrine dis­or­der (PCOS) that makes me less able to effi­ciently process carbs– I get really heavy and unhealthy (migraines, IBS, sinus infec­tions, amennhorea, etc.) when I am eat­ing too much sugar. I lost 80 lbs when I first started low carb­ing, and when I am bet­ter about my diet, I can keep my weight level. Eat­ing low carb is pretty self-explanatory– pro­teins, green veg­gies, small amounts of col­ored & root veg­gies, salad veg­eta­bles, and berries and stone fruits. Bananas, cit­rus, apple and pear are higher-carb, but within rea­son, OK. The real no-nos are: pota­toes, rice, pasta, bread, white sugar and any­thing else sug­ary like honey, molasses, maple syrup, and large amounts of beans or grains. I do occa­sion­ally have whole grains like bul­gur, corn­meal, and quinoa, and I do slip and have white rice or pota­toes every once in a while, but it’s what you can tol­er­ate and keep the weight off. There are lots of vari­a­tions on the theme: Atkins, South Beach, Sugar Busters, The GI Diet, The Schwarzbein Prin­ci­ple, Pro­tein Power, etc. But by label­ing some­thing low-carb, I am specif­i­cally labelling some­thing safe for eat­ing dur­ing a first or sec­ond phase of a low-carb diet, rather than a main­te­nance, see-what-you-can-tolerate phase.

I try to eat gluten-free because I am gluten intol­er­ant, rather than stricken with full-on celiac, mean­ing I get low blood sugar, irri­ta­ble bowel, inflammed rosacea, and increased mucous pro­duc­tion when I eat things with gluten in them. There are lots of sources of gluten, and lots of bet­ter web­sites (see Gluten Free Girl) to guide you through the intri­ca­cies of eat­ing with­out gluten, so please con­sult them about brands of things such as soy sauce and other condi­ments to make sure about what’s gluten-free. (I.e., some soy sauces and ketchups are gluten-free, some aren’t. While “hydrolyzed wheat pro­tein” is a com­mon indi­ca­tor in an ingre­di­ent list, you should really con­sult GFG or another celiac web­site for more info.) But, assum­ing you’ve got gluten free condi­ments to use in mak­ing any recipe I’ve labeled “gluten free,” you should be fine.

Happy cook­ing.