I confess that I am sick to death of cookbooks. I see nothing but cookbooks when I enter a bookstore or turn on the television. It seems like every day somebody famous or semi-famous has a new cookbook. Actresses, politicians, writers & TV chefs are all pushing their latest cookbook. The funny thing is, almost every one of them has some kind of a "hook". The skinny jeans, the white trash, the French way, the American way, and now, of course, the gluten-free way to eat.
And they all seem to be selling the reader (that’s you) this idea that if you buy this particular cookbook, you will automatically become famous and skinny and funny and witty and all that jazz. Well, we all know that’s a bunch of hokum. But still, there’s a reason for all these different cookbooks. They are not only selling their way of cooking, but they're also selling a window into their different outlook. “Look at me and the way I cook and ….the glow of your being will outshine every star” (Or some variation on that theme).
To my way of thinking, there must be others out there like myself.
Not a grand cook, or a famous celebrity, but an ordinary person who suddenly
discovered that unless you are willing to make some pretty major changes in the
way you eat and the way you think about food, then you are never going to feel
really good in this lifetime.
So here am I. And I am writing….a cookbook!? But this is not just any ordinary cookbook. This is a chronicle of a journey that I embarked upon almost 20 odd years ago. It was a time in my life I will never forget. I still remember the day I found out I could no longer eat wheat.
The nutritionist had sent out my lab work and the results were incredible to me. I had to learn to live without bread, without mustard, without shrimp and without dairy products. I remember sitting in a restaurant and wondering if life as I knew it was over. And, in a way, it was. The old way of eating had to die and I had to become a "born-again" kind of convert to gluten free living.
So what did that mean? It meant that the breads that I loved
were taboo. The salad dressing I loved had mustard in it. I couldn’t eat that
either. I had to start scouring the health food stores to find products that
were not always available on the shelves. I had to read labels on almost all of
the foods I purchased, especially canned and processed foods. I had to learn
how to cook from scratch! I didn’t know how to cook with or without wheat
really… So this was a revelation.
And 20 years later, I’m still on the journey of discovery.
What a remarkably expanded world of Gluten Free Cooking and Gluten Free Products
has opened up in the past decade! It’s really gratifying to see. And though I grouse at times about my universally
acknowledged shortcomings regarding cooking, I’ve decided to write and blog
about this journey in the upcoming “Gluten-free Writers Cookbook” It’s a journal of cooking and it started with
my determination, almost 20 years ago, to cut wheat out of my diet and start
living again. And though it hasn’t always been easy, I’ve never regretted the
decision and I’ve never looked back.
