Gluten Intolerance

Famous Philadelphia restaurateur Marc Vetri wrote about the gluten  (GI) conundrum that he faces when designing his menus. “When someone has a shrimp allergy, I don't make them something that looks and tastes like shrimp, but isn't. I make them a great meal based on foods and flavors they can actually eat. Why would they want something "shrimpy" if they don't eat it? So, when someone doesn't eat gluten, I assume they don't want something "wheaty." With so many other choices available from our kitchen, why would they want faux pasta anyway? With Italian cuisine I can make anything they want to eat. Making them a gluten-free pasta--one that's most likely going to be crumbly at best, or chewy, but bound with some sort of chemical that mimics what gluten does to pasta--is the very last thing on my mind.”

Chef Vetri prefers another definition for GI: grossly ill-informed. About 1% of the population has celiac disease and truly gets sick from gluten. “Wheat is nutritious. In its truest form, the wheat berry has so many nutrients. It has protein, fiber and minerals such as zinc, iron, magnesium and potassium. How can a grain that is a basis of human civilization be bad for us? Wheat itself is not bad for us, but how it's used is a big part of the problem. Wheat nutrition depends entirely on the form in which you eat it, and weight gain is actually inversely associated with the intake of high-fiber whole grains.” It is what we have done to wheat that is the problem: over-processing and stripping out all the nutrition.

I am a fan of eating a wide variety of food and not excluding any one group. We should strive to eat minimally processed food and consider the source. Food comes out of the ground – not wrapped in plastic from a factory. If someone has reason to think that GI is a problem, consulting a physician is appropriate. Blood tests can be helpful and the definitive diagnosis is made with a small bowel biopsy.

The original Marc Vetri post.

A discussion about food allergies and intolerances.