3 ms·

Buckwheat is found in some dishes as a gluten free wheat substitute... not in processed foods as much as at restaurants. I assume he is allergic to buckwheat.

bloak 9y ago
Are you sure about that, because I would have thought that there are much cheaper ingredients that are also much more similar to wheat, so buckwheat would be a strange choice of substitute? We use rice flour for cakes. Works fine. Most people don't notice anything out of of the ordinary. We have a genuine wheat-sensitivity in the family, but it's not an allergy and the consequences of accidentally consuming even a large quantity of wheat, though painful and unpleasant, are neither permanent nor life-threatening, as far as we know. We have an accidental-wheat-consumption-event a couple of times a year. Professional medical advice, and it took a long time to get this far, was: here's a brochure on how to run your own experimental exclusion diet; find out what makes you ill then avoid it; goodbye.
- code_duck 9y ago
  What I said was “not in processed foods as much as in restaurants”. I’m referring to fancier settings where price is not an issue, and they are trying to sound upscale, as in “our buckwheat crepes with raspberry fraiche and...”. You’re correct that rice is a more common substitute than buckwheat in processed foods. However, many gluten free items such as pancake mix contain a blend of different grain and non-grain flours. As for the exclusion diet, yes, that’s what I used to believe. It is sort of true for non-celiac sensitivities. Celiac is not as simple as that, and neither are non-traditional allergies like eosinophilic esophagitis. I tried for -years- to identify the source of my malaise, and cut out several things that I have an issue with but never found gluten. The reason is that it is almost impossible to cut gluten out to the level a celiac needs to start healing without a very dedicated effort, and even then it takes weeks to respond if you have a bad case and have been eating gluten steadily. Various times I went gluten free, mostly, for 2-3 weeks and didn’t notice anything. I know now I would have had to be strictly gluten free for 2 months. I strongly recommend medical testing for celiac. Elimination diet will not necessarily detect celiac and then screws up testing. For eosinophilic esophagitis, there is no choice but to run an elimination diet where you stop eating everything and slowly add foods one by one, because normal allergy testing fails for that condition. For normal food allergies, of course you should just take an allergy test.
  - bloak 9y ago
    We didn't get a test for coeliacs because at that time the only reliable test for coeliacs was a biopsy: yikes! The main symptom was "bloating", and it went away after two weeks of a very exclusive diet: just rice and fried vegetables. Then we reintroduced each ingredient by eating loads of it for 2 days, except that for wheat they recommended eating loads of it for 7 days because the reaction to wheat can be delayed, as you mentioned. However, within 48 hours of reintroducing wheat the symptoms had returned, strongly, so it was fairly clear. We continued with the rest of diet plan anyway, and a second sensitivity was detected: lactose. Apparently it's not unusual for people to be sensitive to wheat and lactose. It was quite a fun couple of months, really. We ate loads of things that we'd never tried before. I'd recommend it to anyone who suspects that something in their diet might be making them ill. It broadens one's culinary horizons if nothing else.
    - code_duck 9y ago
      Biopsy is still considered the only reliable and complete method of diagnosis. I got one because I had severe esophagus problems also. I wasn’t leery of it at all - I was very excited to be getting diagnosed, since I had been so ill for such a long time. For me, the attempts at self diagnosis were long ago, about 10 years back. I tried a wide variety of diets over the years and developed very wide culinary horizons - mainly organic whole foods, and I was a vegetarian for 7 years (I don’t think one would fare well on just rice and vegetables since that lacks much protein...). My mother had long said the recommended test was to avoid wheat for 3 weeks, then eat some and see what happens. As noted I was not able to find that gluten was the culprit, though I identified various other intolerances. Part of my issue was that I have two separate issues, and esophagus disorders and also celiac, and was trying to find one cause or solution that fit both.

bloak 9y ago

Are you sure about that, because I would have thought that there are much cheaper ingredients that are also much more similar to wheat, so buckwheat would be a strange choice of substitute? We use rice flour for cakes. Works fine. Most people don't notice anything out of of the ordinary. We have a genuine wheat-sensitivity in the family, but it's not an allergy and the consequences of accidentally consuming even a large quantity of wheat, though painful and unpleasant, are neither permanent nor life-threatening, as far as we know. We have an accidental-wheat-consumption-event a couple of times a year. Professional medical advice, and it took a long time to get this far, was: here's a brochure on how to run your own experimental exclusion diet; find out what makes you ill then avoid it; goodbye.

code_duck 9y ago
What I said was “not in processed foods as much as in restaurants”. I’m referring to fancier settings where price is not an issue, and they are trying to sound upscale, as in “our buckwheat crepes with raspberry fraiche and...”. You’re correct that rice is a more common substitute than buckwheat in processed foods. However, many gluten free items such as pancake mix contain a blend of different grain and non-grain flours. As for the exclusion diet, yes, that’s what I used to believe. It is sort of true for non-celiac sensitivities. Celiac is not as simple as that, and neither are non-traditional allergies like eosinophilic esophagitis. I tried for -years- to identify the source of my malaise, and cut out several things that I have an issue with but never found gluten. The reason is that it is almost impossible to cut gluten out to the level a celiac needs to start healing without a very dedicated effort, and even then it takes weeks to respond if you have a bad case and have been eating gluten steadily. Various times I went gluten free, mostly, for 2-3 weeks and didn’t notice anything. I know now I would have had to be strictly gluten free for 2 months. I strongly recommend medical testing for celiac. Elimination diet will not necessarily detect celiac and then screws up testing. For eosinophilic esophagitis, there is no choice but to run an elimination diet where you stop eating everything and slowly add foods one by one, because normal allergy testing fails for that condition. For normal food allergies, of course you should just take an allergy test.
- bloak 9y ago
  We didn't get a test for coeliacs because at that time the only reliable test for coeliacs was a biopsy: yikes! The main symptom was "bloating", and it went away after two weeks of a very exclusive diet: just rice and fried vegetables. Then we reintroduced each ingredient by eating loads of it for 2 days, except that for wheat they recommended eating loads of it for 7 days because the reaction to wheat can be delayed, as you mentioned. However, within 48 hours of reintroducing wheat the symptoms had returned, strongly, so it was fairly clear. We continued with the rest of diet plan anyway, and a second sensitivity was detected: lactose. Apparently it's not unusual for people to be sensitive to wheat and lactose. It was quite a fun couple of months, really. We ate loads of things that we'd never tried before. I'd recommend it to anyone who suspects that something in their diet might be making them ill. It broadens one's culinary horizons if nothing else.
  - code_duck 9y ago
    Biopsy is still considered the only reliable and complete method of diagnosis. I got one because I had severe esophagus problems also. I wasn’t leery of it at all - I was very excited to be getting diagnosed, since I had been so ill for such a long time. For me, the attempts at self diagnosis were long ago, about 10 years back. I tried a wide variety of diets over the years and developed very wide culinary horizons - mainly organic whole foods, and I was a vegetarian for 7 years (I don’t think one would fare well on just rice and vegetables since that lacks much protein...). My mother had long said the recommended test was to avoid wheat for 3 weeks, then eat some and see what happens. As noted I was not able to find that gluten was the culprit, though I identified various other intolerances. Part of my issue was that I have two separate issues, and esophagus disorders and also celiac, and was trying to find one cause or solution that fit both.