The more I read about grains and specifically wheat. The more I am convinced that our family should limit the consumption of them whether they are whole, sprouted, soaked, etc. While I think that we can get by pretty well on meat, veggies, fruits and dairy, I would still like to have the option of making a muffin or a pancake for the kids every so often. And I should say with the exception of the few cavities our family has, we are not suffering any ill-health affects because of our consumption of grains, so if the kids have a cupcake or some corn chips at a birthday party, I really don't care. I just feel that in the long-term minimizing our consumption of them is best for our family.
For that reason, I recently ordered some books and alternative flours to help us on our grain reduction journey.
Grain-free Books:
Almond Flour Cookbook
Cooking with Coconut Flour
Everyday Grain-free Gourmet
Eat Well Feel Well (this one follows the Specific Carbohydrate Diet Recommendations for people trying to heal their gut based on the book Breaking the Vicious Cycle)
Grain-free Flour:
Coconut Flour
Almond Flour (it is bleached, but I emailed the company to see how they bleach it and they remove the Almond skins by quickly steaming them.)
There are other grain-free flour options available, but I choose these two because they had cookbook accompaniments I could use to guide me as I start cooking with them. I should also say that I only bought these to use occasionally. I wonder what would happen if we all started consuming as much almond and coconut flour as we do wheat, I can imagine that too much of these flours could be bad too...but that is just a guess.
I got the books a couple of weeks ago, but today the flours arrived:
I am super excited to try these alternative flours and look forward to sharing the results here. The only problem is I am heading up to beautiful Traverse City next week and won't be have the time to try them until I get back. Adios Amigos!
2 comments:
I just wanted to make a note that you said the almond flour is bleached, but it is blanched, which is very different:
The meaning of blanching is "to whiten", but this is not always the purpose of blanching in cooking. Food is blanched to soften it, or to partly or fully cook it, or to remove a strong taste (for example of bacon, cabbage, or onions).[1]
When almonds or pistachios are blanched, the skin of the nut (botanically the seed coat surrounding the embryo) becomes softened by blanching and is later removed.
My husband went on the SCD diet for Crohn's last Oct. He is off all his meds and no longer has any symptoms. This diet has been know to cure Crohn's, but it takes "fanatical adherence" (as the book Breaking the Vicious Cycle says) and time. I started the same diet a few weeks ago to try to lose weight without being hungry, counting points, and just because I ate too many carbs. Since carbs turn to sugar, it would probably be good for all of us try to reduce how much we eat. I read in a Costco magazine that at the turn of the century, a person would eat 15 G of sugar/day, about what you'd have in a serving of a low-sugar cereal with milk and fruit. Now, it's up to about 160! I'll be interested to hear how you like the recipes.
Leslie
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