Gluten Free Vegan Living

Once you stop eating gluten and dairy, are you sure you are Meeting your Nutritional Needs with a Gluten Free and Dairy Free Diet?  Both dairy and gluten based grains are two very large groups of food to eliminate from your diet.  What nutrients are you losing and are their other foods that include these important nutrients?

My featured post today, which answers the questions above, is from the Gluten Free Cooking School.  Here are some of her tips:

How to Get Your Nutritional Needs Met on a Gluten-Free, Casein-Free (GFCF) Diet

Important Nutrients Most People Get from Gluten Foods:

1. Fiber: Dietary fiber is a carbohydrate that mostly passes through our digestive system intact. It helps maintain intestinal health, keeps us from becoming constipated, slows down sugar absorption in our bodies after eating, and helps maintain a healthy cholesterol level
2. B-vitamins: B vitamins are a group of water-soluble vitamins sometimes called the “B complex”. People commonly associate them with energy production, though they also serve other purposes.
3. Iron: Iron is an important mineral that helps form the structure of proteins, plays a critical role in the function immune system and the production of energy, and plays a role in the growth and differentiation of cells.

Important Nutrients Most People Get from Dairy Foods:

1. Calcium: This mineral is best known as a major building block of strong bones, but it plays other roles as well. Calcium helps the body’s muscles move and helps nerves conduct messages from the brain to other areas of the body.
2. Protein: Proteins are made up of chains of amino acids, and various proteins are required in order to repair and maintain the body. Dietary protein is required by our bodies for the replication of DNA, stimuli response, and the transport of molecules from one location to another.

How to Meet Your Nutritional Requirements Without Dairy & Gluten …..

Makes sure to READ THE FULL ARTICLE to see what is suggested to fill the needs for the nutrients missing.

Personally, anyone who is careful to have a full range of grains, seeds, fruit and vegetables, will meet most, if not all, of these needs.  Often though, I find people who continue to eat unhealthy gluten free vegan diets — adding LOTS of processed food — which, you probably know contains very little nutrient value.

Without dairy, people are often concerned that they are not getting enough calcium.  It may surprise you to know that may vegetables, ounce for ounce, have more calcium than most dairy products.   In fact, most vegetables, especially leafy type, contain lots of the nutrients we need for optimum health.

But don’t take my word for it …. read the article!!

Cooking or Baking Without Dairy or Eggs can be a real challenge — if you don’t know the special tips offered here by Allyson Kramer, author of the  Manifest Vegan blog.

I found these tips and the wonderful recipe at the bottom of the post on the Adventures of a Gluten Free Mom blog.  Both authors and blogs are excellent resources for tips and recipes for Gluten Free Vegans!

How is it possible to bake or cook without dairy or eggs?

This is often the first concern of people who are thinking about eliminating dairy and eggs from their diets–especially those of us who are avid bakers. And even more so for those of us who are avid gluten-free bakers! Most baked goods recipes contain the obligatory stick of butter and several eggs. With gluten-free recipes in particular, you’ll often find a large amount of eggs called for because eggs balance out the lack of gluten —acting as a binder as well as making many baked goods rise. But eggs aren’t the only solution. In fact, it’s not the actual eggs, butter or milk that’s necessary to achieve great results in baking, but the qualities and chemistry of those ingredients that make a recipe work. Whether it be rising power, binding capabilities, adding fat to a recipe, or simply just thinning a batter, you can find these properties in many plant based foods—and they yield just as good results as their animal based counterparts. …

Dairy-Free, Egg-Free and Corn-Free Vanilla Pudding

Ingredients

• 3 Tbs. Corn Free, Vegan Margarine, or other vegan margarine if corn is not an issue
• 2/3 cup Gram/Chickpea Flour
• 1/2 cup Tapioca Starch
• Dash Sea Salt
• 1 1/2 cups Almond Milk
• 2/3 cup Granulated Sugar
• 3 tsp. corn free Vanilla Extract
• 1 Vanilla Bean, split and scraped (discard pod, or reserve for other use)
• Whipped Coconut Cream for topping

Directions

1. Before you get started, be sure to have a few small bowls or dishes ready to pour the pudding into straight from the stovetop.
2. In 2-quart saucepan over medium heat, melt the margarine until completely liquefied. Add in gram flour and stir until it clumps together, gently turn and break the mixture apart using a wooden spoon. Stir in the tapioca starch and then use a whisk to blend into crumbles. Let cook, stirring often, for about 2 minutes over medium heat, or until the flours are lightly toasted. Add in the sugar and whisk together until well combined.
3. Gradually whisk in almond milk, about 1/4 cup at a time, stirring constantly until smooth, ensuring no lumps remain. This may take quite a bit of elbow grease, but it’s worth it to achieve a smooth pudding. Add in the remaining almond milk, vanilla extract, and scraped vanilla bean, whisking vigorously until all is combined. Continue to cook over medium heat, stirring constantly until quite thick, about 3 minutes.
4. Pour into dishes and let cool at room temp for about 30 minutes before transferring to the refrigerator to cool completely.
5. Let chill for at least 4 hours before serving, best if chilled overnight. Garnish with whipped coconut cream.

If you are interested in more of Allyson Kramer recipes, check out her cookbook below:

Karina is definitely the ‘Gluten Free Goddess’ with her Gluten Free Vegan Bread Recipe below.  She starts out her post telling a bit of her story.  I love the wonderful attitude she describes …. deciding to focus on WHAT she could eat being Gluten Free rather than complaining about what she was missing.  In my case, I grieved over my loss of wheat based bread products, but rejoiced over my improved health so much more!!

Her magic ingredients are sorghum, buckwheat and millet!  Not your typical ingredients used in the store bought varieties of Gluten Free Bread.  Having experiment with Gluten Free baking, I find this recipe to be promising!!  NOTE:  Make sure to read through the entire post as she give tons of extra tips and information after the recipe.

Delicious Gluten-Free Bread Recipe – dairy-free and rice-free, too

First- whisk together your dry ingredients and set aside:

1 1/2 cups sorghum flour (aka jowar flour)
1 cup tapioca starch or potato starch (not potato flour!)
1/2 cup GF millet flour or GF oat flour
2 teaspoons xanthan gum
1/ 1/4 teaspoons fine sea salt
1 packet rapid dry yeast or 2 1/4 teaspoons

You’ll need sesame seeds for the top; set aside for later. Or omit.

For the Breadman bread machine:

Pour the liquid ingredients into the bread machine pan first:

1 1/4 cups warm water (at 110 to 115ºF)
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon honey- or raw agave nectar to keep it vegan
1/2 teaspoon mild rice vinegar or lemon juice
2 organic free-range eggs, beaten or 1 tablespoon Ener-G Egg Replacer whisked with 4 tablespoons warm water till frothy

READ FULL RECIPE  … and story!

To read more information, tips and recipes on Gluten Free Bread, check out my Gluten Free Bread Baking Tips.

PS.  I agree with Karina about Pamela’s Baking Mixes — I refer to them on the above website!

Butter Substitute or Vegan Butter is fairly easy to find in the stores.  Personally, we use Earth Balance because I like the taste and because it does not use soy (trying to stay away from that as well).  So far, it works wonderful for use on toast, in some baking (where we can’t or don’t use coconut oil), …. and just an all around butter substitute.

Check out the article below for other options.

Vegan butter is better butter

Is the Paula Deen side of you wondering how you could ever get by without butter as a vegan? Have no fear — vegan butter not only exists, but it’s easy to find and delicious! You won’t miss the cruelty!

The most popular vegan butter on the market is made by Earth Balance. They have a long line of buttery products. Their buttery spread comes in tubs and sticks. There are several options with the buttery spreads: Original blend; Whipped (perfect for spreading on breads and muffins and the like); Soy Garden, made with the power of soy; Olive Oil blend; and Soy Free, for those avoiding soy. Earth Balance also makes buttery sticks, available in their Original blend, and Natural Vegetable Shortening sticks. You can learn about all of their products on their website. You can also find recipes and health facts for their products.

READ FULL ARTICLE

If you are adventurous or just interested in making your own Vegan Butter, I have written a Squidoo Lens:  Vegan Butter Recipe.  The article includes a recipe that my husband adapted for our personal use.  Please share with your friends if you find my Vegan Butter Recipe Lens helpful or informative.

There has been much speculation concerning Gluten, Casein and Autism in children.  Penn State College of Medicine has released some studies talking about the connection between the diet of autistic children and gluten and casein.

Read on to see their findings….

 

Gluten-Free Casein-Free Diet Improves Autism Symptoms in Children

For those readers that are looking to a gluten-free diet in hopes of improving the symptoms of autism, new research from Penn State College of Medicine is lending some scientific basis to what many suspect: that a gluten-free and casein-free diet may lead to improvements in behavior and physiological symptoms in some children with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD).

As noted in their findings, “…autism may be more than a neurological disease — it may involve the GI tract and the immune system.” And, “Gluten and casein seem to be the most immunoreactive [allergens]”, and were therefore the allergens chosen for further examination by this study.

READ FULL STORY

Interesting that the findings suggests BOTH a gluten and casein free diet rather than just one or the other.  If this type of diet helps autistic children, how do you think it will effect adults?  Something to think about ….