The Corporate Celiac

One of the first (and hardest) thing to do when I was diagnosed with celiac, was clearing out my pantry.

For a self-identified foodie, I have a weird love of junk food: mozzarella sticks, taquitos, chicken nuggets, and bagel pizzas. Not to mention the empanadas, ramen, and pasta that I’d made from scratch and had been saving for a special occasion (or midnight snacks). It was an emotional trial to get rid of these foods.  

On top of this, I realized that I’d had the WORST baking and cooking habits. I’d used the same measuring cups and spoons for flour, sugar, baking powder, and I double-dipped in spreads like butter (something I’d never thought about before). Most of my kitchen supplies were goners: 100% cross contaminated.

So I cleared out my pantry, fridge, and freezer. I gave items to friends (who were happy anything homemade!) and donated to a local food pantry. And started making a list of all the ingredients and foods I’d need to either replace or find gluten-free alternatives for.

If you’re clearing out your kitchen for the first time, here are the key things to check:

Fridge and Freezer:

• Replace: Condiments that could have been double-dipped into after touching bread or food (mayo, jelly/jam, butter, cream cheese, pickles, antipasto)
• Replace: Bottle condiments where the mouth of the bottle could have touched buns, bread, etc.
• Check: Sauces and dressings
• Replace: Anything sliced that might have touched other food or been prepared on unsafe surfaces (sliced cheese, sliced veggies)
• Discard: Any frozen leftovers or meals you previously prepared
• Check: Broths/bases/bouillons (many are not gluten-free, unless labeled as such)

Pantry:

• Check: spices, seasonings, spice packets
• Replace: flours
• Possibly replace: sugars, baking powder, baking soda, powdered baking/cooking items (when I was baking, I used to use the same spoon or measuring cup for measuring dry ingredients, just wiping it out in-between. If there’s a chance you did the same, replace your baking items).
• Check: cereals, snacks, coffee, instant coffee
• Replace: open spreads like nut butters, marshmallow spread
• Check/replace: oatmeal or other hot cereal (check if gluten-free. In some cases, your doctor may also recommend that you avoid oats).
• Check/replace: pastas, grains, dry legumes
• Check: canned goods (like tuna, chicken, prepared items)
• Discard: home-canned, home-preserved, or homemade items (unless you are certain that they were prepared safely)

The good news is that there are plenty of gluten-free alternatives for most foods. Bready foods are harder to replace (bread, pastries, pancakes, waffles, etc.) but with time you’ll find options that you enjoy.

Looking for other gluten-free alternatives? Check out:
Gluten-Free Product Recommendations

What about your utensils, appliances, and other tools?

I tend to make most of my meals myself. It’s the surest way to make sure that I’m sticking to my gluten-free lifestyle.

But at the start, in order to be confident that what I was preparing was safe, I needed to do a deep clean of my kitchen.

Before my diagnosis, I loved to bake bread, cakes, and pastries. Most of the time, you could drag your finger across the counter or a shelf in the baking cabinet and leave a trail in the flour dust that seemed to perpetually coat everything.

After my diagnosis, I (slowly) began the process of cleaning and sometimes replacing utensils and appliances. Some were easy targets, like replacing all of my cracked wooden spoons. Some things I didn’t realize I needed to replace until later on, like my crumb-encrusted cookie racks and oven mitts.

Cleaning List:

• Wipe out drawers, shelves in fridge, pantry, cabinets
• Self-clean the oven, clean the microwave
• SCRUB: nonporous metal cookware, bowls, utensils, etc
• Wash: dishtowels, oven mitts (you may want to consider replacing depending on how they were used: I baked a lot of bread before my diagnosis and needed to buy new oven mitts)

Consider Replacing:

• Porous, scratched, cracked utensils, and worn whisks (don’t forget things like chopsticks, wooden rolling pins, etc)
• Porous, stone, unsealed ceramic bakeware and cookware that may be hard to really get clean (don’t forget things like pizza stones and cast iron)
• Worn cutting boards (food can hang out in the cuts)
• Scratched nonstick pans/pots, scratched/cracked casserole dishes, bowls, or other containers, scratched storage containers
• Hard-to-clean appliances heavily used with gluten flours/items (toaster, waffle maker, electric hand mixer, pasta maker, bread maker)
• Colanders and strainers
• Used sponges or dishrags (just toss ’em)
• Outdoor grill utensils (you may want to replace the grates as well- or at least REALLY scrub)
• Cookie racks (if you can’t get the crumbs and flour 100% off)
• Stand mixer (this is a tough one- if you can get in the nooks and crannies to clean well, go for it. Mine was too well-used to fully clean and every time I used it more crumbs fell out of the mixer, so I ended up replacing it)

I ended up using this as an opportunity to upgrade some of my kitchen appliances as well. check out my favorites here: Recommended Tools

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