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Since removing all the gluten from our home, I now have a new appreciation for our “daily bread.” At first, I was the only one not eating gluten, so I tolerated the Pamela’s Products mix and decided that it didn’t really matter if my bread tasted great or had a nice texture. The Pamela’s mix wasn’t bad, but it was very dense and quite a bit sweeter than I liked. Soon, however, we realized we needed to take all the gluten out of the house. Our “daily bread” suddenly became a big issue.

For the first couple of days the boys didn’t complain too much, but it wasn’t long before two-year-old Hosea just decided that he wouldn’t eat it. The other two boys didn’t refuse, but they were certainly less than enthusiastic. To make things more difficult, Kevin is a “recovering” diabetic (he is no longer taking medication, but controlling his diabetes solely with diet and exercise), and the Pamela’s bread is extremely dense. In order to make a sandwich with a good balance of protein and carbohydrates, he had to eat just half a sandwich stacked with the amount of meat and cheese he would normally eat on a whole sandwich. We definitely needed a new solution to the bread dilemma.

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When I removed gluten from my diet, one of the first things I looked for was a substitute for the standard all-purpose wheat flour I used on a regular basis. I quickly found that everyone has their own idea of what such a substitute would be. I also discovered that there is no perfect substitute. However, there are definitely mixtures that come pretty close (scroll down for my recipe).

The first mix I tried was Bob’s Red Mill All Purpose Baking Flour. It was horrible! Their mix uses Garbanzo/Fava bean flours, which have a very distinct flavor and aftertaste. I’ve read some reviews of the product, and it seems like there are two camps: those who love it and those who hate it. I’m definitely in the second camp!  

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For as long as I can remember, my intestines just didn’t seem to work right.  As a teenager, whenever I ate at certain pizza chains, I would spend the next day or two with cramps and diarrhea.  I just assumed that the sauce was irritating my stomach, and didn’t give it much thought.  When I was eighteen and in my first year of college, I met Kevin, and we had a short courtship before we were married.  During those few months, I remember walking along the river-walk (which was one of our favorite places to go) and having to run into the lobby of a hotel to use the restroom because I couldn’t even make it to the next public restroom.  Still, my symptoms came sporadically, and I didn’t think much of it.

The Journey Begins

Fast-forward nine years and two children later, to early spring of 2006.  I began to have an intense pain in my right side that just wouldn’t go away.  After a while, it subsided to a dull ache, but it was constant and accompanied by a completely debilitating fatigue that left me laying on the couch feeling like I couldn’t even move my limbs.  Enter the doctors!   

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My first and foremost identity is as a follower of Yeshua.  “Who is that?” you might ask.  Well, let me start from the beginning…

At the beginning of time, the One true God, Maker of Heaven and Earth, created humanity to be in relationship with Him.   And yet, we rejected Him and willingly chose our own destruction—we turned our backs on the One who made us.  Though God reached out to us again and again, even setting apart an entire nation as His ambassadors to bring us back into relationship with Him, we still wanted nothing to do with Him.  The Jewish people (Israel) whom He chose as His special possession—His light to the world—refused His love and His calling as they pursued their own lusts and desires.  He was nothing but good and merciful, and we were nothing but wicked and ungrateful.  Yet, despite our unworthiness, God did not give up on us.   

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