My Kids Hate Gluten Free Food

[truthsearcher]

I'm 4 weeks into this diet for myself, ( AND DOING GOOD) but notice subtle symptoms with my kids.

One dd has tummy aches when eating bread, (but not always) and when she eats bananas. She is always stuffy and congested as well.

One ds has some processing issues with learning, reading.

While I can't rule out celiac, I'd like to try them on the diet. We already eat rice pasta, gluten free cereals without a problem, but the bread is what they all complain about.

I have a 8,6,and 4 year old and have tried at least 8 different kinds of breads and they don't like any of them. My 4 year old says," this bread tastes like a tree" LOL.

I would love to see if the diet makes a difference but as long as Daddy can eat gluten, they gravitate towards the gluten and my efforts are futile.

Any suggestions?

Thanks

[blueeyedmanda]

If they don't really care for the bread, I wouldn't keep giving it to them. I would feed them things that are naturally gluten free. By continuing to push the bread they will only hate it more. I can honestly say that the gluten free breads have not exactly won me over yet either.

What is working on your side is the fact that they are already eating the pasta and cereals, that is great Is there a way you can talk with your DH about trying the diet as well, explain you would like to see how the kids do on it and could he maybe restrict his gluten intake to outside the house? I know it is a lot to ask, but maybe if you can get him on board things with the kids will go over a lot easier.

Welcome!

[truthsearcher]

Thanks BEM.

Dh wouldn't have a problem doing the diet except the house is already full of gluteneous products and doesn't want to waste them, and wants to eat them up first.

He did say he wouldn't give up his Ezekial sprouted bread though cuz he enjoys it so much, but the kids don't like that bread anyways.

The kids love sandwiches and nothing compares to the homemade bread they were all use to.

But yes, it's in the works to go all out and be a gluten free household, but it'll be a little while till the pantry's empty.

Thanks again

[Ridgewalker]

Have you tried this recipe? -- Open Original Shared Link

It's the best gluten-free bread I've tried so far. Both my kids like it, even my 4 yr old, who used to be a bread hater. He even hated gluteny bread. He loves this bread, though.

I make hamburger buns with it in a muffin-top pan. We also eat sandwiches on the buns. I also make dinner rolls with it in a regular muffin pan.

It's really good! I'm done with buying expensive premade gluten-free breads.

What other gluten-free foods are they hating?

[Offthegrid]

The premade gluten-free breads are junk. If you make a bread from a mix, I don't think it's that good. If you make it from scratch, it will taste pretty good -- but it's time consuming.

I personally just don't even do bread anymore. I don't even miss it, although I did in the beginning. For hamburgers, I have them plain with veggies on top and mustard. (You can make your own french fries for the side.) Put steak "sandwiches" on rice. When I used to eat hot dogs, I just had them without the bun, too. You could make it fun by giving them a couple different dipping sauces (just make sure they're gluten-free).

If you want to give them a "bread," try homemade banana bread (yum!) or corn bread (yum!).

This may make lunches a little bit tough in the beginning -- I have chicken on a salad with red wine vinegar and olive oil -- but they'll adjust and soon like the new foods. Try things like apples dipped in peanut butter, lunch meat rolled in lettuce, veggies, fruits and nuts.

[blueeyedmanda]

I do hamburgers bunless and I don't miss them. I never found a good bun that ever made me happy. I also eat hotdogs bunless. This I am still adjusting to.

[dandelionmom]

We've pretty much gone breadless. I keep a loaf of kinnick (or however you spell that!) in the fridge in case anyone one needs toast (if you toast it for a long time and put lots of butter and jam on it it is okay!) but we rarely eat it.

My daughter misses hot dog buns so I'm thinking of wrapping her hot dog in a gluten-free pancake. I'll let you know how it goes.

[taweavmo3]

Have you tried Kinnikinnick bread? I don't particularly care for it all that much, but my kids like it. I have to toast it first, but it packs well in lunches. We use the white sandwhich bread,but the italian one is good too.

If we are running low on bread (or funds, lol) I use corn tortillas instead. I put mayo and ham, or pb/honey and just roll them up. I nuke them in the microwave first to soften them up. The kids also really like brown rice torilla roll ups, they are huge, so 1/2 is a good serving per child.

Do your kids like rice? We do alot of stir frys for quick and easy lunches. On a day off, I try to boil a couple of chickens so I'll have a bag of cooked chicken meat on hand. I'll cook a big batch of brown rice, then all I have to do is warm it all up and add whatever sauce and veggies the kids like. My kids don't like big chunks of veggies in their stir fry, so I'll mince up onion, celery, and carrot, and they eat it no problem. Peas and scrambled egg are also good in this.

Hope this helps some. It will get easier once your whole house is gluten free, and the kids will eventually get used to the new foods. My kids eat great now, but it took a long time to get them used to more natural food. One other helpful hint, and you are probably already doing this, but get the kids involved as much as possible with the cooking, shopping, etc. I found that with my oldest child, this gave him a sense of empowerment, and he became much more compliant with the diet and was open to trying new things.

Sorry for rambling, I tend to do that, lol. Good luck with everything!

[blueeyedmanda]

Corn tortilias are good but I can not do them with PB and jams...the taste is funny to me.

[taweavmo3]

Yeah, pb/honey isn't the greatest on corn tortillas....but my kids are such good sports, they'll eat it in a pinch, lol. The brown rice tortillas are much better, they have a more mild flavor that goes well with pretty much anything.

[mandasmom]

Yeah, pb/honey isn't the greatest on corn tortillas....but my kids are such good sports, they'll eat it in a pinch, lol. The brown rice tortillas are much better, they have a more mild flavor that goes well with pretty much anything.

I think that gluten free bread is an oxymoron....really! I keep a loaf of whole foods sandwish bread in the freezer but it goes to waste most of the time...gluten free means bread free for lots of people..i would spend my time and money looking for alternatives to bread rather than alternative bread!!!!

[gfp]

If you still have gluten around the kitchen then they will not really be gluten-free anyway...

(really like blueeyedamanda said)

For the rest... I dunno, if kids were to eat what they liked then it would probably be a pretty poor diet!

The gluten-free bread is rubbish .. sometimes the homemade is OK but mostly i just avoid it!

You can make decent toast .. but really its never the same as fresh bread so the kids will keep being dissapointed...

However gluten-free cookies and cakes work better, specially ones like carrot cake or corn bread etc.

How about giving them a few treats instead of the bread??? Its a compromise but hey...

[blueeyedmanda]

A very good gluten free cookie treat are these wonderful Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies a fellow member posted here a few weeks ago.

1 cup peanut butter

1 cup brown sugar

1 egg

1 tsp baking soda

6 ounces chocolate chips

preheat oven to 350

mix all ingreidents but chips into a bowl. Once mixed fold in the chips.

drop onto a greased cookie sheet.

Bake for 10 minutes or until golden brown. They are very good

[Juliet]

We do the bread mentioned above with some slight substitutions (for all the flours, we use 1 cup sorghum, 1/2 cup brown rice, 1/2 cup potato starch, 1/4 cup cornstarch, 1/3 cup ground flax, increase honey & yeast, too) and use a bread machine. The bread machine makes it workable - I mix it up before going to bed at night (total time about 10-15 minutes), then the next morning I pull it out and slice it up. This bread is really tasty, even by those people we've given it to who still eat regular gluten bread. There's no substitution for a good sourdough bread, but for making a PB & J, it works. And a quick tip: unless it's just been sliced, you always want to toast it before eating it. Reduces the amount of crumble that can happen with gluten free breads. You also want to freeze any leftovers after a couple of days; the lack of preservatives makes it go really fast if not frozen. And don't refrigerate any gluten free bread. It makes it more crumbly.

I also make a quick flatbread when I have even less time to get bread together; I posted it awhile back. Here's the link:

Open Original Shared Link

And when I have NO time at all to get anything together, I have two other quick substitutions for "sandwiches." If it's a peanut butter sandwich, both of my kids love to eat them on Trader Joe's Frozen Gluten Free Banana Waffles. We also use Real Foods Corn Thins for sandwiches, too. They're about 4" in diameter and taste like popcorn. In my opinion, they're much tastier than rice crackers. The corn thins actually taste good with peanut butter (again, tested by people who eat regular bread ) and even taste good with sandwich meats, cheese, lettuce, etc.

And for the record, when we first had our son go gluten free after being diagnosed, he didn't like any of the gluten-free "substitutions" except for homemade sweet quick breads, cookies, and pancakes using Pamela's Ultimate Baking & Pancake mix (also what I used at first to make the quick breads, cornbread, and cookies he was willing to eat). But he loved things like rice, beans, corn tortillas, etc. - basically stuff that's always been gluten free and therefore tastes the way it "should." Now I'm a better cook and can make almost everything that we ate before taste even better gluten free, but at first, it's a real challenge and the store bought stuff, unless you spend a TON of money (and even then, no guarantee), just never really makes the grade.

[Fiddle-Faddle]

We like the bread recipe that Juliet posted so much, we make double batch 2-3 times a week! My gluten-eating family members all agree that it tastes better than regular gluteny sandwich bread.

I do add a teaspoon or 2 of yeast to each batch, and double the baking powder--the baking powder helps it rise better, and the yeast makes it taste like regular bread. (It doesn't sit or bake long enough to help with rising,m that's why you need the baking powder.)

We cut it into either 6 or 9 pieces, and then slit them open for sandwiches, and they are yummy, yummy, yummy! (WAY better than anything premade that I've bought, including Kinnkinnick and WHole FOods Bakery gluten-free Breads.)

[Ridgewalker]

In the recipe I posted, Lorka's recipe, I do make a couple substitutions as well- I use sorghum instead of the bean flour, and instead of potato starch, I do additional cornstarch.

I still haven't tried Juliet's flatbread, I need to do that! I have the recipe saved.

[kbtoyssni]

I would stop feeding them bread. I'm another nearly bread-free person. I have substituted lettuce (like egg salad sandwich lettuce wraps), corn tortillas (any sandwich can be made on a tortilla), and corn chips (like egg salad on corn chips). I use corn chips in place of crackers, too. I also do a lot more baked potatoes or rice with cheese and salsa for lunches in place of sandwiches.

I would also try to get your husband on board. If he's not supportive of the kids being on the diet, you won't have an accurate test. Gluten-lite won't eliminate symptoms so if they're getting any gluten anywhere, it's not worth doing. You should also consider what happens at school and what the eat there (including unplanned things like birthday treats) and whether they eat food at their friends' houses.

[truthsearcher]

Thank you all for all the replies.

Unfortunatly we don't do corn or peanuts because of mold issues and corn makes my joints so sore and creaky. Is there a substitute for the cornstarch in the first bread recipie?

Also they dislike the "Food for life" brown rice tortillas they are so dry and crumbly and too chewy. I don't even like them.

My two girls will eat brown rice cakes though but it's not too tasty with meat on them, but they do occasionally like to eat them with almond butter.

I'm thinking the longer time passes with me on the diet and gluten does not get into the house the better they will be with the changes.

Thanks for all the advice.

[blueeyedmanda]

Do you live in an area where there are health food stores or grocery stores that carry gluten-free products?

[Juliet]

Is there a substitute for the cornstarch in the first bread recipie

You could substitute with any other starch, even more potato starch if you'd like, although that may make it a little "potato-y". I one time used tapioca starch (sometimes in grocery stores, always in Asian markets) instead for the cornstarch, but it had a taste I wasn't crazy about, but the kids were happy with it. You could also use sweet rice flour or glutinous rice flour (one and the same - find it in Asian markets or Asian section of your grocery store).

I also have some great muffin recipes with a base made up of equal parts sorghum flour, fine brown rice flour, and tapioca starch. No one can taste a difference.

[truthsearcher]

Yep we have Wegmans which has variety and a local food co-op.

We just don't do much processed foods. Mostly whole, natural, organic food. I like to cook from scratch if I'm feeling up to it. And avoid if possible all GMO food.

Thanks for the substitutes Juliet.

[blueeyedmanda]

I love Wegmans, very celiac friendly! Before our store opened in Sept, we used to drive to MD or NEPA to shop there.

[Ridgewalker]

Thank you all for all the replies.

Unfortunatly we don't do corn or peanuts because of mold issues and corn makes my joints so sore and creaky. Is there a substitute for the cornstarch in the first bread recipie?

Is there a substitute for the cornstarch in the first bread recipie

You could substitute with any other starch, even more potato starch if you'd like, although that may make it a little "potato-y". I one time used tapioca starch (sometimes in grocery stores, always in Asian markets) instead for the cornstarch, but it had a taste I wasn't crazy about, but the kids were happy with it. You could also use sweet rice flour or glutinous rice flour (one and the same - find it in Asian markets or Asian section of your grocery store).

Actually I think using more potato starch would be fine. The starch doesn't really have a potato-y flavor. Potato flour definitely would, but those are two different things.

(Tapioca starch and tapioca flour are the same thing, though.)

[babygirl1234]

we have a wegmans where i live so i go there fro ceral and cholc pudding because their things are gluten-free alot of their stuff is gluten-free

[SandraD1971]

Try Gluten Free Pantry bread mix - you'll need a heavy duty mixer to make it work but it is worth it! My son is now able to eat grill cheese and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches without them crumbling to pieces.

He ate every last bite and was so excited to have a sandwich with "two tops"!