Gluten Free Girl. How I Found the Food That Loves Me Back...And How You Can Too

Customer Reviews

Fun, touching, I love the food!

2008-08-07
As a person who is perfectly capable of eating all the gluten I like, I appreciate the chance to try out some different food choices. I found the stories entertaining and the tone of the book very approachable.

Embarassing to read

2008-07-25
I have been reading the author's website for a while, and pondering whether to get tested for celiac disease, as I have some of the symptoms. I got this book from the library, thinking it would have more information about the disease and practical information about diagnosis, lifestyle, et cetera.

This book is merely a rehashing of a lot of her longer blog posts. Some are word-for-word, verbatim. That's a lazy approach to writing a book. At some point, she looked at all her lengthy blog posts and thought, "I've got a book here!" No. No, you don't.

The flowery descriptions of food at some point got unbearable. Her snobbery regarding food and foodies is apparent, especially when she shuns a "thin, wan girl with no discernible personality" (apparently only those who wax poetic about food have personality) who simply states that she doesn't understand why people "talk about food all the time. It's just food." The author states that she and that girl had nothing to talk about after that. I would like to point out that a good sign of maturity is the ability to talk to others about what THEY are interested in, not reject them because they don't share your pet passion. I have friends who don't share my passion for homeschooling. I don't reject them.

This passage, more than any other, turned me against the author. It is a wonderful thing to be diagnosed, finally, with a crippling illness and to find the way back to health. And with celiac, it is clear that it is wonderful to find the treatment in the very thing that once made you sick. It is another to become so insular and snobbish that you look down on those who don't share your passion for, say, truffle salt or fine olive oils. For some people, yes, food is just food. I bet there are celiacs out there who look at food as fuel and get on with their lives.

The other passage (actually, it's a whole chapter) that was just cringe-worthy was the one describing her meeting her future husband. While I'm happy for them, and sure that they'll have a wonderful, blissful life together, this didn't need to be in the book. For me, it was way too personal and passionate; I felt as if i were reading a love letter she'd written to "The Chef" (which, sorry, pretentious. He has a name, right?) I felt like I'd been dropped into a Harlequin Romance, where people moan and giggle in the kitchen rather than the bedroom. Way too personal, and added nothing to my knowledge of celiac disease.

The passage at the very end, "Where does Gluten Hide" seems like an afterthought, plunked down after her ecstatic description of "the Chef's" proposal. It would have been better placed in the section about her diagnosis, or about gluten, for heaven's sake. It's like the editor got to the end and said, "Uh....what is gluten, again, and where can you find it?" And the author said, "Oh. Yeah. Let's get back to that aspect of my life."

Do not buy this book, unless you want an overly-personal, florid description one's relationship, with a big helping of snobbery. After reading it, I felt as though the author was presenting us with her ideal image of herself and her life, not the reality of living with celiac. She's "never" had the urge to eat a piece of bread? Or a slice of pizza? Wow. When I had to go on a low-fat diet for health reasons, even though I was told that eating too much fat could seriously harm my body, I sure was tempted. I found her superiority and snobbery hard to take.

I gave this book two stars for the recipes, which look interesting and worth trying. Without the recipes, it would have been one star.

Good for you Chick Lit

2008-07-16
I downloaded the sample of this book on my Kindle ONLY because I'd been hearing about gluten-free this and gluten-free that and I knew nothing about the topic. I ended up enjoying the writing so much that I bought the book and further educated myself. I have no medical need to be gluten free, but I enjoy reading about food and this was just a plain good read -- chick lit that is good for you!

Gluten- free eating advice

2008-06-18
Great reading for those recently diagnosed with gluten sensitivity. A writing style that is pleasing and informative, with recipes that are original and enticing. Recommended reading.

The support I needed

2008-05-28
I felt as if this book (and the writer) understood my life as a person devoted to foods who just so happens to have an allergy to gluten. Before reading this book, I felt alone in this disease. People seemed to have made the assumption that I was a freak who could not enjoy good eating. I believed them, that is, before I read this book.
If you are diagnosed with celiac disease or gluten intolerance, please read this book! In it you will find:
-how to embrace life and food in a way that you never thought was possible again.
-how to find grains that are naturally gluten-free.
-the importance of sticking to a gluten free living if you are diagnosed with a condition that prevents you from eating gluten.
-where gluten can be hiding.
-and the kinship of someone who is undergoing the same problems you are.

I didn't need an exhaustive recipe list that contained gluten free dishes. That is something I could find at any natural food market store. No, what I needed was support. Previous to reading this book, being gluten free meant living a solitary life where I had to face food allergy issues alone. Just from reading this book, I regained my passion for food, and I found the gumption to ask for gluten free dishes at restaurants.

As a side note, someone wrote that her descriptions of food from her childhood was senseless, but I don't believe it was. From my perspective, she was comparing a life that did not have any food restraints to the life she leads now that does contain diet restrictions. Ironically, the life she lead when gluten was allowed did not satisfy her stomach or palate. Once gluten was nixed from her life, she found freedom in eating foods that she would have traditionally avoided. I don't think this makes her bratty. She found her food identity in an unexpected place, a place she would have never imagined: gluten-free living.

Hits Home for Me

2008-05-18
"A delightful memoir of learning to eat superbly while remaining gluten free."
—Newsweek magazine

"Give yourself a treat! Gluten-Free Girl offers delectable tips on dining and living with zest–gluten-free. This is a story for anyone who is interested in changing his or her life from the inside out!"
—Alice Bast, executive director National Foundation for Celiac Awareness

"Shauna's food, the ignition of healthy with delicious, explodes with flavor—proof positive that people who choose to eat gluten-free can do it with passion, perfection, and power."
—John La Puma, MD, New York Times bestselling co-author of The RealAge Diet and Cooking the RealAge Way

"A breakthrough first book by a gifted writer not at all what I expected from a story about living with celiac disease. Foodies everywhere will love this book. Celiacs will make it their bible."
—Linda Carucci, author of Cooking School Secrets for Real World Cooks and IACP Cooking Teacher of the Year, 2002

An entire generation was raised to believe that cooking meant opening a box, ripping off the plastic wrap, adding water, or popping it in the microwave. Gluten-Free Girl, with its gluten-free healthful approach, seeks to bring a love of eating back to our diets. Living gluten-free means having to give up traditional bread, beer, pasta, as well as the foods where gluten likes to hide—such as store-bought ice cream, chocolate bars, even nuts that might have been dusted with flour. However, Gluten-Free Girl shows readers how to say yes to the foods they can eat. Written by award-winning blogger Shauna James, who became a interested in food once she was diagnosed with celiac disease and went gluten-free, Gluten-Free Girl is filled with funny accounts of the author’s own life including wholesome, delicious recipes, this book will guide readers to the simple pleasures of real, healthful food. Includes dozens of recipes like salmon with blackberry sauce, sorghum bread, and lemon olive oil cookies as well as resources for those living gluten-free.

Save your money 2008-05-09
I am gluten-intolerant and am always looking for good recipes and tips for filling in those areas of my diet that are necessarily devoid of wheat products. This book seemed like a good bet.

Wrong. I know the author means it to be an inspirational type book to get people to learn to love whole foods and all that, and that the stuff about her dysfunctional eating habits as a kid and into adulthood is supposed to illustrate the degree of change she has made. But she also makes sweeping statements that are just not true, like when she says over and over that an entire generation was raised on totally processed food. That may be true of her upbringing but that doesn't mean that it is what everyone did. She seems self-involved to the point that she is unable to comprehend that there are realities besides hers.

There's also a lot of text taken directly from her blog. I don't get why a publisher would allow this without calling it an anthology. It's annoying to be reading along and then realize hey, I've already read this. The cost of the book should be prorated based on how much material is new!

I also wasn't very impressed with the quality of the writing for someone who says she has always wanted to be a writer and who teaches writing. She seems to think that the more unusual the description, the better. Sometimes when she is describing a food dish, she actually ends up making it sound like something less than delicious, due to using a weird simile that I suspect she thinks is very creative.

On the plus side...it is inspiring in spots. It made me want to eat more fresh fruit and vegetables.

Maybe I would have liked it more if I were a foodie. I love to cook and eat but food is only one of many passions in my life. I can't imagine food being the focus of my entire life.

Not About the Gluten-Free Recipes 2008-05-09
This is a good read for someone who is already a fan of the Gluten-Free Girl blog and enjoys reading about her personal experiences, life and food philosophy, and positive outlook on Celiac Disease. Although I like the blog and the author's literary persona, I'm afraid this book did not satisfy my desire for a gourmet gluten-free cookbook. There are some recipes sprinkled throughout the book, and many of them sound (and probably are) quite good. However, the true test of a gluten-free chef is really their bread products. There are only a few baked carbohydrate recipes in this book, including a sorghum bread, pizza, and pie crust. Tonight I tried the promising recipe for Crusty Sorghum Bread in the hopes that quality of recipe would replace quantity and I could enjoy a great gluten-free artisan's bread recipe. Halfway through making the recipe, I was a bit astonished to find that the main liquid ingredient in the recipe, club soda, had no quantity listed. The instructions just said to add "as much as is needed to wet all the ingredients completely." Further, at that point the dough should be "soft and firm, like a baby's bottom." Descriptive and lyrical though that is, I had no idea exactly HOW wet the dough should be. I'm an experienced gluten-free baker, but gluten-free dough can have VERY different textures before being baked. Sometimes they are very wet, like cake batter, and other times the dough is much drier. And I can only imagine that the instructions would be even more confusing to someone NOT used to how weird gluten-free baking can be. I found several strange things about the recipe that in retrospect should have warned me that it might not be the kind of loaf I was hoping for. The author tells the reader not to be too optimistic about the bread's rising, because "no gluten exists to stimulate its rising." Later, she says "at the end of the evening, slice up any remaining bread and put it into the freezer. Gluten-free bread usually turns rock hard the next day." (130) Anyone who has made Bette Hagman's bread recipes knows that gluten-free bread CAN rise to the extent that it doubles or triples in size, even, with miscalculation, overflowing out of the pan. Further, those same bread recipes actually do not turn rock hard the next day- they stay just as soft as when you made them for several days until either mold or dryness gets the best of them, depending on your climate. I thought perhaps since this book was written to inspire newly diagnosed individuals, the gluten-free girl was trying to manage expectations and make sure no one would be disappointed. So, I persevered and finished out the recipe, trusting that some of the oddities (using the bread dough hook that is generally always avoided in gluten-free baking, letting the dough half rise and then changing it to another container etc.) were perhaps informed by the chef's training and might pay off in unexpected ways. At last, the loaf of bread was finished. It didn't look exactly like the artisan's loaf I'd imagined but it did have something of a crust and easily came out of the Dutch oven. Ten minutes later I sliced it, as instructed, and served my partner a slice with butter and tried some myself. The first thing I thought was that it tasted very gluten-free. The taste of the baking soda was also quite strong, making the recipe seem more like a quick bread than the more sophisticated yeast bread recipe it was. I have been eating gluten-free bread a long time, so I was not comparing the flavor to gluten breads. Compared to the gluten-free breads that I usually enjoy (such as the soft, whole grain loaves by Bette Hagman) this bread tasted more like a healthy gluten-free muffin than gourmet bread. I thought perhaps my partner would enjoy the bread. Although they can eat gluten and do, they are used to trying out gluten-free breads that I make, and I always solicit their opinion. Unfortunately, even lathered in butter, they didn't want to eat it after the first bite.... and generally they have the first slice of gluten-free bread and ask for more. I was terribly disappointed because I had very high expectations and really expected to enjoy the star bread recipe of the book. My fear is that newly diagnosed readers who try the bread will really end up thinking that gluten-free bread can't rise, and that they have to resign themselves to bread that doesn't last longer than a night. I would like to assure those readers that gluten-free bread can and does do both of those things. Please find inspiration in the Gluten-Free Girl's attitude towards life and positivity- but if you are looking simply for a gluten-free cookbook and seeking bread recipes you can make the staples in your household, this may not be the book for you. I hope that if there is anyone who reads this review that has tried this bread recipe and enjoyed it more than other homemade gluten-free bread recipes, they will post comments to that effect. I think it is important to review the recipes as well as the literary artistry in a book like this, and I hope that some readers will find this review and any follow-up comments useful.

Too Preachy and over dramatic 2008-05-07
I don't know. Was it just me or did you just get sick of the preaching and the parent bashing halfway through the book? I just couldn't force myself to finish it. And I had enough of the boyfriend/husband interaction thank you very much. Too much personal information. Are you running out of things to write about?

This book changed my attitude 2008-05-05
Having been a fan of Shauna's blog for months, I bought her book as soon as it came out. Reading it changed my life, as her positive approach to a life-threatening situation, was what I needed to hear. I've read most of the other reviews, both positive and negative and all, truthfully, make a good point- depending on where you are in your life. As others said, this is not a great cookbook. That said, it is a wonderful resource if you are newly diagnosed with celiac sprue or gluten sensitivity and feeling very much isolated and alone. Living with this condition is not easy in our world. How you look at it and approach this new life-style, makes all the difference in the world and Shauna accomplishes that with grace, humor and honesty. Yes, it needed better editing-- so what! Read it for support and guidance in negotiating the twists and turns of learning to live with this condition. You will be better off for it...I promise!