Gluten Free * (With an Asterisk)

A Very Bad Month for Accidental Gluten

A cautionary tale in four parts — starring one sneaky asterisk, one salad bar, and one very expensive honeycomb.

Oh, friends. It has been a rough month for me when it comes to getting glutened by accident. If you live with celiac too, pour yourself some (safe!) herbal tea and settle in — because you’re going to recognize every single one of these. Let me start with the most recent.

1. The asterisk that got me

I received a gift of chocolates with the words GLUTEN FREE* printed right on the bag. Notice that little asterisk? We didn’t. My husband cheerfully announced they were gluten-free and offered me one. Now, I don’t even care much for chocolate — but hey, it was gluten-free (we thought), so I ate one just to try it.

About twenty minutes later, I felt my batteries start to drain. I picked the bag back up and read the fine print underneath — where, by the way, that promised asterisk was nowhere to be found. Instead it listed the company’s products and noted that two of them, sold in this very same packaging, are NOT gluten-free. “Oh good,” my husband said, “this isn’t one of the ones that aren’t gluten-free.” So we flipped the package over to the ingredients…and there it was, second on the list: Maltitol (from wheat).

So…how, exactly, is that gluten-free? Hmmmm.

2. The Relief Society eye-roll

This reminds me of a Relief Society event years ago. I turned a bottle of fruit juice around to check the ingredients — a habit that has saved me more times than I can count. At the time I happened to be very thin, and a woman nearby, clearly assuming I was fussing over calories, rolled her eyes at me and walked off.

Oh, I wanted to lob that juice bottle straight at the back of her head. If she’d only known! For the record: that juice did contain gluten — and no, I did not drink it. Vindicated.

3. Three days I’ll never get back

This is the hard part, and it’s why eating socially is something I honestly dread. This year’s company Christmas party was at Rodizio Grill. I was so reluctant to go that I told my husband I’d really rather just stay home — I was scared of getting sick. So he had me call the restaurant ahead, and they told me, with real enthusiasm, that almost everything on their menu was gluten-free.

So I went. And I had a wonderful time with everyone. Then reality arrived: by the end of the night I couldn’t walk from the car to the house on my own — my husband had to help me inside. And then I was bedridden. All that day, the next day, and the day after that. Three days of my life, gone — because I trusted the cooks, trusted the gluten-free menu, trusted the waitstaff.

When I get that sick, it isn’t a trace of cross-contamination. Something that was supposed to be gluten-free absolutely was not. I didn’t even touch their meat — it was something at the salad bar that should have been flagged on the “not gluten-free” list they handed me, or someone contaminated it somehow, or it was the drink I was told was safe and wasn’t.

A quick heads-up (and a caution): in my experience, some dishes I’d relied on as safe — like a certain salad and the Zuppa Toscana at one popular chain — turned out not to be, and their dedicated gluten-free pasta dish was a sad, bland disappointment. But please hear me: menus, suppliers, and kitchen practices change constantly, so never take my word (or an old blog post!) as current fact. Always confirm for yourself, every single visit.

4. The $14 honeycomb tragedy

And then — the final straw. I’d bought myself a little square of honeycomb: a tiny, splurgy, fourteen-dollar treat I keep on hand for when the neighbors’ Christmas goodies start calling my name and I need something safe and special to reach for instead.

Well. My nanny decided to spread some of it on…wheat bread…and then dipped the same knife right back into the honeycomb. Contaminating the entire thing. I managed to get sick from it twice before I finally noticed all the tiny bread crumbs hiding in my precious, ruined honey.

URGH. I’m telling you, I need to put locks on everything in my kitchen and keep the only key.

I’m sorry this one is such a gripe-fest. But if you’re nodding along through gritted teeth, then you already know: this is just the reality of protecting a body that reacts. So let me turn all this misery into something useful — the hard-won reminders I keep learning (and re-learning) the hard way.

What this month re-taught me

• Beware the asterisk. “Gluten free*” with a footnote is not the same as gluten-free.
• Always read to the very last ingredient. Hidden culprits like maltitol can be wheat-derived.
• A restaurant’s “almost everything is gluten-free” is not a guarantee. Ask specific questions, and know that even a good-faith kitchen can get it wrong.
• Cross-contamination is sneaky. One double-dipped knife can wreck an entire jar — and your week.
• Never apologize for turning the bottle around. Let them roll their eyes. You know why you check.

If any of this is your life too, please know you’re not being dramatic and you’re not being difficult — you’re being careful, and that care is worth every awkward question and every raised eyebrow. Here’s to a much less glutened month ahead. And to finally getting those kitchen locks installed.

With love (and a very guarded pantry),

Steffi E.