What is most helpful for me is focusing on the foods that I CAN eat instead of focusing on what I can't eat. There are so many delicious, naturally gluten free foods out there that I rarely feel deprived.

Thank you! I was going to vote on this for Reader Week but I had already voted for something else. I sort of object to the word "intolerance" as all true wheat / gluten allergies are diagnosed with a blood test and are not simply intolerances (which is not a diagnosis). One problem GF folks have is that even dumb things like peanuts and bananas are labelled "gluten free"! Well, duh. What we need are people to innovate foods that make actual meals; bread, pasta, stuff that holds other stuff together and which we're deprived of, especially at fast food or convenience stores when I just don't have time to make stuff at home.

Socca is awesome in place of dough for pizza crust. I'm not GF but it's just easier to make and I don't have to feel as guilty about it.

I've been on a gluten free diet for the past six years, and I have found (so far) that the easiest and healthiest way for me to eat is to cook a lot of Chinese and Japanese style foods. I live in a large city, so it's easy for me to find the necessary ingredients. I stock up on gluten-free soy sauce and other essentials, and I stir fry one dish every weeknight. I usually eat half of what I've cooked, and save the rest to eat along with the next night's dish.

I eat a lot of vegetables this way, and my stir fries are typically quick and easy Sichuanese or Cantonese recipes. I generally eat these dishes with Japanese haiga (semi-milled) brown rice (Kagayaki Haiga Brown Rice on Amazon.com). This rice is pretty tasty and the particular variety (or cultivar), Koshihikari, has a nice low glycemic index of 48+/-8. The fact that the variety I use is semi-milled means that it is likely to have an even lower glycemic index than the fully milled variety.

I also eat a pretty healthy mix of proteins, usually salmon or tofu, along with a little meat on the weekends. All of this ends up being pretty inexpensive because the vegetables are dirt-cheap and the meat is usually a cheap cut of pork or chicken, and is usually used sparingly anyway. The most expensive elements of my diet are farmed salmon ($6-10 per week) and the haiga brown rice ($10 per week).

For breakfast I often eat a large bowl McCanns steel-cut oats in addition to a bowl of low fat cottage cheese with diced fruit. I cook both the steel-cut oats and the rice in a Zojirushi programmable rice cooker that allows me to set up the oats the night before so that they're ready at 7 AM.

Another breakfast that I eat sometimes is kimchi fried rice with an over easy egg on top (in a nonstick pan with little oil). It takes about 10-15 minutes to prepare and uses up any leftover rice that I have in the fridge.

In short, my diet consists mainly of low glycemic index whole grains, vegetables, and a smattering of fish and low-fat dairy products for protein. I eat meat somewhat sparingly, maybe 4 to 8 oz per week, mainly on the weekends and when eating out.

Maybe I should start my own blog (sorry for the extra-long post), but I've been wanting to share my nutrition/eating/cooking strategy with other people that might benefit from it if they're interested.

@Technicolor be careful, I've read about contamination with McCann's.

http://surefoodsliving.com/2007/07/whats-the-deal-with-oats/

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17190763

Hey Emmi, thanks for bringing that up. I hadn't been too worried about cross-contamination with McCann's because their oats are processed in an "oats only" facility. It does merit some exploration. One of the reasons that I'm comfortable with McCann's is because it is basically a whole grain in the colloquial sense. It's not ground, and is therefore unlikely to contain a lot of hidden wheat flour/grain.

I was able to find a resource that addresses gluten contamination in McCann's specifically. As it turns out, it is possible for McCanns steel cut oats to be contaminated with wheat. Several tests of various oat brands were ordered by Tricia Thompson, M.S., R.D., and described in a letter to the New England Journal of Medicine. Of the four manufacturing lots of McCann's tested, one contained levels of gluten that would cause me concern, one was below the limit of detection, one was low enough to be considered gluten-free, and the last had only slightly more gluten than would be allowable in certified gluten-free products. The high levels of gluten found in one sample could have been caused by a single wheat berry collected during harvesting, or could have been the result of contamination during transportation with wheat flour. I'm sure there are other possibilities, and it would be interesting to find out the source of the contamination. Given these results, I'm still comfortable with McCann's, but others might be more wary.

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM200411043511924

I've been gluten free (or rather, wheat free!) for nearly 2 years now, and I haven't felt better. These are some excellent ideas, I might make the braised coconut spinach soon, it sounds delicious.

As for people who are looking to ditch the wheat, I recommend this book above all. It's probably the most concise guide to living wheat-free that I've come across on this seemingly lonely journey. And here I am now, healthy and wheat-free. Stay strong, fellow anti-gluteners!

I've been gluten-free for 12 years. And I kinda feel like an old person saying, "Back in my day...," but I have to say it's MUCH easier now to go gluten-free than it was back then.
I think that some people are addicted to bread and carbs, I know I was in my "past life." So it might be necessary to go on an elimination diet for those that are serious about finding out if their food is hurting them.
I went on a vitamin, rice and hamburger only diet for awhile and slowly added foods back in and logged it all in a food diary. Not saying that's for everybody and I probably should've consulted a doctor while doing it, but that's what I did and I learned a lot about my food sensitivies (and eating habits).
If you do suspect you have a problem with gluten, the most important thing is to do the diet for at least three months and if you accidentally (or purposely) ingest gluten, you should really start the whole thing over because doing it for a week isn't long enough for you to heal from the effects gluten could be having on your body.
And if you do feel better, CONGRATULATIONS because there's nothing worse to live your life in a fog, suffering from a food allergy you don't know you have. Going gluten-free is the best thing I've ever done...it literally saved my life.