“What should I call my store?” I asked my son( I had been thinking of something pithy like Gluten easy). Very matter of fact he said to me “Mom, just call it “The Gluten Free Place””. Out of the mouths of babes.
This entire journey started because of Kodiak, my youngest son. We were in Pittsburgh, PA in 2012 when he was “officially” diagnosed with non-celiac gluten intolerance. Finally an answer to the headaches, nausea and almost comatose like sleep he would go in to for the past year and a half. I remember standing in the aisles of the grocery store completely and utterly lost. I didn’t even know where to start shopping. I sought out things that “I thought” would be gluten free. Tomato soup, chicken broth, rice, soy sauce, steak sauce. I have since learned is that even in seemingly innocuous things like “organic chicken broth” can contain gluten. I was discovering that I was “surrounded by gluten” and I had to be seek it out in to ensure that it wasn’t being introduced in everyday things and consumed by my son. I started a gluten free diet so my son wouldn’t be the only one. The biggest thing I learned to do was “read a label”. It’s so obvious? Right? It might sound like a really obvious thing to do there’s always the “sly” thing on the label…spice, natural flavors…. While in Pittsburgh we were directed to a gluten free store. I was game. As it was, a typical shopping excursion would entail going to three different stores, in three different parts of Pittsburgh and trying to remember where I bought what and where. This usually took the better part of a day. When we walked into the store I asked them where their gluten free items were. EVERYTHING in the store is gluten free they said. Relief washed over me, I got tears in my eyes then elation! I told my son to take a basket and he could pick out whatever he wanted because everything in the store was gluten free. Kodiak continued to ask if this or that was gluten free and I kept reiterating to him EVERYTHING in the store was gluten free. I think he was as shell shocked as I was. Through this store we found out about another gluten free store and went the following week. They had gluten free pizza, sandwiches and baked goods. I spoke frequently with the owners asked questions and therein got the inspiration. I wanted to provide a place where other people would be able to come to and not feel like they were “drowning” in a sea of gluten or to have to worry about what they were choosing would contain gluten and at the same time give children like my son Kodiak some freedom to choose. It has taken over a year for this store to come to fruition. In the interim Kodiak has developed other food sensitive as well which have been incorporated into the selections. I hope you enjoy your adventure in my store finding new gluten free foods and finding something scrumptious our pastry chef Ruby has created.
This entire journey started because of Kodiak, my youngest son. We were in Pittsburgh, PA in 2012 when he was “officially” diagnosed with non-celiac gluten intolerance. Finally an answer to the headaches, nausea and almost comatose like sleep he would go in to for the past year and a half. I remember standing in the aisles of the grocery store completely and utterly lost. I didn’t even know where to start shopping. I sought out things that “I thought” would be gluten free. Tomato soup, chicken broth, rice, soy sauce, steak sauce. I have since learned is that even in seemingly innocuous things like “organic chicken broth” can contain gluten. I was discovering that I was “surrounded by gluten” and I had to be seek it out in to ensure that it wasn’t being introduced in everyday things and consumed by my son. I started a gluten free diet so my son wouldn’t be the only one. The biggest thing I learned to do was “read a label”. It’s so obvious? Right? It might sound like a really obvious thing to do there’s always the “sly” thing on the label…spice, natural flavors…. While in Pittsburgh we were directed to a gluten free store. I was game. As it was, a typical shopping excursion would entail going to three different stores, in three different parts of Pittsburgh and trying to remember where I bought what and where. This usually took the better part of a day. When we walked into the store I asked them where their gluten free items were. EVERYTHING in the store is gluten free they said. Relief washed over me, I got tears in my eyes then elation! I told my son to take a basket and he could pick out whatever he wanted because everything in the store was gluten free. Kodiak continued to ask if this or that was gluten free and I kept reiterating to him EVERYTHING in the store was gluten free. I think he was as shell shocked as I was. Through this store we found out about another gluten free store and went the following week. They had gluten free pizza, sandwiches and baked goods. I spoke frequently with the owners asked questions and therein got the inspiration. I wanted to provide a place where other people would be able to come to and not feel like they were “drowning” in a sea of gluten or to have to worry about what they were choosing would contain gluten and at the same time give children like my son Kodiak some freedom to choose. It has taken over a year for this store to come to fruition. In the interim Kodiak has developed other food sensitive as well which have been incorporated into the selections. I hope you enjoy your adventure in my store finding new gluten free foods and finding something scrumptious our pastry chef Ruby has created.
