Eat Me Healthy: Gluten Free

I’ve often been asked to provide a lunchbox of foods to help my clients overcome their illness. I believe in the power of food – that certain foods can make you better and certain foods can make you worse. Here is a short excerpt from my handwritten book that I look to when cooking for my clients.

Coeliac Disease is an inflammatory condition of the gastrointestinal tract caused by the intolerance of the protein gluten, which is found in wheat, rye, barley and oats. Basically no bread allowed. It can be quite serious as the gluten damages the intestinal lining, therefore the sufferer cannot absorb nutrients.

Some clients didn’t even know they had this disease – but often felt bloated, tired, anaemic, depressed, had pain in their joints or even had diarrhorea or constipation. If in doubt, just go check it out at your GP.

What I have done at Sweet Mandarin is to thicken our sauces with potato starch so there is no gluten involved. For the aromatic peking duck, we replace the pancakes with lettuce wraps. Spring rolls which are wrapped in wheat pastries are replaced with cabbage leaves. One can no longer enjoy the good ole chow mein…but don’t worry, I’ve created the most amazing Singapore Vermicelli (made with rice noodles) that you won’t even miss the chow mein! Even the batter for the salt and pepper chilli ribs or the sweet and sour chicken uses potato starch and not corn flour, so its all good at Sweet Mandarin. If in doubt, email lisa before you visit and I’ll personally oversee your dinner is gluten free.