My most recent dietary epiphany has been that I do indeed have a wheat sensitivity. It’s something that I’ve been ignoring and blaming on other factors for years. Whenever I would have a dish of pasta, a sandwich, a cookie, scone or slice of birthday cake, I’d end up feeling bloated and nauseated. That’s pretty much every day when I think about it. Somedays would be worse than others depending on how many wheat products I would consume. I just got use to it after a while I suppose. However, now that I am really zeroing in on which foods make me feel good and which don’t, I can no longer pretend that my body can digest wheat. I’ve considered following the Paleo diet and giving up all grains, but I’m not quite sure that’s the best for me. I know that I’ll figure it out during this next year of furthering my nutritional education.
Since I’ve eliminated wheat from my diet, I’ve had to get creative with my food. Investigating wheat flour alternatives to bake with has been somewhat daunting. There are a lot of alternative flours, but none seem to be able to duplicate the fluffy, light texture that you get from wheat. You have to add tons of other wacky ingredients that don’t even sound like something I’d want to eat (tapioca starch, guar gum, xanthan gum, agar agar powder).There are gluten free mixes and some of them are even organic, though not many. They already have the wacky ingredients mixed in, so at least you don’t have to spend the money to buy each one individually.
There is one flour that seems to be as close to wheat flour as I am able to get when used alone. Quinoa flour is light and so far has given me pretty fair results when baking. It has a light odor that is definitely different from wheat, but it’s not enough to turn me off. It has 4 g of protein (same as whole wheat), but only 18 g of carbohydrates (23 g for whole wheat). So, though it is pricey, it will keep me satisfied when the cravings for baked goods come around.
Tonight, I made these yummy summer squash pancakes with quinoa flour. They cooked up beautifully and was a super way of using up some of the extra squash I had in my farm share this week. The kids devoured them so quickly, I had to make sure to save a few for my husband before they were all gone.
Sweet and Savory Summer Squash Pancakes
Makes about 12 pancakes
2 large eggs
3 tbls melted butter
2 tbls honey
2 tbls milk
2 tbls plain yogurt
a splash of vanilla extract
1 1/2 medium summer squash grated in food processor (pat with paper towels to reduce moisture)
1 cup quinoa flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
Simply stated, mix all the wet ingredients together in a large bowl. Whisk all the dry ingredients in a small bowl. Add the dry to the wet and blend gently until it looks like this:
Then spoon the batter on to an electric griddle or buttered skillet:
The end result is something like a potato pancake, but sweeter and not quite so heavy.
I topped them with maple syrup and butter. Nummies 
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