Adopt a Food Intolerance

So, largely for my own personal amusement, but also as part of a poorly formulated scientific experiment, I've decided to cut back on the amount of gluten I consume.

Specifically, I'm going to try to avoid wheat for a few weeks, while opting for "gluten free" things as much as possible. I may occasionally make exceptions for cake - it depends on how well my will power holds up. Plus, I'll probably not shy away from oats, rye and barely as much as wheat, even though eatin "gluten free" things will probably cut those down as well.

I'm largely doing this to see what will happen. I happen to know I don't have coeliac disease (had the blood test a couple of years ago, which came back negative), but I also have a lot of symptoms that are often associated with it. It occurs to me that I might not have an autoimmune reaction to the stuff, but I might be reacting to it nonetheless.

I suppose I could go through a doctor or natropath and find out if I have an honest-to-goodness food intolerance, but where's the fun in that? I'd rather randomly pick something and see what happens if I just act like I have an intolerance. It's less stressful that way (an experiment, rather than a health imperative), and it gives me a slightly different perspective on the world. Even if it turns out that cutting my gluten intake to a minimum has no positive effect on my health, I'll have a better appreciation of the way people who are gluten intolerant see the world.

I'm already annoyed by the local cafe that, the other day, offered only two salads - one with crutons and the other with couscous. Surely someone avoiding gluten should be able to safely order the salad?

Anyway, my goal is to take as much wheat out of my diet as I can for a few weeks (to let it get out of my system), and then eat a big bowl of spaghetti and see how I feel. I like to think of it as scientific enquiry meets blind stupidity.

So far I've been doing it for a couple of days, and my rice intake has almost quadrippled. I keep looking at the amount of rice and corn I would be eating to replace the wheat, thinking "my, that's a lot of rice and corn"... Which, when you think about it, just highlights how much wheat I usually eat.

I should probably be looking at changing my eating habits entirely to default more to meat/fish/poultry and fruits and vegitables. It seems I have a lot of processed grains in my current diet.

We do tend to fall into a habit of processed foods in our modern world, don't we?