“Did she dream this on Sunday morning?” you might say. Yes, as someone who follows a 95% gluten-free diet and ate flatbread at a kebab shop last night, I might have dreamt I was writing this 🙂 It’s been on my mind for a while. I’ve been getting, and seeing, so many hesitant, anxious, and confused questions about gluten-free diets. I decided it was time to explain it in detail today. Where did this gluten-free diet craze come from? How can the Turkish people, who love bulgur pilaf and bread, cope with this?
For most people living in this country, this is one of the most enjoyable dishes. I prepared this two days ago while planning to eat purslane for dinner, but suddenly my eyes turned to cheese and bread while browsing in the market. I got the carbohydrates, I got the gluten… but how? Because I’m balanced. I wanted to tell you the details.
Everyone has a different opinion. Bread has already been declared the enemy. No bulgur, no pasta, no pastries, no biscuits, nothing at all… Is a gluten-free diet necessary, why, how, and to what extent…? Gluten-Free Diet 101, let’s begin.
What is gluten? Gluten is the protein found in wheat. It has a sticky texture. It is found in wheat, bulgur, rye, barley, and everything derived from them.
What does gluten do to us?
Gluten disrupts the gut flora. Disruption of the gut flora invites many diseases.
Did our grandmothers eat gluten-free? Were they all healthy?
No, wheat has been a part of the diet in Anatolia for centuries. The problem arose as follows: In the late 1940s, during World War II, a scientist genetically modified wheat in a laboratory to increase its yield. The yield increased from 1 wheat grain to 10. The gluten in this genetically modified wheat disrupted human anatomy. Of course, the excessive amount of sugar in our diets, the development of industry, and the enormous size of the food and beverage industry, combined with the packaged, preservative-laden products that entered our lives, created a Voltron that destroyed our bodies. If you notice, autoimmune and chronic diseases have surged in the last 10-15 years. Our mothers were luckier in terms of these types of immune system disorders. Those born in 1970 and later were the most affected by this change because our childhood and youth were the most exposed to it.
Why did gluten-free diets become fashionable or a necessity? :
As medications proved insufficient in treating the increasing number of autoimmune diseases, it became clear that the real cure lay in nutrition and quality of life. Improving gut health is the most essential step in healing the body. To achieve this, it was necessary to address the body as a whole and focus on gut health. So how would the gut heal? First, it needed to be cleansed of gluten clinging to its cells. Immediately alongside this, sugar and chemicals. Nourishing the good bacteria living in the gut and removing the bad bacteria became crucial. I won’t go into too much detail about these; you can find that information with a simple Google search. I want to talk about another aspect of the issue.
You’ve somehow switched to a gluten-free diet, it was suggested, or you decided to. What this actually means is: removing bulgur from your diet and increasing other nutrients that are beneficial to your body. A gluten-free diet doesn’t mean simply buying gluten-free flours, making bread, pastries, and pies, and continuing that routine. You can find my previous article about gluten-free flours at this link. As Turkish people, we are very fond of bread, rice, pastries, and bagels. The main idea is to remove these from our diet and increase colorful vegetables, fruits, good legumes, good fats, and good protein sources. In other words, it means getting the energy our bodies need not from wheat and its derivatives, but from the food groups mentioned in the previous sentence. A gluten-free diet isn’t about eating two pastries made with gluten-free flour for breakfast. While quantities vary from person to person and depending on what we eat throughout the day, a breakfast consisting of 2 eggs, a large salad with colorful vegetables, unroasted nuts, good cheese, and a piece of fruit if needed, means feeling completely full. Of course, sometimes you crave pastries or cakes, but only “occasionally” 🙂 That’s when you can make them with the healthy flours I mentioned in my “Gluten-Free Flours” article.
How do I meet my body’s carbohydrate needs? It’s true that the body and brain need carbohydrates for energy, but the source of the carbohydrate is very important. We can already get the carbohydrates we need best from vegetables and fruits. No human body needs carbohydrates and grains like 2 slices of bread in the morning, 4 spoonfuls of rice at noon, 3 slices of pizza in the evening, or bread again. The carbohydrates the body needs are the right carbohydrates that come from vegetables and fruits. You might be losing weight when you give up wheat. This is a clear indication that most of your daily calories were previously coming from bread/grains. If you don’t want to lose that much weight, I recommend increasing your intake of beneficial food groups and closing the calorie deficit from there. The logic here is: don’t rely on grains to feel full, but consume other food groups in a balanced way. Unless you have a chronic or autoimmune disorder, you can use grains only occasionally in certain amounts for pleasure.
So, are we not going to eat bagels at all for Sunday morning breakfast? Here we come to the key point 🙂 Everyone gets stuck here. I recommend following a gluten-free diet only until your gut health improves, and only on the advice of your doctor or a specialist. No recovery diet (Keto, FODMAP, GAPS, Elimination, AIP, etc.) should be followed forever. These are like medicine, focused on recovery. Personally, I did the same. For about two years, I didn’t eat anything with gluten and solved my endless gas problem. I still eat 95% gluten-free, but as you can see in the photo, there’s sometimes gluten in 5%, but my gut handles that much on its own. I learned this through trial and error. There’s no escaping gluten. It will always find its way back into our lives. Unless you have celiac disease, once you’ve established a routine for healthy bowel function, your body will tolerate a small piece of pastry as a treat. The important thing is not to make it a routine, meaning not to eat pastry every morning. When we eat clean and healthy 90% of the time, the body will handle the remaining 10%. No one can eat 100% healthy food. We’d have to live on a mountaintop to do that, and even that’s impossible in today’s world. There are factors we can’t control. Therefore, there’s no need to make utopian plans or get caught up in disaster scenarios we read online. We need to protect our mental health too, right? 🙂 However, when choosing wheat, it’s beneficial to opt for genetically unaltered Anatolian wheat varieties like spelt, black awn, and emmer. The gluten in these is more easily digested by the intestines.
The relationship between diabetes, fasting, blood sugar balance, and gluten:
I get a lot of questions from people with diabetes. When they switch to a gluten-free diet (although I don’t think every diabetic needs to follow a gluten-free diet), they’re afraid of experiencing hypoglycemia because they think cutting out gluten automatically means cutting out grains as well. While it’s possible to continue with gluten-free grains, it’s not really necessary. Whether gluten-containing or gluten-free, all grains are high in carbohydrates. It’s actually high carbohydrates that cause hypoglycemia, excessive insulin release, and disrupt blood sugar balance. Instead of a diet high in grains, a diet high in fat, protein, and good carbohydrates (vegetables and fruits) is ideal for diabetes and blood sugar control. Everything I’ve said above applies to anyone struggling with insulin resistance, hypoglycemia, or type 2 diabetes.
That’s why doctors like Canan Karatay, Ümit Aktaş, Mustafa Atasoy, and abroad Mark Hyman, who are wonderful Functional Medicine practitioners, constantly tell us to stay away from pasta, rice, and bread. The main point is to maintain balance.
EDIT: I’ll add more as things come to mind 🙂 This addition is point 1… If you’re going to eat bread, be sure of its ingredients. Please don’t eat the so-called “whole grain” breads sold in supermarkets, which I’ve seen on many “expert” accounts lately, that are full of preservatives and don’t mold even after 6 months. If you prefer sourdough bread, made with traditional methods, where you’re sure of the wheat or rye used, you’ll find that you stay full longer and you’ll be eating something relatively more beneficial.
This is a rather long post, but I wanted to write it as an answer to some frequently asked questions. If there are any other things you’re wondering about that I haven’t thought of, please write them in the comments section. I’ll try my best to explain what I know.
Have a wonderful Sunday and week everyone. Lots of love.
