Moleskine II, filled with my scribblings to the point where he is in danger of irreversible spinal injury, has announced he will be taking some much-needed convalescent leave after tonight's Top Chef All-Stars finale.
Resultingly, I was obliged to visit my local outpost of Barnes and Noble yesterday to pick up a new notebook. While I was there, I decided to pay a call at Starbucks for an invigorating tall soy latte.
Whoever decided to put cappuccino counters in bookstores anyway? They're my Achilles' heel. In the gluten-filled good old days, I could rarely resist a sweet companion to my java - a packet of madeleines, maybe, or a slice of pumpkin loaf. If I was feeling wicked or gossiping with a companion, it was not unknown for me to indulge in a great slab of cheesecake or one of those vanilla cupcakes with buttercream swirled a mile high (I know I am on record as saying that I think cupcakes are silly - but the Starbucks' ones grabbed me right in the ol' sweet tooth).
Sadly, the pickings in the pastry case (sorry, vitrine) are pretty slim for a gluten freedom fighter such as myself. More correctly, they are nonexistent. A Kind cranberry and almond bar (all natural! certified gluten free! dairy free! loaded with anti-oxidants! doesn't taste like packing material!) or some milk chocolate, perhaps, but nothing squidgy, squishy, creamy, and sweet sweet sweet to satisfy the soul.
But that's OK. Like Job, I have become accustomed to my lot in life.
Today, for some reason, I noticed an additional comestible possibility next to the cash register: packs of gluten-free chocolate chip cookies. To protect the innocent, I shall give them a rhyming pseudonym: We'll See's, as in we'll see if they're any improvement on the usual gluten-free calamities on offer at other retailers. The founder of the brand, Doctor 'We'll See' herself, has composed a little blurb for the back of the bag where she claims to care about us and be our friend.
Right away, that made me suspicious. Who wants to eat a cookie that's been prescribed by some sort of nutty medical zealot? Not me, that's for sure.
Naturally, I bought a bag.
Why do I do this to myself? Well, for one thing I feel it's my duty as a public figure to sample these products so readers may benefit from my experience. Failing that, I am painfully aware that a certain schadenfreude has the capacity to amuse Others Who Read About My Misfortunes. No sacrifice is too great in the service of truth or entertainment.
Also, I was hungry.
A quick perusal of the label while my soy milk was being steamed to frothy goodness revealed that Dr. 'We'll See' was attempting to mimic a real cookie through the use of a fairly typical g/f flour blend (oat flour, chickpea flour, potato starch, sorghum and fava flours); together with the unnecessarily earnest additions of soy milk, non-dairy lactic acid (huh?) and vegan chocolate chips. For crying out loud, isn't the fact that it's gluten-free sufficient? Is it necessary that we also flog the organic horse to death? I snarled to nobody in particular as I considered the inability of baked goods lacking in eggs, sugar, and butter to be worthy of my time or the effort it takes to digest them. In addition, I was a bit nonplussed to see that even without these worthy components, the itty-bitty bites contained something like fifty calories each!
I decided to postpone sampling my new purchase until I got home, as the convening of tasting panels gives a certain purpose to my gluten-free existence. Since it was curry night, I figured that even if the treats were a total disaster, the let-down might be leavened somewhat by the satisfaction of the preliminary feast and another exciting episode of Lost (we're at the one where John Locke utters the immortal line, 'This is not a democracy!' and the identity of Kate's baby is revealed: all gripping stuff, I'm sure you'll agree).
After the thrilling denouement I proffered my offering to the boys who, in a spirit of willingness, if not eagerness (at this point, they have even less hope than I that anything good can come of these sessions), agreed to tell me what they thought.
We each chose a cookie and did our best to be objective.
The Kid Squid's verdict was the first in. He declared his judgement after just one bite and subsequently begged to be excused from the exercise (the poor thing really has been worn down by months of my foolishness). The Squid likes his cookies on the soft and gooey side and was repulsed by the way his specimen 'instantly disintegrated'. 'It tastes strange to me,' he opined, before refusing to speak further on the subject and dashing to the kitchen for a piece of fudge, better known as 'a proper dessert.'
Sir was somewhat more detailed in his reporting, although his ruling was essentially the same. He thought the cookie was 'all right, but unsatisfying' and found 'no joy' in its consumption. The texture and flavor reminded him of an English digestive biscuit, which he attributed to the presence of oats in the batter. In my memory, digestive biscuits are things of great subtlety and beauty. These sadly, were not.
My own tasting notes recorded that the cookies were crisp and crumbly rather than chewy - in my opinion, a fatal flaw. The chocolate chips, such as they were, tasted of nothing at all. Additionally, the cookies did that g/f thing of sticking in my back teeth for all eternity - or at least, until I brushed my teeth later a few minutes later. The usual unwelcome aftertaste also lingered. I imagine that if one were to be so incautious as to eat an entire cookie, one's gastro-intestinal tract would be clogged with cement-like g/f flour for 36 hours, at least - but since I had only a small taste, I'll never know for sure.
That was one sacrifice that even I - servant of the gluten-free gods and an enquiring public - was unwilling to make.
Having calmed down a bit after yesterday's lack-of-lactose conniption fit, I made myself a calming cup of Earl Grey and added a splash of almond milk. It isn't too terrible a combination, actually: the mild almond flavor complements the bergamot in a not displeasing way. Thus fortified, I decided to do a little research to see if I could find any loopholes in the quacks' latest pronouncement regarding the extirpation of dairy products from my already rather restricted diet.
Suspicious of internet resources as I am these days, I decided to bypass the computer and go straight to the oracle - Harold McGee and his encyclopedic red-covered reference, On Food and Cooking. And boy-oh-boy, am I glad I did! It took only a few minutes' concentrated reading to discover that I can totally get around the medicos' latest craziness without compromising the letter of their law or my own longevity.
I decided to go back to first principles to find out what lactose actually is. I have been so preoccupied by gluten protein chains these days I have given hardly any thought to other edible molecules - an oversight I sought to rectify at once. Turns out, lactose is a disaccharide (composed of the two simple sugars glucose and galactose) that accounts for about 5% of cow's milk, by weight. Our favorite milk these days, which comes to us raw courtesy of a local Jersey herd, is about 4.9% lactose. If I could get my hands on some reindeer milk or fin whale milk, I'd be laughing at only 2.8% or 1.3%, respectively. (Note to self: must lobby Wegmans' influential buyers ASAP for these necessary additions to the dairy case). But it's all academic, really, since drinking milk straight makes me gag and that is something I choose to do as rarely as possible. A splash of moo in coffee or tea is about as close as I get to the unadulterated article and I suppose that's why the good lord invented soy and almond substitutes.
But as I have repeated, vociferously, to anyone within earshot, there are other dairy-derived products without which my life will be diminished to pointlessness. Brie! Milkshakes! Organic super-yogurt! Butter! Anything with cream in it! These are all things that make a gluten-free existence worth tolerating.
I delved further into McGee's herniating tome and hit upon my first piece of really exceptional news on page 44. There is hardly any lactose in live cultured yogurt! This is because the sugars have already been handily digested by wee microbes who break them down into lactic acid, hooray. As long as one eats natural yogurt (that is, yogurt that has not been re-injected with milk-stuff to make it thick and creamy) lactose is not a problem. Hooray again - I can still eat breakfast in the morning. Do I see yogurt-making in my future now? I may have just discovered a whole new line of enquiry - additional note to self.
I soon found another fact to cheer me: cheese (especially the sorts of cheeses we have in our fridge and that I will soon learn to make during my fact-finding tour of sunny Shelburne Falls, MA) also has so little lactose as to make no difference. This is because most of the lactose is to be found in the whey, which is drained off during manufacturing - and because more industrious wee microbes feast on the remaining sugars as the cheese sits percolating over the months and years. Third hooray of the day. My aged cheddar and triple-cremes are safe for consumption after all. Fresh cheeses such as mozzarella and ricotta are more problematic, but since I've already established my willingness to be a good girl in other respects, I think we can let that slide.
Butter. See cheese, above. Most of the lactose disappears during production. Cream. See butter. In fact, somewhat counterintuitively in my opinion, the higher the fat content of a milk product (full fat milk vs. 2% milk, for example), the lower the lactose level. Was there ever more felicitous dietary news in the annals of culinary history?
This is just about the happiest outcome I could have expected and renews the sparkle on my alimentary future.
And the praline milk jam I tended patiently for the better part of seven hours on Saturday, too.
Coming soon: I discover that my home-made preserves are suitable for travel into outer space.
A few days ago I went for coffee with the Cycling Scientist and we had a good old-fashioned two-hour chin-wag.
This event was notable due to two unrelated factors:
- The work ethic for which I am justifiably famous generally precludes my taking time off (playing hooky is another way of looking at it) during business hours.
- I had soy milk in my tall latte.
The first gave rise to a mild taste of guilt that was soon assuaged by the accompanying delicious gossip. The second one, however, has far graver implications for my lifestyle at present - and has me beating my forehead against the keyboard in dismay while threatening wholesale my rather tenuous grip on culinary contentment.
Yes, Campers, the quacks have declared I must now be lactose free.
Taken together with my weekend pasta setback, this latest bolt from the blue is almost too much to bear. I am seriously thinking of emigrating to - oh, I don't know - the South Pole, where there are no doctors to boss me around and interfere with my few remaining reasons to live.
Almost exactly six months to the day since my anti-grain grief got going, I have the basic principles of this gluten-freedom fighting thing pretty much conquered - a bold statement, granted, but one to which I trust these scribblings will attest. I admit freely that one of the great saving graces of all this wheatless brouhaha has been the comfort and succour of dairy goods, luscious gifts from our noble bovine friends. No cake allowed? Fine. I'll eat panna cotta and creme brulee and macarons with buttercream instead. No pasta? I can still enjoy creamy sauces folded into risotto. No bread for my preserves? That's OK: cheese alone makes an excellent foil for chutneys and tangy marmalades.
But now ... well, now it's getting just plain silly. I have decided to stage a mutiny and mount a campaign of passive non-compliance - after all, a girl can only be pushed so far.
Soy milk in my latte? OK, I can just about manage that. Almond milk in my tea? I guess that's not too big a problem.
But breakfast without yogurt? There would be no point in getting out of bed in the morning. Cancellation of my gala Caribbean Cocktail and Cheese-Making Convention and trip to the Cheese Queen's lair next month? I'd rather be dipped in camembert and buried in an anthill. Forced to forswear cream fillings in meringues and gluten-free profiteroles? You might as well take a whirring Cuisinart blade straight to my vitals. These sacrifices are too dear a price to pay in order to [in medical parlance] 'see what happens'.
I'm putting my foot down and drawing a line in the sand. The fates and medicine men can do as they will: I'm damned if I'll go dairy-free.
