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>I'm confused!!! Taken from Bette Hagman's cookbook and many questions
>from the members in my support group (due to reactions from mentioned
>grains), amaranth, teff and quinoa are questionable grains. Many health
>food stores sell them as gluten free or low in gluten.


Since somebody asked me about teff a while back, I'll post what I had
sent in response. I really do think that the reason for the bad rep is
just because of contamination -- which is not a problem if you grind your
own flour or (obviously, since there are very sensitive celiacs eating
the stuff...) if you get them from reliable places that avoid such
contamination. But celiacs, like the rest of the human species, can be
allergic to anything they are eating. So maybe it all started because
there are some celiacs who also happen to be allergic to such things.

Definitely teff, quinoa, and amaranth are not related to wheat, if that's
any help in sorting it out. Neither are buckwheat or millet. Spelt and
kamut, on the other hand, are definitely more ancient forms of wheat. But
their protein is different enough that some people with wheat allergy can
eat them. That's probably why you will get store personnel thinking that
spelt and kamut are safe if you can't eat gluten -- they don't realize
that celiac is not the same as a wheat allergy.

From what I've heard on this list, the US celiac organization is far more
restrictive than similar groups in other countries (such as Canada). And
yet celiacs elsewhere are thriving on foods that the US outfit bans. I
think the US group is just confusing sources of trouble, and is
incorrectly assuming that that foods such as quinoa, teff, millet,
buckwheat, and amaranth "must have gluten" because a few people have
reactions for other reasons entirely.

                          Peace, Cathy Flick [log in to unmask]
-----------
[from some previous correspondence]
I've seen contradictory statements about gluten in teff and amaranth --
some people say to stay away from them as low-gluten but not gluten-free,
others call them non-gluten grains or grain substitutes, others say they
are all right for gluten-free diets, still others say that the gluten in
such grains can come just from cross-contamination. Arf. Well, I'm not
celiac but do better if I only eat wheat about once a week, and do fine
pigging out on teff periodically.... But I also do fine with barley or
oats, and barley at least definitely contains gluten (you can tell by the
way barley flour works when making tortilla dough; oats must have much
less gluten if any, since oat flour just doesn't handle in a wheat-y
way). Someone on the list who is very sensitive to gluten said that he
carefully picked out stray wheat kernels from oats and then didn't have
any reaction to the oats at all, which suggests that cross contamination
is the most important thing to worry about. Whole teff can be purchased,
by the way -- hard to see how a wheat kernel could hide among them, the
teff seed is VERY tiny. I was able to make teff flour from the seeds in a
Vita-Mix, although usually I just buy the flour. Teff is also called
injera.

I saw this on one web site that has recipes you might want to check out:

http://www.javanet.com/~loehr/a/gluten.htm

It says: "Gluten-free diets exclude wheat, rye, barley, spelt, tritical,
kawmut, and usually oats. Rice and corn are generally agreed upon as
gluten-free. More controversially, I accept amaranth, buckwheat, millet,
quinoa, and teff as gluten-free. This page includes links to some of my
gluten-free recipes."

I guess this means teff is in the same category as millet and quinoa,
which most people think are okay as GF but others will insist they are
not. Obviously teff isn't even as gluten-y as oats, according to this
site:

http://www.food-allergy.org/cooking2.html

   "The gluten-containing grain flours include spelt, kamut, rye, barley,
oats, and wheat. Among the non-gluten grains are teff, rice, wild rice,
millet, milo (also called sorghum or jowar), and corn. Non-grain flours
include amaranth, quinoa, buckwheat, tapioca, cassava meal, arrowroot,
chestnut flour, water chestnut flour, and various legume flours and
starches such as garbanzo flour, soy flour, carob powder, lupine flour,
bean starch, and kudzu starch. In addition, tropical tubers can be made
into flours, such as malanga flour, white sweet potato flour, true yam
flour, cassava flour, lotus flour, and others."

Wild Oats web site also has some useful info about using all the grains
and grain substitutes:

http://www.wildoats.com/know/bulk/b_flour.html

They consider teff as gluten-free, also.