<<Disclaimer: Verify this information before applying it to your situation.>> I have been reading this list for the past month or so, and finally decided to respond to several items (in no particular order). I have requested gluten-free meals on two airlines now, with mixed results. In both cases going one way was fine, but the return flight meal was messed up. In fact, on one flight (American) my special gluten-free meal contained pasta, while everyone else's looked fine, so I ended up being served the only gluten-containing meal on the flight! On the other mess-up (Northwest) the meal was labelled gluten-free (or at least checked off) but contained a roll and an oat-based cereal. That time I sent it back with a complaint. I am a self-diagnosed celiac, male 43 years old. I was diagnosed as a celiac as a child (along with a sister), but that was back in the 50's when they didn't really understand it (or at least eliminated more than wheat and grains from the diet). I seemed to grow out of it when I was 8-10, but it reoccurred for me 2 years ago. For the intervening 30 years I ate a LOT of wheat based food (bread was my favourite food), but it didn't appear to affect my health until 2 years ago, when I started to get occasional very bad gas and some diarrhea. The gas was very uncomfortable when it happened, so I tried eliminating various foods from my diet, and when I came to wheat, the bad gas reaction went away and stayed away. I have seen a specialist in town who is very informed about the disease, and he wanted to do a biopsy. But I didn't want to go back on gluten again (I knew what the reaction would be), and I asked him what a biopsy would prove. Even if it was negative, I wasn't about to go back on a gluten diet. He agreed with me that from MY point of view there was nothing to gain from a biopsy - it wouldn't change anything in my life, although it might make HIM feel better. I have since tested myself (a couple of months ago) to verify the gluten reaction - one piece of homemade bread did nothing, so I tried eating 3 slices, and got a typical reaction 48 hours later. The reason I used homemade bread is that I seem to get diarrhea (nothing else) from too much hydrogenated vegetable oil, which is in store-bought breads. I do not seem to be a typical celiac, although from this list I get the feeling that there is no such thing. I do not seem to get a discernable reaction from small doses of gluten (based on what happened before I went gluten-free), and often nothing happens for 48 hours. Then I will have diarrhoea, but it disappears quickly, with no lingering effects. I am generally VERY healthy, healthier than most people I know. I don't often get sick, and when I do it doesn't last long. My sister, two years older than myself, has not as of yet had any reoccurrence, although I have discussed my condition with her. I also have a nephew who was treated as a celiac when he was young. I want to put in a plug here for a Canadian maker of gluten-free products. Everything I have purchased from El Peto Products in Kitchener has been excellent - far surpassing most other products that I have tried, both in Canada and the US. The secret seems to be in their flour mix, which I now use to make my own bread. Most other GF breads I have tried (or made from scratch, using GF cookbook recipes) are dry and crumbly. In fact after 3 days or so they become so dry as to be inedible. In contrast, I just had to throw out part of a loaf of bread made using El Peto bread mix because it was too moist, and had grown mouldy. Their raisin bread is fantastic, pancake mix is very good, pie dough is good, pizza shells are good, and hamburg buns are ok. I think that I wouldn't bother with a lot of these things if not for El Peto, most of the competition putting out virtually inedible products, in my opinion. One final comment. Someone mentioned the volume of mail from this list. There is no need to get a lot of individual items. If you tell the listserv to set your mail to digest format, you will receive just one mail item a day, containing all the days mail compiled into one item, to be read anytime at your leisure. Just send the following message to [log in to unmask] - set celiac digests.