Make Your Own Gluten-Free Flour

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Mix your own gluten-free flour

My search for a easy to mix, easy to use, gluten-free flour recipe began a decade ago when I discovered I had celiac disease. While people choose to avoid gluten for a variety of reasons, anyone with celiac knows wheat, barley or rye will trigger an immediate reaction by your immune system on your digestive tract.

The alternative to feeling miserable and permanently damaging your digestive system is to avoid gluten. But that doesn’t mean you have to stop eating all the things you love.

Simply mix these 5 ingredients in equal amounts and you’re back to baking your favorite treats – gluten-free!

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Crisis Over, Put the Tea Kettle On

In times of stress and angst, my mother always prescribed a deep calming breath and a Nice Cup of Tea.  In times of big stress and angst, however, too many of those Nice Cups of Tea can send your over-caffeinated nerves a-jangling and tank your coping skills all the more.

So, how much caffeine is in a cup of regular black tea?

In part, it depends on how strongly your tea is brewed, how many tea bags or spoonfuls of tea laves in relation to how much water, and how long you let it steep before drinking.

(My grandmother used to let tea stew on the back of the stove for half the day, adding another splash of water or handful of tea leaves from time to time so the pot never ran dry. Her tea could bring a strong man to his knees.)
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Diet Like a Galen Weston Babe

Lately, now that we’re finally starting to peel off mega-layers of winter clothing, unpleasant surprises have come to light. Look away now if you’re squeamish. (Or skip down the page to something far more visually rewarding, if you prefer.)

It’s this pasty-pale end-of-winter body — so long covered up in wool and fibrefill and fleece — so long neglected because, really, who cares when all you want to do is hibernate? Now there’s a hint of spring, of sunshine, of the possibility of weather warm enough to want to wear shorts and little sun dresses and dare-to-dream a bathing suit, perhaps… so I’m suddenly aware of a certain softness at the waistline…. A certain avoir-dupois in the rear end…. A certain alarming lack of firmness about the inner thighs…

What, too much information?

Sorry. I’ve been hanging out with CardioGirl too much lately, and listening to Claudia boast about finding her hip bones when Karen whipped her back to the gym…

Peer Pressure + Vanity = Healthy Eating

President’s Choice Blue Menu products for Health Eating Challenge Long story short, I’ve signed up for the President’s Choice Healthy Eating Challenge.

This means setting some goals for health and fitness and whatnot, and then dragging my cushy tush into town once a week, to meet with a Loblaw’s dietician and confess my chocolate sins.

The idea is that I’ll follow a 4-week healthy eating plan that’s based on the PC Blue Menu line of products, while Loblaw’s kicks in for groceries and nutrition counselling. Which all works out pretty well because (a) I lack the gene for self-denial and self-control, and (b) I like most of the Blue Menu foods I’ve tried — can we say “Roasted Vegetable Lasagna”?

So, it looks like this will be starting up in the next week or so…

Must confess, I am a bit nervous.

I have a vision of these weekly dietician visits as something like being called into the high school principal’s office — “Just where were you, young lady, when you should have been in your third period Home Economics class?!”

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