I have often wondered whether I would ever see this day.  Not specifically Jan 29 2010, which is not an especially significant date for me.  But it has been very significant in that I have picked up my first ever prescribed gluten-free food.

Not that we have an official diagnosis or anything like that, but I have finally found a consultant at Bart’s who understands the important thing here is not a label to attach to a condition, but an appropriate treatment for whatever the underlying condition may be.  So, at the beginning of December, he promised me he would write to my GP recommending a gluten-free prescription.  Phew.

Needless to say, I’ve been checking with the GP ever since to see whether they’d received the letter.  Up until last week there was no joy, but since I had pre-booked an appointment for yesterday with the GP, on the basis that a month and a half was quite sufficient time for the consultant to have written, I chased the department last week.  They apologised, wrote the letter and posted it last Thursday.  By Wednesday of this week it had failed to arrive, probably because the postal deliveries in our neighbourhood can be something of a lottery.  Booted the department again, who said they would fax a copy over to my GP, and turned up to see her yesterday morning as planned.

Not that the fax had been seen by her but, thankfully, she trusts me not to fib about these things and was prepared to start the gluten-free prescription right away, while she waited to see what the letter might hold.  We picked three products at random - white flour mix, multi-grain bread and pizza bases - and decided to leave the rest until we were both more clued in on what we should or shouldn’t be doing.

For some reason, it didn’t occur to me to check whether the things we were ordering were lactose and/or soy free.  I doubt it would have done us much good anyway, as each product appeared as a line on her computer and didn’t have additional information to assist us, but I probably should have given it more thought.

And, today, my first gluten-free prescribables arrived at the pharmacy.  These were the white flour mix and the pizza bases.  Unlucky for me, the flour mix contains both lactose and soy, so I shall probably be keeping that for some time when I’m catering for a group, or maybe Freecycle it out to someone else who can use it.  I suppose it might be handy in an emergency, but the kind of emergency that will make me want to make myself ill would probably preclude taking the time to bugger about making bread, cakes or pastry.

Just as well the pizza bases look OK, then

However, this did get me wondering: how many of the gluten-free prescribables are also lactose and soy free?  In the mainstream shopping environment, this is a pretty tall order, and I have regularly been frustrated to see things containing either lactose or soy for no obvious culinary reason.  If Montezumas can make amazingly good chocolate without either, I don’t see why certain other manufacturers can’t.  For example.  So for a while I had a bit of a wobble, as it seemed like I might not find this whole prescription process as helpful as I’d hoped.

My 2010 Coeliac UK food directory hasn’t arrived yet, so I couldn’t check all the manufacturers in there, but the lovely Kathryn I reached on the hotline emailed me a list of them, complete with email addresses, so I’ve started the process of contacting them all to ask what they have that might work.

My first email left at 16:06.  If I’m honest, I didn’t expect any answers on a Friday afternoon, but hoped to get some in on Monday and Tuesday, by which time the doc should have sorted out what number of products I should be having each month.

So far, I’ve had emails from two of the manufacturers contacted, which is an encouraging start, and at least one has promised to send me a sample so I can see whether their food is worth eating, as well as being safe so to do.  Fingers crossed next week brings in some more responses and I can finally get myself sorted.