Getting Funky in Germany

I had to spend a week in Frankfurt with work a couple of weeks ago. I speak no German at all, which bothers me on a good day as I like to be able to at least attempt communication when abroad, but was especially challenging given my new food requirements. It was a mixed bag of eating experiences.

Day one I was at an all-day conference with buffet lunch provided. I'd booked it ages ago and hadn't specified my dietary needs as I wasn't diagnosed, but I figured there was bound to be something I could eat, even if it was just Rice On Plate. Turns out I was wrong: the veggie options were pizza and filo tart things (time was there wouldn't have been a veggie option, so some progress) and despite eating some chicken of late I just couldn't bring myself to go for the meatballs. So I wandered out into the streets and eventually found a pharmacy with some GF foods. So my lunch that day consisted of a bag of the fabulously named:


After this things picked up a bit though. At a Thai dinner that night a colleague spoke German and was able to ask what was OK and what wasn't. Then the next night we went to an Ethiopian restaurant. This was completely new to me: I've never come across an Ethiopian restaurant in the UK, but there were several in Frankfurt alone. It was fab! For both veggies and coeliacs. The one we went to did big platters to share, and as there was another veggie there the two of us shared this while the others had meat:


Lentils, fabulous potatoes, salad, okra. All very tasty. But the best bit was that Ethiopian food is traditionally served with a bread called "injera", made from a gluten-free cereal called teff. You use the injera to scoop up the food much as you would a chapati with Indian food. Lovely, and totally GF! Couldn't believe my luck.



Rest of the week was something of a battle as the Germans mostly do very good bread and lots of meat. At the conference venue the only option, day after day, was the same tomato, mozzarella and rocket salad. Could be worse, but got a bit tedious. But the hotel I stayed in volunteered some lovely warm and tasty GF rolls when they saw me bringing my own stale bread, and on one evening I made great friends with a chef at a posh buffet, who talked me through every dish available and made sure I got a lovely meal. Didn't get far on the desserts, but that's the case most places.

So, all in all not bad, and far better than a week subsisting solely on Funkies.

I am SO stupid

Since my endoscopy two weeks ago Friday (which I was going to post about, but it was a bit unpleasant to be honest. I have a photo of the inside of my small intestine, but posting that seemed a bit like Too Much Information.) I've been back on the full GF diet. The Gastroenterologist said he couldn't say without biopsy results, but all the pointers were to Coeliacs, so I should go for it. He also asked if I was anaemic, which I'm not (although close) cos I "looked a bit pale". This was at 3pm when I hadn't eaten since 6.30am that morning. Of course I looked a bit pale!


Anyway, had been sticking to the GF quite religiously, but not feeling all that much better. Had put this down to recovery time, and the fact that my symptoms were enough that it might take a while. But on hols this week I still had the telltale jabbing pain in my left side, and couldn 't work it out. When I woke up on Wednesday it occurred to me to double-check my vitamin pills. I've been taking a few supplements of various sorts to try and build myself back up. One was a vit B complex. With, as it says on the front in quite big letters, added "Brewers yeast".


Doh doh doh. Brewers yeast. From hops. Cereal with gluten. So following a strict diet for 10 days I'd been supplementing with a gluten tablet every morning. IDIOT. It even said on the bottle "from cereal containing gluten".


So now I'm properly GF. And slightly cross about two weeks wasted. The lesson, as I'm really starting to learn, is ALWAYS READ THE SMALL PRINT.