Con artist poisons celiacs
It all began at the North Carolina State Fair last October. News spread quickly: there was a gluten-free bread vendor, Great Specialty Products, with a table at the fair. His name was Paul Seelig, and he baked his loaves one small batch at a time in his Amish kitchen with all fresh ingredients delivered from his family farm in Ohio. His table was full of samples that were met with rave reviews by celiacs and non-celiacs alike. The bread was so good. It tasted just like real bread. It was crusty and soft and chewy, just like a good loaf of bread should be.

Turns out it was real wheat bread. Wheat bread that he knowingly bought wholesale from another vendor and repackaged as gluten-free.

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	jujubee 2009-12-26 10:39 pm UTC (link)
	Celiac here. Ugh, I can just imagine how much good bread I would eat thinking it was gluten free. (Though this should have tipped people off that it wasn't: It was crusty and soft and chewy, just like a good loaf of bread should be. That's not what gluten free bread is like at all.) And then I imagine how much pain I would be in after. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	judyhazeleyes 2009-12-26 10:49 pm UTC (link)
	Heh, I can't blame them, though - I ate a lot of 'too good to be true' foods when I was in the throes of IBS, only to find out that it was a) too good to be true after all, and b) improperly labeled. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	sandglass 2009-12-27 01:52 am UTC (link)
	I think people easily will believe in the magic of the home farm. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	kookaburra 2009-12-27 06:17 am UTC (link)
	Yeah - and when I've managed to get the exact right amount of xanthan gum in my gluten free bread, and the stars are aligned properly, I can bake bread that is just like wheat bread. I would have assumed that he'd just managed to figure out exactly what sacrifices one needed to make to the Bread God to make it come out right. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	sandglass 2009-12-27 06:36 am UTC (link)
	And if my mom's rice pasta can taste better than our shitty processed wheat stuff. . . (Reply to this)(Parent)

carmarthen
2010-01-01 01:43 am UTC (link)

I actually had yucca bread in Ecuador (made with tapioca flour, and gluten-free) without knowing it was GF, and it was crusty and soft and chewy. I would never have guessed either that it had no wheat or that it was loaded with cheese.

But it hardens up if you don't eat it right away and you make it in little nuggets of bread rather than loaves (it's also full of dairy, specifically cheese and often butter). But I could see being hopeful that someone had hit the holy grail of loaf-sized tapioca flour bread or something.

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