“Mommy, can we buy this cereal, or does it have too much sugar?” my three-year old petitioned, presenting me with a brightly-colored cereal box he had picked off the grocery store shelf.

“Forget it, Benjamin,” his seven-year-old sister quickly interjected with a degree of superiority. “I've already read the label, and that cereal has hydrogenated vegetable oil. Mommy won't buy that.”

My children learned early that it was my policy to know what was in the food we ate and to feed the family foods I considered healthful. Reading labels was part of every grocery shopping trip even before I learned that I would have to eliminate gluten from my diet. This long-time habit of reading food labels prepared me somewhat for the job of identifying gluten-free foods in the mainstream marketplace, but as a newly-diagnosed celiac, I had to watch for new ingredients and remember which ones were safe and which ones indisputably relegated foods to the taboo list. After finding myself stumped in the grocery store a couple of times with questions such as, “No malt, no dextrin, but what about maltodextrin?” I decided to make myself a cheat sheet to carry on shopping trips.

To make my cheat sheet, I compiled a list of unsafe and questionable ingredients, put the list in alphabetical order, and printed it out on a 3x5 index card that I could carry in my purse. My ingredient list did not enable me to classify foods as being absolutely gluten free because there was a possibility that foods containing safe ingredients could be contaminated with gluten during processing. However, it did allow me to eliminate foods that definitely were not celiac-safe. It shortened the list of items that I had to check by calling the manufacturer or by researching on the Internet.

The ingredient list proved to have an additional benefit. Because I was the first person in my family to go on a gluten-free diet, other family members were totally mystified by my diet. By giving them copies of my ingredient list, I was able to give them a good starting point for knowing what I could eat when I went to visit them.

My ingredient list turned out to be an indispensable shopping aid until I became so familiar with the vocabulary associated with gluten-free eating that I no longer needed a cheat sheet. To make your own grocery shopping cheat sheet, use resources such as materials from your Alamo Celiac New Member Packet, current books on celiac disease or the gluten free diet, or ingredient lists available on the Internet such as those found as answers to the first question “What are the safe and unsafe foods for celiacs?” on Celiac FAQs. While compiling your list, keep in mind that although the Food Allergen Labeling and Consumer Protection Act (FALCPA) requires food manufacturers to declare ingredients containing wheat on their labels, there may be products on grocery store shelves that do not have the new labels yet. Until all the old labels have disappeared from food products, we still must be wary of ingredients such as modified food starch and hydrolyzed vegetable protein. Furthermore, FALCPA does not require the identification of ingredients that may be derived from gluten sources other than wheat. Thus, “natural flavoring” on a new label cannot be from a wheat source unless it says so, but it may come from barley.

Even with all the confusion with new labels versus old labels, making an easily portable list of unsafe and questionable ingredients can simplify grocery shopping for you while you are learning to eat gluten free. Your list can also be a valuable tool for other family members who want to cook for you.