Broken Promise #1: I’ll Never Be One of Them
Last night, as we were finishing dinner, my wife described the worst dessert she’s ever eaten:
“You take pears–canned pears, in heavy, heavy syrup. Fish out one of the halves and slide it into one of those little white bowls your mom has—not a ramekin, but a step up. Then [shudders] you top it with—are you ready?—mayonnaise. MAYONNAISE. Next, take a piece of extra sharp cheddar cheese, and a strainer, and you hold them like this [hands in front of her], and then you [with vengeance] push the cheese through with your thumbs, to make tiny curly cues. Then you sprinkle the curly cues on top of the mayonnaise and syrupy canned pear—and you eat it, in a house with cats.”
[Silence. Then—] “That’s revolting. You eat that with a fork?”
“You eat it with a spoon. If you eat it with a fork you miss some of the mayonnaise.”
That—right there—what you’re feeling now. For years, that’s how I felt about going “gluten free”: the concept itself, the food, and (on rare occasion) even some of the people—until, on January 5, 2015, I became one of them.
Someday I’ll tell you why. For now, though, I’m cleaning up some GF-certified broken promises.
Broken Promise #2: I’ll Never Let My Gluten Freedom Dominate Literally Every Conversation in the Room
I’ve learned a lot in the last five years about the ignorance, prejudice, and snobbery with which I once regarded my gluten-free brethren—excluding, of course, those actually diagnosed, by a medical professional (bigoted of me, I know)—with Celiac or a legitimate gluten allergy.
Unsurprisingly, I’ve found that most of my prejudices were unfounded. But not all.
There are two kinds of biscuits in the gluten-free bag. The first: well-adjusted people, in charge of themselves and of their gluten freedom. These people I term “GFs.” A sub-sect of these, however, have lips as loose as cannons sliding all over a gluten-free warship, spilling gluten-free facts about their gluten-free lives, shortening the fuses of their wheat-eating friends, until the friends are ready to blow themselves up just for the chance to slip Nut Job over there a Saltine. Such people aren’t just gluten free; they’re Gluten Freaks.
GFs can be the coolest people you’ll ever meet, like the homeschooler whose parents gave a rip about their son acquiring human friends. Gluten Freaks, by contrast, walk into your life out of Gulliver’s Travels. They get to educating you, and everyone you used to like, until your eyes cross. But they’re nothing compared to the Gluten Jedis. These captivate you so that you actually want to stand there listening to your favorite childhood food memories get tortured, contaminated, and destroyed as chaff. They spellbind you over dessert with quasi-religious, gluten-free incantations. They have their own sacred myths:
In the beginning God made everything very good. Except for the gluten. And he bade the man, ‘From every tree you shall eat, except for the Gluten Tree.’ And the man said, ‘Clearly you’ve never tasted Eve’s yeast rolls. Let me tell you, they’re sinfully good’—and ate unto damnation.
That’s Gluten Freakishness. I know, because I’ve done it.
Broken Promise #3: I’ll Never Abandon Craft Beer, Having Already Done It Once and Experienced Dark Sadness
One month before we left Boston for Dayton, I stood with my fellow English teacher friends in a dimly lit, wildly renovated basement-turned-scotch bar that was profiting by making chairless dining appear charming. During a lull in the electronic music enveloping us, I told them I would soon be giving up alcohol because my next school had a temperance clause in its contract. (Temperance not as “moderation,” but as “You’re actually signing this? Are you that unemployable?”)
Right then the musical humming swelled something fierce, so I couldn’t hear my friends—who for three years had schooled me in the art of home brewing, helped me buy my own equipment, and taught me the value of hops. But the messages on their faces were clear:
“Good God, Mike, what are you gonna do?”
“You need a stiff drink.”
“You’re turning into worse than one of those anti-gluten fanatics.”
By then I had home brewed enough small batches and toured the Samuel Adams and Harpoon breweries enough times to know how to really appreciate a microbrew for its myriad complexities: color, clarity, aroma, mouthfeel, maltiness, hoppiness, bitterness, carbonation, and packaging.
So, rich as my next three years of teaching were, a portion of my gluten-loving soul slept through them until my exit. My Second Great Awakening included a return to spirits clear and spirits oaken, but it centered on my return to brewing. Home brew. At my home. I returned to glory last summer, brewing ten gallons (96 bottles) of an Imperial IPA. Then, as winter approached, I invented my own Molasses Oatmeal Stout recipe, brewing and storing 52 bottles in my basement. “And knowing how way leads onto way / I doubted if I should ever come back” to temperance.
Well, two months later, I came back, at least from beer, for as anyone acquainted with 16th-century German purity laws knows, a beverage properly called “beer” must consist of exactly four ingredients: water, yeast, hops, and malted barley or wheat. And as anyone acquainted with natural law knows, barley and wheat contain gluten.
I should be telling this with a sigh, considering that I’ve been reduced to bartering off my home brew for half-respectable bottles of whiskey.
Instead, however, just 80-some days after kicking gluten, I’m finding the “free” in “gluten freedom.” Soon I’ll explain how. I promise.
*****
image illustration via here
Join the conversation as a VIP Member