Gluten Free Every Day Cookbook

Tara Fitzpatrick

By Robert M. Landolphi
Andrews McMeel Publishing, LLC, $16.99, May 2009

With more and more people asking for gluten-free items, a cache of flavorful recipes that cut out wheat can be a valuable resource to have on hand. Author Robert M. Landolphi, a Johnson and Wales University-educated chef and culinary instructor, developed Gluten Free Every Day Cookbook as a “labor of love” for his wife, Angela, who suffered severely for years with undiagnosed Celiac disease.

Angela's health began to deteriorate in ways that threatened the couple's dreams of a life together with a big family. She was plagued with “fatigue, digestive symptoms, and unexplained aches and pains, muscle weakness, numbness and pain, and headaches, and then a complete shutdown of her reproductive system,” Landolphi writes.

After several misdiagnoses, Angela finally was correctly diagnosed with Celiac disease. Just days into a gluten-free diet, her condition improved. After several years, the couple conceived, and Landolphi names his two sons as further inspiration for the recipes in the book.

The recipes show that gluten-free cooking can be simple and even delicious. New England Clam Chowder, Country-Style Chicken Potpie, Tri-Spiced Onion Rings and Spiced Pumpkin Roll can still be enjoyed by people who have forgone gluten in order to be healthy. The basics of gluten-free cooking are addressed, and chapters include soups, entrees, side dishes, baked sweets and breads.

“Dusting and crusting,” the book's technique for coating beef, pork, poultry or fish with a combination of herbs, spices, nuts cheeses and/or special flour mixes, has gained acclaim from Celiac experts.