All my life I enjoyed cooking and baking. When diagnosed with coeliac disease at 46, I took it not as a deprivation, but as a challenge, and created recipes for every possible pastry and dessert gluten and soy free. I have learned that substitution of wheat flour with gluten free wholegrain flours, starches from corn, potato and tapioca, almond and other nut meals, as well as buckwheat, quinoa and other exotic grains, gives my cakes, cookies, pasties even better taste, compared to the original wheat product. My main principle is to never compromise on taste. In all recipes, presented here, you will never say that the taste of a gluten-free product is inferior. My background as a research scientist in biochemistry of nutrition helped me to create nutritionally balanced dishes.
The idea of this blog was to show that you can have everything you want gluten free, tasting divine and looking amazing. Fellow coeliacs – life is great without gluten, be brave, be inspired, and do not allow anyone to convince you otherwise.
When I cook, I rarely follow recipes. I usually take the idea and run with it. It was a challenge for me to start measuring all ingredients, because normally I cook by feel and taste. However, since I became precise in making desserts, they now appear to be more consistent. I am much better and innovative at desserts and pastries, compared to cooking meat and particularly fish. May be this is caused by the challenge in front of me – to make all possible cakes, pastries and buns without wheat flour and gluten in it, while regular family cooking transition into gluten free zone is reasonably simple and easy.
This project is a team work, where I only do the cooking, baking and writing, and my husband is responsible for his amazing photography and all computing, necessary to create the site and keep it going. I am driving him mad with my demands, and I am forever grateful for his patience.
I do not participate in social media, though occasionally companies which products I use, publish links to my blog. You can contact me with your questions or suggestions via email.
All material anywhere on this website may not be copied (except as legally allowed for private use and study) or further disseminated without the express and written permission of the legal holder of this website. Any reference to such materials must be accompanied with direct link to this website.
Dr. Irena Tarvid
Update
August 2017
I also publish recipes, reviews and discussion articles in 3 other blogs.
- ecookingblog is dedicated to recipes I have been developing for our friend with specific dietary restrictions, which are more severe than Paleo protocol. All recipes in this blog are grain, pseudo-grain, soy, lentils, starches, dairy, yeast and sugar free, including unrefined sugars. Only honey and dextrose (pure glucose) are used as sweeteners.
- Готовим Без Глютена is the blog where I publish my recipes and reviews in Russian language. I started it more than 2 years ago, when I realised that contrary to an abundance of gluten free blogs and recipes in English, were few could be found in Russian. Some of my recipes appear in both blogs, but some are specifically developed with attention to popular dishes in East-European cuisine.
- Радости Жизни – Joys of Life – is another Russian language blog. It is not a culinary one, but has a mix of themes in its posts. I share what makes and keeps me happy, write about my favourite activities and topics that interest me and captivate my attention. There is a special category of posts “Australia in Photographs”, each contains very little text, but plenty of images, photographs made by my husband. It gives me an opportunity to share my favourite images, each post is like a theme gallery on a specific topic.
Cooking Without Gluten 