Gluten Free Watchdog

06 Dec

Gluten Levels in Medication: FOIA Request

It has been three years since I filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with the FDA asking for testing data from an FDA funded study on the gluten levels in medications. FDA has yet to process my request.

Bottom line: FDA has concluded that medications are unlikely to contain more than 0.5 mg of gluten per unit dose (see Gluten in Drug Products Proposed Guidance available at https://www.glutenfreewatchdog.org/news/gluten-in-drug-products-proposed-guidance-please-comment/). This conclusion may in fact be accurate BUT it is […]

By Tricia Thompson Uncategorized 0 Comments Read more...

27 Nov

Video: Facial Misbranding of Gluten-Free Food

At the end of October, I gave a presentation on the facial misbranding of gluten-free foods at the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics Food and Nutrition Conference and Expo. At the beginning of November, I gave a mini version of this presentation at the celiac disease conference hosted by the National Celiac Association. In this video I talk through printouts of the slides presented at the latter conference. The video runs about 15 minutes. Please let me know if […]

By Tricia Thompson FDA Action Alerts, Video Library Q&A 0 Comments Read more...

02 Nov

Reminder: Pick Through Your Lentils for Errant Wheat and Barley!

We continue to receive reports of errant gluten-containing grains in bags of dried lentils sold in the US. Health Canada just issued a recall on a brand of lentils for undeclared gluten. As a general reminder, under US GIPSA standards (Grain Inspection, Packers & Stockyards Administration), lentils are allowed to contain a certain percentage of foreign grain, including wheat, barley, and rye. As a precaution, please make sure to pick through dry lentils carefully and rinse them very thoroughly under […]

By Tricia Thompson Gluten Contamination of Food 5 Comments Read more...

30 Oct

Why mechanically and optically sorted “gluten-free” oats continue to keep me up at night

If you are new to the gluten-free diet and are unfamiliar with the cross contact issues associated with oats and the differences between purity protocol and mechanically/optically sorted oats, please see the following articles before reading this post https://www.glutenfreewatchdog.org/news/oats-and-the-gluten-free-diet-qa-part-1/ and https://www.glutenfreewatchdog.org/news/oats-and-the-gluten-free-diet-qa-part-2/

Many labeled gluten-free foods contain oats supplied by providers of mechanically and optically sorted oats. Recently a consumer reached out to me regarding the labeling on a gluten-free snack bar containing oats. The label read, “”Contains … wheat** **Trace […]

By Tricia Thompson Gluten-Free Oats 0 Comments Read more...

16 Oct

Updated Testing Protocol from General Mills for Labeled Gluten-Free Cheerios

General Mills uses standard oats that have been mechanically and optically sorted to remove wheat, barley, and rye in their labeled gluten-free Cheerios.

Finished product testing

(As reported to Gluten Free Watchdog and confirmed October 12, 2018)

General Mills is producing gluten-free Cheerios using what they term “validated gluten-free flour.”

General Mills determines gluten-free status of a “lot” of oat flour via a lot mean.

Further, General Mills determines gluten-free status of a “lot” of gluten-free Cheerios via a lot mean.
In both […]

By Tricia Thompson Gluten-Free Oats 6 Comments Read more...

09 Oct

Please do not panic: The research abstract on the Nima Sensor and gluten-free restaurant meals presented at the ACG annual meeting is misleading

Yesterday evening I was just about to close up shop when three messages arrived almost simultaneously asking about a research abstract presented at the American College of Gastroenterology annual meeting entitled “Gluten Contamination of Restaurant Food: Analysis of Crowd-Sourced Data.” According to the abstract, study authors, including physicians from the Celiac Disease Center at Columbia University “analyzed data from a portable gluten detection device (Nima), collected across the USA during an 18-month period by users (n = 804) who […]

By Tricia Thompson Nima Sensor 7 Comments Read more...

18 Sep

Sometimes that “not quite right” looking gluten-free food turns out to be gluten-free

Sometimes that “not quite right” looking gluten-free food turns out to be gluten-free and sometimes it does not.

Latest incident. We recently tested two pretzel sticks that looked different from the rest of the pretzel sticks in a bag of gluten-free Snyders’s of Hanover pretzels. They were longer, thinner, and darker than the other pretzels (see photo). GFWD asked SH to test the errant pretzels but they declined.

SH will not test any product once packaging has been opened. This is […]

By Tricia Thompson Gluten-Free Labeling, Product Alerts 3 Comments Read more...

17 Sep

When an individual is maligned because his scientific opinion is at odds with the commercial messaging surrounding a food-testing gadget we have a problem

Background: As many of you know, Gluten Free Watchdog has been independently testing, assessing, and writing about the Nima Sensor for gluten for a couple of years. Third party testing data was recently released. As a result, we provided an update to our position statement on the testing gadget* (we are not able to recommend it).

In our post we included the following statement from Adrian Rogers, Senior Research Scientist at Romer Labs about the Nima Sensor and the third […]

By Tricia Thompson Nima Sensor 2 Comments Read more...

10 Sep

A Bit of Good News from the FDA on Gluten-Free Labeling Issues

We’ve received a bit of good news from the FDA but before you get too excited continue reading to the end of the post…

Gluten Free Watchdog periodically sends emails to FDA updating them on possible facial misbranding* related to the gluten-free labeling rule. An email sent on August 14, 2018 stated in part:

“I dealt with two product issues yesterday. A sauce labeled gluten-free yet containing beer with barley and malt listed as sub-ingredients AND a cookie labeled gluten-free containing […]

By Tricia Thompson FDA Action Alerts 5 Comments Read more...

06 Sep

Gluten Free Watchdog’s Updated Position Statement on the Nima Sensor for Gluten

At Gluten Free Watchdog we are not able to recommend the Nima Sensor consumer testing gadget* for gluten. Third party testing data released yesterday by Nima Labs has further solidified our position. This testing data confirmed what we’ve noted in our own testing with this gadget. There is no way to know whether a smiley face test result from the Nima Sensor is a true negative in terms of the gluten-free labeling rule (gluten below 20 ppm) or a […]

By Tricia Thompson Nima Sensor 8 Comments Read more...