Welcome to Celiac Strength. This is a blog and information site that we’re starting to chronicle our attempts to run the Starting Strength program while maintaining a celiac friendly diet. The hope is that this can be an ongoing resource for celiac and other gluten-free people for nutrition and cooking information as well as a healthy dose of strength training thrown in.

Who are “we”?

At this point “we” aren’t using real names, but for now we’ll be Husband and Wife. There’s also Son, but he’ll be less involved. Wife is the celiac of the household and the reason for our dietary restrictions. Husband is the menu planner and day-to-day cook. He also writes most of the copy. He’s writing this right now… in the third person. It’s a little weird.

About a year and some change ago both of us decided that it was time to get serious about our health. We started simple with the Nerd Fitness Beginner Body Weight Workout. We both got stronger and with more energy. In the last 4 months we decided to get leaner. And in the last month or so we decided it was time to lift heavy.

We’ll be cleaning out the garage, building a barbell training gym from scratch, and running through Starting Strength on our own. Along the way we’ll talk about diet and some of the standard recipes we use that are high in protein, low in calories, and taste great. We don’t eat crap food, and neither should you. This blog will hopefully capture some of that progress and serve as an inspiration to others.

Why are you doing this?

Honestly? Because lots of gluten-free or celiac cooking blogs are about how to make all that food that normal people eat. We’re no longer normal people. We eat mostly whole foods. It’s not paleo, because we’re not trying to make a system other than “The right amount of calories with the right macros”.

So while it’s great to know, for the 100th time, how to make a gluten-free chocolate cake, what I really want to know is how to make a tasty cheesy chicken chowder that’s less than 500 calories a serving with 55 grams of protein. Yeah… we have that one.

There will also be other recipes for “normal” food (we’re not masochists) or information on where to find them. For example, we’ve had half a dozen people that want to know how to make our gluten free pizza crust, so here’s a place for it so we can stop e-mailing it around all secret-like.

Why should you read this blog?

Inspiration, I guess. If you’re new to gluten free but want to maintain a healthy lifestyle, even if you’re not going to lift, we’ll show you how. We’ll talk specific brands that work for us and basic cooking techniques in every recipe. On the lifting side, we’ll talk about the challenges we run into doing Starting Strength on our own. Maybe you’ll have the same issues. Or had them and you want to help out.

Where are the comments?

I hate comment sections. Find us on twitter for now if you want to communicate.

That’s all for now, check back soon for more progress towards setting up the gym and maybe a few recipes.