Becky Excell - How to Make Anything Gluten Free (The Sunday Times Bestseller): Over 100 Recipes for Everything from Home Comforts to Fakeaways, Cakes to Dessert, Brunch to Bread

YOUVE JUST OPENED THE BOOK THATLL SHOW YOU HOW TO UNLOCK ALL THE THINGS THAT YOU CAN NEVER ORDINARILY EAT ON A GLUTEN-FREE DIET. LET ME EXPLAIN

Most people have a bucket list of things to do before they die. But not me. I have a bucket list of 100 things that I wish were gluten-free.

Freshly baked bread, Chinese takeaway, fried jam doughnuts, homemade pastry, fresh pasta, classic cakes, bakery-style cookies, non-cardboard-tasting pizza

Sorry, Ive just realized that Im just literally listing foods that I cant eat. But, if youre gluten-free yourself (or you know someone who is) I bet youll totally understand why I often get lost in my bucket list.

Thats because, when youre gluten-free, all your favourite food instantly gets put on the list of things you used to eat. But do you forget about them and get on with your life?

OF COURSE NOT!

Instead, you gaze through the window of every bakery you pass, narrowly avoiding a head-on collision with a lamp post. You might occasionally catch yourself day-dreaming about when you last ate a real jam doughnut*. Youre probably also filled with food envy whenever a fast-food ad comes on TV, uttering, I wish I could eat that for the millionth time.

*It was 4,622 days ago FYI

Being gluten-free made me realize that, when youre told you cant eat something, you only crave eating it ten times more. But there was one big problem with my gluten-free bucket list: I was probably never going to be able to eat any of the things on it ever again. After all, most things are utterly impossible to make gluten-free, right? And if theyre not impossible, a gluten-free version always tastes and/or looks worse agreed?

Well, Ive got a little news-flash for you that took me years to realize: its not true. And I totally understand if youre filled with scepticism upon reading that. When I first became gluten-free twelve years ago (not sure why Ive phrased that like I became a wizard at Hogwarts) I wouldnt have believed me either. But honestly, through years of travelling to gluten-free bakeries across the world and creating/ sharing my own recipes online, Ive discovered this:

YOU CAN MAKE ANYTHING GLUTEN-FREE

and even muggles* would never notice the difference.

*people who can eat gluten

So, no nothing needs to taste any different or look any worse either. Nor do you need tons of strange, unobtainable ingredients or a top-secret blend of gluten-free flour. I actually use a simple commercial gluten-free flour blend (if needed) for nearly every recipe in this book.

SO WHATS THE BIG SECRET, THEN?

Well, in the early years of being gluten-free, Id naively try to replace wheat flour with gluten-free flour when following a recipe. Or even worse, Id just skip those gluten-containing ingredients entirely.* Not surprisingly, Id always end up wondering where it all went wrong and with a big mess to clear up.

And of course that didnt work! Thats like reading a book, but removing the main character. Yes, you can still kind of follow the story, but the ending is probably going to be a big, confused mess. To truly get that happy ending, a gluten-free recipe needs to be its own unique story from start to finish.

*Spoiler alert:9 times out of 10, it just doesnt work.

THATS THE SECRET!

Oh, and just like on my blog, most of my recipes can easily be made dairy-free or lactose-free with simple swaps* and lots are easy to make vegan/veggie too. Plus, there are loads of recipes that are low FODMAP, which is handy if you suffer from IBS like I do.

*my boyfriend, Mark, is lactose intolerant and chief taste-tester, after all

So remember my bucket list of all the things I thought Id never be able to eat again? Yep, I did it I finally made them all gluten-free with zero compromise. And thats what youre holding right now a collective list of all the things I once could only dream of eating. Now I can make them whenever I want, and so can you.

But if you still believe its impossible to make anything gluten-free without compromise, thats OK. Because once you take a bite of something you havent eaten in years and it tastes even better than you remember youll be so happy that you wont even mind me saying:

I wish I could write this part in the third person so it didnt sound like I was tooting my own horn Lets try it anyway. Im Becky Excell, Ive been gluten-free for over a decade and I share recipes online via my blog and on social media. I should probably also mention that 300,000+ people follow me and I won some awards and stuff too. That wasnt so painful to read, was it?

First of all, thanks for buying my debut cookbook, How To Make Anything Gluten Free. Or, if youre standing in a book shop considering buying it, then you definitely should because its great (in my totally unbiased opinion).

Long story short twelve years ago, my doctor diagnosed me with IBS and told me that my relationship with gluten was officially over. He probably should have tested me for coeliac disease before telling me not to eat gluten anymore, but Im still working on my time machine to fix that part. Suddenly, I couldnt eat out anymore, I couldnt eat any of my favourite food and I was now confined to a tiny section of the supermarket. It was rubbish.

After a few years of eating tiny slices of gluten-free bread (which cost a small fortune) and watching my boyfriend eat real pizza every week, I wasnt adjusting to gluten-free life well at all. Out of pure frustration, I got my apron on and began recreating all the things that I really missed eating. Then Id post the recipes on my blog, just for safekeeping. But rather randomly, a handful of people started making my recipes, sending me photos of their creations and thanking me. How on Earth did that happen?!

Fast-forward to today and that small handful of people has somehow turned into over a quarter of a million people. And I just want to take a second to thank each and every one of you who follows me. It goes without saying that this book wouldnt be possible without you and thats why it is dedicated to all of you!

But even if you have no idea who I am at all, then great Im so glad you found this book anyway! I guess that if I had to sum up everything I do in one sentence, it would be this: I pride myself on creating recipes that show you how to unlock all the things that you could never ordinarily eat on a gluten-free diet. And I do that without using tons of hard-to-source ingredients or overly complex methods. Ive just realized that was definitely two sentences. Oh and nobody would ever know that any of my creations were gluten-free either. Oops, thats three sentences now this isnt going well at all, is it?

Did you notice the key distinction there, though? My recipes focus on unlocking all the things you cant normally eat on a gluten-free diet. Not the things you can. So no, this book isnt crammed full of recipes that are naturally gluten-free and never had gluten in them to start with. Oddly enough, its hard to miss soups, salads and fruit when you can still eat them!

But if Im allowed to toot my own horn once more, I think that small (but super important) distinction is why people have grown to love my recipes. Ever since starting my blog, Ive made it my mission to reunite people with their gluten-free bucket lists by recreating all the things they can no longer eat. And in this book, Ive tried to do that 100 times across 100 recipes.