Mini Road Trip to Trader Joe's and Whole Foods

Hope everyone had a great weekend! Mine consisted of sitting around the house with John and a walk around our neighborhood and Smithville village. Nice and relaxing :-) Since my diagnosis last week and honestly for a long time beforehand I had been dying to make the hour trip out to Marlton to go to Trader Joe's and Whole Foods. From Pinterest and some of the blogs I follow it seems a whole lot easier to stock my pantry and fridge with good options when the grocery store is filled with tons of healthy (and now in my case, gluten free) options. 

So on Saturday my friend Amanda and I went! And I have to say both stores didn't disappoint. Trader Joe's was small but so cute and I had so much fun looking through all the options I had seen on their website. (So crazy how your idea of "fun" changes when you become an adult) Whole Foods is sooo much bigger and definitely had more of my gluten free basics. I felt a LOT more confident after this trip that it IS possible for me to completely change my diet. And I totally wish we had both of these stores by me, BUT I will explain in a bit why this isn't going to be such a big deal.

Here is my haul in detail-

 This is a combo of stuff from both Trader Joe's and Whole Foods. 

 Of course we had to get a pic of the cute little Trader Joe's brown bags in Amanda's trunk...

 Check out the gluten free PIZZA and HOT DOG BUNS! I did NOT think I'd be able to eat either of these two items again. And the hot dog buns taste exactly the same as regular ones! I am so happy! Not the healthiest but being that it's summer time sometimes nothing beats hot dogs and hamburgers on the grill. 

 Some other key items, pasta and breadcrumbs. As mentioned in my last post I am a HUGE pasta lover and this was one of my first fears upon hearing I had to switch to the gluten free diet. I haven't tried this organic brown rice pasta fusilli from Trader's yet but I will mention it was only 1.99 (over 2x what I paid for regular pasta but compared to some of these other gluten free items a bargain). The bagel chips I'm excited to try with some bruchetta, only after taking Pepcid AC of course. 

Those chocolate chip cookies in the yellow bags are DELISH! And don't taste gluten free at all. I'm not a big snacker but do get a sweet tooth sometimes and these two bags should definitely hold me over until my next trip out there or until I can perfect a homemade gluten free cookie recipe. I will admit I wasn't a huge fan of the corn pasta in the blue box, which sucks cause it cost 3.50 a box. Amanda can attest that it was a little difficult for me to drop 2 boxes of this in my cart but I won't let the other go to waste. 

 I'm excited about trying the gluten free honey corn flakes in the yellow box and mix it with some fruit to hopefully create my own Special K, which was my go to breakfast cereal that I miss dearly. I'm also hoping the peanut butter panda puffs taste like Cap'n Crunch peanut butter crunch which I also get a craving for occasionally. 

Not gluten free but definitely wanted to try these organic pasta sauces.

I found this at Whole Foods and am hoping it tastes good because chicken noodle soup can go wrong. If it's bad, I will start making my own.

Trader's had tons of yummy drink options. The organic strawberry lemonade is a little tart but very good, John already made half the bottle disappear. We're a fan of Arnold Palmer's so hopefully this organic Trader's version is good.

I got this for our BBQ this weekend. Spinach dip is my FAVE and while I've yet to find a gluten free bread bowl I'm excited I can still dip my gluten free chips in this and not miss out on some BBQ staples.

I was a little apprehensive about this but I love oatmeal and felt I should at least try it. It is SO good! I used to eat Quaker's fruit and cream which tastes so processed compared to this! I've had it for breakfast the past two days and it will definitely make my go to shopping list for the next trip.

So there's pretty much everything I got. My total at Trader's was 73 dollars and 103 at Whole Foods. Definitely more than my usual grocery bill and the fact that this is all for me mostly is a bit staggering. But I called John while at Whole Foods to warn him of the high cost and he put it simply "I'll spend as much as I have to as long as it makes you feel better" So sweet! ;-) But I remember a friend mentioning something about tax write offs for Celiac disease so once I got home I researched it further and discovered good news about the extra cost, we can use it for tax write offs! Since I need these foods for a diagnosed disease, we can claim the difference between a "normal" food and the gluten free version. For example if a loaf of bread costs 2.50 and my version costs 6 (which it does and kills me), we can claim the additional 3.50. I can also claim any extra mileage it takes to go to a specialized store, which helps because these stores are an hour away! I just need to file all of my receipts in the case we get audited so I have my proof.

So long story short this ISN'T as bad as I thought it would be. It's definitely staggering at first to hear you need to make a complete overhaul of your diet but with how popular gluten free options are nowadays (which after seeing my grocery bill I can't understand why ANYONE would eat gluten free by choice) it's easier to go to a health store and have these options. I was going to see a nutritionist at the doctor's recommendation but honestly feel like I can handle this myself. It hasn't even been a week yet but I'm doing great so far! I haven't consumed any gluten (besides ONE cheat bite of John's wawa quesadilla Friday night) for 5 days now. I am feeling better but at the same time think I'm fighting a bug off so that's kind of messing with my gluten free results. Until next time!