Tuesday, May 6, 2014

Celiac Disease Awareness Month - May 6, 2014

Each day this month, I will be posting something about Celiac Disease.

Day 6:

Today, we're going back to the basics. I did something that even I've never done before. I looked up gluten in the dictionary. Thanks to merriam-webster.com, I was able to get the following definitions:

Merriam Webster definition:
a substance in wheat and flour that holds dough together
full definition: a tenacious elastic protein substance especially of wheat flour that gives cohesiveness to dough
origin of gluten: Latin glutin-, gluten glue

Medical definition of gluten:
a gluey protein substance especially of wheat flour that causes dough to be sticky

Concise encyclopedia definition:
Mixture of proteins not readily soluble in water that occurs in wheat and most other cereal grains. Its presence in flour makes production of leavened baked goods (see baking) possible because the chainlike gluten molecules form an elastic network that traps carbon dioxide gas and expands with it. The properties of gluten vary with its composition, which differs according to the source. Thus, doughs range from soft and extensible to tough and elastic, depending on the gluten in the flours. Persons with an allergy to gluten can often eat rice or spelt products.

Does this help you to understand celiac disease better? Why or why not?

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