The Hidden Gluten Dangers in Your Kitchen

That wooden spoon in your drawer might be making you sick. When I was diagnosed with celiac disease, I learned the hard way that gluten can hide in more than just crumbs—it sticks to wood, plastic, nonstick pans, and even toasters. In this episode, I share the common kitchen tools that can cause hidden gluten exposure and what to replace them with to stay safe. If you're still having symptoms on a gluten-free diet, this might be the missing piece. 

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Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction to Kitchen Safety
• 2:43 Why Gluten Hides in Kitchen Tools
• 4:35 Cutting Boards and Wooden Utensils
• 5:22 Toasters and Nonstick Pans
• 7:19 Cast Iron, Colanders, and Condiments
• 9:58 Creating a Safe Gluten-Free Zone
• 11:38 Episode Wrap-up and Resources

Transcript

Carrie Saunders: 0:41

Quick reminder before we get started on this episode this podcast is based on my personal experiences and isn't medical advice. Today we're talking about something I didn't think much about at first, but it turns out it made a huge difference for my family's health, and that's the kitchen tools we use every day. If you've been diagnosed with celiac disease or are highly sensitive to gluten, you may need to replace the items in your kitchen yes, even if they look clean. I know it might sound dramatic, but once you understand where gluten hides and how hard it is to fully clean off, you'll see why this step can make a huge difference in your health. So let's get started. Welcome to the Gluten-Free Engineer Podcast. I'm your host, k Saunders.

Carrie Saunders: 1:24

In 2011, I was diagnosed with celiac disease, a moment that changed everything, but I was determined not to let it hold me back. With my two engineering degrees, I set out to reverse engineer the gluten-free lifestyle, breaking down recipes, safety tips, travel hacks and everything in between to rebuild a life I love. Whether you have celiac disease, gluten intolerance or simply choose to live gluten-free, this podcast is for you. Join me each week as we simplify the gluten-free lifestyle, make it fun and prove that you don't have to miss out on anything. Welcome back to the show.

Carrie Saunders: 2:00

We are talking today about something that often gets overlooked your kitchen tools, specifically why you might need to toss out things like cutting boards, pans and, yes, even your toaster. If you've been diagnosed with celiac disease, I know it can sound very dramatic, but once you understand what gluten hides and how hard it is to fully clean off, you'll see why this step can make a huge difference in your health. So when you're celiac, even the tiniest crumbs of gluten can cause damage to your small intestine. This isn't just about avoiding slices of bread. It's about cross contact as well. Certain kitchen tools are nearly impossible to fully clean once they've come into contact with gluten. This means that even if they look clean, microscopic gluten proteins may still be hiding inside.

Carrie Saunders: 2:46

One thing that surprises a lot of people is that gluten just doesn't rinse away with soap and water. It's a sticky little protein that cling to porous surfaces like wood, plastic and scratched nonstick pans. Even a trace amount left behind can trigger a reaction. If you're celiac and I found this out myself as well To truly clean something of gluten, you need to scrub it thoroughly, sanitize it many times with alcohol, and sometimes that isn't even enough, especially if there are tiny scratches or grooves where gluten can hide. That's why in many cases it's actually safer and less stressful to just replace high-risk items and have a gluten dedicated free set.

Carrie Saunders: 3:25

Whenever I first talked to a dietician when I found out I had celiac, one of the things she stressed was to make sure I removed all wooden things from my kitchen. It was something I hadn't really thought of, but she insisted I got rid of them and what I also found was that nonstick items also were a problem and had little grooves and kept that gluten stuck inside. So let's do a thorough list of the top kitchen tools to replace. So I alluded to this already. Cutting boards are a definite thing you want to replace, especially wood and plastic cutting boards. They can develop grooves. That is where gluten can hide from the knife that you're using on the cutting board, and even scrubbing doesn't always get it out. It's just not very safe. So if it was used for regular bread or gluten-filled foods, it's a really good idea to start fresh, and many times you also want to be looking at wooden spoons and utensils along the same lines. Wood is porous and absorbs whatever it touches, especially from like pasta and things in containing gluten. So you need to be tossing wooden utensils that you use during your gluten-filled days.

Carrie Saunders: 4:35

Before you found out, you had celiac disease. Now toasters is another thing. Crumbs are galore and toasters as I'm sure you if you've ever tried to clean a toaster. It is pretty much impossible to clean a toaster. You can't clean out every nook and cranny. Those gluten crumbs will stick to the sides where the toast touches, and so if you want to share a toaster you can use toaster bags. But honestly, a dedicated gluten-free toaster is much safer because then you don't have, you know, extra little crumbs running around.

Carrie Saunders: 5:07

I'm sure you've tried to clean a toaster and seen how impossible it is to clean a toaster. So when we go on vacation we bring our own toaster, or sometimes in like a condo, like we have a Marriott vacation club. So many times there, if we forgot that toaster, we've asked them for a brand new one and they had absolutely no problem giving us a brand new one, and then we hid up high, so our kids didn't actually get it accidentally. Get it the gluten-filled toaster. Now nonstick pans. I alluded to this a little bit ago. That was something that was a little bit surprising and something my dietician didn't think of at the time. I'm sure dieticians now might be thinking about this more. But at the time she didn't mention to get rid of my nonstick pans and I kept finding that I was getting gluten whenever I would cook my rice pasta in our old pans and I kept trying to figure out how am I getting this? And then I remembered what she told me about wooden items and nonstick items and being an engineer, I know what those nonstick pans do over time is they get these little cracks and crevices in it and it just hides the gluten. So it was pretty easy to figure out. Once I switched to a stainless steel pot to cook pasta in that I didn't feel bad after that. So I knew it was the pans and really we shouldn't be using except lute before Most people know now, nonstick pans aren't the best thing in the world for you either.

Carrie Saunders: 6:30

So switching to the stainless steel pots and pans is much better for our health. We found in cast iron also can hide gluten in it too. So I want you to be very careful if you have old cast iron pans. Now these I have found are possible to clean. But you really got to be thorough and kind of dramatic about it and really grinding down the surface of the cast iron pan and it generally won't hurt it. Most cast iron pans are very thick, so you need to grind down the surface, get rid of, you know, the first whole layer and then re-season your pans and you're probably okay. But again, use this as caution and with your doctor's advice. But I have restored old nonstick pan or old sorry cast iron pans that were like family heirlooms and been able to eat safely in them and honestly, when we first did this I would just cook my husband's stuff in it the first like say 10, 20 times um, just to get you know, cook off not really cook off, cause it doesn't really cook off, but kind of cook off as far as pool the um potential little bit of remaining gluten out of the pan by cooking food in it. Um, and he wasn't celiac or that responsive at the time. So use your own discretion when it comes to cast iron, but I do find that that can be one. If you're really diligent and really careful, you can get that cleaned out for you. Now, colanders and strainers those meshes or tiny holes can really trap gluten, especially from pasta, especially, I find if it's a metal, one that has the metal weaving in it, the gluten can hide in those little cracks that are in between where the metal weaves together. So you're going to want to make sure that you are replacing your colanders and strainers.

Carrie Saunders: 8:17

And then we also want to be looking at shared spices or condiments. We've talked about this a little bit on the podcast before, but if you have like jelly jars or peanut butter jars or mayo jars, those are really great places for gluten to hide, especially if you're in a shared kitchen because of somebody gets some mayo out, puts it on bread and says, oh, I don't have enough mayo, and then dips the knife back in to get more mayo. They've just put a little bit of crumbs back into that jar. Same thing with jelly, peanut butter, et cetera. So we want to make sure we either have squeeze bottles where we can for shared condiments or label them, which is even better, label them gluten-free for the ones that are gluten-free set. So this is something you're going to want to be diligent about as well. It's just so easy to cross contaminate with shared condiments.

Carrie Saunders: 9:08

So then you might feel a little bit overwhelmed at first on getting rid of some of these things. Some might be special to you, some might be cooking things that you've gotten down from through the family, but your health is really important here. Find a creative way to either display or still have those items without using them. If you're celiac, and whenever you do this kitchen reset, you're going to feel a lot better and your kitchen is going to become a lot safer. Gluten free zone for you, zone for you.

Carrie Saunders: 9:40

So I want to have you, if you have a shared kitchen, encourage you to have a designated gluten-free drawer and or shelf for gluten-free items. It's really important because even when we get items out of the dishwasher, they still have like sometimes you know they don't fully clean and they've got some crumbs on them too. You can also use color-coded utensils or labels to help if you're sharing a space. Buying new pans, cooling racks and muffin tins are very important. We didn't really go into the muffin tin thing, but if you have muffin tins again, you're going to want to have gluten-free versions of those as well and work on setting boundaries with your roommates or your family to make sure that they understand that you need to be safe and to keep you safe. So and I'm sure you know, they will be compliant and help you out, especially if you explain the situation and they start to understand what cross-contamination is for celiacs and for those that are highly sensitive to gluten. So the more confident you feel in the space, the more happy you're going to be, and your body will thank you. It will be a lot less stressful. So take some of these steps into account if you need to, and make sure that you are safe, you are happy and you feel good while eating gluten-free.

Carrie Saunders: 10:53

Thank you for listening to this episode of the Gluten-Free Engineer. If you found value in this story, please share it with someone who might need encouragement on their own gluten-free journey. For more tips, recipes, resources and even links to my YouTube channel, head on over to theglutenfreeengineercom. It's your one-stop hub to make gluten-free living simple, fun and full of flavor. And don't forget to subscribe so you never miss out on an episode and we will see you next week. The Gluten-Free Engineer podcast is for informational and entertainment purposes only. I share my personal experiences and stories about living with celiac disease and navigating a gluten-free lifestyle. This podcast does not provide medical advice. Always consult with a qualified healthcare professional for medical questions, concerns or advice specific to your health.