Since You Put It That Way

Gluten-Free Baking: Delicious Solutions and Gluten-Free Dilemmas

• Mary Louder, DO • Season 3 • Episode 14

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Welcome to the tastiest episode yet! Dr. Mary Louder and Jeffrey Larson, a James Beard Award-winning cookbook author and food stylist, discuss his journey into gluten-free baking, inspired by his mother's celiac diagnosis. Mr. Larsen highlights the emotional and physical challenges of adopting a gluten-free diet, noting the importance of comprehensive testing and creating inclusive meal environments. Then, in true holistic fashion, he and Dr. Louder talk about the significance of love and emotional support in managing dietary restrictions, allowing people to remain connected to their family and culture through food. Take a listen, and check out Mr. Larsen's cookbook, "Gluten-Free Baking at Home". 

Intro for "Since you put it that way" podcast.

Outro for "Since you put it that way" podcast

Jeffrey Larsen:

Hi, Dr. Louder here, and I'd like to welcome you to this episode of Since You Put It That Way. Our guest today is Mr. Jeffrey Larson. He's a food stylist, recipe author, cookbook author, and a James Beard award winning cookbook author to boot, and he lives in San Francisco. What we find out after our conversation is over being recorded is that we actually were at the same university together, at the University of Montana in Missoula, so we had all these connections and didn't even know it until we explored them at the end of our conversation, which, we did leave that part off of the recording, but I just wanted to bring that in.

Mary Louder:

And he's a lovely gentleman who has put the best cookbook together for folks who need to be gluten-free. He talks about how best to approach this in your life. But what's more importantly, we get into the aspect of the soul, which I did not expect that, that we would be delving off into love and soul work, and all we were trying to do is figure out how to be gluten free. So stay tuned for this really, really wonderfully engaging conversation. Enjoy. Well, welcome Jeffrey to our episode of Since You Put It That Way, the podcast that makes us all pause and say, Well, gosh, that's an interesting perspective, and I'm glad--or since you put it that way, right? So, so today, you know, I'm bringing in your expertise as the man about town, knowing all about gluten and gluten-free, and I want to highlight the two things that I think are--is very, very important in your work. First of all, the author of the cookbook that's called Gluten-Free Baking At Home, which has very high Amazon ratings, congratulations, because that's not easy to do. And even what's more difficult, I think, is the

Jeffrey Larsen:

Thank you. Thank you. James Beard Award, which for our listeners who may not know that's like the Who's-who's and the What's-what's in the culinary world. And James Beard goes way back with Julia Child, and really kind of launched all of our, you know, our neocultic-like approach to cooking, right? And, and, and just all that. And so congratulations on that, and that was in 2020, and the same year, the International Association of Culinary Professionals gave you an award as well for your cookbook. So congratulations. Yes, I always kid that it's like winning the Golden Globe and the Oscar.

Mary Louder:

And maybe since we're in 2024 we could say the Olympics too, right? We could throw that in just--

Jeffrey Larsen:

Okay, yes, I got my gold medal.

Mary Louder:

Exactly. We're on the heels of that just now too. So, but you, you also do food styling, recipe developing and in, in addition to being a cookbook author, that's like, quite a resume. Where did, how did that all start? Where did that come from?

Jeffrey Larsen:

I think the impetus was, well, I was trained as a theater designer, and I have my degree in costume and set design, and I did that for many years here in San Francisco. But there was a point where I wanted, I have always loved working with food. And then I was on a set one day doing a commercial, and I was in charge of wardrobe, and it also involved food, and I went and hung out with the food stylist, and I realized, oh, I have an aptitude for this too, and it might augment my, my theater work, which is up and down. So, I started assisting, and was just loving it. It was kind of like theater, but on a very small scale. You know, you're working with a small set. You're working with props, lighting, the whole nine yards. I just fit right in. So that's where it began. And then the impetus was when I--well, my mother has always suffered from digestive issues, and so have I. We just figured it was a family condition that there was no hope for, but she was very progressive in her thinking, and she called one day and she said, I think we need to go on a gluten-free diet. And I was like--

Mary Louder:

Oh, we!

Jeffrey Larsen:

I knew what gluten was, but well, she well, I say that because she knew that I was, I suffered as well. She

Mary Louder:

Sure. Yeah. And what, how did that change your said, I think this might be the impetus for this. So, I love, I loved my mother with all my heart. So I was like, Yeah, Mom, let's, let's do it. But I wasn't on board at first, Mary, I was helping her, but that's how I framed it, and that's how I was able to make the transition. But it was also this great way of us staying connected long-distance. life, then?

Jeffrey Larsen:

Well, at first, like I said, I wasn't on board, and I was just trying to change her life. She suffered greatly with it, probably more so than I ever did. But she was older by then, too, so she had a lot of inflammation, and it caused all kinds of problems. I was just at the beginning of that kind of torture, and I thought, you know, maybe she's onto something. And we immediately took gluten out of our diet, and it wasn't till later that we were both diagnosed as celiac. And then that really hit it home. Like, okay, this is something that I need to get ahold of. So we started developing recipes together, and she was mostly my, my test baker. I would send her things because I didn't always have the time, and she would test it out, and then I would tinker with it. So we were lost in wandering in the dark forest. And you know, we had already gone through the whole medical world and them telling us, oh, it's just irritable bowel. It's irritable bowel. So it wasn't until we were actually diagnosed as celiac that we thought, okay, we couldn't get a handle on this.

Mary Louder:

Right.

Jeffrey Larsen:

So we did it together, and I I'll be forever grateful that that was something we shared and then so when I won awards, she won awards.

Mary Louder:

Yeah.

Jeffrey Larsen:

You know.

Mary Louder:

Nice, nice.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Yeah.

Mary Louder:

Is your mom still alive?

Jeffrey Larsen:

I lost her last year.

Mary Louder:

Oh, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Yeah, I--yeah, it's, it's one of those things you just like, it's, it's knocked me back, and it's helped. You know, there was a long period where I just couldn't do this anymore, so you reaching out to me is kind of like a new start for me as well, in in that I'm devoting this to her.

Mary Louder:

Oh, okay.

Jeffrey Larsen:

And her memory.

Mary Louder:

What's your mom's name?

Jeffrey Larsen:

Phyllis.

Mary Louder:

Okay, Phyllis. Phyllis, this episode is dedicated to you.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Yes, thank you.

Mary Louder:

Oh, I just, I just really Jeffrey. I just really sense her presence right here with us, and--

Jeffrey Larsen:

She is around all the time. She was a very gentle soul, and I think it's hard for her to bust through, but she does it. She does it now and then.

Mary Louder:

Oh, no, I definitely get it. I get a sense of her. Very much. So okay, good, good, good. So yeah, and she's glad we're talking about this. So yeah, all right, we already have an endorsement from the--from Phyllis, so we're doing good. We're right on dress.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Thank you.

Mary Louder:

Mother approved, so we're doing good.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Yes.

Mary Louder:

So take me then through the development. How many years did it take for you to write the cookbook?

Jeffrey Larsen:

Well, it was, honestly, Mary was never intended to be a cookbook. I worked in that realm, and I styled a lot of cookbooks. I became known as a good editorial stylist. Because of my theater work, I could tell stories, and I could kind of put myself in the place of the author and tell their story. So that was really a strength for me. And so I was approached several times when I would just bring baked goods onto the set, and some of the publishers would say, you know, this is really good. I think there's a book here. And I'd be like, no, no, no, no. I don't want all that pressure. I don't want all that stress. And it took 12 years.

Mary Louder:

Okay.

Jeffrey Larsen:

It took 12 years. But in that time, I taught and conducted weekend-long workshops in Napa, which were all about helping people find their way with this. And I realized at some point that my mother and I had kind of worked it out in isolation, so we had our own way about it that was like nobody else's, because we were, like I said, stumbling around, just trying to figure it out.

Mary Louder:

Yeah. So say more about what developed, what you saw developing that was different than what might have been around.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Well, back then, you know, we were, we were faced with mixes that didn't quite--they were good for like one end of the spectrum, like a mix can be really good for, like, breads, breadsticks, pizza, but then they're not great for like the lighter things, like popovers or cake or muffins. And so I started tinkering, and with what I was learning in my food styling career and learning from other authors. You know, I was starting to incorporate that and like, this needs--this recipe for cake needs a lighter touch, and the ones for bread need a heavier touch. And then I started to understand what the different ingredients brought to the equation. And so I could pump up certain things or decrease, depending on what was needed for that recipe. So I wasn't relying on a mix. I actually started to hate the mix, because I would--kept, you know, trading cookbooks, and then it was a whole new set of mixes with different ideals. And so my refrigerator was all the--full of all this dribs and drabs, so I just started to find my own way with it. And I discovered I was onto something that was really powerful.

Mary Louder:

Yeah. Well, you describe actually, Jeffrey, just the the properties of the different ingredients. I mean, with what we know about gluten is it gives the strength to our baked goods.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Right, right.

Mary Louder:

And so I have a confession. My, my parents owned a bakery, and there was, there was never a gluten-free item there. It was not, was not, it was, it was in the 1980s it wasn't a consideration. And my dad was an amazing baker, and I learned a lot of things from him, but just the whole strength of the baked good depends upon the amount of protein in the flour, which is what the gluten is. But there's, you know, there's also Gliadin and other wheat proteins that, you know, comprise the wheat kernel, but the gluten seems to be the one that's the issue, but that also gives the strength to the recipe. And so then--

Jeffrey Larsen:

Exactly.

Mary Louder:

Coming up to counter that, to figure out how else--and I would agree with you about the mixes, a lot of times they're filled with things like guar gum and a lot of what we would call fillers. And so I would wonder if we're moving more towards super ultra processed foods. In doing that,

Jeffrey Larsen:

I think it's unavoidable, Mary, that, you know, a lot of my recipes can say contain xanthan gum, because it's, it's a it's a vegetable, cellulose, and it's highly processed, yes, but it is so key in keeping the structure. But I also discovered, like in my world, I understood, that tapioca could also be strengthening in that elast--elastic way, you know, like if you've ever had a Boba drink and you know those little tapioca balls and how chewy they are. That's the property that you want from that particular flour.

Mary Louder:

Okay.

Jeffrey Larsen:

But then, on the other hand, potato starch is, like, fluffy and light and sensuous.

Mary Louder:

Yeah.

Jeffrey Larsen:

So in my mind, I was like, How do I balance these things to keep the xanthan gum minimal--

Mary Louder:

Right.

Jeffrey Larsen:

--and, and still have my structure. So that's why my recipes are so long, because each of those ingredients is weighed for that particular--that recipe.

Mary Louder:

Well, that would speak, yeah, that would speak to your excellence, because baking is about precision.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Exactly, and I'm, I'm rare in that I, I'm, I'm very right brain and left brain at the same time. And I didn't know that until I started doing more recipe development and realizing I like the math. I like figuring this out. I like how I can gauge it up or down based on ratios, and then studying the ratios of, like, regular baking goods, and then mutating that for gluten free once I figured out my approach.

Mary Louder:

Right, right. Yeah, I think that that's super important. And so, yeah, you're right. The precision, the calculating, the ratios, that's all 100% baking. Totally different than cooking, you can just throw things in and it most likely will turn out, usually.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Well, and even with regular gluten flour, it's very forgiving.

Mary Louder:

It is.

Jeffrey Larsen:

But, and that's why, you know, Americans are so adverse to using weight. But as you probably know, your father did not bake using measuring cup.

Mary Louder:

Nope.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Cups and spoons. He used weight. And any really good baker is going to do that. So I always have a little trouble in the beginning with my students, like, you gotta use a scale. But when I show them how easy it is, then they're sold. And they're realizing, Oh, I don't, I don't have to, I don't have to wash all these cups. I can just do it all in one bowl.

Mary Louder:

Yes.

Jeffrey Larsen:

So that's revelatory. But then that same kind of precision--I've already figured it out. So in my book, you know, in my cookbook, you're not having to figure it out. It's just really solid recipes based on 12 years of trial and error. And I should also say that in the beginning, I took bag loads of stuff down to compost. But I am also a tenacious soul, Mary, and not many people would be able to go through that kind of study and intensity for very long. And, you know, I just, I think my mother, I was so worried about her. It just, you know, I wanted to, I wanted to give her her health back.

Mary Louder:

Yes.

Jeffrey Larsen:

That was what was at the bottom of it all, yeah. So you can be a little more tenacious when you've got a goal that's that important.

Mary Louder:

Yes. And ultimately, really, that whole thing came out of love then, didn't it?

Jeffrey Larsen:

A great love, yeah, yeah.

Mary Louder:

So it would make perfect sense to get an Excellence Award.

Jeffrey Larsen:

I never counted on those things. I mean, you know, you do this stuff in isolation, and you just think, when I finally agreed to do the book, I thought, Okay, it'll go out and it'll help some people. That's all I wanted.

Mary Louder:

Right! Yeah.

Jeffrey Larsen:

And that's, that certainly has been the case. The the awards are just the cherry on the top that gave me the self esteem to like, say, okay, you know, I don't have baking credentials, but I figured this out the hard way, and it's, it's solid. It's really solid.

Mary Louder:

Well, what you know, in my experience in the baking world, yes, there's formulas, and yes, those are formulas and measurements you follow. And yes, I weigh things. And to this day, I weigh things. I have two different kitchen scales, and you know, that's what my, my father taught me to do. And the, the thing with that is, but you, you still have to get the feel for the dough. You still have to get the feel for the mix, and what the the beater is doing, what the batter is doing, what all the rise is, literally. I mean, so there's so much to it that is both an art and a science.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Right. And what I tried to do with my book, because I did learn all those things the hard way, like pie dough doesn't have the same kind of elasticity. Pizza--you don't throw that up in the air and twirl it.

Mary Louder:

Yeah.

Jeffrey Larsen:

You don't--so you do have to kind of incorporate new techniques. So, when it came to those hard things, I insisted with the publisher that that all be outlined in little vignettes like, this is what it looks like. This is what it feels like. And, you know, pushing your thumb into it. That's all the visceral stuff that is also important, very important, and that's why I love to teach live when people have those aha moments where it's like, Why--why are you struggling to get this in the pan? When maybe you turn the pan over onto the pie dough with a tray, and then you flip it and you know, it's just those little things that make it so much easier. And I knew that, you know, I was teaching busy moms, and in some instances, I remember one specifically, she had three kids with three different allergy groups. And I thought I was standing in front of her teaching, and I thought, you know, how is she doing this? Because she's like a short-order cook in her own home. But I, I've met so many fierce moms through the years that I did it for them, you know, because a mom is going to fig--try to figure it out at all costs.

Mary Louder:

She will.

Jeffrey Larsen:

And so the book really was an extension of that. Is here, let me show you how to expedite this and make it easier so that you can make this stuff a little more approachable.

Mary Louder:

Yeah. Well, that's an interesting principle. You

Jeffrey Larsen:

Oh, I love that, Mary. bring out that, you know, fierce love by a mom. We have a term

for that. It's called POYA:

protective--Protection-Of-Young

Mary Louder:

So, isn't that really cool? So, yeah, you know, Anger. So it's a type of a righteous anger that that protects the young person. So yeah, frequently done on their behalf, so that that individual then can stand in their agency, yeah. I can see why your cookbook is just off the charts, honestly, because it hits these really, really key--honestly, not only good principles, but they're literally sacred principles, Jeffrey, they're literally sacred.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Thanks. Thank you. You know, sometimes I still feel a little bit like I'm out in the dark, especially without my mom.

Mary Louder:

Sure.

Jeffrey Larsen:

But, and there was a time for quite a while where I was just like, I'm not doing it anymore. I'm withdrawing this from the world. And now I do it in her honor, which puts a different spin on it for me.

Mary Louder:

Yeah.

Jeffrey Larsen:

You know, you don't go into publishing to make money. No, no. So that was never what it was about. But when I lost her, I did lose that POYA, and that fierce love that sort of drives the machine, but it took, it took some time to figure out, Oh, she's still here, I just, I gotta drive the machine in a different way.

Mary Louder:

Yes.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Yeah.

Mary Louder:

Yeah. They, they certainly are a part of us, you know. And that the veil is quite thin actually. So.

Jeffrey Larsen:

I'm glad you said that sometimes I might think I'm a little cuckoo, like I talk out loud to her. She's, she's there, yeah.

Mary Louder:

So what was, what was Phyllis favorite recipe in your cookbook, then?

Jeffrey Larsen:

She, I'm going to confess something else.

Mary Louder:

Yeah.

Jeffrey Larsen:

My, my mother was constantly shifting her allergens. And I think this is important for your listeners as well, and that's why I tell this. She'd call up and say, I think we need to take coconut milk out now. And I'd be like, okay, Mom, back to the drawing board. Or, I think xanthan gum is causing problems. I don't think I should have blueberries. Or, you know, there was a myriad of things, and I was constantly just like, trying to keep up with her and then my own set of allergens. So I became really well versed in not just gluten-free, but allergen-free. Remind me of your question again, I'm sorry.

Mary Louder:

What was your--what was your mom Phyllis' favorite recipe in your book?

Jeffrey Larsen:

So, I don't think she ever had a favorite, but she was a, she was a, she was a Cookie Monster. That's why the cha--that chapter's the biggest. But over the years, she would play, she would toy with the idea of, should I have the butter? Should I not have the butter? And then that's when I, I started to make it well, let's just clarify the butter and take the lactose out. You know, so she was constantly shifting me and driving me crazy. But I, I can stand in a front, in front of a whole room full of people with various allergens, and I could say, I know to help--how to help you. I know how to help you. I know how to help your child. I--because my mother just never let it drop.

Mary Louder:

Yes, yeah.

Jeffrey Larsen:

I got my tenacity from her.

Mary Louder:

Yeah. It's an, I think that's an interesting point,

Jeffrey Larsen:

So-- because, you know, you mentioned earlier about maybe being in the dark with some of this in terms of being on, you know, when the physicians weren't helpful, medical system, you know. And even a dietitian, sometimes is not all that helpful if they're really rigid, really in the Western thought, because it's like, well, it's a food. It can't really harm you. But what we know about the microbiome now, what we know--or what we're learning, let me say that. I mean, we know of just a small--we're barely scratching the surface, but there's more cells in the microbiome that we carry around inside of us and literally make up our body. And that microbiome interacts with our genome, which is our genes, which then interacts with the environment, which then has a resultant interplay with fight, flight, fear, fawning, all the stress response, and then that's driven by hormones. And in folks, what we see with a lot of food sensitivities, often called allergens, is a lot of autoimmunity. The body is struggling with itself. Yeah.

Mary Louder:

And, and so in my world, and this is something that you know, you and I, because this is our first conversation together--I look at that and look, okay, yeah, there's a physical things we have to do. Then I go into the interior world. I go into the emotions. What emotions are being held or restricted or need to be healed? So then a person is not at odds with themselves, and then the foods they consume are friendly versus a foe.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Right.

Mary Louder:

Yeah.

Jeffrey Larsen:

There's, there's another component to this, Mary, and this is not scientifically proven, so you feel free to refute this. But I learned, you know, when I finally got on board with the gluten-free and started joining my mother in just, you know, the gluten-free kitchen, the gluten-free life, I discovered, at first, like everything was still in turmoil, because I had continued to eat it, even though I shouldn't have. I. And and so over time, when I finally got on board, I noticed, like I, I just hung in there with it. Hung in there, and things started to subside, and things I thought were allergens weren't. And I, I started to make this link with that inflammation, with all those other things that start to get destroyed. Would you say that that's true, like your body can actually start to heal, and then that might be only a few foods that you need to replace?

Mary Louder:

Yes, I would agree with that, yeah, because the body is, you know, very--it always seeks homeostasis, which is balance, yeah, and it's very forgiving, otherwise we would have been dead a long, long time ago, right? For everything that we do. And, and it always has self-healing capacities and inherent wisdom.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Yeah.

Mary Louder:

Yeah. So it does, and--

Jeffrey Larsen:

No, that's great to hear you say that because, like, I say, it's not scientifically proven, but I've--I even think about family members like my uncle, who was a manager of a bakery for a big grocery store chain. He got so sensitive to being in that room, they had to move him to another position, and he became a manager of bakeries and but he couldn't, he couldn't stay in a bakery. So that was a piece of the puzzle. And then my grandmother developed really debilitating Fibromyalgia later in life, and I started to wonder, like, was that maybe something in this in this lineage, too, where there's an upset and she could have been helped by being on an allergen free diet?

Mary Louder:

Mm-hm.

Jeffrey Larsen:

But, you know, I'm originally from Montana, and people don't give up food there, and they don't, they don't give up food. And my mother took a lot of flack over that, over time. She was not helped greatly in even within her community and her circle of friends and family. She was often left to her own devices, carrying along her little cooler with her special sauces and soy sauce and her mayonnaise and her dressings that were gluten free. So it's a complex issue, and it really strikes a chord deeply in people, in, in that you are left out. And when you're left out of food celebrations, I don't know that there's anything more damaging, it's really, yeah, it hits at the it's hits at our center.

Mary Louder:

It does. And I think, I think that's a really good point, because there's often two. I mean, you almost mentioned and butt up against even, some shaming that your mom might have experienced.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Yeah, oh, she took horrible shame. You know, people are told they're finicky ears, or it's just irritable bowel syndrome. Try to calm your nerves. You know, all these things, and it's it's not true. That--some of it's just not true.

Mary Louder:

Especially with the diagnosis of celiac, which is really a genetic condition that you literally don't have the enzymes to break down gluten.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Right.

Mary Louder:

You just don't have it.

Jeffrey Larsen:

You know, if she had any other ailment like diabetes or cancer, her friends would have surrounded her and protected her and made sure she was okay and that she got the foods she needed. But when you're celiac, you're just, you know, even, even chefs in restaurants will--they're just mad. They have to, like, try to figure it out. So it's a very complex thing, and I feel like that's where I can help on a couple of different levels. I feel, I--I'm comfortable admitting to you that I'm a gay man, and I, so I already knew what it meant to live outside of the norms and people's support.

Mary Louder:

Yeah.

Jeffrey Larsen:

So when I saw all these mothers--and men too, but it's, it was generally more mothers on board. When I saw them struggling, especially with, like I said, kids with multiple allergies, was like, I gotta do something about this, because it's a multi-dimensional ailment.

Mary Louder:

Yeah, it is. And then, and, and you're right, food is so steeped in our culture, and even our various cultures have different foods and, and, and you know, ceremonies around food. And rituals around food. And food has--takes on certain really strong meanings in cultures and, and, so it has--so, I agree, it has so many dimensions and layers to it and and yet, at the same time, I think some of the folks that have some of these sensitivities, whether, if we don't identify them as celiac per se, what I find is they're sensitive souls. And one of the thing, yeah, one of the thing to do is to practice self-compassion.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Oh, Mary--

Mary Louder:

Yeah. And then that acceptance of their selves, what we see is a lot of those foods like you've mentioned, kind of start to quiet down. We heal the gut. We can do functional studies to look at how you know, if there's imbalances within the gut, they might need certain probiotics, they might have an overgrowth of something. We can heal that, the body heals that, and we can treat that, and then we withdraw the food for a certain period of time, and we can reintroduce and we can see how the body's healing. And sometimes they need digestive enzymes. Sometimes they need betaine, sometimes they need protease, lipase, amylase. And so when we support the body, all of a sudden, it can take the nutrients, because we aren't what we eat, we are what we are able to absorb and metabolize.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Right.

Mary Louder:

Which is a difference.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Yes, that's really a beautiful distinction, Mary, thank you for that. That's great for your listeners to hear too. No, I, it's, I think that when you're left out of things like that, it's, it strikes a chord. And I honestly can say my mother died without finding a true path to releasing herself, because there was a lot of stuffed emotion that then just complicated it further. I feel like because of where I am and the fact that I put myself on kind of a more of a journey of emotional growth and exploring myself, that I--I've fared better with, with my diet and with my my training. But, yeah, she died of congestive heart failure. And I know so much it was just like stuffing emotion down. But, you know, a certain--she belonged to a a generation of women, which they were just--she was expected to be pretty and be valuable for a man, cook, clean, you know, beautifully groomed and, and on top of that, my grandfather wanted her to play the piano, which she hated. So, you know, there's a lot.

Mary Louder:

Who knew that gluten was the window to the soul, right?

Jeffrey Larsen:

Well, food, food is kind of the window to the soul. If you--

Mary Louder:

It is.

Jeffrey Larsen:

If you want to take it one step further, I think that you know, when you study people's traditions, indigenous or otherwise, you start to see some really interesting things. One of the exercises I do in my classes where I'm teaching more an extended way about how to adapt your recipes. Yeah, one of the projects I love to do is take your favorite grandmother's recipe or your auntie or whoever is in the family like something that might be only show up at holidays, but it's so steeped in emotion, and let's convert that. You know, there's there's some trial and error as we go through things, but especially in a group dynamic, I love how it unfolds, and people are supporting each other, and then we, we always get to a point where there's a breakthrough and they have something in front of them that is actually like grandma's cookie or or grandma's ravioli or pot sticker. And then--I've seen tears, I've seen uncontrollable laughter. It just strikes my heart in a different way, because you know that it's satisfying us at a soul level.

Mary Louder:

Yes, yes, very much. So that's really cool.

Jeffrey Larsen:

And when I can bring 'em to that, it's it's so rewarding, so rewarding. It makes all my struggle kind of worth it. You know, to be able to say, I helped this person find their pot sticker. I, I had a woman cry over pot stickers.

Mary Louder:

Yeah. I can, I can, I can, I can, well imagine, because, you know, when we when we, when we eat something that we love, and you're right, it hits all those emotions. It reminds us of special times, special people, special events. And you know, even the smell of food has such a strong emotional component for us, right? Brings us right back into that memory of a variety of things, and then to be told you can't have that anymore. To be told that's not going to help you, or this is all in your head, there's nothing wrong with you.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Yeah.

Mary Louder:

So we've got both sides of that equation, which I think is just super challenging. I know we've got good ways to diagnose it. It's pretty simple. It's a blood test. We do stool tests, we can do blood tests, we can figure out enzymes, we can figure out inflammatory markers in the bowel. And I do all those testings in my office. It's like, done--it's like done and dusted in a matter of two and a half weeks. We know exactly what's going on in your gut. And yeah, folks that have been like, they've been scoped from both ends, and they're sent away saying, well, there's small bits of inflammation, but, you know, hey, everybody's got that. And, you know, see you. See you in five years, and there's just, you know, no help, right?

Jeffrey Larsen:

Right. Yeah, no, the testing is so much better today. And yes, you know, I discovered it that I do have complications with other foods. Blueberries, the whole sweet pepper family. It, and it has just to do with the skin. It isn't the the flesh. So you know, when you start breaking all this stuff down, and realize when you take those things out, and then you start to feel this kind of ease. And you know, everyone in my family is really heavy, and when we gather at family events, they're, they always look at me and go, you don't eat enough. Because I'm still slender, at six--at 61 but I have no other way to explain this, except that I controlled my diet and I kept a handle on it to the extent that there's, I'm not blocked. I'm not full of inflammation anymore.

Mary Louder:

Right. Yeah. Well, I think that those are really, really important things. Is to maybe, what not, guess, find someone who can help you, right? And then, you know, look for good resources, which your cookbook would be top of the list, right? And--

Jeffrey Larsen:

Yeah, there's another component to this, Mary, and you might struggle with this as well. Like, it's an elitist thing to to be able to buy these products and convert your kitchen. And I, I don't know how to bring this to, you know, the people that may not have those advantages.

Mary Louder:

Right.

Jeffrey Larsen:

So if that's a struggle as well. Like I want people to understand that this, and maybe it is just simple as getting a good cookbook or seeing someone like you, but sometimes it is cost prohibitive.

Mary Louder:

Yeah, I think that's a, I do think that's a really good point. Jeffrey, I think a lot of it is education. Yeah, there's a lot we could do through all of our I mean, if we look at the quality of food without, you know, taking too far of a dive off into that--off that cliff and in that rabbit hole, the quality of food, when it is supported, when it is subsidized, which is, you know, appropriately needed, because that's one of the, the, the Adverse Childhood Experiences is food scarcity, right? And if there isn't that, or if there is that, and the type of food is not helpful or causes the child to feel poorly, then they tend to act out because they just do, or some of the food can be even neuroexcitatory. So when it goes through the gut, it goes right to the brain and makes them, you know, hyper. And so then they're in a disadvantage for those things. So these, I mean, these are real, these are real big issues. And I would agree it's not just, it shouldn't just be an elitist issue of, what can we eat? That makes you know that, you know, how do we flip our kitchen? It's a matter of, how do we really get good nutrition and take care of our needs.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Right, some people you know, just don't even have the wherewithal to, to cook. So, it gets really complex, especially when you get to this really complex style of baking, which requires so many more ingredients. So it's, it's a struggle, but when I learned it early on in my investigation, that the wheat that we eat, that we consume here in the United States is so much higher in gluten. In fact, the wheat that we eat on a regular basis was developed for glue. So--

Mary Louder:

I didn't know that. No, I did not know that. Right. Yeah, that's a good point. And I have

Jeffrey Larsen:

Yeah, it's so when you go to European countries and they haven't monkeyed with their wheat sources, and it's the appropriate amount of gluten. I've had students come back and say, you know, I could have a croissant there in Paris, or I could have pasta in Italy, and it wasn't bothering me. Plus, I think some of those other experienced that in Europe, doing better with the breads cultures also have it figured out. You can walk into a restaurant in Italy and they'll just immediately--tell them you're celiac, and they'll make the substitution. There's no fighting. there. And I have sourced a single source grains, where they farm their heritage grain and things like that, and did a fair bit of that. And there was, there certainly was a difference. And I, honestly, I live in that world of the, you know, more heritage driven grains and, and I don't get the--I get the higher quality flowers, and that's great. And, you know, but I also, at the same time, I have an avocation of baking, and when I have the time and take the effort, it's always by scale and the stuff, turns out, you know, my dad taught me well, and then it's fun too. It is fun. You know, the fact that I even just in 2019 I was still fighting with the publisher over just making a book with weights. I was insistent on it. It has to be weights. And they were just fighting me. Well, well, you will put the weights first, but you still have to put in cups and measures and--so it's all there. But I always tell people, don't, don't use the measuring cups. Don't use this, this, this--the spoons, actually, I do find to be better than, like, a cheap scale. The measuring spoons. So I've kind of found my own way through that as well. And sometimes that's confusing for people. But as Americans, you know, we just, they always kind of dumb it down for us, and I don't know. I don't know why that is.

Mary Louder:

Because they proc--

Jeffrey Larsen:

It actually makes it worse. It makes it

Mary Louder:

It's probably because they process everything worse. and we're expected to be processed or something. I'm not sure either, but that's a really good point. Touch a little bit, you know, touch a little bit on the other things you do. Because when I looked at your website, which, by the way, everybody is jeffreylarsen.com and Larsen is spelled L, A, R, S, E, N, jeffreylarsen.com, it's got a great amount of resources, but there's a lot of companies you've helped and been involved with or consulted with, I'm going to say, because that's really what you're where you're doing across, you know, across the board, but share with me a little bit about that, that part of your work.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Well, you know, in the beginning of my career, I just took everything, but I found myself in the middle of doing some of these corporate things, you know, making food pretty to sell to people that I couldn't really even get behind, you know, like I'd come home feeling dirty. Like, and I won't, I won't name names. We all know the biggies.

Mary Louder:

No, but it's kinda like food porn.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Right? And I'm, I'm the pornographer. You know, I'm at the center of making it enticing and doing reader boards where hamburgers look heroic and enticing. But we all know it's going to come slammed into tissue paper and it's going to be like someone stepped on it, but I made it beautiful, and so I switched fairly quickly to like, I'm only going to work with companies that are actually involved in helping. So my work with Hodo Foods, which does tofu, and then the tofu skin noodles, that that's a proud moment, and Nutiva, I've done a lot of recipe development for them. In fact, I did an entire--they paid me for like, six months to develop a mix for them.

Mary Louder:

Nice.

Jeffrey Larsen:

And--a gluten free baking mix, yeah, and then it never came to market. They just decided it was too co--wasn't cost-effective, I'm not even really sure, but you know, so it's always this kind of thing of walking that line. I work for drink companies and juice companies now, and do recipe development for things that are really on the cutting edge, like the vegan tuna and the impossible meats, and that's where I feel best these days. You know, just trying to spread some healthy good vibes.

Mary Louder:

Nice. That's really, really good. So what's the takeaway? If you had three points for listeners, what would be a--what would be takeaways?

Jeffrey Larsen:

Take away on which component of this, the social or the more mechanics of baking?

Mary Louder:

All of the above from our entire conversation, three key points.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Well, I think first of all, bake with weight. I think we both have hit that home pretty significantly. The second is get yourself tested. And they have to go to someone like you, where we--it's outsourced. You can't--Western medicine does--isn't really there yet. I don't think--I could be wrong.

Mary Louder:

No, it's not.

Jeffrey Larsen:

So get your get yourself tested, and get a really comprehensive test. And then--I don't know the third, third component is, take care of those around you.

Mary Louder:

Right.

Jeffrey Larsen:

My message with my book and with my teaching is, let's create a meal where it's just not an issue. We don't even need to talk about it. We're going to serve pasta, and we're going to serve chocolate chip cookies at the end, and maybe even cake, and we're just not even going to talk about it, because every, everyone is safe in this realm. And my, my, my, my, big thing, what I'd love, is to have a weekly supper club of people that suffer, suffer with allergens, where we just meet and we create a dinner together, but we know all the allergens in the room, and we know all the people in the room, and then we just create a safe space. Because it's that important to me, the emotional part of this might be bigger than the actual ailment.

Mary Louder:

I think that that's true. And so really, our fourth point, and probably our final point, is, everything we do, do from love.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Yes. That seems to be your sweet little touch, which I appreciate, and if--you are a, a sensitive soul, and I can recommend you, yes, just in this small amount of time that we've been together, because I know that you're really invested in helping people, and you have the kind of capacity to do that.

Mary Louder:

Yes.

Jeffrey Larsen:

And I know that is true for myself as well.

Mary Louder:

It is. I mean, this has just been such a surprising, delightful conversation.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Oh, good, Mary.

Mary Louder:

Because I thought, Oh, we're gonna be talking mechanics, and we're gonna be doing this. And here we are off into the soul world, which is my most favorite part to be in anyway. And so, yeah, it's just been delightful.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Honestly, that's, you know, all the stress that's in the world right now, it's turned me towards that. And I think that, you know, when we when we're gathering, we're putting down our phones, we're gathering, we're helping each other, we're talking through each other, and the power of our being infused into another. I know I sound totally hippy-dippy, but we are powerful.

Mary Louder:

We are very powerful.

Jeffrey Larsen:

We are powerful.

Mary Louder:

That's the kind of Skippy Dippy we need. Jeffrey,

Jeffrey Larsen:

I really do believe, and I love investing in men too. When they they find their way to me and they're they're more rare, and I can help them find, not only a way, a pathway to their ailment, but maybe a pathway to what it means to be a softer man.

Mary Louder:

Yeah.

Jeffrey Larsen:

And then living in this world of toxic masculinity, we beat that out of our men and our boys, and that's a whole different podcast, but I can speak to that as well.

Mary Louder:

I would require gluten free alcohol for that, for that podcast.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Yes.

Mary Louder:

Most likely. Most likely. Well, I want to thank you, Jeffrey, for being so open, so candid, so vulnerable and talking about things that is so, so, so close to your heart. And again, my deepest love and respect for your mom, Phyllis, for everything she's done and how she's helped all of us really be better people, and by her, her, her continued carousel of food sensitivities, that, that has, that has propelled you into your great work and some of your best, best deepness on the planet. So.

Jeffrey Larsen:

She was that--she was my ally, my collaborator and my greatest challenge.

Mary Louder:

Yes, they our mothers frequently are, and my mom is, for all practical purposes, here with us now as well, she passed in 2019 and she and Phyllis were cut from a very similar cloth.

Jeffrey Larsen:

Yeah, yeah. In fact, she's infused me so much that I'm, I'm a sweaty mess. So thank you, Mary.

Mary Louder:

Oh no. No worries.

Jeffrey Larsen:

No worries. Exactly.

Mary Louder:

So, everybody go to jeffreylarsen.com because there's some consulting that you can do for folks, and there's also the resources for your book at amazon.com and wherever else you might buy your books. And it's a James Beard award book and, and so it's just highly recommended. It's one of the best out there. So thank you for being open.

Jeffrey Larsen:

So, my consulting--yeah, I want to say one more thing about my consulting, because this is kind of my bread and butter these days, is I, I want to say that it's on the main page of you can see kind of a breakdown, but I will give you a free consultation. We can have a 15 minute discussion about what your needs are, and then we can just kind of figure it out. And you know, I have set my prices, but let's--I don't, I want to work with whoever needs the help.

Mary Louder:

Great.

Jeffrey Larsen:

So I want to just put that out there, like, just contact me and let's start a discussion. And that sounds wonderful. It's j, e, f, f, r, e, y, l, a, r, s, e, n.com. Cool. You can find out all about it. Wonderful.

Mary Louder:

Thank you for being here today.

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