Are There Any Gluten Free Meal Options On Medifast?

I make no secret of the fact that I've been on this diet for a decent amount of time and have had a food deal of success.  A coworker of mine is interested in trying the program, but she has celiac disease and wanted to know if medifast was gluten free.  I did not know the answer to this, so I looked it up.  I learned a lot about gluten and how it is measured in food.  And I also learned that although not all of the products are free of gluten, the vast majority are.  I'll go over the specifics of what I found in this article.

Many Of The Medifast Foods Do Not Contain Gluten, And Those That Do Only Contain A Small Amount: Before I researched the foods, I first had to know how much would be too much for my coworker.  I learned the the United States FDA has never defined a safe amount of gluten for those with celiac disease or those with an intolerance. However, in Europe, foods that contain less than 20 PPM (parts per million) are technically deemed "gluten free."  So, with this knowledge, I looked at the plan's foods to see just how feasible this would be.

Before I go into specifics, the medifast diet is based on around 70 different foods including shakes, oatmeals, eggs, puddings, stews, soups, chilis, cappuccinos, protein bars, and fruit drinks.  All of these options come in different flavors to give you several different choices to work with.  You eat six times per day (five of the meals are the plan's and one of the meals you make on your own.)

I went into this research knowing that many of the plan's products and foods are soy based, so I suspected that she would be safe. In the end, I found that only the shakes and one soup option contain some gluten.  Specifically,  the 55 and 70 shakes and the chicken noodle soup were culprits. But, the shakes only contain < (less than) 10 PPM which is a very low amount that would be considered safe in Europe.  The soup contains a higher amount which she should steer clear of, but there are many other flavors available that doesn't contain anything that is off limits. And, the ready to drink shakes are gluten free.

In a nutshell, only a very small percentage of foods ending up being objectionable to my coworker.  Avoiding the chicken noodle soup is no big deal as there are other flavors available.  And, she told me that the less than 10 PPM of gluten in the shakes is really a minute amount that is safe for her, but, were it not, she would just opt for the ready to drink shakes instead.

Lindsey offers the most current, updated medifast food list on her Medifast review website. You can also get a copy of her free "Getting The Most Out Of Medifast" ebook by visiting http://easiest-diet.com/medifast/html

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