The Zeer Blog

We are enormously excited to introduce our latest companion and tool for helping people with Celiac Disease answer the question of what is and isn’t gluten free.

GlutenScan is the first iPhone app that allows people to pick up a product in the grocery store, type in a Name or UPC and determine if that product is safe or not.  If a product contains gluten, glutenScan automatically searches the database and recommends gluten free alternatives.

Our first release includes ability to call the manufacturer quickly if you have a question, high resolution photos so you can be sure be sure that the product you’re holding in your hand is the one in our database, and easy browsing for over 130 categories in one click.

GlutenScan goes beyond your gluten free food book or list.  Over 30,000 products in our database are assigned a gluten-free safety status; We are continually adding or updating 500+ products every week so you can get the most updated information available to make your decisions.

Features:

1. Gluten free safety status attached to over 30,000 food products
2. Database contains products from over 10,000 manufacturers
3. 500+ products added or updated each week
4. Search products by Name, Category, UPC, and Manufacturer name
5. Call the manufacturer at the touch of a button
6. Comprehensive list of problem ingredients and synonyms
7. High resolution images of each product
8. Easy to view highlighting of problematic ingredients
9. Access to over 130 categories in one click
10. Find Alternatives for any product instantly

Process & Expertise:

GlutenScan’s comprehensive list of problem ingredients was prepared by experts with over 40 years combined celiac & gluten free nutrition experience. This medical advisory and research team makes glutenScan the most thorough, instructive product and ingredient resource available for individuals with celiac disease. To read more about the process & expertise behind glutenScan & Zeer.com visit our process & expertise page.

Pay Only For What You Use!

One of the first iPhone applications available on a subscription basis, glutenScan is currently offered at an intial discounted rate of $1.99 for 30 days of use. Continue as necessary by extending your subscription for $1.99 for another 30 days, or $3.99 for 90 additional days.

At Zeer, our goal is to make finding safe food easier than ever before. We hear every day from people who believe in our mission but just couldn’t shoulder our price.

You’ve written in, we’ve listened. Zeer Select is now only $4.95.

Everyone deserves the right to find safe food. That’s why we lowered our price so a greater number of people could benefit from the 40 years of Celiac Disease expertise that went into building Zeer Select.

Sign up now and get 30 days free. Cancel at anytime. Find Safe food.

To upgrade, login to your Zeer Basic account and click the upgrade link at the top of any page!

Enjoy and stay safe,

The Zeer Team

In our effort to find the best gluten-free products out there, we hosted our first gluten-free taste test at our offices in Cambridge, MA. We invited 15 people living gluten-free to stop by and try a variety of products ranging from pretzels to brownies.

For our brownie smack-down, (our most popular taste-test), we had our ingredients-guru Gillian prepared 5 different batches of brownies for our taste-testers in her gluten-free kitchen. Gillian followed the directions on the boxes to the letter and we presented them to our taste testers and told them to chow down.

The Brownie Smackdown Contenders:

Betty Crocker, Gluten-free Pantry, Bob’s Red Mill, Pamela’s Products, and Cherrybrook Kitchen!

The Results:

Overall, people really enjoyed the brownie smack-down and to be honest, their enthusiasm for the products made this taste test one VERY close-call. However, when we tallied up the scores, a winner did emerge. That winner was Cherrybrook Kitchen.

1^st Place - Winner!

Cherrybrook Kitchen Fudge Brownie Mix

Though we made Cherrybrook Kitchen’s recipe with dairy for our taste-test, the mix itself is peanut free, dairy free, egg free, nut free, wheat free, gluten free.  These brownies were incredibly moist and cake-like. I could easily imagine that they’d be awesome with a little frosting on top.

Tied for 2^nd Place

Betty Crocker Gluten-Free Brownie Mix

This newie on the gluten-free scene really impressed Zeer’s taste-buds. And it looks like the testers also enjoyed eating this selection as well. This brownie was incredibly fudgy, moist and as one tester pointed out it is exactly what you expect from the Betty Crocker brand.

Bob’s Red Mill Brownie Mix This brownie mix is one that Zeer’s assistant ingredient guru, Michele calls “So good that sometimes the batter never makes it into the oven!”

Another tester even pointed out that these bad boys “taste the most like the brownies I had in my childhood.”

Tied for 3^rd Place

Pamela’s Products Chocolate Brownie Mix This dairy-free, gluten-free option made our dairy-free, gluten-free testers extremely happy and I can see why - it’s easy to wonder when you’re diagnosed with dairy & gluten intolerances that you’ll never eat brownies again, but this brownie mix definitely was an exciting and tasty option.

Gluten-Free Pantry Chocolate Truffle Brownie Mix

Gluten-free pantry’s brownie was what many testers cited as the most fudge-like brownie, so if you like your brownies sticky and moist, this one might be for you.

To be honest, I found the results shocking! I did my own gluten-free taste test (my opinion was not included in the results) but I quickly plucked out Gluten-Free pantry as my personal favorite followed by Betty Crocker, but the taste-testers have spoken!

Once again, this taste-test was insanely close, especially between the top three contenders Betty Crocker, Bob’s Red Mill, and Cherrybrook Kitchen. In the end, the difference between 1^st, 2^nd, 3^rd place was only a couple of points.

There are still many more Brownie Mixes on Zeer we’ve yet to test including Namaste Foods Brownie Mix, Whole Foods 365 Day Value, and Arrowhead Mills Wheat Free Brownie Mix. If you know of any other brownie mixes we should put up against the taste test, leave a comment and let us know!

The gluten-free sandwich is not an easy or cheap food to come by. Not only do you have to do your research to find a delicious gluten-free bread or wrap, but you also have to find gluten-free fillings, too… like gluten-free mayo, mustard, and of course, deli-meat.

To make it a little easier to find gluten free deli meats you can eat, we’ve used  Zeer Select to unearth some potential gluten-free finds to beef up your lunchtime.

Applegate Farms Honey & Maple Turkey Breast
Not only are all Applegate Farms turkeys vegetarian and grain fed from birth, they’re also antibiotic free, too. So next time you find yourself munching on some deli meat from Applegate Farms, give them some props for providing natural, hormone-free deli meat that is also gluten and casein free!

Wegman’s Oven Browned Turkey Breast
Remember Thanksgiving? Boy a lot had changed since going gluten-free. This gluten & lactose free oven-roasted turkey breast a great find for those of us looking for a lean turkey breast that is also affordable. And for those of us who miss thanksgiving, don’t worry it’s also great with cranberry chipotle cheese.

Hormel Deli Roast Beef
Hormel isn’t exactly known for its natural foods, but their Deli Roast beef contains no artificial ingredients and is gluten & MSG free. If you’re concerned about cross-contamination from using the slicer at your local deli, then this pre-packaged roast beef is great in a pinch.

Boar’s Head Boneless, Skinless, Maple Glazed Roasted Chicken Breast
Thinly sliced chicken breast really does not get enough credit at lunch-time. This gluten and saturated fat free maple glazed chicken is a sweet and flavorful deli meat that won’t make you drowsy like turkey can. That means you’ll be full, happy and awake when you get back to your desk after lunchtime.

Buddig Extra Thin, Original Corned Beef
Buddig company has many gluten-free options but one of their best is their extra-thin original corned beef. This affordable deli meat is a great & reliable deli comfort food that makes two pieces of millet bread actually seem like a sandwich.

While looking through some of the new products uploaded this week to the Zeer Database, I found a product that to me, struck me as a perfect example of a product that is labeled as gluten-free but contains some questionable ingredients: Michael Season’s Honey Chipotle Multigrain Chips

For someone newly diagnosed, a similar product might be difficult to comprehend. They may ask, “How can products like this, which contains ingredients I’ve been told to avoid, still be gluten-free?”

The truth is many dieticians advise their patients starting a gluten-free diet to take the strictest, safest route to recovery and avoid any products & ingredients that are questionable. As a person begins to understand the diet, many people begin to discover there are many gluten-free products that are safe, but hidden in their grocery store.

At Zeer, we have a very specific process that helps people cut through these mixed messages on a products packaging.

Determining the Problem Areas

Let’s take a look at the product in question: Michael Season’s Honey Chipotle Multigrain Chips. These light and crunchy chips are the gluten-free equivalent of Sun Chips (which contain wheat and therefore are not gluten free).

It contains ingredients such as natural smoke flavor, natural flavors, maltodextrin, & oats - four ingredients that we’ve singled out as ingredients that those with Celiac Disease should know more about .

Since the manufacturer states, in text printed on the product package that the food is gluten free, we have set the gluten free safety status as “labeled as gluten free.”

We do this because some products contain questionable ingredients, but contain less than 20 parts per million (ppm) of gluten and therefore, under the new standard proposed by the FDA, would be considered “gluten-free.”

However, it’s understandable to remain cautious. This is your body and your choice. You want to be certain that this product is safe for you.

Our number one goal at Zeer is to help people get the product information they need to make their own decisions. Even if a product is labeled gluten-free, we always try to display all the information we have available so you can see where questionable ingredients clearly.

Zeer can help decipher mixed messages on a products packaging.

As you can see from the image above, these chips contain natural hickory smoke flavor, an additive that can utilize a gluten-containing grain or by-product in the manufacturing process. Since the product is labeled gluten-free we can assume that the Hickory Smoke Flavor used did not utilize a gluten-containing ingredient such as Malt Flour in their process.

But what about oats? We have labeled the ingredient oats as red because although oats do not contain gluten naturally (they contain the protein, avenin), they likely have been contaminated by exposure to other gluten-containing grains such as wheat, barley, or rye during manufacturing. However, there are gluten-free oats available on the market that manufactures could use instead of cross-contaminated oats.

Products that use gluten-free oats will usually be labeled gluten-free, which is why we don’t hard-code oats as yellow which means “may contain gluten.”

Since Michael Season’s has labeled this product as gluten-free, we can assume that the oats used in this product are certified gluten-free oats.

As you can see, Zeer makes it easy to review all this information, prepared by a team of Celiac Disease advisors, quickly and easily so you can make the decision if this product is right for you.

We all know that Twitter can be an awesome resource for finding out about what your friends are up to or for following Celebrities or bands you admire. However, it’s also a great tool for following food brands you admire as well.

As I pointed out in our Food Brands That Tweet: Why More Consumers Should Be On Twitter , twitter makes it easier to have a conversation with the food brands that you like but following food companies on twitter isn’t always a 24/7 marketing fest.

In fact, following food companies can also keep you in the know when a particular food brand has some exciting news, new recipes, coupons or contests available.

On our Zeer Select Twitter account we tweet and re-tweet gluten free topics we find interesting, especially from manufacturers who contribute gluten free goodness to the grocery aisles. Together, we’ve picked our favorite gluten free food follows so you can benefit from the great deals and contests we’re finding every day.

Enjoy!

10 Gluten Free Food Manufacturers You Should Follow

Kinnickinnick

When Kinnickinnick had a big announcement to make about their factories becoming 100% nut free they turned to Twitter to share the happy news. That means that people who live with multiple allergies suddenly had over 20 new products suddenly available to them. Without twitter, many of them might never have known!

Pamela’s Products

Pamela’s does a great job of letting its customer’s know about events, tastings, and appearances they’re doing to get the word out about their products.

Enjoy Life Foods

Enjoy Life CEO uses Twitter to let his followers know about special deals posted to the website – super helpful since most of us are probably checking our Twitter feed more often than Enjoy Life’s website.

Kind Snacks

Kind Snacks recently began selling their gluten-free snack bars in Starbucks. After Starbucks got some bad press from discontinuing their Gluten Free Valencia Cake and replacing the option with Kind Snacks, Kind Snacks turned to twitter to help repair some of the demand created from the decision by offering its followers a taste of their product, a very classy move from a very company that’s obviously extremely dedicated to making its customers happy.

Honest Tea

Some products are great because they’re socially conscious, too. Honest Tea is not only USDA certified organic but they also remind their followers to take advantage of their ultra-cool, music-lover’s giveaways.

Blue Bunny

I don’t know about you, but I miss secret clubs. Blue Bunny knows this and offers their follower’s a chance to get free stuff just by saying a secret password.

Dagoba Organic Chocolate

We count on food manufacturers to know the ins and outs of their products. We also want them to provide us with new and fun ways to use their products. Dagoba knows that their organic chocolates are awesome but also understand it’s hard to find the need for it on a hot sunny day like the 4^th of July.  Recently they tweeted a great recipe on how to turn their chocolate bars into frozen hot chocolate. The best part is, the recipe is easily gluten free when you use gluten free hot cocoa mix.

Bobs Red Mill

Bob’s Red Mill is one of the better companies that twitter. Not only are they super responsible responding to customer tweets, they also make following them fun and rewarding with their daily contests and trivia questions.

Lara Bar

Sometimes following a food company gives you an inside scoop on what’s going on behind the scenes, like the launch of a new product.

Stonyfield Farms

In this economy, it helps to know that great companies are still hiring. Stonyfield farm recently tweeted about their job opening in NH. That’s one way to attract someone who really cares about what they’re doing as a company.

Nothing says “It’s summer!” like the sound of an ice cream truck’s hypnotizing melody curling around the neighborhood.  But for many of us, what used to be a daily highlight during the long, hot days of summer vacation, now is just a reminder of food we just can’t eat anymore.

Fortunately, with Zeer Select you can see alternatives for old favorites and find out what’s really gluten free. We’ve taken a closer look at some of our old summer-time favorites and unearthed some potential gluten-free alteratives that you and your family can enjoy this summer.

Blue Bunny Assorted Fudge Bars

Diana’s Dark Chocolate Banana Babies

Haagen-Dazs Vanilla & Almond Ice Cream Bar

Klein’s Real Strawberry Flavored Ice Cream Bar

Edy’s Assorted Fruit Pops

Since the Zeer launch in early 2008, we have been inspired by the support and passion that our members and visitors have shown.  We’ve heard from many people who say they’d like greater insights into the foods they are eating, that they want help reading a product’s packaging. Today, we are proud to introduce several exciting enhancements to Zeer that are directly in response to these enthusiastic requests.

A Simpler, Easier Way to Find Safe Food

We are excited to announce the release of Zeer Select, the easy way to find gluten free food. Zeer Select is a database of over 30,000 food product that helps people stay safe, save time, & learn the gluten free diet. Zeer Select is a monthly subscription ($14.95 a month) where members can:

• Instantly see the gluten-free safety status for over 30,000 products in our database
• Discover gluten free alternatives for any product
• Search gluten free foods by category, brand, product, and UPC.
• View highlighted problem ingredients and manufacturer’s statements to help you learn why products are safe or not.

We began all this work from a belief that finding great food information online should be easy. For many, this may only be a minor inconvenience, but for individuals living on a gluten free diet, finding food that is safe and also delicious is essential. Now individuals on a gluten free diet have help in making sense of the 60,000 ingredients and 30,000 products from over 10,000 manufacturers.  In Zeer Select, we have assigned a Gluten Free Safety Status to over 30,000 products. Subscribers can search or browse the entire database to find specific products or browse by categories such as entrees, condiments, sauces, etc.

We have also engaged a group of leading medical and nutrition advisers and food researchers with deep personal and professional experience in celiac disease and the gluten free diet to help in the process of assigning gluten free safety status’ to products. We have analyzed every ingredient (and synonyms) in every product for problematic ingredients, considered issues of cross contamination and have manually reviewed (in duplicate) every manufacturer’s statement/allergen warning on every product in assigning the Gluten Free safety Status.

Zeer Select is updated continuously unlike books and static lists which become out dated very quickly. Each week 500 products are added or updated so that our users have the best information to make their decisions.

To check out all the exciting changes we’ve made to Zeer, login now, and let us know what you think.

We are very proud to present our first ever iPhone app, Food Reviews on Zeer. Now all the great information on Zeer is available while you’re on the go — nutrition facts, warnings, and our stellar user reviews, plus a searchable database for 100,000 + grocery products.

Take a tour of the exciting features our app now!

From our press release:

“The Food Reviews iPhone App gives consumers access to the Zeer database of grocery products across 35 categories, ranging from bread and breakfast foods to pizza and beer. Consumers can easily search important information, including nutrition facts in the standard FDA format, consumer reviews, ingredients, and manufacturer warning labels.

The first-of-its kind application also allows consumers to filter searches by average rating to help discover high quality foods while on the go. Consumers can easily keep track of their favorite foods and sync their favorite products automatically with Zeer.com. Shoppers preferring Organic or Kosher foods can easily filter their searches to see only these products. High quality images are also featured for each product, enabling easy identification while in the supermarket aisle and improving the overall shopping experience.”

We also created a fun 1 minute demo on YouTube featuring our very own CEO, Mike Putnam, showing you some our favorite features of our application. Enjoy!

1.) Liberty Orchards Aplets & Cotlets Ever since Edmund in The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe became addicted to Turkish Delights, people have wondered, “Well, what on earth does a Turkish Delight taste like?” For curious eaters, Gen H. might be able to shed some light with her recent review of Liberty Orchard’s Aplets & Cotlets which she professes is “a very delicious, authentic, American-made Turkish Delight” that has a “sweet, fruity flavor, and a smooth consistency, with a slight crunch of walnuts.”

2.) Nestle’s Lion Bar Looking for a Nestle bar with a little more bite than the standard Nestle’s crunch? Nestle’s Lion Bar is a “crispy, chewy and sweet” caramel filled wafer that has Thaniya A. positively growling.

3.) Cadbury Mini Eggs The Cadbury company has long had our attention with its delicious dairy milk chocolates, but Cadbury Mini Eggs are a Zeer favorite that Sarah R. claims is “solid proof of such superiority” to Hershey’s. However, you might need to act fast. These addictive little eggs only make their appearance once a year around the Easter holiday, a fact that is fortunate indeed for those of us who just can’t say no.

4.) Ritter Sport Dark Chocolate with Marzipan If your quest for a good Marzipan bar has left you hungry, Ben L. has determined that Ritter Sport Dark Chocolate with Marzipan is one of the “best marzipan bars.” What makes this bar distinctive among the rest? For Ben L. it may just be that distinctive hazelnut flavor which “shines through an excellent dark chocolate covering.”

5.) Yummy Earth Variety Candy Drops For the allergy mom, it’s tough to find a candy available at a local supermarket that are safe for your children, but it’s even tougher to find a candy that’s also USDA organic and tastes great, too. Fortunately, Jennifer B. found Yummy Earth Variety Candy Drops a “rare safe (for peanut allergy) candy treat” for those of you who have people in your life who need to eat “nut-free, peanut-free, corn-free, dairy-free, wheat-free and more.”

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From the Zeer Better Buyer,  April 7, 2009

The Better Buyer is a newsletter that brings the best advice found in Zeer reviews straight to your inbox. With Zeer’s Better Buyer, you can see what products are buzzing in the Zeer community, check out the newest Zeer members, and glimpse a smorgasbord of new reviews. To make sure you receive Zeer’s Better Buyer, sign up for Zeer and double check that the newsletter box is currently in the “checked” position on your email settings page here.