Help The Black Farmer - please

[Feedingmyintolerantchild]

Just thought I would do my bit to show some support. Just had an email from the Black Farmer. He has a meeting with Tesco on Friday but is anxious as 'they don't think he has a strong and loyal fan base up and down the country'. I am not sure if that is 'buyers speak' for 'we are going to delist you'. I hope not, but I would not be surprised. So Wilfrid, The Black Farmer needs lots of support to arm himself with. Please, please can you all check out his website and or facebook page and tell everyone you know to contact him, reassuring him of your support and love of his products.

theblackfarmer.com

[tmoxon]

Hi thank you for bringing this to our attention, here is a link to the area of the Black Farmer site which provides email links to the supermarkets including Tesco. theblackfarmer.com/get_invo...

I have always bought good quality sausages and the Black Farmer ones are very good and he tries to bring awareness of Coeliac Disease to the fore as well.

I have just email Tesco so hopefully if more people contact them as well they will realise we will support the companies who provide good quality GF food. When I emailed Tesco I also mentioned their digestive biscuit which contains oat flour and says that they may not be suitable for some people with CD, I cannot understand why they have decided to change the ingredients to limit the market. I dont buy biscuits in general anyway however the digestive biscuit was handy if I wanted to make a quick cheesecake for dessert.

[Hidden in reply to tmoxon]

Apparently Prewetts make biscuits for supermarkets using oat flour and I have just emailed Prewetts about their biscuits containing oat flour. And I told them that I didn't even look at biscuits in the free from shelves because of oat flour.

What worries me is that coeliac are told not to eat more than 50g of oats in 24hours and coeliac children 15g which's just over 1/2 ounce and that's if they can tolerate oats!

I buy only buy biscuits occasionally but like you want them to be wheat oats and gluten free, so it might be worth you also contacting Prewetts over this too.

[e-mail]

I will also check out the BF site

[sassyl in reply to Hidden]

Jerry,

I don't buy biscuits ofte, but if I do then it's always Prewett's. Your post shocked me.

I just checked their website and NONE of their biscuits contain oat flour.

[Hidden in reply to sassyl]

Hi Sassyl, well I'm sorry if I shocked you. I went into Sainsbury's and they had a whole selection of biscuits including these:

tesco.com/groceries/Product...

Gluten and wheat free all butter oat & honey cookies made with gluten free oat flour and oat flakes, made for the whole family to enjoy.

So I checked out all the other Prewetts biscuits in the free from section eg chocolate digestive made with oat flour chocolate sandwich biscuits made with oat flour and the only Prewetts biscuits that did not contain oat flour was the triple chocolate ones.

I read that Prewetts are the main supplier of own brand free from biscuits for the major supermarkets and the Co-op sell a chocolate sandwich biscuit with the same ingredients as the ones in Sainsbury's.

[sassyl in reply to Hidden]

Are they in the free from section? I'll have to look. If you look on the Prewett's website they only list 4 Free From biscuits, all oat-free.

These are the ones I've nibbled at tesco.com/groceries/Product... They seem oat-free to me. Maybe it's different on the packet. I have to admit (big bad confession) I did watch TV in bed and got through a whole packet of these a couple of weeks ago. I wasn't too well the next day but put that down to the chocolate as I'm dairy and carb restricted too.

[Hidden in reply to sassyl]

Hi Sassyl, until I checked out the Prewetts biscuits in the free from section in Sainsbury's the only biscuits of theirs that I had seen was the chocolate bourbon ones you show here which are oat free. They are actually very nice biscuits so I wanted to checkout the range at Sainsbury's and was disappointed to see that all but one was made with oat flour labelled as gf oat flour as I don't eat oats.

These are my favourite gf choclate biscuits and I usually buy them in independent health food shops:

amazon.co.uk/Eskal-Gluten-F...

All Eskal gf biscuits are wheat gluten and oat free too.

These are good dunking biscuits and dairy free:

eskalfoods.com/eskal-gluten...

I did check out Prewetts site and thought that it lacked information.

[Lynxcat in reply to tmoxon]

Sadly this is the case with a lot of the foods in the free from aisle range - they are supposed to be for coeliacs but contain ingredients (in small doses) that are damaging to people with coeliac disease. It is all very well for companies to start baking products for coeliacs and making them with Codex wheat starch, oat flour, malted grains and so on and so forth but all of these things affect people who have coeliac disease - because it is an autoimmune disease. It doesn't just cause problems in the small intestines it causes inflammation throughout the body in every single organ. The smallest amount of gluten will get into the blood stream and will travel somewhere. We may not experience any problems from this initial ingestion of the gluten but there are more and more concerns that total disregard and lack of information are causing the most debilitating health conditions for people with coeliac disease.

I really think that Australia leads the way with its advice on gluten and its strict laws on how much may be allowed in products. They at least keep tightening the wynch which provides safety for coeliac sufferers. The Australian laws are currently 0.0005 of allowable gluten this is 5ppm. These are the laws that the UK should aspire to:

coeliac.org.au/professional...

Coeliac laws of the world .... we have a really long, long way to go in the UK - we led the world with our health service and we really should be leading the world championing a better way of living and eating for people with autoimmune diseases:

glutenfreepages.com.au/CMS/...

[kmminver in reply to Lynxcat]

Agree!!

[Hidden in reply to kmminver]

Me to and I do not think that coeliac getting codex wheat on prescription and the prescription co's part sponsoring the only UK charity for coeliac helps.

In the US/OZ they have to label wheat derivatives as exactly that whereas in the UK and the Eu they do not. According to the FSA it is so that manufacturers can change they source of a derivative like dextrose/maltodextrin without having to change the label.

I also agree 100% about Australia leading the way as far as standards are concerned and what interests me is Roscoe an Australian member of GFG said that 22% of Australian coeliac can not tolerate 'pure' oats.

Whereas this figure is quoted at around 5% in the UK and is this because coeliac eat allowed levels of gluten in malted cereals and codex?

[marywales]

nice one, just emailed Tesco.

[Hollyberry]

Just e mailed Tesco, I love BF GF sausages...............

[Lynxcat]

They do contain soya and sulphites though and so not everyone would risk eating them. In recent years there have been health problems high-lighted with both soya and sulphites. Sulphites are known for their ability to cause many problems and allergic reactions. With regard to Coeliac Disease sufferers, sulphites are known for destroying Vitamin B1. The sulphites are usually added to make a longer shelf life.

tesco.com/groceries/Product...

[Feedingmyintolerantchild]

I have to say the e numbers and sulphites make me slightly anxious too. I actually rate the Debbie and Andrews sausages the most, but totally admire the Black Farmer and think he has a delicious product and would hate for him to lose shelf space to inferior Tesco rubbish. Thanks for the comment though. Much appreciated.

[tmoxon]

Hi Just to update, I have just received a customer service telephone call from Tesco.

The person I spoke to is ensuring that my comments are passed on to the relevant department in Tesco and he has put a request that my local store starts to stock the black farmer sausages. He said that tesco only stock one type of Black Farmer sausages and he has given me the bar code so I could ask in store as well. He did say he could not guarantee that they would start to stock them though.

I have to say I am very impressed that Tesco contacted me and apologised for me having to contact them and in a short period of time as well.

I mentioned the biscuit problem to him as well so hopefully that will be fed back to the powers that be. To be honest I have now started making my own biscuits for a base for cheesecake that way I know what is going into everything.

I dont know whether Paul Rankin Sausages have sulphites and E numbers, Waitrose sell these and they are very good as well.

With regards to the Uk and Australian coeliac societies differences I like so many people with CD/DH wish that we also had the lower figure of 5ppm as I am one of those who still has problems following the GF diet as recommended by CUK. I think the lower figure would stop confusion and make life easier.

[kmminver]

Will get on the phone/email!

[BellaC79]

Thanks for bringing this to our attention, I emailed Tesco, asda,sainsburys, morrisons and booths, all supermarkets I regularly visit.

Just got a call from Asda this morning saying that they will include my request in the next review of adding new products ..positive outcome

so far!