The Nourished Festival

For the past several years, I’ve enjoyed going to the Nourished Festival (formerly the Gluten-Free & Allergen-Friendly Expo). It’s been a great opportunity to learn new things and be introduced to new products. I’ve even met people with whom I’ve connected online there. I would recommend that anyone attend one held nearby.

The first Festival, or Expo, I attended was back in 2014. At that time, the vendors were in a separate area from the presenters. People could hear the presenters free of charge, but if they wanted to walk among the vendors, they would have to pay to enter the Expo. I can’t remember who all were presenters that first year, but all the ones I heard were good, and it was nice to go to separate conference rooms to hear the presenters because the noise of people going around to

the various vendor booths didn’t distract. That year, I met Dr. Alessio Fasano and got him to sign my copy of Gluten Freedom. I also ate way too many samples. I did feel pretty yucky after two days of going to the Expo, which at the time I wrote off as eating too many processed food items, but it was really due to cross-contamination. I touched and ate food with my hands and didn’t think about how the vendors were handling the samples.

I went back in 2015, and if memory serves, it was pretty similar to the first time I went. Speakers were in a separate area from the vendors. People could go hear the speakers without noisy distractions and then go into the vendor area to see who was there, check out samples, and more. That year, I actually met up with several people from a Gluten Free Atlanta Facebook group. We enjoyed talking about our various trials and tribulations on the gluten-free diet. By this time I knew I had to be really careful about trying the samples. I had to make sure I tried things that were handled appropriately and that didn’t require me to use my hands to eat. I would always go to the Expo with friends and family, and they got to try whatever they wanted. I just abstained to keep myself safe.

I didn’t go in 2016 because my family and I went on a vacation during that time. In 2017, the Expo had changed. Speakers now had an area in the vendor room set aside for their presentations. We now had to try to listen and pay attention with commotion going on behind us. However, the presentations were still good, and we still got a lot out of them. We just preferred going to the separate conference rooms so that we could better hear and focus on the presentations. There were still plenty of vendors with plenty of samples to explore.

In 2018, there was a speaker who had two really good presentations. She emphasized eating a diet that fit with a person’s genetics. What may work for an individual may not be one of the popular diets. I know for myself, my main focus, other than avoiding wheat and flaxseed, is making sure I keep copper in balance with zinc and iron in balance with vitamin E. I try to keep my diet as healthy as possible around these main concerns. I don’t feel I have to avoid carbs, fat, or sugar, although I don’t believe I overindulge in them either. My diet is not plant-based, and with increasing my consumption of animal foods having such a dramatically positive impact on my health, I don’t see myself ever going that direction. As the Expo was concluding, I got a chance to talk with her and share with her my health concerns, and I told her how much I appreciated her presentations. After we were done, she gave me a hug and gave me a card with her contact information on it.

In 2018 and this year, there were a couple of vendors noticeably missing from the Expo. We didn’t see any booths for Glutino or Udi’s. Some of the rice and pasta vendors were missing this year as well. This year, the Expo was called the Nourished Festival, and they’ve added sections for Keto, Plant-Based, and Paleo in addition to the traditional Gluten-Free and Allergen-Friendly. There were still some good presentations this year, and we went to most of them. I also got to meet up with a friend on Facebook with whom I connected through one of my gluten-free groups. We talked for a few minutes.

After all of the years of going to the Nourished Festival (or Gluten-Free & Allergen-Friendly Expo), I’ve discovered that the main reason to go is to listen to the speakers. Going around to the vendor tables and checking out the samples is fun too, but I have to be really careful about trying samples. Even though the vendors serving samples wear gloves, some will still handle other items while having the gloves on their hands and then touch food with those same gloves. I’ve tended to let down my guard at the Expo and have had to pop Benadryl and Zantac multiple times due to my carelessness. Other than just seeing what’s there and seeing if I may want to buy something or what I can find back home or online, I don’t feel I get as much out of the vendor areas. Also, it seems like each year, the vendor area seems to offer less and less. The speakers are wonderful, though, and they have a lot of interesting information to share about diet, health, and other topics. I highly recommend that people with health issues where they’re looking at diet to help fix them to go hear what these speakers have to say to see if any of it may apply. Of course, they should always check with their primary healthcare providers to make sure that any of the changes would be safe or suitable for them.

If you happen to live near an area where a Nourished Festival is held, I highly recommend going. You have the potential to get a lot of good health information as well as find some good product samples from many different types of food and diets. You may likely learn something that will help change your health for the better.

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