Recently I attended the Gluten-Free and Allergen Expo in Lisle, IL, founded by the awesome Jen Cafferty. I was so in awe of all the different vendors, bloggers, authors and gluten-free experts I got a chance to talk to. It really was a cornucopia of gluten-free goodiness!
Here I am with Jen Cafferty.....Jen ROCKS
The Expo ran from Friday April 29, 2011 to Sunday, May 1, 2011. On Friday, I had the pleasure of meeting a lot of the vendors and sampling a lot of new products I hadn’t tried and visiting some of the vendors I am very familiar with and whose products I absolutely love.
I was SO excited to meet “The Pamela” from Pamela’s Products and had a lot of fun hanging out with her too! Pamela’s Products puts out the most awesome cookies (they’re addicting!) and I sampled some of her cheesecakes. You really need to try her products!
Here are "The Pamela" and Marion from Pamela's Products
I recently posted a product review of Crunchmaster‘s crackers on Examiner.com (click here to check it out!) and really really LOVE their crackers! I had the absolute pleasure of meeting Dani and Lisa and got to have dinner with them on Friday night too when a few of us went to Maggiano’s.
Loved meeting Dani and Lisa, "The Crunchmaster Gals"!
Tried the best oats from Gluten Free Oats! It was great meeting Forest and hanging out with him too!
Forest really knows his oats!
We all know how much I LOVE Rudi’s Gluten-Free Bakery! It was so great meeting them and at the Expo they were handing out some awesome grilled cheese sandwiches….yummy!
Vanna White....eat your heart out!
SO glad I got the chance to meet Lee Tobin from Whole Foods Gluten-Free Bakehouse. Lee was instrumental in helping with the “World’s Largest” Gluten-Free cake for the “1 in 133″ event I posted about last month.
Go Lee for helping with "1 in 133"!!
So many great bloggers attended the event too! On Saturday, after volunteering, I was fortunate enough to be included at the VIP Party with some awesome gluten-free bloggers, authors and other fantastic gluten-free people. A great time was had by all!
We all rock the Gluten-Free World!
I was able to attend some of the presenter’s demos on Sunday as well. Here is one of my favorites, Carol Kicinski. Carol was just on QVC recently in their inaugural Gluten-Free episode selling her new cookbook, “Simply….Gluten-free Desserts”. Carol is a professional recipe developer, food writer and America’s first gluten-free (only) TV chef. She is currently on “Daytime TV” monthly as “The Gluten-Free Cook”. She creates simple recipes that are absolutely delicious and just happen to be gluten-free. I am proud to announce that I have a copy of her cookbook that I will be giving away very soon! Please watch my Rockin’ Gluten-Free Facebook page for details. Check out Carol’s website at simplygluten-free.com
Carol makes it so simple to be gluten-free!
Stay tuned for more featured bloggers on my site during the month! They will be making some outstanding contributions and have some amazing stories to share.
I would like to close this post with bringing back my friend Lauren-Lucille aka “The Celiac Diva” with two videos she shot while at the Expo. She always knows how to put a fun spin on anything and you may recognize someone in the one of the videos 
. Enjoy!
