Okay, so the other day, we received our weekly (or so) mailing from Proctor & Gamble. Usually, these are just coupons - some we can use, some we can't. But this most recent mailing was a product sample for a shampoo and conditioner called Fekkai. Apparently this is a "high class" hair product.
We already have a brand or two that we like, and more importantly, can afford, but hey, free shampoo is free shampoo, so I set it aside as I went through the rest of the mail.
A few days later, I peel the sample packets out of the mailer they came in and flip them over to take a look at the ingredients. Have you ever noticed that many low-end and high-end shampoos contain, more less, the same ingredients? And of course, most shampoo ingredients are chemicals that the average person cannot decipher sources for.
But this product has a lot of natural things - like grape seed extract, so I'm able to recognize what many things are....
And then I come to, HYDROLYZED WHEAT PROTEIN!
Great, just what I wanted in my gluten-free house! And hydrolyzed to boot (hydrolyzed, lipolyzed, autolyzed, etcetera, brings MSG into the picture on top of the already bad gluten).
Why, you may ask, do I care if gluten is in shampoo? Surely, you're not going to EAT the shampoo?
Well, no, of course I'm not going to eat it -- but just about everyone's had the experience of having soap dribble down your face and into your mouth. You'll spit it out, of course, but there's a chance you'll ingest some of it. And there goes all my careful diet planning, ruined by SHAMPOO.
Also, there are some people who have ALLERGIES to gluten, not just an intolerance, and will react to a topical gluten without ingesting anything.
Unfortunately, as a non-edible product, there is no "Allergen warning" on shampoo packages. At least, I've yet to see one.
Gluten isn't just in food!
