Where Can I Find Wheat Gluten

When gluten is a large part of the American diet - in fact we are the largest importing country and consumer of wheat gluten in the world - but most Americans don't even know what wheat gluten is. That is because it is primarily used as a filler product or mixed ingredient in commercial food processing.

Wheat gluten, similar to tofu, only wheat based instead of soy based, is not generally eaten in its raw form here in the United States. Tofu is at least pretty commonly sold in super markets and widely consumed by American families. Wheat gluten, however, is not. You will likely not find it in any super market and may not find it even in your local health food specialty store. Wheat gluten has been consumed for hundreds of years in Asia and Southeast Asia mostly as a meat substitute by Buddhists and others not desiring to eat meat. It is a normal part of the Asian cultural and is quite widely available to the Asian consumer.

Here in the United States, finding obtaining wheat gluten can be a bit more tricky, but not impossible. First of all, we need to define what it is that we're after. Wheat gluten is sold to consumers in basically two different forms - a powdered flour substance and in its raw form. The best way to obtain wheat gluten in its raw form, is to find a specialty Asian health food store. Your local health food store may carry it, but it is not likely, as raw wheat gluten is not all that popular here in the US and probably does not make economical sense for most stores to stock it. If you live in a larger metro area, you are more likely to have luck finding it in the local Asian community health food stores. Large metro areas, like San Francisco, have their "Chinatown" districts and such that heavily cater to their cultural residents. If, however, you are in a small rural town, you're probably out of luck find the raw form of wheat gluten.

The easier way to obtain and use wheat gluten is to purchase it in its flour form. This is much more readily available and is easily obtainable online, for example. If you do a search for "Vital Wheat Gluten" for example, you will find various online stores that sell it. It is readily available and quite affordable - a quick search yielding results as low as $3.98 a box for a single 10 ounce box of Vital Wheat Gluten. There are other brands as well, this is just the most commonly available source. This article is not endorsing or promoting this product, but just pointing it out as an industry example. If you really want the true raw wheat gluten, then by all means, start calling up health food supply stores and you're likely to find it, though maybe not so close to home. But for many the flour based wheat gluten is the easiest to obtain and work with as well.