It's tough enough keeping track of hidden gluten in your food, but did you know that gluten also can hide elsewhere in your home?

You can find gluten in shampoos and other hair products, of course -- most of us know to look there. But you also need to beware of it in various other products you may have scattered around your bathrooms, your kids' rooms and even your work shop and storage spaces.

When I first went through my entire house to clean out the gluten, I found tons of it -- far more than I was expecting. I had thought I already had a gluten-free home, but boy, was I wrong! Now, the house is cleaner (from a gluten standpoint, anyway), but I realized we always need to be on guard -- gluten can creep in from so many different sources.

If your goal is creating the "cleanest" living space possible, here's some more information on creating a truly gluten-free home.

Although gluten-free summer camp programs are filling up fast and time's running out to sign on for 2011, registration is still open at some camps on the list.

There's also another camp to add: New Jersey Y Camps, a group catering to Jewish children, has partnered with the Celiac Disease Center at Columbia University Medical Center to develop a gluten-free summer sleep-away program at its camp in Milford, Pa.

NJY Camps always had served celiac children, but this year decided to increase the scope of its program, which now offers a dedicated gluten-free kitchen providing Kosher meals and snacks. The camp is open to both children and teens who have celiac and type 1 diabetes.

In addition to the sleep-away camp for kids, NJY Camps will offer a Gluten-Free Family Camp Weekend on June 10-12. During the weekend, kids can enjoy day camp, parents can enjoy programs designed for them, and all will eat gluten-free and Kosher. The weekend costs $250 per adult (kids attend free), and proceeds will benefit Columbia's celiac center.

There's been a spate of recent publicity on celiac websites involving the safety of "meat glue," a product that butchers and others apparently use to bind different cuts of meat together. You can find meat glue in some processed meat products, and (perhaps) in some seemingly whole cuts of meat.

Technically, meat glue is made with an enzyme that, in its pure form, does not contain gluten. However, the enzyme is called transglutaminase ... and this is almost certainly where the confusion surrounding meat glue and its safety comes in.

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I got an email the other day from a reader who questioned whether some of us really are "super-sensitive" and react to trace gluten in some foods, even those foods labeled or certified gluten-free. Many or most of our perceived reactions could be psychosomatic, this writer said.

The reader also questioned whether I was perhaps doing a disservice to the celiac/gluten intolerant community by suggesting that some of us can't tolerate 20 parts per million or even 10 parts per million of gluten. Options are limited enough as it is, the argument went, and I shouldn't make it more difficult for people.

I'm sorry, but I don't agree that providing information on PPMs below 20ppm (the current proposed FDA standard) or even 10ppm (the level to which many manufacturers are testing) is misleading. I hear all the time from readers who are grateful to me for pointing out that their "gluten-free" foods may still contain some gluten and may be causing them symptoms. In many cases, they eliminate those products (usually grain products, but not always)  and finally feel better.

Accusing those of us with very real symptoms from those minute amounts of gluten of being "psychosomatic" doesn't help at all. But unfortunately, the "it's all in your head" theme ("If I don't react to it, then you must be imagining your own reaction") seems fairly prevalent in some parts of the celiac/gluten intolerant world.

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