While most of the United States has Whole Foods Market and/or Trader Joes in their area, for much of the Midwest, this just isn’t the case. Fortunately, much of the Midwest has access to a major grocery chain which is very friendly with the Celiac community. That grocery chain is of course Hy-Vee Foods.
Over the past decade, Hy-Vee has been proactive in their quest to meet their customer’s needs by adding a health food section to their stores, which naturally includes several essential gluten-free packaged items those of us who follow a strict gluten-free diet. This is especially convenient for people who live in small towns that don’t have specialty health food stores.
In addition to the new health foods section, Hy-Vee has also gone through all of the product on their shelves and built a huge list of products which were confirmed to be naturally gluten-free. This list is updated regularly and is available for anyone to download on their website here (scroll to the bottom of the page and click on the PDF link). I didn’t link directly to the list as it changes a few times each year, so I figured it would be better to link directly to the actual source, which can be bookmarked!
If that wasn’t convenient enough, most Hy-Vee stores also staff dietitians which are available to consult with Hy-Vee shoppers. In addition to performing their normal roles, these dietitians will often accept feedback on existing gluten-free products, and in my experience they will also bring in requested products to their stores.






