"Fried" Chicken?

It has been a little while since last I posted. I've been on the road again a bit and will follow up more on the ups and downs of traveling gluten free - will eventually have a whole list of graded locations, but that is another post for another time.

Finally home for a few weeks, last night I put together a great gluten free dinner which was super healthy, relatively inexpensive and delicious.

Corn flake crusted "fried" chicken tenders
Garlic mashed "potatoes"
Spinach and Broccoli Rabe

For the chicken, I'd purchased 1/2 a pound of chicken tenders from the Whole Foods butcher (the AHGSTCMTWF doesn't sell meat products). I rinsed the chicken and dried it, then let it sit wrapped in paper towels to really absorb all of the moisture.

I made a breading from several cups of corn flakes (not the regular grocery store brands - those have malt added which contains gluten), smashed into powder/little tiny pieces, cayenne powder, garlic powder, onion flakes, salt and black pepper.

I beat one egg with a little bit of skim milk for the binder.

Preheated the oven to 400, and prepared cookie sheets by covering them with parchment paper (to catch any drips or crumbs) and put racks on top of those (non stick racks are definitely better for this purpose).

To prepare the chicken, I took each piece, dunked it in the egg/milk mixture, then dredged it through the cornflake mixture (I used a big shallow pan to do this), turning it over and really pressing some of the coating onto the chicken, then placing it on the rack on the baking sheet. I baked it for 15 minutes (the chicken was pretty thin, so baking time may need to be adjusted depending).

My husband pitched in and made dipping sauces - one spicy mustard, one balsamic pesto and one BBQ sauce (the BBQ sauce was from the fridge).

For the "potatoes", I took a head of cauliflower, diced it, boiled it until tender, drained it, then "mashed" it with my immersion blender. I put the mashed cauliflower into a pan on the stove, added milk, butter spray (it works better if you just remove the top and pour some in, instead of spraying and spraying), garlic powder, salt, black pepper, and dried onion flakes. It was still lacking something, so I investigated the refrigerator for ideas. I found several wedges of light Laughing Cow garlic and herb cheese. I cut up two of these and let them melt in and it did exactly what it needed to for flavor.

For the green veggies, I sliced a small shallot and sauteed it in some olive oil. I added the Broccoli Rabe, sauteed for a few min, then added a good amount of spinach (enough to fill the large-ish frying pan) and let it wilt down. Added salt and pepper and it was ready to go.

The result was a super healthy delicious gluten free meal. The chicken came out super crispy and the "breading" adhered well to the meat, so it really was like eating chicken tenders. The cayenne gave it a nice bite, and the cauliflower balanced that out nicely. My husband even went back for seconds, and not just of the chicken but of the mashed "potatoes" that he'd mocked for their health factor while I was cooking.

Definitely a meal to add to the rotation - should have taken pictures because it was a really nice looking meal as well. I just wish I'd made more so I'd have leftovers for lunch!

Gluten free on the go

Was my last post really in May? Wow, this summer has FLOWN by!
I should have titled this blog Gluten Free Girl on the Go. At times, my travel schedule can get pretty hectic with my company being based in NYC, me living in San Francisco and the bulk of my project business being in Washinton, D.C. I also like to travel for fun, and between fun and work, in the next 60 days will find myself in Chicago, Sarasota and Tampa, New York, DC and all over France.
The frequent flyer miles are nice, but I have to say the food can be challenging. At home in my lovely little organic San Francisco bubble, gluten free is as easy as it gets. GF bakery down the street, the AHGSTCMTWF in the neighborhood (see prior posts for this definition), and with the exception of the French restaurants in town, a culinary culture very accustomed to working around food allergies.
Most of New York is workable as well. Roughly 1% of the US population has Celiac, and that doesn't account for the population of intolerant and sensitive folks like myself. Apply that to the 8 million people that inhabit Manhattan, and there's a good sized group of people who won't be eating a bagels for breakfast, pizza for lunch or traditional pasta for dinner. Most restaurants (again, save the French) accommodate, and I can usually find myself a salad or the like around lunchtime and yogurt and fruit around breakfast.
LA is not an issue because no one there actually eats, so most potential pitfalls are automatically eliminated. DC is doable - with all of the intellectuals, food allergies are common. Chicago is a bit tougher, but again, workable as it is a city. I expect Florida will be fine. I won't even get into France for now, given the reaction of the French in this country to my issues with food - will save that for another entry.
Regardless of city, I find the most difficult places are transportation centers. Yesterday, I found myself at Penn Station with an hour to wait before my 7:15 train. "Perfect" I thought, I'll just get a bite to eat. Will all of the options in Penn Station, especially here in the vicinity of the Amtrak gates, this will be easy.
NO.
Quite the opposite actually. As I looked around the circular area surrounding the Amtrak center, I saw the following:
New York Pizza (obviously inedible in my world, sadly)
Hot dogs (the boiled kind, not edible sans bun)
Bagels (not shockingly, they did not carry the gluten free kind)
A counter called "The Bread Basket" (they did have salads, but they looked incredibly wilted and unappetizing)
Aunt Anne's Pretzels (no)
A falafel and shwarma wrap counter (which had a hummus plate! But the only thing that came with it for dipping was pita bread).
KFC (2 things on the menu I could eat - their "grilled" chicken and their potato wedges)
Taco Bell (their crunch tacos are okay from a gluten perspective, but yuck)
Sushi (I may have been hungry but I am not dumb enough to eat sushi purchased underground at Penn Station)
Ice cream (no)
Frozen yogurt
Deli (sandwiches only).
Cupcakes (no)
I made several laps around this area to make sure. Finally, against my better judgment I settled on KFC grilled chicken and frozen yogurt. I threw out most of the genetically altered bird and focused on the yogurt.
Airports are a little bit better, though not much. The best is the new T2 at SFO, but that terminal is brand new and a complete anomoly, so it does not count. My safest bet is always a salad. Perry's in the Delta terminal at SFO has a decent spinach salad, and Balducci's at JFK has some options. National in DC flat out fails in this category, the only thing I can eat there is McDonald's french fries. Dulles is a little bit better having a Chipoltle.
Luckily when I travel for work, I'm usually so busy that I have no time to eat.
The moral of the story? I've learned that when I can, I bring something with me. And, I've prematurely become an old lady in that I always now carry Kind bars and packages of cashews in my luggage. Better that than Penn Station sushi!

I know I promised you pizza, but...

...first there are a few other things I need to throw in there.
I also know it has been quite awhile since last I posted, and for that I apologize. Blame it on a heavy travel schedule and a crowded social calendar - the combination does not leave much time for creative cooking.
An update in the world of baked mac and cheese - I made this again last week with brown rice pasta (I prefer quinoa pasta but did not have enough to make it with in the cupboard). I also did not have any butter so, substituted olive oil while making the roux as the base for the sauce, and used Bob's Red Mill all purpose GF flour instead of the rice flour I used last time. I went with the original ratio of 1:1 for fat to flour, and forgetting how differently GF flours react, used WAY too much flour (but only 3 tablespoons really). The flour/oil mixture behaved somewhat as it should have (aside from when I stirred too aggressively and ended up with a few boiling drops on my forearm - OWIE - that will leave a scar!) until I added the milk. It literally grew to 4x its should have been size into a sort of gluteny (ironic right?) porridge. I had to add almost half a container of milk, and still ended up dumping half of it out because it kept trying to eat my spoon. A word of advice for the future: MODERATION! Add the flour slowly!!! And wear long sleeves.
Now, back to GF pizza as promised. Over the last few months, GF pizza has been a regular on the menu in my house. We've tried ordering it once or twice from the few places in town that will deliver a GF pie, and although the delivery stuff is good, it is expensive ($25+ for a 12 inch).
We usually make it once a week, and have found that it is a great way to (1) use up the leftover veggies from my every 3 weeks farm produce delivery and (2) to keep my husband happy. I've not yet tried making my own dough (like I said, I've been BUSY), but have sampled a number of pre-made frozen crusts from both Whole Foods and the AHGSTCMTWF (see prior posts for explanation of this one). My husband may differ in opinion, but my new favorite is Conte's, which Whole Foods began carrying recently. The crust is thin, somewhat light (it looks aerated) and doesn't taste too powdery (a flaw of several other of the crust brands). Most pre-made crusts come frozen in 2-packs.
Husband and I agreed that last week's iteration was likely the best thus far. We made one veggie and one meat pizza.
For the veggie, I started by slicing up 2 small zucchinis (farm produce delivery), some frozen artichoke hearts, a couple of mushrooms, shallots, black olives and tomatoes. Everything but the tomatoes and the olives got sauteed in some olive oil for a few minutes - the shallots and the zucchini went in first to get a bit caramelized, followed by the mushrooms and the artichoke hearts. I brushed the crust with pesto sauce (store bought - will try making my own next time with the basil plant that is slowly dying from my influence on my patio), then covered with grated mozzarella, the sauteed veggies, the olive and the diced tomatoes. I topped that with some shaved Parmesan.
For the meat pizza, we had some chicken sausage (I think from Trader Joe's) in the freezer, which we sliced very thinly and popped in a frying pan with a little bit of olive oil and some slice onion. We used red sauce (this one from the AHGSTCMTWF), topped with grated mozzarella, then sausage, onions and olives.
We baked both as the crust directions instructed (I think at 400 or 425) for about 15 minutes. I like to turn on the broiler for the last couple of minutes for super crispy pizza. Topped both with some chiffonaded basil and crushed red pepper, and added a couple of drops of arbequina olive oil to the veggie pizza.
Both were absolutely delish, both as dinner that night and as leftovers, and a super easy meal. We make it a habit now to keep frozen crust and mozzarella in the house, as the rest is pretty easy no matter what else is available.
So now you have pizza!
I'm back on a cooking kick, so more GF yumminess to come soon!

Brown Rice Couscous, tamales and possibly the best salad EVER!

Two days, two new GF meals to add to the list: 1. Grilled shrimp and veggie skewers with Mediterranean brown rice couscous 2. Tamales with Mexican Salad Both pretty easy, and fairly quick. Both also fab when the weather decides to be nice here in San Francisco (which is not all too often despite it being a part of "Sunny" California). The weather WAS nice last week, so we decided it was grillin' time. Having a big event upcoming, the menu had to be healthy. I had some shrimp in the freezer (flash frozen, not cooked, tails on) that I cleaned and made a marinade for out of olive oil, Dijon, Worcestershire, agave, garlic, onion, red wine vinegar and cayenne powder. I skewered the shrimp, put them in Tupperware, and poured the sauce over. Then I skewered some zucchini, yellow pepper, onion, mushroom and cherry tomatoes (on separate skewers - veggies and fish cook at different rates so you cannot skewer them together) and threw those in the Tupperware with the shrimps. Threw the whole thing in the fridge for awhile until it was ready to grill. For a side, I'd gotten a box of brown rice couscous (which is really just chopped up rice and no couscous, so totally fine for the gluten-phobes of the world like myself). I decided to do it a little bit Mediterranean style, so I chopped some almonds, toasted those with some olive oil, threw in some golden raisins and let them brown up a bit. For the couscous, I got the boiling water ready, added some cumin, chili oil, garlic powder and onion flakes. Unfortunately, I completely misread the instructions and thought it should cook like regular couscous where you boil the water, toss in the couscous, stir, cover, take off the heat and 5 min later you have couscous. Not so much with the brown rice. After a generous 5 min of sitting, during which I thought it was doing its thing, I realized that there was an extra step of boiling the whole mixture for an extra 10-15 min and THEN letting it sit. So, I had to improvise a bit, and it got a little bit overcooked (when I reboiled after letting it sit and then had to let it sit again), but it covered the basics. When it was done, I threw in some goat cheese and stirred int he almonds and the raisins. The flavor was spectacular, but the couscous itself was a little dry. Could have used some following of instructions and maybe a little bit of olive oil :) My husband took care of the grilling, and even though I threw off the schedule a bit with the "need to boil" delay, the food was good. We'll make this meal again but will coordinate the timing better. Higher heat for the shrimp and the veggies, more time for the veggies so they get nice and charred. This could have been a truly spectacular meal, but at least with some nice wine, it was a good one! Tamales and Mexican salad was a kind of cheat meal. I pre-bought the tamales at the Arrogant Hippie Grocery That Charges More Than Whole Foods - vegetarian tamales (locally made) with zucchini, tomato and corn. I decided to steam them rather than microwave. When they were done in the steamer, I topped each with some green salsa and some grated pepper jack and put in the microwave for less than 30 seconds just to melt the cheese. For the salad, I combined romaine with a bunch of cilantro for the greens. Added pinto beans, scallions, some crushed up blue corn tortilla chips (just a few for crunch), tomato (chopped), black olives. For dressing, I took some olive oil, a bit of dijon, a good amount of habanero hot sauce, some red wine vinegar and a few spoonfuls of Greek yogurt and whisked that all together. I feel like I may have added some garlic or some salt as well, but can't be sure. In any event, I seasoned it to tasted and then tossed it with the salad. All in all, super yummy and a totally fancy version of a lazy dinner. Will definitely make again!!! Next post: PIZZA!!!!

Chinese Food!

Chinese food presents an interesting problem in my gluten free world: Soy Sauce. Yep, most soy sauce is made from 40-60% wheat. Tamari, a soy sauce made from 100% soy beans, is a great alternative, but I've yet to find a restaurant that uses it in cooking, and the majority don't even carry it for dipping (this applies more to Japanese/Sushi spots). While I've yet to find a dining out solution for Chinese food, I've managed to make some very nice and MSG free dishes at home. Example - last night's dinner: Chicken with chinese eggplant, cabbage, baby bok choy and pea shoots. YUM!!! I've been making stir fry forever. Usually I buy the bag of prechopped stir fry veggies at Trader Joe's, make a sauce, add some chicken or shrimp, serve over brown rice and call it a day. My husband appreciates that I accompany the dish with egg rolls (great quasi healthy ones are available in the freezer section at TJ's). Last night I went in a slightly different direction, inspired by a trip to the Rainbow Co-op, or as I refer to it, the arrogant hippie grocery store that costs more than Whole Foods. I had some chicken at home (the hippie shop does not sell any meat products), as well as some frozen TJ's brown rice (so easy, cooks in 3 min and tastes exactly like it was cooked in a pot, with no dish to clean). In the hippie store produce section, I picked up 2 mini purple cabbages, 2 baby bok choy, 3 chinese eggplant, some crimini mushrooms, an onion and some peashoots. At home, I made a sauce from Tamari, the juice from 2 small oranges (one may have been a large tangerine), some agave syrup, dried onion flakes, garlic powder, chili garlic sauce (from the Chinese section of the grocery store) and Sriacha. I also added some cornstarch as a thickener (so much easier if you mix cornstarch and water in a separate container first into a slurry and add that to the sauce). I'd also on a prior trip to Whole Foods picked up some Asian Stir Fry oil, so I heated that in the pan until hot (on Medium High) . Added the chicken breast (just used one - trimmed and diced), cooked for a few min. Added the onion, mushrooms (sliced) and eggplant (sliced). Let those cook at a high heat for a few minutes until the eggplant and mushrooms were browned. Added the sliced/diced bok choy and cabbage, cooked for about 2 min, then added the sauce. Stirred everything together, then covered, and cooked on high for a few min (maybe 5, maybe 10 - just until it looked right). Once it was all done, I added some frozen edamame (out of the shells), stirred that to warm it, then added the pea shoots and stirred it around until they wilted a little bit. Served it over the TJ's brown rice, with one eggroll for my husband. It was great! The cabbage got almost carmelized and the flavor was excellent! A good amount of spice (we like heat, so if you don't, just don't add too much chili or Sriacha). I'm not going to lie, I was a little bit jealous of the eggroll, but was so full and satiated by the meal itself that by the end, I did not mind one bit :) I just ate the leftovers for lunch - they were FAB!!! Healthy gluten free delicious MSG free Chinese? Check!

Once again a lover of the Mariposa Bakery

Mariposa is back on my good side I didn’t follow up with this story last month, so here’s the background. On Feb 13 I called Mariposa Bakery in the Ferry Building to reserve some gluten free gnocchi for Valentine’s Day. My plan was to make my way through the Ferry Building constructing a delicious and romantic meal, centered around the gnocchi. Originally I’d considered making my own, but as I’ve written in prior posts, I hear it is quite difficult and time consuming. Also on Feb 13, I managed to do something to my back that caused a major muscle spasm, which rendered me fairly useless at dealing with any sort of adversity on Valentine’s Day. Feb 14 arrived with a big windy ugly rainstorm, expected to last all day. I spent the morning and the lunch hour in client meetings with a colleague. My plan was to leave my last meeting and walk 3 blocks to the Ferry Building, pick up my supplies for the meal, head home and get cooking. The rain provided a small obstacle, but would not have been insurmountable had it not been for the back injury. I could barely walk, and I was in PAIN. Every step was agony. It didn’t help that I was carrying my work bag that contained my brick of a laptop, and I gave up on my umbrella after about half a block in the wind. I’d managed to get a last minute appointment with my doctor for mid afternoon. If I timed it right, I could get what I needed foodwise, walk to the doctor and be completely on schedule. Fate had other plans. I hobbled my way to the Mariposa Bakery, announced that I was there to pick up my reserve gnocchi and was met with a very confused look and a “what gnocchi? We don’t have any gnocchi today.” Um…… On a normal day, like I said, I could have dealt with this. But, with the rain and the back pain I just couldn’t. I tried to hold back my tears, but I didn’t do a very good job. I explained to them that I’d called, that there was supposed to be some reserved, and that I was new to my gluten free lifestyle and cooking dinner for my husband and that I didn’t have time to make the gnocchi myself and AGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. The woman who worked there was really nice. She called the headquarters. They apologized. They agreed to give me a $25 gift certificate. While that was processing, I regained some of my composure and told them I was going in search of an alternate meal and would be back. I got some sage, thinking of the butternut squash I had at home in my fridge. Then I looked at my watch. I had 3 minutes to get to my doctor’s appointment. I called the doctor and they had no more appointments for the day. Not one. Couldn’t squeeze me in. I begged. I pleaded. And I lost it. Called my husband crying. All for a missing bag of gnocchi. Now, I got into to the doctor’s office that afternoon, cooked an awesome meal and all was well in the long run. Why this explanation? Because I’d avoided Mariposa ever since, as they’d let me down. Yesterday we were out of bread, and I didn’t have the car so couldn’t go to the grocery store. Mariposa was the only option. Their bread is the best GF bread I’ve had hands down. Even better? They had fresh butternut squash ravioli. The price for one bag of pasta and one loaf of bread? $20.00. Worth it? Yes. I made croutons with the bread (they were DELISH) for a ceasar salad, with Tyler Florence’s dressing (yum!), and made the ravs with some sautéed mushrooms and onions (well done) and some crispy sage. Finished it off by putting the ravs in the pan with the mushrooms and onions and some Arbequina olive oil to brown their outsides a bit. It was a great meal in all of its carby - deliciousness!!!

Bread Pudding

There are several foods that I am willing to endure the pain of gluten for, or at least that I think I will be open to doing so, given the early term of my gluten free life:
1. Gnocchi
2. Croutons
3. Bread Pudding (preferably from Alfred's)

While I've found 2 acceptable substitute for croutons (one purchased, one home made), I was really thinking that the other two might be lost causes. I've yet to see a viable solution for gnocchi. There are recipes out there, but per reviews, apparently more than 50% end in the "gnocchi" dissolving in the boiling water. Mariposa bakery in the ferry building apparently has it from time to time, but after Valentine's Day, when I called ahead and they promised to have it there for me to pick up, and then they did not, my faith level for them is not super high.

Occasionally, things go your way. I was invited to a birthday party where the theme was Southern Comfort food this weekend. The gracious hostess was planning to prepare Mac & Cheese, Fried Chicken, Sloppy Joes and Red Velvet Cupcakes. While I knew I could get through dinner by eating Sloppy Joe's sans bread, dessert was going to be an issue.

Brainstorming Southern food, and with the help of the internet, I decided to try to find a recipe for bread pudding, preferably involving Bourbon. As luck would have it, I came upon this link: http://glutenfreecooking.about.com/od/dessertsandsweets/r/gfbreadpudding.htm which provided a recipe for GF bread pudding with apples and raisins, and a bourbon sauce. Jackpot.

The recipe even gave guidance for using Udi's bread instead of homemade GF bread. I'm a big Udi's fan and always have it in the fridge. I subbed 85% chocolate for the apples and raisins, breaking up a bar of Scharfenberger as the last step, stirring it in and adding a few semisweet chips after I'd poured the mixture into the baking pan.

The bread pudding came out nicely, but the hit was the sauce - 1/2 cup of cream, 1/2 cup of brown sugar, 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla and 2 tablespoons of Woodford Reserve. Heat the cream, add the sugar, boil, remove from heat immediately, stir in the vanilla and the bourbon, and you've got vanilla bourbon caramelly deliciousness.

Dessert was served to a crowd that were on average 3 drinks in, and received incredibly well. No one could believe it was gluten free. Not exactly health food, but a great option for holidays!

Now if I can only solve the gnocchi issue...

Here's the full recipe:

Preheat oven to 325. Butter a baking dish (I used a standard glass pie pan).
Ingredients:
1 12oz loaf of Udi's bread
2 cups of heavy cream
1/2 cup of sugar
3 eggs
1.5 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon(ish) of bourbon
2 tablespoons melted butter
1 large bar of dark chocolate, broken up into a lot of pieces.
A handful of semisweet chips, or more dark chocolate of your choice.
Cut up the bread into cubes - I made 9 cubes out of each slice. I hear stale bread works better, but mine was from a sealed loaf and right out of the fridge.
Put the cut up bread into a large bowl.
Heat the cream in a saucepan on medium heat. Add the sugar and stir it until it melts.
Pour the cream/sugar mixture over the bread. Stir a little bit to coat (not too much or the bread will fall apart).
Let the bread/cream mixture cool.
Beat the eggs lightly. Add the cinnamon, vanilla and bourbon. Beat until mixed, but don't overbeat the eggs.
Pour the egg mixture over the bread. Fold in gently (again, not too much or the bread will turn to mush).
Pour the melted butter over the mixture. Fold in gently.
Pour the mixture into the baking pan. Pat it down (don't squeeze too hard). Make sure the chocolate is distributed equally(ish) and add more as you see fit.
Bake at 325 for 45 minutes.
Serve warm with bourbon sauce.
Go to the gym for the next 7 days :)

The weekend & Valentine's Menu

First - serious hats off to the American Grilled Cheese Kitchen for HAVING GLUTEN FREE BREAD!!!! I thought this was a place I'd never get to try because, well, their menu consists of grilled cheese sandwiches. But they have house made gluten free bread! And it was good! As good as the sourdough that my husband had his on? Probably not. But I'll take it!!!
Tried the squid ink risotto at La Briciola on Friday night - I think it may have some flour in it. Or else I ate something that made my stomach a little bit upset.
Saturday we opted to cook a beautiful meal at home - pork shoulder (or leg, we can't remember), roasted fingerling potatoes and sauteed brocolini with red pepper flakes, shallots and lemon juice. We had a great Croatian cheese and pickled veggies to start. Dry riesling (Alsacian) to start and Ripasso with dinner. For dessert? Mexican chocolate with salted peanuts ice cream from Bi-Rite and Salt Caramels from Recuitti. Delish! The leftovers were great as hash this morning as well with a piece of Udi's gf toast and a poached egg. Yum.
So, on to Valentines. I am cooking, and looking forward to a yummy meal.
I found a recipe on TTSF for a french onion soup, sans soup (more like a french onion fondue). That will be the app, and I'm checking out the Mariposa bakery to pickc up something to dip into it.
Main course will be gf gnocchi - I was originally thinking of making this from scratch, but time constraints and my lack of a food scale were making it a little bit of a reach. Luckily, Mariposa also claims to have gnocchi in their refrigerated section, so I'll be picking some of that up tomorrow as well. Planning on hitting up the fishmonger to get some scallops, or mussels, or whatever looks good. Next stop will be the farm produce shop, and then the last stop will likely be Recuitti.
Recap to follow!

First Post

My favorite food is Bread. Doesn't really matter what kind, though there are many that I love more than others, with rare exception (rye, yeck), I love it all - sourdough, ciabatta, focaccia, wheat, french, baguettes (!), bagels, cornbread. I love all of Bread's cousins too - pasta, gnocchi, pizza, cake, cupcakes, croissants. Oh my.
As with all relationships, there began to be some disagreements. Somewhere around college, I started to notice that my stomach hurt. A lot. Sometimes more than others. Looking back it was not exactly coincidental that my diet consisted largely of pizza and bread, but who knew then?
About 6 or so years ago, I saw my doctor in Boston about this recurring (and near constant) stomach/abdominal pain. I was referred to a specialist. They did a lot of tests. Test results? No issues. No gluten allergy. Maybe a sensitivity to gluten. Likely IBS, but they couldn't be sure. They put me on a medication which the FDA has since pulled from the market for giving people heart attacks.
My love of bread and all of its associates continued to overshadow this pain until this year. I'd learned to avoid the white bread, because that caused more pain than the whole grain stuff, but all the same, it was an unsolved problem. Certain meals caused agony.
A good friend of mine came to visit around the holidays and let me know she'd been gluten free for 5 weeks and felt amazing. Why not give it a try, I thought? Eliminate gluten from my diet for a week or two and see how I felt. How hard could it be?
The first week was easy. No bread, no problem!!! I had brown rice pasta in the pantry that I'd been putting off cooking for about 2 years - no time like the present to try that out. And it was good! Who knew? I'd been eating smoothies for breakfast anyway, so that was an easy meal to start my new gluten free days. Lunch meant salad, and I'd stopped keeping croutons in the house long ago to control my borderline addiction to their yumminess, so not a big deal.
Dinners proved to be a bit more challenging.
Day 1 - fish tacos - easy!
Day 2 - Beet salad, shared fries and red wine while out with friends - easy!
Day 3 - Indian food, sans naan - good to go.
Day 4 - Enchilada casserole - yum!
I don't remember my exact meals for the ensuing days, but for the most part, it wasn't too bad. I could still eat all kinds of good food! And because I was not eating bread, I found that I didn't feel so guilty about tortilla chips and french fries and chips - foods I'd avoided for years! What a revolution.
The weekend came and with it some cons. I went out for drinks and apps with friends. Ordered a cocktail, and the group ordered some apps. The tough part - most good apps have bread in them. So my friends ate apps. I ordered another cocktail. On an empty stomach. Normally in these situations, I'd switch to beer to slow down the intoxication process. Beer has gluten in it. That night ended early.
Next con - I travel a lot for work. Now, I've never had an easy time with airport food anyway, but the elimination of bread made it WAY harder. No more standard veggie quesadilla order from Perrys in the Delta terminal at SFO. No more Thai dumplings from Balducci's in Terminal 2 at JFK. I found myself eating a lot more of the peanuts they pass out on planes - thank God I don't fly the airlines where they stick to pretzels!
Quick lunch in NYC proved to be the next hurdle. There are sandwiches everywhere. Soup comes with bread or crackers. Salads come with bread or pita or (gulp) croutons. Dessert options are typically cookies or brownies. And who wants fruit when its 10 degrees out? The first couple of days were tough, but by the end of last week I was getting very frustrated. Needless to say I was happy to get back home to CA.
It is not going to be an easy road. Some restaurants are awesome and will go out of their way to make your meal gluten free great. Some don't get it - like the Chinese place on 39th I went to last week - so despite my careful ordering, I was in PAIN for 2 days afterwards. Some are honest - like the Cafe on Geary in SF I tried yesterday that told me they had nothing on their menu that I could consume safely.
People have asked me - is this a forever thing? Or just something I'm doing for now? My answer is it is a forever thing for now - I may cheat from time to time. I'll see how I feel when I do. I suspect I'll feel awful and go back to my gluten free zone, but who knows. For now, wheat and I are not speaking.
Here's the bottom line - I do feel better with the gluten out of my system. I'm learning where it hides in food and what to avoid. I have more energy because I'm not in pain. My skin looks better. All good things. And I'm learning to cook with these gluten free ingredients, which is kind of fun. My husband is being incredibly patient - his payoff is I'm happier and not miserable after eating. He even really likes the GF pizzas we've made at home, and loved the quinoa mac and cheese I made last night for dinner. So onward we go. To be continued...