No big surprise, but it's tough to have a gf vegetarian meal in the French Quarter. We did find a place that had a rice and tamato sauce thing right on the menu, and one night we had the classic, time-honored French Quarter tradition of having sushi (soy sauce-free, for me.) I enjoyed beignets olfactorily and avoided getting a snootful of powdered sugar. And i came home with a touristy kit to make red beans and rice, so I have a little bit of that NOLA flavor yet to sample.
In reading another book, I learned that most of the diseases related to celiac decrease in likelihood of occurance after five years on a gf diet. All, really, except for cancer. Yikes! My chances of getting non-hodgkins lymphoma are 70 times higher than that of the non-celiac population. It stays bad even on a gf diet. I hate the thought of living such a health-conscious life and I might have to deal with cancer anyway. Or maybe my health conscious life will keep me from developing it. That's what I'll go with.
Last Saturday we had the extreme fortune of being able to hang out with my distant cousin Sara, who is also a great friend. She brought me a very tasty gluten-free cookie from cookiesforme.com and brought me some TVP because she read my blog post about my family having faux meatballs with their spaghetti and me having unadorned red sauce, which was good, but I had faux meatball envy. I knew about TVP, but in my readings about celiac had come to believe that TVP was glutenous by definition. Lo and behold, I should have realized Bob's Red Mill would have a gluten-free TVP. Yay, Sara!
Then we all went to lunch at Olive Garden. I had read on-line that they have a gluten-free menu, and was curious to try and see what my experience would be. I'm pleased to report that while the vegetarian gluten-free pasta offering wasn't thrilling it was a) vegetarian, b) gluten-free, and c) not-cheesy. I had salad and requested no croutons and dressing on the side, thinking that they'd bring me my own little salad. Instead, they served the table salad with croutons and dressing on the side. Sara noted (and I agree) that OG tends to use too much dressing on their salads anyway, so it suited her just fine. In Sara's honor, I added TVP to the lentil, kale and veggie soup I made that evening. It was delish! Thanks for caring and being a loyal reader, Sara! New respect for people who can write an interesting blog every day.
Jenn and I ventured out to Pei Wei last weekend. They advertise a GF menu. We called in advance and asked if a gluten-free vegetarian would have an easy time finding a good dinner, and were assured that it would be fine. We arrived, and the only item on their gf menu that was also vegetarian was the edamame, if prepared in water, not broth. I started to make a little bit of a scene, which prompted the young man at the register to run for help. In the end we learned that their tofu isn't gluten-free, which pretty much meant I would need to stick to rice and veggies. In the end, I ordered brown rice with steamed red peppers, broccoli, and onions and got some packets of gf tamarind sauce to top it with. It was tasty if not thrilling, and REALLY cheap -- $.50 for the rice and $2.50 for the veggies. Jenn noted that we could splurge next time and I could order a FOURTH vegetable. Crazy, I know. Oh, and we split the edamame. |
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