Restaurants We Love

This is where we eat, and how.  This is by no means an all-inclusive list of the restaurants and food purveyors in West Palm Beach that cater to celiacs, but these are merely the places we have found that work for us.  So far.

* Paris Bakery and Cafe (Olive, between Evernia and Datura):  I always order the Notre Dame salad because it is both GF and CF (casein free secondary to milk allergy)  The tarragon dressing is made in house, GF and fantastic. NO BREAD - if you are dining in, the silverware will come inside the bread basket.  Ask for your silverware to be brought to you separately.  Avoid soups and wraps obviously, but the eggs (scrambled or omelets) are prepared in a skillet rather than a flat top grill, which should be avoided at all costs. The bacon is pretty sweet, as well.

* Nature's Way Cafe:  I only order the curry chicken salad with balsamic vinaigrette dressing, with no adverse effects.  I have yet to branch out.

* Joy Noodle:  There is a GF menu, and they seem to have a handle on things.  I think I had grilled chicken and a bean thread-type noodle.  It was good, not great.

* The Breakers Hotel - The Italian Restaurant, Ocean Grill, Seafood Bar, Flagler Steakhouse, Ecco - tell them you have a "gluten allergy," and they will take care of you.  That being said, pay attention to what comes out of the kitchen.  If you are suspicious about something (e.g., breadcrumb on your child's hot dog) bring it to their attention, and it will be remade.  If you order french fries or even corn chips (chips & guacamole), ask for FRESH OIL so they won't be cross contaminated from the fryer.

* Rocco's Tacos:  Well, here's the story with their corn chips.  They are prepared in the morning in a fryer that will later be used for a variety of items that will contain gluten.  The fryers are allegedly drained and cleaned each night.  I know that the chances that some cross contamination will occur, but it has not affected us.  We are both very sensitive to contamination, and I do believe that our lab results speak for themselves in this case.

* Chick Fil-A: grilled nuggets are okay, as are fries, hash browns, scrambled eggs, and sausage.  Ask the person taking your order to "RED FLAG" your food for "Wheat allergies."  As stated before, mistakes do happen, so be sure to inspect your food.  I have only had one transgression take place with them, but I don't think I ingested anything harmful.

*Duffy's Sports Grill (Clematis and Olive):  There is a GF menu, and it's not bad.  Most of the wait staff is pretty young, so if you don't feel that they grasp what you really require from them, don't be afraid to bring the manager into the fray.  In my experience, they have gone above and beyond what I expected of them to be sure that we could eat safely in their restaurant.

*Chipotle:  First of all, try to go during a non-peak time, if that actually exists.  Inform the first person on the line that you are CELIAC and GLUTEN FREE, and ask them to change their gloves.  This person should be the only person to touch your food, and they will walk you all the way down.  It makes no sense for the first person to change their gloves and put your salad in the bowl if they next person who has been touching tortillas all day puts their thumbs right into your bowl.  Avoid the green tomatillo salsa, as it has not been listed on their website as GF.  And while I'm on the subject, the Chipotle in Boynton Beach on Gateway & Congress is absolutely superb in their snappy and competent response to my request for the glove change.  They are impressive, to say the least.

* Joey's Gluten Free Bakery:  Found at the West Palm Beach Green Market and now in her very own store, Miss Joey has the most fantastic selection of cookies, breads, and muffins!  We have unfortunately been unable to patronize her new dedicated store (on Woolbright in Boynton Beach), but it is on our list.  She will even take special orders for cakes, pies, and other heavenly items!!  

I am sure there are more, but I just haven't found them yet.  Again, this is a very limited list of places where we have enjoyed safe dining experiences.

Cheers!

Farewell 2013

I talk about our journey with celiac disease to a lot of people.  I mean a whole lot of people.  I do this not to call attention to myself and my high maintenance diet, but to spark awareness.

There is a whole slew of people who "try" to eat GF,  (not an inappropriate use of quotation marks.)  These well meaning people are merely attempting to eliminate gluten from their diet (maybe that's the flag they should wave), but they actually make it much more unsafe for us to eat out.  They don't really care whether or not their scrambled eggs were prepared on a shared surface... they just order eggs, sans toast.  They are perfectly willing to let a dash of soy sauce slide in their vegan spring roll, or excuse a dash of malt in the CORN flakes. (Ahem, Rachel Ray... you are irresponsible and downright dangerous. Jimmy Kimmel, I hope that your children never have to avoid "imaginary" gluten that -- what was that?  Doesn't even exist?)

Me, however?  If I were to lax my standards for one second and allow one of the above-listed grievances to be ingested, the inside of my mouth would seem as though I ate large shards of glass for lunch whilst shedding HANDS FULL of hair.  But never mind me, who cares about me... my son would be violently ill, and who can tolerate even one moment of their child in pain?

For the past two years, we have navigated the murky waters of a gluten free lifestyle, as it is much more than just a diet.  This truly involves the support of family, friends and even a community in order to resemble the smashing success that we have experienced.

As of November, 2013, our bloodwork results are as follows:  Tissue Transglutaminase level 4.  At diagnosis we were 100+, and a normal, non-celiac individual would be anything under 4.  NCS and I are both exactly a 4.0.  I think that this means that our unrelenting GF standards work.

We only eat in a few restaurants, and we have educated the bejeezus out of many a restaurant manager/owner/waitstaff.  We have illuminated the dangers of cross contamination for countless friends, family, and unsuspecting acquaintances.  We have probably been subject to many an eye roll or criticism, but we are healthy.  If I can protect my child from the looming possibility of gastrointestinal lymphoma, intestinal cancer, peripheral neuropathy, and who knows what else, then I consider our journey thus far a success.

GF Cupcake Trick

My son is going into first grade, and he is still of the age when cupcakes are really the coolest thing ever.  Well, I guess half the world is still "of that age," when you get right down to it.  Cupcakes have gotten much more fancy and dare I say, even sexy, over the past few years.  Although we can't just pop into our local cupcake boutique, we can still make them at home.  I should be able to post for you my homemade fancy (even sexy) cupcake recipe, but I'm really not that brave as of yet.  Instead, I buy the box cake mix.  Betty Crocker, the angel that she is, now makes a GF cake mix, and I buy the yellow cake variety.

Anytime there is a bake sale, class party, or family dinner thing at my son's school, I make sure to send a big box of GF cupcakes, just so he won't feel left out.  I was actually complimented by a friend on my tasty cupcakes, when she accidentally ate a GF one, so I guess they're pretty good.  However, I thought that they were just okay.  I think that the cupcakes taste a little too strongly of vanilla, and I think the texture is a little dense.  So I started tweaking the box recipe a little, and this is what works for us.

The box recipe calls for 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract.  I only use one (1) teaspoon instead of two.  The box recipe calls for 2/3 of a cup of water.  I use 1/3 cup water, and 1/3 cup orange juice.  I also add just shy of one tablespoon of baking POWDER.  Any more than that is too much.  The only other thing that I might do in the future is possibly add a little orange zest, if I happen to have an orange around that day.

Little kids seem to have cupcake parties every time you turn around.  I got caught unprepared once last year, when there was a surprise birthday party in my son's kindergarten class, and I vowed that it wouldn't happen again.  Now we have a freezer full of these little gems.  And as a bonus, I picked up a travel cupcake container (plastic) at BB&B, so I can put it in his lunchbox and not worry that it will get smashed.  Or thrown.  Or slung around.

Best Pancakes Ever

So my son loves pancakes.  He does.  I can count on one hand the number of times he has NOT eaten them for breakfast.  I spent hours and hours perfecting the batter in our pre-celiac days, and they were lovely, they really were.

The day we were forced to dive into the GF world, head first, I of course bought him every kind of GF pancakes and waffles that Whole Foods carried.  Well, he hated them.  Every last one of them.  Some tasted like sweetened sheet rock, others had no real taste, yet resembled some type of spongy plastic.  Breakfast became quite a challenge for us.

Thankfully, I had discovered a flour blend that is used cup-for-cup in recipes, just like regular flour.  It's a rice flour/tapioca flour/potato starch blend that I'm sure I could blend myself for a whole lot less money, but I'm really not in the mood.  I know that people buy prepackaged pancake mixes and such, but I prefer not to.

So for those of you who would like it, here is my kickass pancake recipe:

3 large eggs (I prefer farm-fresh.)
1 large spoonful (about 1/4 cup) of yogurt or sour cream (I use dairy-free sour cream.)
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp salt
1 Tbsp sugar
3-4 generous shakes of cinnamon
1/2 c. oil (canola, coconut... your choice)
4 teaspoons of baking POWDER

Get all of that in a big bowl, and whisk it.  Whisk it up.

Now here comes the tricky part..
2 cups of flour (I use Tom Sawyer GF Flour blend.)
1 1/3 cup of milk (I use rice milk.)
4 or so tablespoons of ground flax seed
*optional:  1/4 cup of shredded coconut

Whisk again, and let it sit for a couple of minutes.

In the meantime, I have a ceramic skillet (nonstick-ish), sprayed with canola oil heating up on just-hotter-than-low (#3).  Pour or ladle out the pancakes (my son prefers minis), and flip when bubbles form.

The best thing about this batter is its longevity.  I make it on Sunday or Monday, pour it into a cupcake pen, (BB&B, you're welcome.) and it lasts in the fridge all week.

If you're really feeling frisky, you can add any fruit to this... mashed bananas, pumpkin, blueberries, go crazy!

Enjoy,
Whip

God Bless Chick-Fil-A

So, for one or two of you who may not be aware of its existence, Chick-Fil-A is a fast food chicken restaurant, and they serve damn good chicken -- fried especially, but also grilled. They have a few items that qualify as gluten free, but most importantly, they have a condiment known as Polynesian Sauce. In our house, it is referred to as Palls-en-esian Sauce, and if you drizzled it on an old shoe, I would go all-in that my son would eat at least half of it. Best of all, all of the sauces at Chick-Fil-A are gluten free, (per both their website and the ingredient labels).

Nutritionally speaking, I am not a fan of sweet (more like a sweet and sour) sauces, especially for kids, but this is almost the ONLY way I can get my son to eat meat. (What preceded my son's celiac diagnosis was a few years of what can only be described as feeding hell, due to some sensory issues. Several studies have alluded to the reduction of oral sensory dysfunctions in celiac children once on a GF diet, and I would definitely say that his aversions have gotten much better over the last five months.)

The aforementioned condiment elixir is provided whenever you purchase chicken items, but since most of their food is now off limits to us, we still acquire sauce packets. Here's how you do it, if you're lucky enough to live near (or even not so near) a CFA: Eight ounce containers of this sauce are sold via their catering menu, and you can buy them. The one ounce containers are not typically sold, but you can ask them to sell you eight of the one ounce packs for the same price as the 8 oz. bowl (something like $1.79). I used to swing by every couple of months and buy about 32 or so of the packs, and then I was stocked for dinners, lunches (lunchbox), one or two for the car, in case we decided to have dinner with friends, etc.

In addition, the grilled chicken breasts are GF, and they now have grilled chicken nuggets!! French fries, hashbrowns, and non-biscuit breakfast items are also listed as GF on their website, though they don't guarantee that all food prep areas are safe. But here's what you can do: ask the person taking your order to "RED FLAG" your food for wheat allergies (easier for most people to process if you tell them you have a serious allergy). Tell them to specifically red flag your food for wheat cross contamination, and ask them to have the person touching your food to change their gloves before handling it. Each and every time I have made this request, the person taking my order or the manager immediately walks back to the kitchen, personally ensures that the gloves are changed, and my food is placed immediately into a container that is then sealed. (Additional Mommy tip: if you order a kid's meal, you can surrender the "toy," which is usually now a book or a game, for ice cream. If you're eating GF, just make sure they put the ice cream (vanilla) in a cup, never a cone.)

To most people, this may not sound like much. But I can tell you that the care and attention that these wonderful people take when making sure that I or my son can eat some french fries has almost brought me to tears on several occasions. We have eaten in highly acclaimed restaurants where the chef meets with us before ordering for a culinary consultation and then personally goes back practically into a bubble to cook for us, only to have an "operations error" where the expediter accidentally brings us the wrong food. Um, this sucks, and it makes me much less trusting when it comes to "eating out," if that's even how you can refer to my transactions at Chick Fil A.

**Note: sometimes, if inside the restaurant, my son likes to play in the indoor playground, but he MUST ALWAYS wash his hands afterwards, before he eats. The kids that he's playing with have probably just handled chicken nuggets, and they are joyously applying a greasy film of gluten to the slide and gym. Just a heads up.

Best,

Whip

NCS, 5 Months Later

So here we are, in the spring. NCS was diagnosed as celiac in early October, and he went totally and completely GF ten minutes later. The following is just a basic rundown of how we've navigated these waters, in case it could possibly help anyone else.

Quick recap: Total cleansing and purging of almost all food and small kitchen appliances/tools. Check. Full brain immersion in all things GF/celiac, including a thorough education on cross contamination. Check. Crash course education of all friends and family members on cross contamination. Check. Boy healed and growing... Check.

We pretty much live our lives in our home as we did before. Our house is absolutely GF, no flour in the house, and nothing that ever touched flour in the house. I cook just as I did before, but now with a wonderful premixed flour blend that I can substitute for regular flour, cup for cup. Easy. The difficulty comes in when we venture out into the world. We still don't eat out very much (maybe three times in five months), and I'm not so sure that will really resume anytime soon. NCS' school has been nothing short of incredibly supportive throughout this journey, and I can't thank them enough for respecting NCS and protecting his health.

I just calculated NCS' growth in height with my ultra scientific measuring device: marks on the kitchen door frame. It seems that he's grown 1.5 inches since October, and I know that he's gone up two sizes in his clothes and probably three in shoes. This can only mean that he has healed, and his body is now celebrating everything he eats with a burst of growth.

Symptom-wise, he hasn't thrown up since he went GF, and he's only had one or two tummy aches, which could certainly be attributed to almost anything else typically ingested by a five year old. And the "celiac belly," think Save-the-Childrenesque bloated Ethiopian belly... gone.

He understands that he has celiac disease, and it means that he can't have anything with gluten in it. He is absolutely amazing in that he assumes that any new food is contaminated, and he asks me or another reliable source ("Mommy, look this up on your phone.") whether or not he can safely eat it. He has a few backup snacks at home and school that he can indulge in when his friends are toasting each other with cupcakes, and we have a freezer full of GF cupcakes, which I have learned are really just a safe, yet labor intensive delivery device for icing and sprinkles.

This is a short list of his approved snacks:

* Fruit (except unwashed strawberries and unpeeled non-organic apples)

* Lays (unflavored) chips: from Stax (like Pringles, but safe) to baked, which he loves

* Vanilla ice cream (we buy Blue Bell, vanilla only)

* Plain popcorn (we pop the kernels at home, don't trust microwave bags or ingredients)

* Xochil corn chips (he likes the blue ones), and I think Tostitos scoops are safe

* Ore Ida french fries and hash browns (haven't checked out the "extra crispy" varieties)

These are some things that we have learned are NOT SAFE:

* unpeeled conventional (non-organic) apples: wax on the skin may contain gluten

* Pringles

* Mission brand corn chips (processed in a facility that also processes wheat)

* Chocolate ice cream (depends on the brand, read labels carefully)

* Frozen yogurt with any "cookie/cake" flavors (cookies & cream, wedding cake, etc.)

* McDonald's fries: rumored to be safe, but THEY CONTAIN WHEAT (also hash browns)

These are the snacks that we usually have on hand, just in case. Lunchbox wise, he primarily eats cantaloupe, bananas, grapes, and Boar's Head turkey/cheese wraps (use the turkey slices as the outside wrapping), plain popcorn. Occasionally, I'll include GF chicken nuggets (either homemade or Ian's), with Chick Fil A Polynesian sauce.

More later,

Whip

Galaxy Glue

I've been singing that song to myself all week.

I am exhausted, and I feel like the Incredible Shrinking Woman. The end part, where they tell her what's making her smaller.

I have a lot to say, but unless I can type whilst sleeping, I'll have to say it this weekend.