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Showing posts from 2013

Why I'm looking forward to the 2014 Gluten and Allergen Free Expo

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A picture is worth a thousand words- here is our haul from last years's expo: These were just the samples we managed to collect for products we liked sampling at the expo. It does not include any products we didn't care for, or the many local bakers who offered fresh samples at the expo for on-site tasting only. In a nutshell, there is no other place to be able to sample such a huge variety of quality gluten free foods. It was truly overwhelming. By the end of the expo we were actually taking a single bite of  a cookie, slice of pizza or dessert bar and then THROWING THE REST AWAY because we were so stuffed from all the samples! If you are gluten free or have other food allergies or intolerance's,  you will want to attend this expo. If you live in the San Francisco Bay Area,   your time is January 25th and 26th up in San Mateo . I'll be there as an official blogger. I can't wait to see what demonstrations and other seminars are scheduled. Last year I only ma

Disney World, Gluten Free

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Original post: November 2013 Updated: July 2020 There are enough posts out there on other blogs stating how amazing Disney is at dealing with food allergies. They rock. All but one restaurant we visited followed the same process - tell them about your food allergies and the chef will come out and tell you what you can order, if buffet show you what is safe, and then any food you order is brought out by the chef. When we visited in 2013, we were not glutened a single time and we were there for a week. We have since visited two more times and have also never been glutened.  Here are our top 10 places to eat gluten free at the Walt Disney World resort: Cinderella's Royal Table - Magic Kingdom Sanaa (Dinner) - Kidani Village Resort Boathouse (Dinner) - Downtown Disney Be Our Guest (Lunch & Dinner) - Magic Kingdom T-Rex (Dinner) - Downtown Disney California Grill - Contemporary Resort Crystal Palace (Lunch) - Magic Kingdom Chefs de France - EPCOT Pinocchio Village Hau

Flying Gluten Free

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Traveling gluten free can be so depressing. I'll never forget the layover I had in Seattle when flying from San Francisco to Anchorage. 2008 - our first full year gluten free. We had eaten the gluten free wraps and fruit I had packed for the first flight, and still had a slew of bars and dried fruit & nuts we were saving for our vacation. The terminal had a few eateries- Starbucks, Pizza and Burger King. Of all those places guess what our options were? A banana at Starbucks. Even the prepared salads had croutons sprinkled on top. Fruit cups topped with granola. Fast forward a few years- now most airports have plenty of offerings although you still have to do your homework. I've had Greek salad in Phoenix, soup in San Francisco. But I still pack a slew of food our flights and trip. The only airline I've seen offer a gluten free snack box is Alaska Airlines (although I have not flown with them in over a year so they may not now). I've done a few International busine

Gluten Free Store-Bought Bread

When I first had to stop eating gluten, the only gluten free bread available at stores like Whole Foods and Trader Joe was the brown rice bread by companies like Food For Life . Upon my first bite I became very depressed - it was the consistency of clay and had a horrible bitter taste. So I gave up on store bought bread and decided to become a bread baker. Most attempts tasted OK but did not hold together well but at least it was better than the rice bread. I also tried Kinnikkinnick bread which was far from a brick, but too light and with zero nutrition.  I saw on their site they have recently discontinued a number of their breads so perhaps their new varieties are better. A few years later Udi's came out with bread, hamburger and hot dog buns which actually held together and tasted decent. Not quite how I remembered their gluten counterparts but do-able. So Udi's became a staple in my freezer for a few years. Rudi's followed soon after. Their sandwich bread tas

The Left Bank - never again.

I had the opportunity to go out with one of my mom's groups to the Left Bank at Santana Row for dinner. I was excited to try The Left Bank as I have heard a lot of good things about it. So, several days before I emailed their web site to find out what sort of gluten free offerings they had (if any). I received a prompt reply from someone from their corporate office who then forwarded my request to the executive chef at the Santana Row location. I was very impressed with the prompt follow up and then soon received a reply from the chef saying there were many things he could prepare gluten free. So happily I braved Santana Row one rainy evening the week before Christmas - I somehow won the parking battle after only 20 minutes. One mom spent over an hour circling around. At any rate, when I arrived I let my server know I had emailed with the chef earlier in the week and that the chef had told me there was a lot I could order. So the server went off to find out. When he returned he

More Pizza

Just a quick note that I've juggled around the pizza rankings and we have a new #1 - Palo Alto Pizza ! They also use the Venice Bakery crust which  you can order in a small, medium or large crust.  Small and medium use the seasoned crust (our preference) but we ordered large since we wanted to see if they could pull it off - when we tried the large crust at Pizza Party it was a bit soggy for our taste. But Palo Alto Pizza totally pulled it off. Decent amount of sauce (although next time we may ask for a little more), good cheese mix (maybe a bit too much, but still very tasty) and it was cooked to perfection - very crisp crust. We will definitely be back! You can get coupons on their web site too. We saved $3 on a large - when one has to eat gluten free, we'll take any savings we can get. Speaking of Venice Bakery, I decided to take advantage of a sale they had last month on their crusts at their online store - I purchased a 6 pack of the size medium seasoned crusts