Eating Out

[Guest guest]

Welcome to V/GF, Lonna. We are glad to have you join us.

 

Eating out as a gluten-free vegan isn't easy! It is hard enough to

eliminate the animal products, but when you start eliminating gluten it

makes food choices even less! Our family policy is that we accommodate the

member who has the greatest need in the food area. In this case only one of

us requires a gluten-free diet, but we choose places we can eat out that

help meet this family members need. We eat out much less frequently, but

have found several places that offer " safe " and delicious food.

 

Some places we eat out at are:

 

1.) Buffet Restaurants: similiar to Old Country Buffet, Sweet Tomatoes, or

Granny's Buffet They usually have a pretty good salad bar and potato bar.

You might chose to take your own dressing, or stick with lemon juice and oil

for salad dressing. They have fresh, homemade salsa that is gluten-free and

it makes a nice topping for baked potatoes. Corn chips and corn tortillas

are also sometimes available. Cooked vegetables are usually served plain,

so there are usually choices of cooked carrots, green beans, peas, and corn.

Sometimes white rice is available also.

 

2.) Taco Bell: they are great about adapting/special orders. Although I

sometimes wonder if their chips are actually gf, they don't seem to bother

our gf family member (who is very sensitive to hidden things like modified

food starch, etc.). Taco Bell will substitute beans for beef without a

problem and are happy to leave off the dairy products. They have great

green sauce and salsa (usually you have to ask for them) and they help

" spice things up " .

 

3.) Chinese Restaurants: I hesitate to mention this alternative, because I

believe it could be wrought with difficulty in the gf area. Our community

has a wonderful, locally owned Chinese restaurant that caters to

vegan/vegetarians. This restaurant has are a wide variety of menu items

that are v & gf (lots of rice dishes), but this will depend upon your

community/restaurant. Watch out for soy sauce which can be made with wheat.

 

I'm interested in how other " " list members meet this

challenge.

LaDonna

 

PS: About the time our family member was diagnosed as celiac our community

opened a brand new Olive Garden Restaurant. Needless to say, we haven't

been there. . .and we had been waiting for one all these years! Sigh!