LEGOLAND Is Soooo Gluten Free

Have you been looking for an amusement park experience, but are afraid you’ll starve to death in the middle of hamburgers, churros, and corn dogs? Well, have I got news for you, left-out celiac. LEGOLAND is all about the gluten-free eats, so much so they have a map showing you where you can pick up the gluten free specials on their web site, and it doesn’t even include all the gf goodies in the park! Holy buckwheat pancakes, allergy sufferers!

Exhibit A: As my kids ran for the hot dog stand, I decided I’d just have to wait until we could pry them away from the plastic park hours later in order to eat at one of the designated gf spots. So imagine my swooning when I spotted the sign in the photo above. That’s right, GLUTEN FREE BUNS AVAILABLE UPON REQUEST.

Gluten-Free Chicken Parm – ish

I’ve spoken before about my sadness as I am forced to reject fried chicken. I’d just like to reiterate that giving up fried chicken is sad. Really freaking sad. Please don’t deny that fact. At some point I will attempt to fry some up myself in a gluten free fashion. But for now I’m going to concentrate on small chicken pieces that I’m less likely to screw up. So I tackled one of my favorite pre-diagnosis recipes that I invented when I messed up another recipe from Fresh Direct. I like to call it “Italian Surprise” but really it’s kind of like a chicken Parmesan casserole cum lasagna situation with some delish prosciutto in the mix. The surprise being, I managed to come up with this and I’m not an Italian grandmother from Jersey, nor Eastern Pennsylvania.

The gluten free changes I made include buying Boar’s Head prosciutto because I read it’s gluten-free. Although I really wonder when your read “pork” and “salt” as the only two ingredients — do I still need to worry? I don’t think so, but let’s be careful out there. I used oat flour, but I also love my gluten free panko bread crumbs I found at Whole Foods. (They also work in a gf mac and cheese gluttonous — yet gluten-free –recipe to come.)

Another tip — if you make your own thick sauce, it works far better than thin pre-made stuff. But if you want to save time please feel free to use your favorite jar, it will still be super good.

If you want to go all Jersey Shore, cook up some gf pasta and pile it on. Personally, I think fried chicken with sauce, prosciutto, and cheese is filling enough. But I haven’t had my Ron-Ron juice today.

Peeps Are Gluten Free! Plus 10 More Killer GF’ers

With news of the Gwyneth Paltrow g-free diet hitting the Interwebs, it may seem like going gluten-free is a great way to keep in shape and look hot. Not so, says the woman searching for all things fried, yet gluten-free. Although I am resorting to doing my own frying, there are lots of chemical-laden treats you can buy at the store then shove in your body with no fear of gluten damage. Of course, those toxins might get you!

But if you’re feeling deprived, and like you’ve been eating quinoa and kale for like, days, there are some other awesomely bad gf foods out there. In fact, here are 10 things I was very excited to learn are gluten-free, yet could still kill me.

Gluten-Free Pancakes: Lemon Ricotta Nom Nom

One of the first foods I got hysterical about when I got my celiac diagnosis was pancakes. In addition to the fact that they’re a weekend ritual around our pad, I had just perfected a specialty pancake that involved lemon and ricotta that I adapted from MyRecipes.com. Yes, it is RAD. That’s my daughter up there making them, because if (god forbid) something ever happened to my stirring arm, she was being trained to take over the lemon ricotta pancake duties.

So naturally one of my first moves during my Whole Foods shopping spree was to pick up some gluten free pancake mix. I tried a few, and they were okay. (One tip — add water a little bit at a time and test the texture. I found I didn’t need nearly as much water as they called for in either mix.) These mixes definitely do in a pinch, but when I really wanted to get my pancake on I decided to throw some Bob Mill’s all-purpose gluten free flour in there along with that crazy xanthan gum. Voila! My super duper pancakes are back in rotation!

Here’s how you can impress your GF friends with an amazing ‘cake for breakfast (or if you’re not sensitive, just sub regular flour and skip the xanathan gum.)

Supermarket Sweep at Whole Foods

I’ll admit that after my initial diagnosis I wasn’t really taking this gluten-free thing that seriously. I had already decided that every third Friday was “Gluten Gorge Friday” and a cupcake from Magnolia every now and again wouldn’t kill me. Then I had my sit down with my GI doctor where he scared me straight. See, I’m incredibly lucky that I — unlike many celiac disease peeps — was only sick for about three months before getting my diagnosis. And I started to feel better even before my diagnosis, and abrupt change to my diet. Sure I lost a weird amount of weight in those three months, and I was a total mess of a girl, but after coming out on the other side I quickly forgot the pain that pasta could bring. Then the doc showed me my non-existent villi in my small intestine and started throwing around words like, “diabetes” “osteoporosis” “stroke” and the dreaded “cancer.” Which prompted me to go to Whole Foods and come home with this:

Why Gluten Is My Bitch

Damn you fried chicken and delicious waffle!

Celiac disease is nothing to laugh at, but guess what? I’m totally laughing at you celiac! Sure my first reaction was devastation at never making it to Roscoe’s House of Chicken and Waffles before getting my diagnosis. And yes I pestered my GI doc post-endoscopy with questions like, “Are you sure I can’t still have cake?” and “What about cupcakes?” But I was under anesthesia, so I’m sure he thought it was cute when I then ran down a list of my favorite foods and made him answer “no” to every one of them. The point is, once I was out from under the influence I became determined to not let this gluten allergy negatively affect my love of food. It turns out some days that’s super duper easy. Other days it’s all I can do not to cry over a pile of cheeseburgers. But mostly, this blog is here to show how you, too, can still enjoy pancakes and cake without pooping it all out 15 minutes later.

Bon Appetit!

Photo via arnold iyuaki/Flickr