Fun Adventure Finds!

The past couple of weeks I have found several new GF/GF friendly products that I thought were pretty cool. I also have a couple new restaurant reviews to add to my growing pile...

Down in the Valley Bakery - courtesy of Valley Natural Foods, they have started their own GF bakery line. I have tried the Banana Bread & Double Chocolate Brownie, both are DIVINE. The Banana Bread was eaten over the course of 5 days and the texture was just as good on day 5 as day 1 - it came in a mini loaf size. I still have half the brownie (which was huge) so it is going on 8 days, so we will see how good it lasts.

Coleman  Dutch Oven Liners - How cool is this? If you had a Dutch Over pre gluten free days, or inherited one, you can still use it! These liners were created for easy cleanups, but would work like aluminum foil or parchment paper as a barrier to keep your food clean when using a "glutened" cast iron dutch oven. My husband and I usually camp with family (and I haven't bought our own dutch oven yet) so this would be great for shared meals we are making GF. I found them at Wal-Mart.

Doolittle's Woodfire Grill - We ate here on a Saturday night, I had checked out their website for their GF menu in advanced. The website instructs you to ask for a gluten free menu when you arrive, so I received my very own GF menu. One thing I liked about their GF menu is it included a description of the dishes and the prices just like the regular menu, something that is occasionally lacking on GF Menu. We GF customers do like to know what we are eating and how much we are going to pay for it...  Anyway, I had options from almost every section of the regular menu, the only things left out were sandwiches and pizza, no surprise there. It was nice to have both appetizer and dessert options. I ended up ordering the Scallops with Bacon Mashed potatoes and mango butter sauce, it was quite tasty. My husband and I split a creme brulee for dessert - it wasn't quite as good as Bonefish, but I would get it again. Everyone else in our party agreed it was a good pick as well.

Original Pancake House - I looked back on my posts and I can't believe I haven't mentioned this place before. The Original Pancake House has GF Pancakes AND Crepes! Oh, and the omelets, hash browns, sausage, bacon and a bunch of other things are safe too... but the big attraction for me is the crepes. They are so good I don't even put syrup on them. We only go there occasionally because it is a nutritional train wreck aka carb overload, but dang it is good. Ask your server for the GF Menu, and be prepared to wait 30 - 45 minutes if you go on a weekend.

Last but not least - many thanks to my local Whole Foods culinary director - I took her Meat Cookery class this week, and she made the whole class GF since I was attending. Gluten Free cooking wasn't discussed, but she picked brands/switched stuff out as needed so I could sample everything in the class. If you have a Whole Foods near you that offers classes, don't be afraid to ask if they are willing to modify a class for you, it is quite possible they will!