G-Free NYC (The First of Many Visits)

As I mentioned yesterday, I finally made it to G-Free NYC this weekend!

Happy stripe-y awning

Where I bought:

The GF goods

I kept forgetting that everything was GF, that I didn't need to read labels. And I kept finding new gems, things I didn't know existed. I've been eating gluten-free for 10 years or so; I consider myself pretty gluten-free savvy. But I didn't know about:

Breaded cheese. What's not to like?

I shared the 6 massive mozzarella sticks from Russo's Gluten-Free with a gluten-eating friend yesterday and we agreed: They are excellent. (And I have to say: That price is good, too. Cheese is expensive! So that price seemed more than fair.) I toasted them up in the oven and paired them with some marinara sauce. Beautiful.

All week, I've been eating this for breakfast:

Challah? Holla!

Toasted on its own, or with a little schmear and jam. Delicious. I'll go ahead and say it: This is the best GF challah I've had to date. (And the price is fantastic - under $6 at G-Free NYC.) Best of all: It is soft at room temp. Yep, no need to toast it - though it's even better if you do. (I suspect the French toast made with this will blow my mind.)

Another of my Katz purchases didn't last 24 hours. These were so good:

Old school rugelech, just like your bubbe used to make/buy

So good that I ate 5 of them on the train ride home! (Hence the battered package.) I will admit that I missed the nuts, but they still get an A. Good combo of crunch and softness, with nice bits of melted sugar around the edges. Well done, Katz.

I mentioned that these cones from Goldbaum's were a hit on Memorial Day:

These got holiday raves too:

Smile on the bag, smile on your face

I toasted them up to pair with cheeseburgers. Favorite comment of the day came when I served these: "I don't understand. Why do we need to eat gluten?!? All the gluten-free things you make are delicious." And that, my friends, is how you make sure you're ALWAYS invited to dinner.

One of the (many) things I like about G-Free NYC is their selection of individually wrapped snack options. While the environmentalist in me abhors the waste associated with individual packages, the vain realist in me knows that I have zero self-control around sweets. Any box of cookies, cakes, baked good of any kind may as well say "servings per package: 1". So I appreciate that G-Free NYC carries individual brownies, cookies, and such. Many are locally baked. I picked these Italian wafers up because they'll last a while and travel well:

Ciao, bella! Come stai?

The wafers are just like the gluten-y version, but with better chocolate. (These have a good quality chocolate filling that is on the dark side.) I tested them on a gluten-eater today and she loved them, eying the pack, hoping for another. (Had she not been concurrently eating a fudge cupcake from Dean & Deluca, I might have relented!)

I couldn't help myself and also picked up these wee snacks from Surf Sweets:

Gummy bears!

But I think my favorite purchase is actually one that I haven't yet used:

GF soy joy

I opened this and stuck two in my purse. When I cook at a friend's place, find GF sushi but no tamari, or when my lunch needs a little flavor punch - these will come in so very handy. (Yes, I am a very practical girl.)


Thus ends this trip around my shopping cart. Hope I've convinced you to get over to G-Free NYC. Seriously worth the trip!

Break Glass In Case of Emergency (Cookies When You Need 'Em)

Native New Yorker? Visiting NYC soon? Either way, may I present goods from your emergency baked goods purveyor:

COOKIES!

Yep, Duane Reade. They currently offer GF ginger snaps and animal crackers. As far as I can tell, they are cookies made by Midel and sold under the Duane Reade label (assessment based on nothing other than my taste buds - but I put a fair amount of faith in them). Wherever they came from (the Cookie Fairy?), they have been a godsend on many a long afternoon schlepping about the city. Sometimes you just need a cookie, damn it, and Duane Reade now it makes it possible to have one (or five) without breaking the bank. These usually retails for $2.99-ish, but I got them on sale for $2.49 in Brooklyn this week. And with Duane Reades now ALL OVER the city, you can get your fix in just about every neighborhood.

I often worry that GF items like these will be in limited production, available only in some locations of a chain - or will be phased out unexpectedly (see: Starbucks GF orange cake), so I have a habit of checking to see if these are in stock when I'm in a Duane Reade. I can honestly say that one or both have been in stock every time I've checked. In this GF life, the certainty of access to a safe treat is valued, even on the (very) rare occasion  when you aren't in the mood for a cookie.

Sun In Bloom (The Sweets)

Lemon-strawberry cupcakes. You want one.

Some days, you just need a cupcake. Meeting that need when you're gf? Not so easy. I will admit to baking up a tray of cupcakes from a mix when I'm desperate - and then eating way too much, of course. (Even if I just want ONE, I over-indulge; my sweet tooth doesn't have an off switch.) Or schlepping to an out-of-the way (verrrrry out-of-the-way) gf bakery, only to overindulge yet again because, I trekked ALL the way there, dag nabbit. And (whimper) doesn't little 'ol gluten-free me deserve treats?

Pathetic, I know.

But those days, they are over - thanks to Sun In Bloom (yes, the "I" is capitalized here), a Park Slope eatery that has gf cupcakes every single day, so I can get just one - and get my fix. My favorite is relatively new, the lemon-strawberry pictured above: lemony cake with lemon frosting and fresh sliced strawberries. (I like it best after it's been refrigerated, as it hardens the frosting.)

Want a sweet, but (strangely) not in the mood for a cupcake? They also offer muffins, chocolate chip cookies, whoopie pies, and banana bread (with or w/o chocolate chips) - all gluten-free! 

Carrot cupcakes and chocolate chip cookies.

For all my goings on about their sweets, should mention: Sun In Bloom is a full menu organic vegan and macrobiotic eatery, with the breakfast, lunch, and dinner menus available all day. Brunch is served Saturday and Sunday, and the menu changes weekly, with a gluten-free pancake item offered every week. (A recent brunch menu included pancakes with caramelized bananas and fresh strawberries. Nice.) Oh, and: All items are vegan, most can be made gluten-free, and some are raw. (Gluten-free, vegan, raw cheesecake, anyone?) I can't offer savory recommendations, as I haven't sampled them yet (will post an update when I do) - but sweets? They all rock.

Cookie sandwich? Yes, please.

The restaurant space itself is gorgeous and comfortable: farm tables, loads of natural light, and high ceilings. The staff is delightful to a fault, even when presented with surly pre-caffeine, low blood sugar me some mornings. You should go there. You will like it. Open 8am-8pm every day, Sun In Bloom is located at 460 Bergen St. between 5th and 6th Avenues and can be found on Twitter at http://twitter.com/#!/suninbloom

Chametz-Free (Why This Shiksa Loves Passover)

Rainbow Cookies: Italian-inspired, Jew-produced, gf-goy-girl-consumed.

I love Passover. I look forward to it every year, for one very special reason: rainbow cookies. About five years ago, Wegmans in Ithaca, NY started carrying kosher gluten-free items from Shabtai Gourmet.- but only at Passover, when observant Jews need to avoid chametz, loosely defined as leavened grain products. To my delight, these old school Italian cookies were among the offerings - AND they taste like the real deal. Moist cake, great chocolate icing, and the essential raspberry/almond flavor combo in the cake and filling. Perfetto! (Er, l'chaim!?)

Only "problem"? I can't eat just one. Or five. Really, they are addictive and unkind to my waistline. So I save them as a treat for every Passover season, when they make their appearance in NYC grocery stores such as Morton Williams and Food Emporium (where I recently found the beauties pictured above). Can't wait for Passover to get your cookie fix? Shabtai offers $5.95 flat rate shipping on all orders in the U.S.

Though this post is a tribute to gf rainbow cookies, I'd be remiss if I didn't recommend another Shabtai product, i.e. their lady fingers. They're perfect for a gf tiramisu - and more reasonably priced than the few other gf lady fingers I've seen on the market.

File Under: Things I Really Shouldn't Complain About

So, you know how there's always that person in your workplace who likes to bake? The one who is forever leaving out coffee cakes and brownies she just "whipped up", much to the detriment of your healthy diet? Having celiac disease means that I don't have to deal with that anymore. Ha-HAH says my healthy diet!

Ah, but I have a new dietary nemesis in the form of the incredibly kindhearted, well-meaning Gluten Eating Friend (GEF) who finds gluten free food and BUYS it for me. These foods are usually comprised of ingredients from the following food groups: fats, carbohydrates, and chocolate.

(Isn't that part of the new Food Tetrahedron or whatever the USDA is using now?)

A few weeks ago, I had to put my serious face on and tell a good friend that I needed her to stop bringing me a VERY LARGE chocolate chip gf cookie every time we met up - which was, on average, once a week. I had asked her with my not-serious face a few times prior, but to no avail. This time I firmly explained that while I appreciated the gesture, I was really trying to not eat sweets and that this was stressing me out. (I didn't have the heart to tell her that the cookies also SUCKED. Were from some company that makes them -free of everything, including taste.)

Tonight? Tonight I walked in from the gym only to be presented with a box of chocolate-covered gf cookies before my coat was even off. Another well-meaning person - my neighbor - had picked them up on the way home, just because. (I think it was "just because" she's seen me in varying stages of distress over my recent and very sudden break-up. But that's another post...)

Now I am a gym-goin' girl. I work out, I like it, feels good - but I won't lie: These days I am SO in it for the svelt-ifying effects. Fellow gym kids know: No matter how much you value fitting into your pants, some days it's hard to motivate, to get your spandexed booty to the gym. Well tonight my motivation was having pigged out on delicious, delightful, delovely Babycakes treats this afternoon. I would be embarrassed to share what exactly "pigged out" entails in this case. (Dude. It was a frosted free for all.) I don't know about any of you Babycakes lovers out there, but before every visit I resolve to only buy a couple of things. By the time I schlep all the way there, I think how it's such a pain in the arse to get to that I'll just stock up. And ration myself. Yeah, that's it. I'll only eat a little bit at a time - my stash will last for WEEKS.

(If you've been to Babycakes, you're laughing right now.)

Instead, half the goods were gone before I even got home. Now, with this new gift, my stash had magically been replenished. I willed myself to not even try the new treats, to just give them away at work, or... who was I kidding. The cookies? They were Italian-style sandwich cookies, the kind with two oblong shortbread wafers held together by raspberry preserves with that base then half dipped in chocolate and rolled in sprinkles. Old school Italian bakery-style cookies. Drool. Will spare you the cookie carnage, but needless to say, my spandexed self will be logging extra hours due to those beauties.

The larger issue (hooray, is larger than me!) of gf food gifts from friends remains. How to handle them? I appreciate the love and care, but not the lbs. More importantly, friends often buy unsafe items - things that are only wheat-free or are from places that I know are unsafe from me. To not hurt their feelings, I often say that I just ate and will enjoy them later. Invariably, they later ask how the treats were. To lie and say they were delicious means that I will likely get these treats again. And they are so expensive! Hate to have friends waste money! But if am honest, then I am sure to hurt their feelings. If I eat them, I feel terrible - either because I deviate from my healthy diet or because I get glutened by unsafe goods.

What to do?

No words of wisdom from me - I haven't any. Do you? I just wanted to share, as I imagine other gf people have similar experiences. Please share!