Gluten Free Dining in Bellingham

Eating out while following a gluten free diet can be challenging. Items that you wouldn’t expect to contain gluten are sometimes made with wheat. Some restaurants coat their cut potatoes in flour before frying to get a crispier exterior. Seasoning blends sometimes use flour as a carrier, and sauces are extremely risky. Evaluating menu items can feel like navigating a mine field. Asking how things are prepared can be helpful in determining what is safe to eat, but the gluten free menu options can be limited.

Within two months of moving to Bellingham, Washington, I have found three places that I can get delicious gluten free foods. Well, technically I didn’t find them on my own. A coworker of my husband who follows a wheat free diet passed along her knowledge of where it’s safe to eat. It is so nice to be able to eat at restaurants without having to make any special requests or inquiries about how things are prepared. These gluten free offerings are available as part of these restaurants’ regular menus.

For freshly baked gluten free bread that I can take home, I go to Avenue Bread in the Sunnyland area of Bellingham. They also serve a variety of sandwiches that they will make on gluten free bread or gluten free English Muffins when requested. They have plenty of seating, so going there for a weekday lunch date with my husband is a special treat.

For the best gluten free pizza I have ever eaten, I go to Boston’s The Gourmet Pizza Restaurant and Sports Bar. I can have dinner with my family and enjoy delicious freshly made gluten free pizza with my choice of toppings. Boston’s has a full menu featuring a variety of items, not just pizza, so everyone can find something they like. There are some fairly good frozen pizzas on the market that can be baked at home, but they don’t compare to the gluten free pizza at Boston’s.

Bellingham’s Community Food Coop is a wonderful cooperative grocer carrying a variety of natural and organic foods. Their in-store bakery/deli has numerous gluten free items, and they are all clearly marked as being gluten free. They have some unbelievable gluten free desserts, as well as salads, rolls, enchiladas, frittata and soups. There is a dining area within the store making this a great place either to stop in for a delicious gluten free lunch, or to pick up items to take home for dinner.

Bellingham is a great place to dine gluten free.

My Latest Food Find

It’s been two weeks now since we left Medford and relocated to Bellingham. I’ve been too tired to do any baking, and my favorite store for buying gluten-free food is in Medford. This week, I found that a local grocery store sells a gf bread made by a company called Angeline’s. I bought a loaf of their “Just Right White Rice Sandwich Bread and a loaf of Outrageous Orange Cinnamon Swirl Rice Bread. It’s actually good (for gf bread), better toasted as is usually the case with gf bread.

Getting to know a new town and adjusting to a new house are hard enough without having trouble finding what you want to eat. I guess I just needed some comfort food: PBJs, grilled cheese sandwiches, and buttered toast with eggs. I’m good now.

Another Staple from the Store

In addition to the Van's waffles, this is a must-have pantry item for me. Except that I keep it in the freezer, not the pantry, to keep it fresh longer. The pancakes are great, but I also like to use it for muffins and chocolate chip cookies. The recipes are on the bag.

Traveling Gluten-free

I just returned from spending some time visiting family in California. I enjoy spending time with loved ones, but I sometimes worry about being able to stay gluten free while away from home. I don’t want to be a burden to anyone, but I need to avoid gluten to be well. I really had nothing to worry about.

My husband and I spent the weekend in Santa Barbara with his family. I am blessed with wonderful in-laws, and getting to spend time in beautiful Santa Barbara is a bonus. They served us delicious home-cooked meals, and always made sure that I would be able to eat safely. We had delicious French Onion Soup for dinner, pancakes for breakfast (my sister-in-law made special gf pancakes just for me), and finished with a big BBQ in honor of my husband’s late grandfather. Nonno immigrated from Italy to Santa Barbara as a young man and would have been 100 years old this year. We enjoyed a loving reunion of family and friends as we shared BBQ with all the fixin’s. For dessert, my sister-in-law was making a trifle, and she actually made a second gf version so that I would have dessert too (thanks, Julie!). I am a fortunate person.

Next we went to Northridge to spend some time with my family. Now, my mother is very health-conscience and generally only keeps healthy foods in the house. There is always plenty of fresh fruit in the fridge, but she also stocked her kitchen with some of my favorite gf junk-foods to make sure I would have foods that I liked and could eat safely. Thanks Mom! At my sister and brother-in-law’s house, one of their friends cooked a delicious gf meal for all of us. It was so nice to be able to enjoy everyone’s company and delicious food without having to think much about staying gluten free.

Of course, it’s not all about the food. Since this blog is mostly about food, that’s what I write about most often, but life is about so much more. And my trip was about so much more: spending time with my husband, seeing family, including my 94-year-old grandmother, enjoying my niece and nephews, visiting with my parents, touring my sister’s business, and generally catching up with what everyone has been doing.

I truly am a fortunate person.

Not More Zucchini!

Summer’s officially over, but the zucchini keep coming. If you’ve ever grown zucchini, you know how they can get out of hand. Some of my family members are definitely giving them the “fish eye”. This recipe is a favorite even with my beloved zucchini haters.





CHOCOLATE CHIP ZUCCHINI BREAD

Dry Ingredients
1/2 cup white rice flour
1/3 cup tapioca flour
1/3 cup cornstarch
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon xanthan gum
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon

Wet Ingredients
1 egg
1/4 cup canola oil
1/3 cup milk
1 cup shredded zucchini

1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips


Preheat oven to 350ºF.
Combine dry ingredients in medium-sized bowl.
In separate bowl, mix together wet ingredients.
Mix wet ingredients with dry ingredients, and stir in chocolate chips.
Pour into greased 9”x 9” baking dish.
Bake until done in center and slightly browned on top, about 30 minutes.

Summer Bounty

I never met a summer squash I didn’t like, or a tomato either for that matter. The summer garden that my family helped me plant this year is overflowing with squash and tomatoes. Beans too, but that’s a story for another day.

I got the idea from Mike Eberhart’s gluten free blog to make “bases” that can then be used in other recipes. The idea is to start with a set of ingredients, cook them, then use the resulting “base” as an ingredient, or a sort of sauce, in other dishes.

Using what I had, which were onions from the grower’s market and lots of tomatoes and summer squashes from my garden, I made this “base”:


Tomato Zucchini Base Sauce

2 onions, chopped and sautéed in a little olive oil.
8 cups diced, peeled and seeded tomatoes
8 cups diced summer squash (zucchini, yellow crookneck and patty pan)
Salt and Pepper to taste

Combine and simmer until all veggies are cooked. Store in refrigerator for up to 5 days, or store in freezer.


Here’s how I’ve used it so far:

Eaten as-is – sort of as a thick soup
Mixed with leftover pot roast and peas to make a delicious stew
Thinned with chicken broth and added to leftover grilled chicken and peppers (from fajitas) plus a dash of cayenne pepper for Chicken Fajita Soup
Combined with cooked red beans and served over rice for a quick vegetarian meal.

Biscuits

We recently ate at a seafood restaurant that has really good garlic cheese biscuits, and my daughter told me that she likes my cheese biscuits better! I hadn’t made them for a long time, so after receiving her compliment (smart girl, my daughter), I felt compelled to make a batch. I’ll admit, they’re not really as good as biscuits made with wheat, but there’re not bad. They certainly disappeared fast.

Gluten Free Cheddar Biscuits

¾ cup white rice flour
½ cup tapioca flour
½ cup cornstarch
2 tsp. xanthan gum
1 Tbls. sugar
2 tsp. baking powder
½ tsp. baking soda
¾ tsp. salt
¼ cup shortening
¾ cup milk
1 egg white
2/3 cup shredded cheddar cheese


Preheat oven to 350F.

Combine all dry ingredients.
Cut in shortening.
Combine milk and slightly beaten egg white. Mix into dry ingredients and cheese.
Drop onto greased baking sheet and bake about 15 minutes.
Makes one dozen biscuits.