Pizano's Sausage Crust Pizza

About twice a year, my day job treats our office to pizza from Pizano's! Today was our lucky day! The past few times, I had a roast beef sandwich as my pizza alternative, but ordering this time around would be a little more difficult. My boss's wife and I were brainstorming what I could order and then I decided I would just call and see what they had that was gluten and lactose free. I had my answer: a sausage crust pizza. (I was unable to find this on their website.)

There was only one review on yelp that mentioned this specialty pizza and it was overwhelmingly negative. I heard of this sausage crust phenomenon before - it seems to be a Chicago thing since deep dish pizza is our speciality. I decided to go for this exciting pizza option! Normally, I have cheese and sausage pizza, but when my crust is sausage, I don't think my stomach would be able to handle the explosion of meat. I decided for a cheese-less pizza with green peppers (for balance.)

Here it is! All in its greasy glory!! Yum...pizza...

And where it is after I worked my magic and added some goat cheese that I brought from home. Almost everyone at work was intrigued by my pizza and a few people asked if they could have a slice. With only four slices of my personal pizza, I was cutting slivers of the sausage crust for people so they could try it. Everyone loved it! It overall was a pretty good pizza. It was not bursting with flavor - it was just a traditional tasting pizza that just so happened to be made with a sausage crust. This is something I will be ordering again in the future!

Wilde, Flat Top and Oberweis

I realize that I'm a little behind on blogging about some of my recent dining out experiences - and they were all fantastic!


For my birthday, I spent almost two hours researching restaurants in Lakeview where I could easily eat gluten free with my friends. I was googling and yelping restaurants and finally returned to one of my first finds: Wilde. The theatre geek in me was super excited about going to a pub and restaurant named after famous playwright Oscar Wilde. The gluten and lactose intolerant in me was thrilled at their GLUTEN FREE MENU! (See here to check out all their delicious options! http://wildechicago.com/IMAGES/WILDE_GlutenFreeMenu.pdficago.com/IMAGES/WILDE_GlutenFreeMenu.pdf) I ordered their Wilde Burger with a gluten-free bun and said that I was also allergic to dairy - so no cheese and no buttered bun. Then my waitress revealed that she too was gluten and dairy free! I was super excited by that - she said that should would make sure they took good care of my food in the kitchen. This was one of the most delicious burgers I have ever had. The whisky added a nice touch, too. ;-) For my side, I had herbed brown rice - also delicious. One of the most amazing parts of the meal was the hamburger bun. I had not had that much luck with bread at that point, so it was thrilling to have bread that tasted like actual bread. (It was worth the upcharge of the gf-bun; the burgers can also be ordered sans bun.) I would love to return to Wilde and try more of their food, otherwise that Wilde Burger is a delicious default option! (P.S. My friends all were raving about their food as well - including the mac and cheese - but I was too busy obsessing over my mouth-watering food to pay that much attention!)


Last week, a friend and I dined at Flat Top Grill. I am always a fan of stir-fry, but a stir-fry restaurant that is super allergy aware? I'm in heaven! http://www.flattopgrill.com/allergies.html The dairy intolerance really doesn't come into play if you are creating a stir-fry; with the exception of the Mu-Shu wraps, all of their dairy items (grand total of 4) are part of dessert. I came to the restaurant with a print out of their web page so I could make good food choices. I shared it with my waitress, who returned with their allergen binder so I could look at the ingredients in their sauces, since they had more sauces available than what was on-line. For the non-marinated meat, my waitress was able to go to the kitchen and get my beef for me (it looked like all the meat they have out was marinated, but I could be wrong.) I had a brown rice bowl with beef, ginger water, rice wine vinegar, and LOTS of veggies! Since their allergen guide says "Feel free to use: All Vegetables" I went to town with adding some vegetables that were new to me. I had endame and a few others new vegetables, whose names now escape me. I added a white stick to my bowl and it was cooked in its own wok, so cross-contamination risks were greatly lowered. My waitress was great and even brought out gf soy sauce to our table for me! I had a fantastic time and really enjoyed dining here! I hope all Flat Top locations are as welcoming as the one I went to!


For dessert after our stir-fry dinner, my friend suggested Oberweis Dairy. Thanks to my blog inspired can-do attitude, I said that sounded like a great idea! I glanced at the menu and decided that I could not figure navigate the menu myself, so I asked the cashier if they have anything that was lactose-free. They had one option! Lemon Sorbet. I asked if she knew if it was also gluten-free. Since she did not know, she pulled out a binder that had their allergen chart (same one as here: http://www.oberweis.com/web/pdf/retail_nutrition/Allergen_Summary.pdf). The lemon sorbet was both dairy and gluten free! The cashier even showed me the chart so I could see for myself what allergens were in my sorbet of choice (which I love!). My sorbet (which was delicious) was served in a glass container with a metal spoon. My friend (who ordered ice cream) had his served in a paper cup with a plastic spoon. Next time, I think I will pay more attention to the different options of "cups" (since cones are clearly out unless I am in an allergy-friendly location) and request a disposable to cut down on any cross-contamination risk. I really enjoyed knowing that I could still go out and "get ice cream" with my friends without any issues!

Bacon and corn

I am always suspect of people dancing around as they put food in their mouth because the food is just THAT good.

Yesterday morning, I was watching 5 Ingredient Fix on the Food Network. The theme of this episode was Southern Style cooking in the city. After my fried chicken and biscuits, I was still on my little Southern kick, so I sat down and watched the episode rather than having the tv on as background noise while cooking. Claire Robinson showcased a family recipe with Grandma Moore's Creamed Corn. There are only two ingredients: bacon and corn. The cream comes from the corn which is essentially "milked" with the back of your knife! No dairy! The recipe is here: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/claire-robinson/grandma-moores-creamed-corn-recipe/index.html I highly recommend watching the video to see how she cuts the corn. It took me a few tries before I got the hang of milking the corn. In the end, I was able to get a lot of the liquid out for my cream corn. Since I still had the bacon, I crumbled it up and added it over the corn.

I cooked 3 ears of corn and 7 pieces of bacon. I was fully intending on eating this as a side with some leftover fried chicken, but I ate it as my main dish! That can't be healthy!!! (It really was dance-in-your-kitchen so delicious!)

Fish #1

I have been frantically preparing for an upcoming vacation. In addition to packing and assisting with some of the trip planning, I have been researching restaurants near our hotel, double checking the cruise line's website about having gluten free and lactose free meals, figuring out which restaurants had food I can eat at the airports, tasting and buying packaged snacks, and cooking fish.

Yes, you read that right. I was cooking fish. We are going on a cruise and I know that fish is going to be on the menu often and what better place to eat fish than the Caribbean, right? I can count on one hand how many times I have eaten fish (ignoring McDonalds fillet of fish and super cheap fish sticks that are so far removed from fish, that they really don't count.) And I grew up Catholic - I should have loved eating fish on Friday's during Lent! Somewhere along the line, I decided that fish was gross. (Likely because of the slimy texture that I attributed to the fish I would see in the grocery store.) Life without fish really never was a problem. I was able to opt for macaroni and cheese or a grilled cheese sandwich on those meatless Fridays. But now, with a cruise looming in my near future, I needed to eat fish. To make sure I was not intolerant or allergic.

So I consulted one of my many cookbooks and found an easy recipe that was very hands-off with regards to the actual cooking. I placed my single serving of Whole Foods salmon on aluminum foil sprayed with cooking oil and added some lemon before sealing up the packet and cooking it on a cookie sheet in the oven for 20 minutes. Meanwhile, I cooked some rice in my rice cooker. When the timer went off, I took the fish out of the oven, consulted the cookbook to make sure that the fish was indeed done (it was) and added some fresh squeezed lemon juice on top. For good measure, I also added a little bit of lemon juice to the rice.

The fish was not slimy at all. It has a much softer texture than meat, but nothing scary. It was quite tasty, despite the overpowering lemon. The good news? I'm not intolerant to fish! So I can add that to my "approved" menu and enjoy some delicious fish prepared by chefs who know their way around a fish much better than I ever will! One more culinary door has opened!

Fried Chicken 'n Biscuits

I went to the library on Friday and checked out Roben Ryberg's You Won't Believe It's Gluten-Free. What is truly unique about her book is she gives the same recipe a few different ways using the different flour. So there are multiple recipes for breads that are rice, potato, corn or oat based. These recipes all emphasize the chosen flour so unlike the other cookbooks I'm reading, there is only the need to have one or two special flours - not five or six! A welcome change for my small pantry! She includes recipes for fried chicken. I have not had fried chicken in over a year. Although at some fast food chicken restaurants, I could have a certain variety of chicken that was not made with milk, my choice of sides were extremely minimal and I could never have the biscuit. Growing up, I would eat more than my fair share of biscuits when my mom brought home KFC or Popeye's for dinner! I'm not sure what I loved more - the crispy flour texture surrounding the chicken or the melt-in-you-mouth biscuit.

I set out to make my own fried chicken. I have never fried anything before; I am much more of an oven-baked kind of cook. My small kitchen lacks a deep fryer so I used the last of my cheap cooking oil in one of my pans. I used Roben's recipe for corn-based fried chicken ("special" ingredients are cornstarch and xanthan gum) and used eggs with water for my dredging liquid. Making the fried chicken was fairly easy but a bit messy. In hindsight, I would have cut my chicken pieces smaller and cook them for a few minutes less, but overall, an easy dish to repeat.

For the biscuits, I used her rice-based recipe, substituting rice milk for rice. The result was a very softy and delicious biscuit. It lacks the height of my favorite fast food biscuits, but it was still tasty!

After dinner, I began reading another one of my library books: How to Read a French Fry and Other Stories of Intriguing Kitchen Science by Russ Parsons. I wish I began reading it sooner! The very first chapter is all about the science behind frying, which leads to extremely helpful tips on frying because when you know the why behind cooking, it is much easier to do.

Summer Squash Medley with Rice Noodles

Instructions on making a super easy and fresh gluten-free, lactose-free, vegetarian and vegan dinner:

Go to farmer's market on lunch break. Be indecisive. Finally choose a summer squash variety that includes patty pan's that you need to google to learn the name. Also buy "The Best Italian Garlic" and a tomato.

Arrive home. Boil water with some Kosher salt. Wash vegetables. Take pictures of ingredients.

Add rice noodles to boiling water. Cook for 6 minutes, per instructions on bag. Heat your finest (Spanish) olive oil in wok. Add some thinly sliced garlic. Watch garlic burn quickly. Turn down heat to low. Chop other vegetables. Take pictures of improving knife skills.Drain noodles. Add vegetables to wok. Pick out burned garlic. Stir (allowing it to cook for about 5 minutes on medium heat). Add four more garlic cloves - chopped in half this time. Dice a tomato. Add noodles to wok. Stir. Add tomatoes. Stir. Cook for a minute or two.

Place in bowl. Take pictures. Eat. Decided to add salt and pepper to make taste. Continue eating.

Repeat the "eating" step for lunch as well tomorrow.

Gluten-Free Girl

I just finished re-reading Gluten-Free Girl: How I Found the Food That Loves Me Back & How You Can Too by Shauna James Ahern.

Amazing.

I initially read this book simultaneously with Gluten-Free for a Healthy Life. Shauna's book is a conversational invitation into her world and experiences with Celiac disease and moving towards a life full of "yes" rather than depriving herself of foods when she went gluten-free. I have already recommended this book to a few people who are looking to know more about Celiac disease and gluten-intolerance.

Shauna recommends shopping from local butchers and at farmer's markets. The last time I went to a butcher shop was when I was a very little girl and accompanied my mom to buy meat for a party. I'm sure I could find a butcher in one of Chicago's ethnic neighborhoods (I'm surrounded by chains in my neighborhood.) Almost religiously, I go to the downtown farmer's market on my Thursday lunch hours. Being able to buy fresh food from a market is so great. Seeing the abundance of foods in season help navigate food choices for upcoming meals.
***The next day***

Two of Shauna's tips are to "Make as much as you can from scratch" and "Only use a packaged product if it says it's gluten-free."

When I initially read that, I was congratulating myself on finding so many incidentally gluten-free products. Even with a list of dozens names gluten can go by, I paid the price by having incidentally gluten-free chicken broth. It was manufactured in the same facility that processes milk and wheat. I used the broth earlier and felt a little sick. I made quinoa with the broth (to give the food some more nutrition) and felt sick when I had about half a cup. Last night, I had about a cup and absolutely crashed. The pain returned in my chest, I had trouble breathing, I lost all energy and could barely string together some coherent thoughts and even went to bed two hours earlier than normal. Well, I think my incidentally-gluten-free broth is the trouble-maker. (And I bought three more boxes of the broth - oops!)

Moral of the story:
Use the chicken broth I already made from scratch myself.
Avoid packaged foods that are surprisingly gluten-free.

When I first found out that I was going to be gluten-free for the rest of my life, I was disappointed because my taste buds were finally maturing and coming alive. My body wanted to be a foodie but my lifestyle was forcing me into a grab-and-go way of eating. I learned to cook foods that I could easily freeze when I was not able to cook more than once a week for a few hours (2 or 3 total). Now, I AM a foodie. Every closed door in my diet means that a few new doors open with foods I have never tried. Nothing seems daunting any more. Reading Gluten-Free Girl has been such an encouragement to me. Here is someone who is a few years into her gluten-free life and what a life it is! She is truly living and loving her food. If you are gluten-free or simply want to better appreciate food or live better, please read her book! It is a guidebook and an uplifting testament from someone who really knows food and the dangers that gluten can cause some people!