eating out, transplanted taco inserts, and I scream for ice cream

I thought I'd share a few more nuggets about vacation, although my contact-lens-stealing, willingness-to-toilet-dive story cannot be beat.

Dinner out, take 1:  We ate dinner out twice.  The first night we walked into town.  I decided in advance I wouldn't make a big fuss if we didn't find something I could eat.  I would not punish everyone else for my celiac thing.  

Historically I have struggled to find a menu with enough GF options, and it has perhaps dampened the my mood.  Ahem, I'm looking at you Vancouver restaurant.  

The first place had Tacos.  I can usually eat tacos - minus the flour tortillas.  Coach insisted we check a few more places to be sure I had enough to choose from, as much as I was trying to be chill, he was trying to be accommodating.   We ended up back at the place we started.  Curly, a burger lover, was all set.

I asked if I could do tacos without the tortillas.  Um, no.  Their tacos and burritos had gluten in them - like in the meat or the sauce or something.  Sorry.  I panicked. Already ate a salad for my lunch.  

Coach later claimed that he did NOT start to grow impatient with me, but he DID bump the table hard and turn away in frustration.  I know this.  I think he caught himself and realized I was scrambling to choose under pressure.  Then he tried to act smooth, like he hadn't just behaved like a jerk his father.  I just wasn't feeling the burger with no bun.

I ordered chicken in a peanut sauce on a bed of noodles, hold the noodles.  Well, guess what's gross?  An abundance of Thai (was that even it, I don't remember) peanut sauce without pasta to soak it up or tone it the hell down.  I could barely eat it.  I picked the chicken out of it, and then offered it to family members who wanted to try it.

Ed was sort of giving me a look, like 'It looks and smells amazing, stop being difficult' then he sampled it.  His eyebrows shot up and he agreed, without the noodles it was all wrong, way too strong.  

Dinner out, take 2:  The last night we ate out again, technically it was our anniversary. Coach thought I was serious when I suggested we leave the kids at the house with a pizza while we went out.  I was like, NO.  Not doing that.  

A storm was coming.  Like a big 'un.  We found the place we had looked up.  They were no longer seating folks outside because it was about to get all 'Toto, we're not in Kansas anymore'. 

We decided to try a Mexican place in a strip mall.  Not the atmosphere I was hoping for.  I preferred a place near the water.  They told us it might be a 45 minute wait.  Nope.  

At last we went back downtown to a cute bar and grill.  The storm hit just as Coach parked across the street.  They could seat us, so I waved the gang inside.  The power went out right after we got to our table, but it came on a minute later.  We watched torrential downpours blow through the streets.

Coach ordered a pulled pork, nacho thing as an appetizer.  It was amazing and I had high hopes for dinner.  I asked for the tacos.  No tortilla.  On a bed of corn chips would be great.  The waitress acted like, YES.  NOT MY FIRST RODEO.

We waited forever for our food.  My tacos came out in flour tortillas.  She sent them back when I pointed out that I couldn't eat them.  Then they arrived at our table 1 minute later in a new basket.  Yep, we are classy people and eating food out of baskets on our 24th anniversary is acceptable.  

Me:  So, can you find out if this is the same taco dinner that you just brought me, because if the chicken was in the flour tortillas then I cannot eat it.  I'll get sick.

Waitress:  Let me check.  (a minute later)  Well, they aren't sure but they don't usually do that.  They usually start over, so let know if you want to re-order just in case.  

Me:  I'll just eat this.  (I didn't want to sit there and wait all over again, and I hate to make a fuss)

Um, the chicken was cold.  Was it the same taco inserts just dumped on chips?  There was hardly any food, mostly chips.  Coach was annoyed.  It couldn't really be classified as an entree.  

Meanwhile:  Reg, Mini, and Curly all ordered a southwest chicken wrap.  The girls wanted plain mayo instead of the spicy kind.  One of them ordered crispy chicken, the other two grilled.  Their dinners were all-kinds of messed up.  They just ate what they were handed with an obligatory eye-roll.  

I contemplated ordering another round of the appetizer since my meal sucked.  Ed admitted that his dinner was not really filling, but he wasn't interested in more appetizer.  Mini later told me that she wanted to strangle him for not agreeing to order it with me.  It was our last night at the house and I was out of other GF options in the fridge.

When we were packing for MI, and by 'we' I mean 'me', I started calling out things for people to grab.  I had a list of my GF food.  Curly grabbed the list  and packed my food.  She forgot to pack these.  It's my favorite food item.  Protein/granola thing with toasted quinoa and GF oatmeal and dark chocolate chips.  It was rough to get through the whole trip without these little yummy treats.  I keep them in the freezer.  Love the crunch.  

We drove downtown after dinner, and Coach asked if I wanted him to stop and get me ice cream.  We had taken the kids out for ice cream the night before.  I hesitated.  Then I said, HEY, YEAH.  I WOULD LIKE SOME ICE CREAM. (damn it - implied).

I got a smaller size than the night before.  None of the kids complained that Coach wasn't buying everyone an ice cream treat.  He reminded them that he had hidden bakery cookies back at the house.  We crossed our fingers that Tank hadn't found them.

I'm not sure if it is a coincidence or not, but after that taco 'meal' I did not sleep great for 3 nights.  That is sometimes how I react to trace amounts of gluten.  Fuzzy head, unable to sleep.  

I used to be big on packing food to save a buck when we traveled.  Then my motivations shifted - I bring food to avoid eating out and getting gluten by mistake.  I do better eating out near home, because I have a few go-to menus that I trust.  

This is just a portion of what we packed.  Some of this is food.  
The cold food was in a huge cooler.  It is a darn chore
 to pack food, but it makes so much sense.

Can I get an amen to the universal mindset:  Hooray for ice-cream?!

Well, I was going to share movies that we watched on vacay, but I gabbed too much about our eating out experiences.  More on movies later.  Oh, and the unexpected visitor on the beach.  Get excited.

I want to find a recipe for this pulled pork nacho appetizer, so if you make something like this please share.