peacefood cafe

Located on Amsterdam and 82nd, peacefood cafe is a vegan restaurant with many gluten free options.  They describe themselves as having healthy and delicious food with seasonal and locally grown ingredients when available.  I've been a few times and agree that they have healthy and delicious food.  I'll take their word on the seasonal and locally grown part.

I like getting the vegetable plates.  They have japanese pumpkin, chinese eggplant, zucchini, cauliflower, brussel sprouts, broccoli, choyote squash, kale, and baby boy choy.  You can choose two or four.  Or you can get two with a cup of soup.  Last week I had some butternut squash soup with zucchini and brussel sprouts.  It was really good and I felt good eating it.

Other gluten free options include fluffy quinoa salad, raw lasagna, raw pizza, raw sushi, potato salad, chickpea fries, and vegetable tamales.  There is also a case of desserts with several gluten free options including cookies, pies, and cheesecake.

This bustling casual restaurant has a really friend staff and the kind of owner that will give you samples of smoothies while you sit at the counter reading a book and eating some butternut squash soup.

Harrison's Restaurant - Hilton Garden Inn State College

I'm in State College for a few days for more business meetings.  I'm watching the whole Penn State scandal unfold on TV as it unfolds outside my window.  Because my meeting isn't until this evening, I was going to drive to Philipsburg to have lunch at the 1921 Restaurant in the Philips Hotel.  I found this place on the Gluten Free Travel Site as well.  Alas, due to the rain and my general laziness, I decided to just stay in my hotel all day.

It turns out that the restaurant in the Hilton Garden Inn where I'm staying also has gluten free options on their menu.  I was unnaturally excited when I noticed this.  I was having a hard time deciding between the Quinoa Risotto, the Mesclun Greens with Rosemary Chicken Salad, and the Modern Waldorf Salad, but the waiter suggested the chicken salad and I was sold.  I was tempted to get a soup to go with it, but decided against it.  They have at least two gluten free soups each day.  At dinner they also have a few gluten free dishes and gluten free pasta.  Having gluten free options is so nice for gluten free guests at the hotel.  I would stay here again just knowing that I could eat safely and well.

I'd also try the Philips Hotel if I was in the area again.  Any one know of other hotels with gluten free eating options?  Not just in PA, but anywhere?

Butternut Squash Soup

With my lack of recipes you might think I don't cook that often.  Well, that's kind of true.  It's especially true in the summer when I mostly eat fresh fruit with cottage cheese or plain yogurt.  Also, living in a city with so many food options, I find myself eating out a fair amount.  But as the season starts to turn to fall, I start to turn to soup.

My mom makes this delicious butternut squash soup.  We ate it while I was home last weekend and then I made it this week.  Easy, healthy, and lasts for days.  It's easy because we use pre-cut squash.  If you have the time and energy to do it yourself, I am very impressed.  The amount of the veggies isn't so important, so don't worry if you don't have it exact.

Ingredients:
2 packages of pre-cut butternut squash
2 medium russet potatoes
1 package mini carrots (1 pound I think)
1 large onion
2 cloves of garlic
4 cups gluten free vegetable broth
2 cups cheddar cheese
salt and pepper to taste
parsley for garnish

Directions:
1) Preheat oven to 425.  Chop the potatoes and onion into large pieces (similar in size to the butternut squash).
2) Put all vegetables and vegetable broth in a large baking dish.  Cover and bake for one hour.
3) Transfer the roasted vegetables and broth into a large pot and blend with an immersion blender.  Or blend in a regular blender before transferring to the pot.
4) Stir in the cheese and shake in a bunch of salt and pepper to taste.  Garnish with some parsley.

Serve with warm bread.

Progresso Soup

We were a Progresso soup family growing up.  That Campbell's soup always looked a little funny straight from the can.  Progresso was perfect for a cold winter day, an afternoon snack, or lunch when there wasn't much else around.  Canned soup remains a good staple to have around for those days when you don't feel like cooking (or haven't been to the grocery store in weeks).

I'm very happy that Progresso has 17 different gluten free soups, including my favorite - lentil.  A list of their gluten free soups is here.  The gluten free soups are marked gluten free, so be sure to check the label.

Hale and Hearty

I used to love Hale and Hearty soup for lunch.  Warm and comforting, it is a great lunch choice for fall, winter, spring, and even some summer days when the air conditioning in your office makes it feel like winter.  Once I went gluten free I was too scared to eat at Hale and Hearty because I wasn't sure if their soups were gluten free or not.   A few weeks ago, though, I really wanted soup for lunch so I emailed them to see.  I wasn't sure I'd hear back, but low and behold, I had an answer within the hour.  Turns out, the vast majority of their soups are perfectly safe to eat.  This information is on their website, but it's a bit difficult to find.  A full list of their gluten free soups is here.

Hale and Hearty has locations all over the city and each day they have multiple soup options.  I've never had one I didn't like and I'm happy to know I can add them to my lunchtime restaurant choices.

I haven’t had a good rant for awhile, so here it is:

There are hundreds of places to eat lunch in midtown Manhattan.  Hundreds.  They are all basically the same.  Delis with overpriced salads, sandwiches, and soups.  Some of them have make your own pasta.  All of them have chips, a variety of beverages, and candy.  Sprinkled in are a few other places: dollar pizza, Chinese, Mexican, burgers.

Most of the aforementioned foods I cannot eat.  I try to bring my lunch as much as possible, but that doesn’t happen as often as I’d like and as a result I’ve had more create your own salads than I can count.  Today I didn’t bring lunch and I couldn’t eat another salad.  What to have, what to have?  I couldn’t think of anything.  I just wanted a sandwich.  Or a slice of dollar pizza.  But no.  Finally I decided on sushi and then realized I didn’t have any more gluten free soy sauce at work.  Next I decided on pasta from this place that has gluten free pasta.  Turns out it closed down.  I wandered around for half an hour trying to find something I wanted and could eat.

I ended up with lentil soup from Pret A Manger.  As I was eating I remembered that ingredients often change and I should check the site again to make sure their lentil soup was still gluten free.  Turns out, it wasn’t.  Seven dollars and an hour of my time later I was too grumpy to care.  I ate the soup anyway.  No symptoms so far but I’m sure my tummy villi are pissed.

Mushroom and Wild Rice Soup

Yes, that is steam rising off the top.

I adapted this recipe from Robert Landolphi's Gluten Free Every Day Cookbook.  The only change to make this soup gluten filled or gluten free is the kind of broth you use.  I, obviously, used gluten free.

This soup is really easy to make, especially because I take the lazy route.  I buy pre-sliced mushrooms, pre-diced veggies, and pre-minced garlic.  The Mirepoix mix of onions, celery, and carrots from Trader Joe's is just about the best thing you can buy.  For $2.99 you don't have to cry while chopping onions, have left over celery in your fridge for weeks, or dice those tricky round carrots.  If you go this route, don't worry about measuring them out - just dump this container in, that's what I did.

4 cups (gluten free) chicken broth
1/2 cup uncooked wild rice
4 tablespoons butter
10-12 ounces sliced mushrooms (whichever kind you'd like)
1 cup diced onion
1 cup diced celery
1 cup diced carrots
2 cloves minced garlic (or 2 teaspoons of the pre-minced stuff)
1 tsp dried rosemary
1tsp dried thyme
2 medium or 1 large russet potato, peeled and diced
1 cup water
salt and pepper to taste

In a medium pot, combine 2 cups of the stock and the rice.  Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer covered for 30-40 minutes until most of the liquid is absorbed.

While this is cooking, melt 2 tablespoons of butter in a large pot over medium-high heat.  Add the mushrooms and cook until golden brown and tender, about 5 minutes.  Put them aside.

In the same large pot, melt the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter and saute the onion, celery, carrots, garlic, rosemary, and thyme for about 5 minutes.

Add the potatoes, remaining stock, and cup of water.  If you have another cup of stock and want to use that instead of water, great, but the broth I buy comes in a carton of 4 cups.  Cover and simmer for about 15 minutes, or until the potatoes are soft.  Add the mushrooms back in.

If you like your soup blended, blend it now.  If you like it more chunky, don't blend.  I stuck my immersion blender right in the pot and blended just a little.

Add the cooked rice and salt and pepper to taste.  I hate when people say "salt and pepper to taste", what does that even mean?  Well, I have no idea, so I just shook in a bunch of each and it turned out just fine.  Simmer over low heat for another 15 minutes.  Enjoy!