Maple Grill

Tags

allergy friendly, Dairy-free, Kosher, lactose-free, Vancouver

Another huge hit in Vancouver, the Maple Grill is a Kosher restaurant located on Broadway near the Burrard Bridge.  One of the requirements of Kosher cooking is the complete separation of meat and dairy products.  So any meal with a meat component cannot also contain a dairy component.  Since this particular Kosher restaurant was a grill…yeah, it was nice to be able to order pretty much anything off the menu.  In fact, I think the only thing I couldn’t order was dessert.  I’m pretty sure the rest of the menu was dairy-free!

After much debate on what to order (I’m not quite used to having so many options), I ordered the Herb Crusted Chicken Breast (“gently grilled”) with Roasted Baby Potatoes, Mushroom Gravy, Seared Lemon and Seasonal Vegetables.  Of all the menu items, why this one?  Because I saw the word “gravy” and thought about the last time I was able to order a gravy at a restaurant.  Hint: I couldn’t recall a “last time”…  Being able to order something with a gravy just made me smile.  Sometimes it’s the little things in life!  The chicken was moist and well-seasoned, the gravy was delicious (on both the chicken and the potatoes) and I enjoyed every minute of a restaurant experience where dairy wasn’t really an issue at all.

They are open from Sunday to Thursday and have take out available on Friday (as they observe the Shabbat), and if you’re in Vancouver, I highly recommend this restaurant (visit their website here)!  Overall, I found the price reasonable and the food and service excellent.

 

Daiya Homestyle Ranch Dressing

Tags

Dairy-free, Daiya, lactose-free, Ranch Dressing, Salad Dressing

There aren’t words.  Since this is a blog post, I need to come up with some to describe how incredibly thrilled I am with Daiya’s new Homestyle Ranch Dressing, but there aren’t really any words to describe how wonderful this is.  So, let me count the ways:

1. It tastes like ranch dressing.  Or at least how I remember ranch dressing.  But my husband (who can still have regular dressing) agrees that it does, in fact, actually taste like ranch dressing.
2. It’s not soy based.  I try to reduce my soy intake if it’s easy to do so (I don’t go out of my way, but it’s something I pay attention to).  Daiya just makes it so wonderfully easy.
3. It’s not liquidy.  It’s actually a thick dressing so the texture is even like ranch dressing.
4. I recognize most of the ingredients.  Even the ones I don’t commonly see are not some random chemical.  Daiya takes the time, if you want to read about it, to explain their ingredients.  For someone with allergies, I always appreciate that.
5. Oh, and by the way, IT TASTES LIKE RANCH DRESSING!

Anyway, I highly recommend at minimum trying this product.  I’m on my second bottle (and it hasn’t been very long since my grocery store put the dressing on the shelf).  They came out with two other dressings, but I was a huge fan of the taste of ranch so I dove for this one first.

Blueberry Pie Recipe

Tags

Blueberry pie, Dairy-free, dessert, lactose-free

With blueberries being one of the few fruits I can eat, I wanted to take advantage and make a pie!

Ingredients:

5 cups fresh blueberries
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 package refrigerated pie crusts (you want both a top and bottom crust, so make sure the package comes with two crusts)
1 cup sugar
1⁄2 cup flour
1⁄8 teaspoon salt
1⁄2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 tablespoons earth balance butter
1 tablespoon canola oil
1 teaspoon sugar
extra ground cinnamon (as needed)

Instructions

1. Add lemon juice to berries and give it a quick mix.  Set aside.
2. Roll out one of the pastry crusts into a pie-pan, according to package directions.
3. Combine 1 cup of sugar, flour, salt and the 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon and add to the berries.  Mix well and pour into pastry shell.  Dot the top with the earth balance butter.
4. Unfold the remaining pastry and use a knife (I used a pizza cutter) to create strips.  Create a lattice pattern on top of the pie, making sure to crimp the edges where they meet.*
5. Brush top of pastry with the canola oil, and sprinkle with 1 teaspoon sugar and the extra ground cinnamon.  Cover the top loosely with aluminum foil.
6. Bake at 400° for 40 minutes.
7. Remove the aluminum foil and bake for another 20 minutes.  Make sure the blueberries look slightly watery/liquidy (and slightly bubbling) and the crust is golden brown before removing from the oven.
8. Let the pie sit for at least an hour before serving, otherwise it will be too runny.
9. ENJOY!

Right out of the oven before I let it sit for a few hours!

* If you don’t want to do a lattice pattern, just add the uncut pastry to the top of the pie, seal the edges, and cut slits in the top so the steam can get out.

The Wallflower

Tags

allergy friendly, Carnivore Friendly, Celiac Friendly, Omnivore Friendly, The Wallflower, Vancouver, Vegan Friendly, Vegetarian Friendly

The first, and last, stop on my too short Vancouver culinary journey was an adorable little hole-in-the-wall diner called The Wallflower.  The Wallflower has a regular and a vegan menu, providing options for a variety of different people, and they self-describe themselves as “Omnivores, Carnivores, Vegan, Vegetarian and Celiacs” friendly.  Importantly, they understand their business.  I’m not vegan, but I can’t have lactose (so I’m dairy-free whenever I eat out).  They understood that and helped me mix both menus to have a wonderful meal.  Two meals, in fact: lunch the day we flew in and breakfast before hopping on our cruise ship.

We flew into Vancouver at eleven a.m. the day before we were set to cruise and were more than ready for lunch by the time we found our luggage and checked into our hotel.  We were meeting my parents and brother (and later my husband’s family), so we had a plan that they would eat at The Wallflower and pick my husband and I up some wraps to eat in the car.  I turn on my phone and there’s this text from my mother asking where in the world I sent them to eat, since they were not expecting the eclectic little diner.  Not long after I received a text saying that the food is incredible, never mind the last text.

When they showed up with our wraps, mine was labeled “ALLERGY”.  Needless to say, there was no confusion about whose food was whose.  They understood that I wanted to have the regular Chicken Wrap, just with a few allergy-friendly changes.  They didn’t question anything other than making sure I could eat tomato.  My mother was impressed with their thoroughness and understanding.  And the wrap was probably the best wrap I’ve had in a long time.  I wish we weren’t across the continent because I’d love to be nearby just to sample more of their food!

Luckily, my husband and I were already planning on eating breakfast there.  Breakfast is always my hardest meal to eat out (not that the other meals are particularly easy), but the half vegan menu was exciting because it meant options!  I had their eggs benedict with vegan sauce and vegan bread.  It was delicious!  Way too much food for me, but that just made me wish my stomach was bigger!  Judge for yourself:

It was as good as it looks.  And, once again, I’m really wishing I could frequent this restaurant!

 

Vancouver, BC

Tags

allergy friendly, Vancouver

Like anyone with food challenges, traveling can be a scary and difficult thing.  Where do I eat?  Will I have to cook for myself?  Will everything be okay?  Traveling anywhere has been difficult since my lactose intolerance and other allergies have gotten much worse.

Enter Vancouver.   I was only there for a day, but it seemed like a food allergy haven.  Everywhere I ate was particularly sensitive to my issues and, just as importantly, knowledgeable about what ingredients were used in their food.  You’d be shocked (or not…I always am) by how unaware people are of the ingredients in the food they’re serving.  And I don’t just mean the service staff.  I mean the chefs as well.  The amount of times I’ve heard, “Well…we don’t make that on site so we really have no way of knowing what’s in it…” is astonishing.  I always assumed that either things were made on site or they came with ingredient labels…but I guess that’s not the case…but I digress.

That, being the whole unawareness of what’s actually in the food, was distinctly not a problem in Vancouver (at least where I dined).  The service staff and chefs alike were knowledgeable.  And, get this, they listened to what the food challenges were.  They were responsive and communicated if there were any concerns.  Because of this, there was not a single issue at any of the three places I ate at.  I wish I was there longer.

I might drag my husband back there just to do a food tour, since I never thought I’d get to do a food tour.  I’ll post about each of the restaurants I ate at, but I wanted to take a second to rave about the general attitude of the city first.  In case I didn’t make it clear: Vancouver was awesome!

Meatloaf Recipe (with bacon)

Tags

bacon, Dairy-free, entree, lactose-free, meatloaf

This meatloaf was so moist it was falling apart!  It was a huge hit with my husband and company!

Ingredients:

1 tablespoon canola oil
1 sweet onion (minced)
4 cloves of garlic (minced)
2 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
2 eggs
1/2 cup of almond milk
1/2 cup of ketchup
1 cup of Ian’s Gluten-Free Italian Style Panko Breadcrumbs
2 pounds meatloaf mix ground meat
3-4 strips of bacon (as needed)

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. In a skillet, heat the canola oil over medium heat.  Add the onion and garlic and cook until tender (about ten minutes).  Don’t brown the onions and garlic.
3. Add the salt, cumin and nutmeg to the onions and garlic.  Cook for another two minutes to combine flavors.
4. While the onions and garlic are cooking, add the eggs to a medium mixing bowl.  Whisk the eggs.  Add in the almond milk and ketchup and combine well.  Add the breadcrumbs and whisk well.
5. Add the meat to a large bowl.  When onions and garlic mixture is finished, add to the meat.  Add the wet ingredient mixture.  Using your hands, combine all the ingredients until well mixed.
6. Line a bread pan with aluminum foil.  This will help you take the meatloaf out in one piece.

Before going in the oven.*

1. Cook for an hour and fifteen minutes.  Make sure the meatloaf is fully cooked (I prefer to make sure that a meat thermometer reads 160 degrees) and remove from the oven.  Drain off some of the fat/grease.  Carefully pull out of pan and let sit for 10 minutes.  Serve!

 

*The first time I made this I didn’t use aluminum foil, and it fell apart while I was trying to get it out of the pan.  Tasted great through!