-image-Finagling
We’re planning to go to Texas for two weeks at Thanksgiving to… well, show off the baby and give the relatives ample holding time. We only get to go to Texas every other year or so, so we want to spend lots of time with the fam and also see some friends while we’re in town(s). We’ll spend a couple of days driving each way, so that really puts us down at 10 days in Texas. And we’ll need to spend multiple days in each of Amarillo, Big Spring, Fort Worth, and Abilene.
So I’m trying to figure out how I can finagle spending an entire day in Dallas. Close to Ft. Worth, yes, but that’s a WHOLE DAY to cut out of family/friends time.
I usually avoid Dallas as much as possible–I’ve always said it’s good only for sports teams and restaurants (yes, as a 25-year F-Dub resident, I’m firmly in the Ft. Worth camp in the ever-important question of Fort Worth or Dallas?). But see, that’s why I need to spend all day there–food.
I was browsing for gluten-free options in Ft. Worth (since the trip is only 5 1/2 months away) and came across a restaurant called Kozy Kitchen. I first looked at their breakfast menu. Gluten-free French toast. I’ve made it for Frank (quite successfully), but he’s never been able to order it at a restaurant. There’s just something about being able to order your (that is, his) favorite breakfast food at a restaurant that you can’t recreate at home. And of course, there are several things on the breakfast menu I would eat. GLUTEN-FREE PANCAKES, PEOPLE! Again, I can make them and have eaten them, but never have I been able to walk in and order them at a restaurant. Nevermind the Hangover Helper, which just looks YUM. I mean, I’d order it without the eggs, but YUM.
And then I went to the lunch menu. Um… buffalo burger! With a gluten-free option! There’s a bunless option, yes, but this is an option to have your buffalo burger on a gluten-free bun. Yes, yes, I make GF buns all the time, but again, it’s the whole restaurant thing. When you go gluten-free, your restaurant options severely dwindle. Even in the three years that I’ve been gluten-free, the options have expanded hugely, but there are still entire don’t-even-bother restaurants, some restaurants where you can eat maybe one thing unless you want only steamed veggies and boring chicken, and others where the gluten-free items might as well not even be listed, because the cross-contamination is so bad that you’ll be sick no matter what you order. And generally if you’re eating gluten-free, you’re eating expensive, or you’re at Qdoba, Pei Wei, or Chipotle (and in Boise, we have only Qdoba of those three). You can get into a rut where there are only four or five restaurants you’ll go to because you know you can safely eat at them without research (Chang’s, Outback, Chipotle, Qdoba, Five Guys, etc.). So to see a restaurant offering a buffalo burger (have I mentioned my love of buffalo burgers before? Because I would marry them.) with a bun I can eat is just… well, sigh. It gives me hope. And no, you can’t make me care (at least not 5 1/2 months in advance) that I would be paying $14 for a burger. You just can’t. This is the first time I’ve ever seen a gluten-free burger on a menu that isn’t just the meat and fixin’s. I’m sure that’s partially because I live under a rock and we don’t eat out much anyway (costs money), but hey. I just saw a gluten-free bun available for order at a restaurant, so I’m a little giddy.
The dinner menu looks wonderful, but can we just skip right to dessert? All desserts are gluten-free. Ah, so… an assortment of sorbets, right? (I do love sorbet, but I’m not always wanting sorbet.) Listen to this. Italian Wedding Cake, Carrot Cake, Tres Leches. Gluten-free. Bunch of other stuff, too, but those are things I would actually consider ordering. Forget the egg thing. I’ll eat eggs on vacation. Not gluten, but eggs, yes.
So yeah. I have to make this happen for three different meals. Somehow.
