Gluten-free in NYC and Travel Tips

Without fail if you tell others you are going to New York, they will a) Tell you to call it the City (New York, New York that is) because that’s how the locals refer to it and b) tell you that you must go eat at Lombardi’s for the pizza and Steak N’ Shake for those special brioche buns.

Those restaurants don’t hold the same glow for someone looking for gluten-free treasures though. 

Not to fret, NYC holds plenty of options that I’ll share with you below! I’ll end the post sharing some non-food notes from our five day trip.

FOOD and associated area-In case you happen to do some of the same activities, here’s food that was near by!

 

 La Cabana Salvadorena-Washington Heights

Our local friends wide eyed commented “You went there? You want to get shot???” To be fair we went to that area looking for lunch on Yelp after the Cloisters museum. No warnings that I saw by Yelpers. We wouldn’t want to be in that neighborhood at night. The subway was a long, somewhat dark and very dingy. Bring your picky meat eater here for steak and peppers with bean soup. The vegetarian gets to savor lorocco papusas, a crisp-chewy masa (corn flour) dough that ensconces gooey-cheese and squash blossoms. Eat those babies up with the cabbage and salsa (?) topping. Another plus was a TV to catch some of the World Cup.

Zabar Market-Upper West Side location

My friend attended classes at Columbia University and mentioned she still had not checked out this local/specialty food and kitchen store. So off we went in the rain. A magnificent panoply of cheeses and olives! House roasted coffee beans and tea blends. My favorite find was a gluten-free rugelach cookie. Looked like a fabulous place to pick up the fixings for a picnic to pack for Central Park.

Bare Burger-Hell’s Kitchen

Can I call it a tradition if this is the third time we’ve HAD to hit a burger place while being out of town (Nashville and Long Beach)? After scouting out discounted tickets at the TKTS booth in Times Square, we were hankering for lunch. Café Terratin (French, gluten free, sustainable) in Hell’s Kitchen was closed on Saturdays so we just took our chances walking to the area to find something suitable. Dave eyed this restaurant and I actually had perused the menu online before the trip-most pleasingly they had gluten free buns, free range meats and even a veggie burger option. You must try the fries with dipping sauces (two of them may have dairy, but I think the curried-ketchup is safe).

Dellarocca’s-Brooklyn

What is a NYC trip without pizza? We did the walk from NYC Centennial Park to Brooklyn crossing the bridge on foot. We continued on to a few parks that Bash ran wild in, skipped the long line at the Ice Cream Factory, watched boats along the waterfront and came across a gathering of food vendors (maybe just there for father’s day). As the humidity and warmth was relentless, we Yelped to find AC at a sit-down restaurant that carried a non-salad gluten-free option. I was tickled to see that the gluten-free crust was handmade (no machine cut perfect circle) and that the sauce tasted of fresh tomato.

Amber’s-West Village

This is a NY friend’s favorite sushi-Thai food bar. We met her and her boyfriend after work there to enjoy a roasted eggplant appetizer, and then some raw sushi. I tried escolar for the first time-a creamy white tuna! For the sports fans, they had World Cup playing on the bar’s tv.

Risotteria-West Village

We were in the neighborhood to do the Empire State Building. Dennis had looked up this restaurant for me since it was a gluten-free Italian food. Don’t expect to see pasta here though, they specialize in the arborio rice dish risotto. The chefs can accommodate dairy free to leave out the butter and cheese. I tried the squid-lemon risotto which would have been wonderful with the cheese to balance the citrus but my stomach had protested. The best goodie was refills on the gluten-free breadsticks. If I had more time or a larger suitcase, I would have bought some of the gluten-free bread loaves or baking mixes there.

David’s Tea-West Village

This is a shop & not sit down place, but had to mention it since it’s just across the street from Risotteria. Bonus that they were open until 10pm (it is the only shopping I was able to do with our busy schedule!) In addition to the more traditional teas, they have many creative blends of tea (just check the ingredients if you have sensitivities, I noticed some have dairy because they add chocolate or soy lechitin) such as blueberry pancake or sparkling cream soda. They will weigh you out any amount of tea you would like. They originally started in Canada and have expanded to NYC and LA.

If you are hoping for a sit-down place, I can’t speak to the service or drinks but in China Town across from the Relax Foot Spa on Hester (great place to treat your tired feet and back-pack weary shoulders…ask for Mike or Jacky if you can), I spied a Japanese tea café, I think it was one where the servers had cute maid and animal ears!

Candle79-Upper East Side

Doing a whirlwind tour of the MoMa, I did a fist pump for being able to check an entire ONE place off my list since this place was just down the street. It’s a popular place so luckily we got in without reservations at lunch time. They had a separate gluten free menu and you can avoid soy here if you do a mushroom dish instead of tempeh. The flavorful mushrooms and asparagus crepe made me sigh happily and left me with room to eat an entire Mexican chocolate brownie (yeah, you heard right, a gluten free brownie!) with non-dairy ice cream (I did not ask if this was soy or coconut based…you may need to ask about this). Vegan-phobes can rest easy by ordering Angel’s nachos. The other non-gluten free desserts our table seemed to have no trouble disappearing were the cannoli and strawberry-rhubarb pie.Thank you, Clarisse for the recommendation.

Coney’s Cones-Coney Island

I had read on Gluten is My Bitch blog (love this lady’s cheeky logo for the banner) that Coney Island is a desert for gluten-free choices. Nathan’s wasn’t a draw for us but we paused at the clock that counts down until the next annual hot dog eating contest (read Think Like a Freak if you want to learn how the Japanese Man experimented on himself and approached the problem from a different angle to find successful training methods).  We were going out on the 45 minute train ride to rest our feet, soak in the beach rays and grab an ice cream (no dairy free, no special gluten free cones). I indulged with a Pink Gorilla (strawberry banana with fudge) and Dave had a bi-polar bear (white chocolate and oreo…not gluten free, darn!) The board walk for Brighton Beach there stretches on quite a while-so we did at least 20 minutes of walking. We were a weekend shy of the official open season for Coney Island so hardly any rides were running and no fireworks would fly that night. When the Aquarium opens the Shark exhibit it should be fantastic (doing construction when we went, but looks enormous). Coney Island is another area where you should just stick to the boardwalk at night, the surrounding area isn’t so nice.

LODGING

Even the hostels are fairly pricey ($100/night) in the popular areas on Manhattan, at least when I looked for summer. Of course it’s awesome if you have a friend or relative who can house you for free, but if that’s not an option…read on. Would advise if you stay in NJ to save money, try a city that is served by PATH train. We did Union City and it was reachable by bus-could not buy a weekly pass, carrying change was a pain. My NY friend said if she had thought about it she would have told us to stay in Queens instead to save money.

ACTIVITIES

I mentioned many activities during the food section, but this is what else I would share with others:

• Be ready to wait an hour or more after you sign up for a time for the Top of the Rock (Rockefeller Center)-the bottom floor is a mall so plenty to do, unless you’re there at 9pm like we were. Hurray for sipping Starbucks.

• Many of the museums are by donation. We bought the City Pass online (using Dave's corporate discount) to help speed up waiting in lines though. If you pick up the City Pass at Natural History Museum, just ask staff where Will Call is (we were told wrong several times).

• Central Park has free summer concerts (thanks, Ann) and Shakespeare in the Park (there is an online ticket lottery and regular lottery)

• ·For Statue of Liberty trips to the Crown and Base may sell out, even if you look two weeks ahead online. Instead, we opted to see the Lady from afar by doing the Circle Line cruise to get oriented with Manhattan (and of course to have sit down time). However, my friend reports you may be able to go first thing in the morning to the ticket counter and get inside the monument.

So many places I didn't get to eat or see, but there can be a next time! Although the next trip out to NY, I'd like to explore Rochester and the northern areas. 

Coming up next: The library surprised me with a Filipino-American cookbook full of inviting pictures and explanations of “mysterious” types of coconut, calamansi juice and variations on traditional ingredients for a US cook. 

Do you have any summer or travel traditions? Have you recreated anything from your travels this summer?

Slow Cooker Split Pea Soup, Juicing cleanse

Are you feeling a bit chilly because you are doing a juicing detox for the summer? Try making this as a preparatory meal as I did before you start juicing or following your juicing. I was following the same format as last year 3 days of eating whole foods (trying to avoid dairy, meats, refined sugars, processed items), then going into juicing 3 days and coming off for 2 days with citrus juice and veggie soup (salad ok at the end of the second "off" day...sooner might cause discomfort in your intestines/stomach)

I was first introduced to split peas while traveling from Indiana to California at Split Pea Andersons as a kid. My mom says when they went this earlier this year, the restaurant does carry vegetarian (ham served separately on the side).

A split pea is nutritionally rich and you just spend 5 minutes throwing the ingredients in, then leave it sitting all day? Three cheers for split pea soup that I found on Chow.com!  Self Nutrition data website says 1 cup of cooked peas gives about 16 g of protein (that's half a scoop of my rice protein Sun Warrior and tastes much better!) and 14% of the daily iron needed.

A random factoid courtesy of Professor K for a class I took last semester, you can try this iron related experiment. Find a significant other or someone your are tight with of the opposite sex. Wash your hands, and pull your lower eye lid down. See the reddish color of the membrane underneath your eyeball? Remember it. Go to your partner/friend and check out the color of theirs.

This is a recipe that your mouth appreciates but your eyes may avert (think swampy lagoon). No pic today then.

Chow's Slow Cooker Split Pea Soup (or other 'mushy' legume)

Modifications: no meat, halved recipe-4 servings

Seasonings:Used 1/2 tsp garlic powder or 2 fresh garlic cloves, 2-3 shakes smoked paprika, 1 tbsp sundried tomato flakes
2 oz mung beans + 6 oz split peas (or other beans that get mushy when cooked, last time tried 2 oz split peas and 6 oz of red lentils)
1/2 cup chopped onion
1/2 tsp celery salt
1 bay leaf
2 cups broth
1 cup water

Favorite 2014 Juicing Recipes

My thoughtful girl friend (pictured above) had sent me an extensive list of juicing recipes when she and her husband were on a health kick a couple years ago. I've tried two of them this time around and have to say my favorite is the "Liver Cleanse". Sorry I did not take pictures, they weren't super beautiful-the beet color dominated this one.

2 Apple

¼ Grapefruit (W/O peel)

1 Small Bunch Grapes

¼ Lemon (W/O peel)

½ Beet

For a savory juice, the 6 tomatoes (I did 4 large round tomatoes) + 1/2 peeled lemon + 1 cup beet greens is a welcome break from sweet liquids. It made about 12 oz of juice. Drinking it the second day isn't as tasty-tomato starts to taste odd to me. Tried adding the spice that the unknown author suggests, with cumin or another no salt seasoning blend (Healthy Heart from Seattle's public market), gives some nice variety but wasn't a award winner. Fresh cilantro might be best to try next time like a salsa smoothie! It came out an ugly mud color since mixing red and green.

Tips if you're doing a multi-day juicing cleanse:
1. If you can start on a day where you don't need to work, it is somewhat easier.
2.  Dial it down-don't have to avoid working out, but listen to your body. I like to pick one activity per day (yoga, hiking, running or light to medium weights) during the detox. 
3. Reiterated from last time, if you have health concerns, recommend talking with a professional before doing a juicing cleanse. 
4. There's probably never a "good" time to do it, always people want to go out to eat, celebrations. Just see what you could afford to miss, unless you feel steely enough to be around people eating.
5. If you can wash and cut up some of your produce the night before you want to juice, it can save time (making the beets drink it still took me a good 10-15 minutes to complete the recipe-need to wash out the juicer before the pulp sticks)
 6. Separate the fruit dominated sweet juicing pulp from the savory in ziplock bags in the freezer or in silicon muffin tins for portions. You can save the pulp to use in soups, meatloafs, baked goods. Do a search online.

Last year's juicing recipes and coming off: 
Juicing Days 4-6 Sample Meals
Days 7-8: Meal Planning, candied orange (non detox) and no bake protein powder truffles


Report: For whatever reason, my body was not up for doing the full three days of juicing. I cut it to 2 days and a breakfast juice on the 3rd. I was tired and not even feeling like doing scrapbooking or reading a book for fun. This was abnormal. I could have just spent the day sleeping and juicing, but really wanted to get some crafting or reading done so...made the switch over to light, clean meals. Key take away-don't be too hard on yourself, listen to your body as far as when to push a little past comfort and when to ease off...well, I get that reminder every time I do yoga-and I got to apply it in another part of life.