Monday, October 15, 2012

Adjustment and Disappointment

Just a warning, this post contains a little bit of whining on my part J

If you have read my last few posts you will note that I have been moving into the gluten-free world, not because I think it’s some great new diet that will help me lose weight, but because I have Celiac’s disease and it’s required.  I understand that some people out there think this is a way to lose weight, it isn’t, and actually, many of the replacements that are used to make baked goods are higher in calories than plain ‘ol whole wheat.

This is where I pause for a bit of a rant.  Eating out is a pain in the you know what.  I used to enjoy going out for dinner, even on WW, there were always a bunch of options for me.  Now that I have to eat GF the options are severely limited.  Even restaurants that offer a so-called GF menu offer very little on that menu.  Most of the time you will find salads and plain chicken or fish (no sauce, those always have wheat), a burger with no bun of course, I always have to ask because a good portion of restaurants put breadcrumbs in their patties.  It’s frustrating, discouraging and all of those negative things.  I have been shocked about what isn’t GF, no wonder I felt so awful all of the time, wheat is everywhere.

I had a particularly bad experience yesterday at the local Olive Garden.  My husband wanted spaghetti and meatballs that weren’t GF.  Ok, this I can do, I checked Olive Garden’s website, where they say they have a GF menu and even GF pasta (penne only).  When I get there I ask for the GF menu, it has 5 items on it, not including salad and the kids menu, two of the items are basically the same thing (pasta with marinara sauce, one is a little different because they put fresh tomatoes and garlic in the marinara sauce).  To say I was disappointed was an understatement.  Why in the world would a meat sauce contain wheat???  I make meat sauce at home all the time; there isn’t any need for wheat unless you are using it as an inexpensive filler.  When I relented and ordered one of the two pasta dishes on the menu I thought, this is ok, at least I can still eat here.  Then it arrived, it looked good at first, but it only looked good.  When I dug into my big bowl of GF pasta it wasn’t even close to fully cooked.  I couldn’t get a fork through the pasta, it wouldn’t even bend!  I was upset, my husband was mad because I was upset and I just wanted to cry.  To say that the manager was dismissive about it would be an understatement.  I’m not sure I will go out again for a long time; I’m really tired of being disappointed.

Anyway….after that I went to B&N and found some good cookbooks.  Everything I eat from now until I can convince myself that it will be ok to go out again will come from my kitchen.  I’m a better cook anyway.

On the positive side, getting back to tracking in WW is making a difference, I lost 2 pounds last week, yay!

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