Auntie M's - Gluten Free Food Truck

 Recently my husband and I were talking about state fairs and it came up, that he'd never been to any state fair, ever. I remember growing up, going with one of the neighbors to see the Wisconsin State fair, and going again with friends after college. As I looked at events at the fair I saw Lindsey Stirling was performing one day so we decided we'd get tickets and get there early to check out the fair. The week leading up to the fair I saw a post on a Milwaukee Celiac group about a gluten free food truck being there. I was shocked to realize this was 'a thing'! I had pumped up my husband on how he'd have to get a cream puff, cause it's just what you do at the Wisconsin state fair. But now I had options for amazing food too, not just whatever we hunted down. 

Once we found parking and found our way into the fair we found an information booth and found where the Auntie M's food truck was parked. which was the exact opposite end of the park. The lady at the information booth was doing her best to talk us into other options, but finally gave up when I told her I only wanted gluten free options, she said this was it. She wasn't 100% correct, we saw other options, although limited as we walked around We also saw a Vegan food truck too. 

After joking I was going to order 1 of everything on the truck, I did get a corndog, cheese curds and went back and got a funnel cake. I mean, I had to! I can't remember the last time I had a funnel cake! 

We walked around, checked out the expo center and mile shops, and saw some of the cows being shown, and of course had to check out the pig races. We were waiting for our concert, and my husband found a brat and eventually I decided to get some roasted corn. We want to know how much corn you have to bring daily to meet the demand of the people getting corn. While waiting in line for our corn, I left my husband there to get water and saw a sign on another booth for Gluten Free Chicken, Hamburger, and "Boneless Wings" with sauce. I was in awe! After the concert we wanted a cold beverage and I decided I needed some wings for the walk back to the car. We had so much fun, enjoyed all the food and beverage options, my husband ask "Why don't they do this every weekend in summer, this is fun!" 

The one drawback was, I never eat fried food. It's so hard to find any safe fried food, other than Five Guys Fries or Chik Fila Fries, so all the fried food made my stomach unhappy, but honestly I didn't care! It was all so good and I was able to handle it to get home and some lower back heat helped a lot! 

 For a fair I give them 4 dragonflies, if you look hard enough there are options, and their website has info if a vendor has listed it in their food listing.  For the food truck I give the same rating. I will say they have a perfect model going on technically 3 items, that as soon as someone orders, you make another, knowing you're just going to have a steady stream of customers for those 3 items. So wait time is minimal, and it's food that is rare for someone who is gluten free. I was disappointed they didn't have cheese or honey for the corndogs, but I know I have some weird tastes for how I spice up my food. I am following Auntie M's to see when they may be back near Milwaukee, or if we're heading to Minnesota, where I might find them! 

Water Street Brewing- Wisconsin

Normally when we head up to Eagle, WI area we always head over to David Allen Allen Smokehouse for amazing BBQ. But one of the things we love about them is their outside patio they installed during Covid. It's a nice place to hang and eat with friends. On our recent trip up there it was a misty, rainy day and we were bummed, but thought we'd check Find Me Gluten Free and see what other options might be interesting, and we found Water Street Brewing Co. Now, I know some people have issues with FMGF and the accuracy of the options. But we always read reviews and look at the site before going to a new place. We've yet to be steered wrong, and have found some great places that even our non-gf friends end up frequenting. 

We looked up Water Street and saw they even listed the gluten free menu on their website, so we headed over there. There was a bunch of cute shops right there including Penzy Spices, which I had to stop to get spices from, since they're so gluten free friendly. 

This summer we've been checking out breweries and trying flights where we can, so this fit the bill of what we've been looking for all summer. I was excited at Water Street I could get a fancy grilled cheese with a salad as the side, along with some very tasty cocktails. I'd never thought of a rootbeer Old Fashioned being a thing, and honestly it was super tasty. The server was super knowledgeable and even did a double check on ingredients when I seemed concerned, mostly cause my bread was so large when I saw my sandwich. My husband was excited by the size of his flight and how big the pours were. 

The sandwich was so tasty and while salad is not my preferred side, it was actually a good tasting salad that was fresh and didn't taste processed. We actually ended up here a month later with my brother, who was impressed by the 'foodie' menu they had. Though he says he's not a foodie.... He tried one of the light beers, since we had a lot more stops in our day so he didn't want to get anything too heavy. I got a nicoise salad, I'll be honestly I can't pronounce it, but it was so good. I added beef short rib to it, which was just what it needed. 

Honestly, I'm ready to go back - Everything I've had was so good and the service and the people there are so nice. I give them 5 Dragonflies because the options, the taste and the service are all wonderful! 

 

 

 

Prairie Street Brewing Company

Prairie St Brewing Company - We’ve now been here a few times, not a huge place, definitely has more seating in the summer when you can sit on the patio and watch the water flowing of the Rock River. The menu is a bit hip for a brewery, they are definitely trying to compete with the Chicago microbreweries for Nuevo style foods. We saw one of the appetizers was a cheese board, with tortilla chips. It was a unique style idea. The cheeses were dip/spreadable cheeses. Such a simple idea, and so good. My loving Non GF Hubby kept raving about the Pimento cheese that I actually had to find a recipe and make it at home. Other cheeses included Buffalo cheese and jalapeno cream cheese. All super tasty. I honestly could come here and just eat this. Their beers are not gluten free, (though a review on Findmeglutenfree says they are, they’re not) but they offer several canned ciders. One being Schilling’s Pineapple Mango Cider. Super tasty and unique. I actually hit up Binny’s Beverage Depot and got a case. When I told the server I need to be gluten free, she even told me she’d confirm the cider was gluten free before bringing it out. Really awesome!

Look at this cheese board? Isn't it gorgeous??? 

I got the Taquito salad the first time we came. It was tasty and unique, but I think it was a bit too much Kimchi for my stomach. I didn’t have a gluten reaction, but it definitely left me hitting the bathroom a few times after eating it.

Second visit the menu with the daily specials caught my attention. I’m not a big meatloaf person, but it sounded so good! The ribs sounded good, but a bit to eccentric for me, so I was glad the Non-GF hubby got them so I could try a little but not make such a commitment to the meal. We totally filled up on the cheese board and tortillas, so we had left overs. The food was really good, the portions are hearty, but service is a bit sparse. Our server kept wandering off and we kept having to flag someone down to get what we needed.

  The meatloaf really hit the spot, there wasn't too much sauce and the potatoes were very rich. I love that so much of their food is farm to table and unique. 

I give them 5 Dragonflies for their unique but plentiful menu options and even having GF markings for the daily specials. 

 

We're working on finding another day to take some more friends back to check out what is on the new seasonal menu and hopefully get to sit out on the outside patio and take in some summer sun and beautiful weather.

Alchemy at Aldeen - Rockford

Alchemy at Aldeen – We found on accident, well with the help of Find Me Gluten Free. We were planning on hitting up Prairie Street Brewing, one of our favorite places in Rockford, but noticed the parking lot was beyond packed and nearby vacant lots and street parking were full also. Seeing that Prairie Street is also an event venue, we assumed something was going on, but decided the meal would be slow, long and may not even get a table for some time, but we were hungry and on our way to Wisconsin for the weekend. 

We found Alchemy and headed that direction, it wasn’t far, and happened to be at one of the local golf courses as the country club. The inside of the restaurant was super charming and cute, I felt a bit under dressed, but I don’t think it really mattered. Most people were chilling on the patio or at the bar.

The Gluten Free options on the menu were impressive and plentiful. Most things it felt like could be made gluten free. Their format for the winter months is to operate like a super club and have a fancy cocktail menu to match it.

My husband went with the 52 day barrel aged Old Fashioned and I got a daiquiri. His Old Fashioned was pretty tasty, not strong or harsh and went down smoothly. My Daiquiri was a bit like a margarita and super satisfying. 

For dinner I got the pasta bosco it was super interesting as it had chunks of beef, mushrooms and was in a broth style sauce. I have to try making this at home as it was so good and didn’t give me heartburn since it wasn’t a tomato sauce! The servers were very conscious to call out gluten free when repeating the order and bringing out the food. Which was good, cause the pasta was so good I honestly questioned if it was gluten free. 

The server told us they’d be starting their summer menu soon with handhelds and lighter far for enjoying on the patio. Hopefully that continues to be gluten free plentiful.

I give them 5 dragonflies – The food and drink were both amazing, the staff was attentive, and the ambiance was great. I would go here for a date night any time!

 

Arby’s Eating Dirty

While doing a roadtrip halfway across the country  during covid to visit my Sister-In-Law on the East coast, we got to talking about places to drive thru for options, and trying to find something different, as we got away from our Urban options who would have things like Chik-Fila, Jimmy Johns, Jersey Mikes…. And I questioned “Would an Arby’s beef sandwich be gluten free if served not on a bun?” My husband asked “Would you eat it like that, or on your own bun?” 

So we set off to the grocery store, found some BFree Pita’s and went to Arby’s and ordered a Double Beef and Cheddar in a bowl. We found a cute spot to park near a river by a park and pulled out our car trays and proceeded to have lunch. I built my beef and cheddar into the pita pocket while we laughed and had one of the best ‘dirty food’ meals I’d had in a long time. At the time they still did a side salad as an option so that and my beef and cheddar hit the spot and we cracked up that it took us 10 years to think of this as an idea! At the time Arby's still had a side salad option, which made a nice touch to the meal. Now they no longer have the salad sadly, but I'll survive.

Since than we've stopped at Arbys on more than a few occasions, for something different to eat.  I always make sure to have a bread option with me, or we just take it home to eat. It's such a simple concept, that is quite tasty too.

Tumbled Rock Brewing

Not far outside Starved Rock in Baraboo WI is a tasty brewery - Tumbled Rock Brewing. We found them on a previous trip to go hiking and really enjoyed the food we got. I had gotten the steak tip appetizer (Sans the crostini) and the elote salad. I was expecting a 'normal'serving size for the elote and was shocked at the large portion. I couldn't finish it even with help from my husband, who had gotten a pizza because they have a giant pizza oven, and seems to be their specialty item.

As we were heading back up this way after doing a few hikes, I suggested we stop there for a late lunch get a beverage and some appetizers. We opted to get a few appetizers to share. One thing to note on their menu is anything that is marked GF that is fried, IS in a Shared fryer. Which annoys me when places do this, but I knew to ignore these items. Our server was very engaged an able to punch in 'allergy' & 'gluten free' notes on the items we ordered and she went back and talk to the kitchen to make sure they saw the note. Since the steak tips should have crostini, the server offered to bring us a plate of tortilla chips to go with our food instead. My husband loved the tortilla chips and we took the extras with us to munch on later.

Our meal was fabulous and the rain held off so we had a nice meal on their patio. I give them 4 dragonflies because they have a bunch of options that are GF, and they are tasty. Do keep note that they have a shared fryer for GF items that are fried. So keep that in mind when ordering off the menu. I wish they wouldn't mark those items, as it can be confusing when ordering, to know what really are safe options. Otherwise they seem knowledgeable and diligent with the food on all orders. 

Dempsey's Arkansas Dedicated GF!

Can I say this is amazing - Traveled to Arkansas for the first time to visit my best-friend. Little Rock, though a "larger" town for Arkansas, is still small in my world, living outside Chicago my whole life. So I wasn't sure how gluten free friendly it would be. I started looking things up, and found out they have a gluten free bakery! Dempsey's, It's the cutest little place too. The front reminded me of a re-purposed auto shop turned bakery. They had some fancy pretty cakes on display, some samples of products and your run of the mill cookies, cupcakes.

I tried some of their Cheese Bites, I was sold! They were so good. They had both individual packs of them for instant eating pleasure, and a mix. I got the bites themselves. I told my friend, she might need to ship me more of these when I need a fix. It's a cute, retro looking "diner" that has gluten free goodies! If you're in the Little Rock area, you've got to check them out. They won't disappoint. 

Recently I met my best friend in New Orleans for a trip, I texted her the week before, that she better be going to Dempsey's and getting me some Cheese bites. She even got me a bag of mix, so I can try my hand at satisfying my cravings for these any time I want. I might add a bit less cayanne pepper than they have in it, but they're soooo good! 

They definitely get 5 dragonflies, cause they were a nice random find and dedicated gluten free! Some slightly longer hours would be nice, cause traveling it can be hard to fit in everything, but we made it work! 

Honeymoon Travels Part 2

Monday – Day 4, we’re usually real good with finding hotels that include breakfast, this trip, Only one did! Granted we were booking hotels the same day, as we drove along, got tired and decided to stop, so we weren’t as picky on options. We got going on a nice foggy cloudy morning from Santa Maria we headed North with some Kind Bars for breakfast. We stopped in Pismo Beach after checking out some coastal areas south of there. We found Chip Wrecked for lunch. They had tasty handmade potato chips with so many options from Sweet to salty to savory. We were in heaven. The sandwich I got was huge, mostly because to make a “full” sandwich they used 4 pieces of GF bread! I got a lot of food and tasty chips to go with it. All their sauces are GF too so it was a treat. Though inside they had a whole 4 tables, they seem like a great place to grab food to take to the beach. We stopped and got some McConnell’s ice cream, because the night before in Santa Barbara the line for ice cream was 2 hours long! It was tasty, but a bit melty. We checked out the big rock in Morro Bay, we met some SUPER friendly squirrels who I think were on to us that we had Kind Bars in the car!

Checked out Hearst castle before taking the detour back to the 101 since the 1 was closed due to a mudslide in 2017 on the 1, south of Big Sur. We got into Monterey later at night, found a cute swanky place to rest our heads and find some food. The hotel restaurant was underwhelming so we headed to Carmel and went to the Carmel’s Bistro Giovanni. Not many places were still open at 9:00, but they were and the food was good. It was a bit pricey but well worth all 3 courses! Prosciutto wrapped melon, gluten free fettuccine and crème brulee as well as tasty wine. 

We got a great night’s sleep and headed on to Big Sur in the morning. It was still super foggy along our drive, luckily it cleared up some on our way back up the 1 by afternoon so we could view the Bixby bridge and see the coast. It was around 1:00 we decided we were hungry, so stopped at a little ‘grocery’ market shop, and got some meat and cheese. We had crackers in the car, and grabbed a dessert I’d never heard of, but said it was GF on the package. 

At this point I’d been fighting cell service for some time so grabbing food to eat in the car was easiest. We were running into small shops and B&B’s so not much in terms of places to eat. We kept going back North up the 1, back to Monterey and stopped to see the pier, there were GF options in the area, but nothing hitting our fancy, we’re not the biggest fish eaters, so we debated where to go and saw there was PF Changs, so we decided why not have Chinese food for dinner. Chinese food is the hardest thing to find GF so we hit up PF Changs while making a plan for the day. 

Changs Spicy Chicken Gluten Free

We checked out 17 mile drive, saw some seals and the lone cypress. We laughed at how bad (awful fish smell) Pebble Beach has and that we feel bad for anyone golfing there it’s so overwhelmingly strong!

To make up some time for time lost going around the mudslide area we brushed thru Santa Cruz and San Francisco. (We’ve been to San Fran, Sausalito and Napa before), though we did stop and enjoy a beautiful sunset of the beach before heading thru San Francisco, and since it was later at night, traffic was a breeze. Trying to stay on our coastal route we couldn’t find anything on the coast for a hotel last minute. We ended up in Santa Rosa, which is just West of wine country so hotels were expensive and the cheap ones were creepy! We ended up with a creepy one to stay on price point, it was an experience! Right by our hotel happened to be the Amy’s Drive Thru! 

Sad part, they were closing the same time we got there. They also opened After we’d left the next morning (booooo) But it was fast food haven there, so we took another visit to In-N-Out Burger before heading back to our interesting hotel. Not our best night’s sleep, we headed out early and on to Bodega Bay, back on the coast.

Day 5, Tuesday – Made a stop at the ‘pier’ in Bodega Bay. Nice quiet fishing town, Bodega Bay is the town the movie the Birds was filmed. (Who knew!) We checked out the menu at The Tide’s Restaurant, they mentioned gluten free and we wanted breakfast food, so we were in. Not the tastiest food, it was fine, very healthy! My eggs didn’t have any salt (or cheese) and my hash browns definitely needed salt! 

Omelet and Hasbrowns.

There was the cutest seal duo playing in the water outside the window that kept us amused while eating. At least it wasn’t foggy any more, but man it was COLD! We kept going on our twisty winding drive up the coast, saw more seals, lighthouses, coves, trees, Tide pools. Stopped at the Chandler Drive thru tree and got some ice cream from the ice cream freezer there. Another late dinner we stopped in Eureka for gas, and with signal finally again we found Stuf’t Potato. Nice little family run European restaurant with amazing huge stuffed potatoes. We both got a potato cause it sounded so good! It didn’t disappoint! 

We made it up to Crescent City to spend the night. Our goal was to be in Oregon by morning. Another cute place to stay. It reminded me of the House on The Rock Inn, in Wisconsin. Cute, they had the most simple breakfast buffet, cereal, gluten, hard boiled eggs, fruit and coffee. We got some food and headed to Oregon! We had a lunch date planned with some friends.

Honeymoon - 9 Days on the go, Gluten Free

Traveling Gluten free for 9 days, while staying at a different place each night makes for an interesting trip. You can’t always rely on Find Me Gluten Free, as I had no service for portions of the trip, even with 3 providers between the two of us we were in total cellular dead zones, so some preplanning is necessary when traveling. We did 9 days of mostly eating out and eating junk food with no stomach issues and only 1 dicey hotel stay! I’d say over all it was a successful trip. I couldn’t have imagined how pretty the coast of California is, and honestly we could have spent even more time on the coast in California but we wanted to get to Seattle. We had to omit Portland, sadly I didn’t get to Ground Breaker Brewery, but I know where to order their beer! We did however make it to Ghostfish which was pretty awesome.

The first 3 days were intertwined with my New Hubbies family since we were in Los Angeles for his cousins wedding. After flying in we went to his aunt’s house for dinner. We were pleasantly greeted with 2 frozen Saffron Road Entrees! 

We laughed, most people would be annoyed to go to someone’s house for dinner and be handed frozen entrees. I was thrilled cause I didn’t want to insult her that I was apprehensive to eat something not knowing how she prepped it. She was quite proud of her accomplishment to find me safe food. We hit up Target to get ourselves some snacks for the trip and hit the hay. It had been a long day of work, travel and family. We got up Saturday and looked thru the app and saw a place in Agoura Hills, Hugo’s. Looking at reviews there were so many options and everything is made from scratch and farm to table. The menu was overwhelming. There were so many options. I wanted to get the French toast but was worried about CC since my hubbie got the Green Tamales and eggs, which were marked (GF) but the server said it wasn’t Gf… I got the Desayuno Fuerte. – I learned I like Poached Eggs. We had turned off highways on the GPS so we took a wonderful drive thru some beautiful canyons and mountains. The wedding we were going to was a generic buffet so I was glad I brought some Kind Bars to hold me over while enjoying some cocktails and mingling and meeting more of his family. We did make a mandatory In-N-Out Burger run on the way back to the hotel. As we walked out we looked at each other and went “In-N-Out?” Love when he reads my mind! My Protein Style burger and cheese fries totally hit the spot! 

Sunday we hit up “The coffee Bean and Tea Leaf” for some morning coffee before heading to his cousins house for a surprise party. The same aunt who got the frozen entrees the first night in town made sure to drop off some frozen GF entrees for me again! (She’s too sweet!!) I’d brought some snacks, not sure what was being served. She was worried about us being away from home and not knowing where grocery stores were, I was set! We ducked out a bit early from the party to start our trip up the coast, but not before taking lots of family photos! We made it to Santa Barbara before sunset and looked up some options on FMGF. The Hoffman Brat House looked tasty so we ventured over there. The menu looked good and they had Gluten Free Fried Pickles, Gluten Free Corndog nuggets listed. Upon talking to the server they don’t have a dedicated fryer….. Ugh. I questioned it after we sat down and were waiting for him to come over cause a reviewer said she had opted to NOT get the fries when she found out the fryer had been cross used so it wasn’t safe that day. So I asked and he inquired and told us “no we don’t have any dedicated fryers.” Thanks FMGF, and crappy reviewers. At least there were still options on the menu since it was getting late, we’d already ordered drinks and man was it cold out that night! We got some bacon wrapped dates, (Not marked GF but verified gf) and a brat on a GF bun and a side of pickles. Cute town, good food, bustling despite the cold weather. That rounded out the first weekend for our trip.

Bacon Wrapped Dates, Sign me up!

Gluten Free Brat on a bun and pickles - Yum!