Gluten Free Maui

I just returned from beautiful Maui!!! Mark and I went to Hawaii four years ago and stayed on Oahu at the Hilton Hawaiian in Waikiki. It's amazing what a difference four years makes. On our last trip, I was miserable, unable to find food, and getting "glutened" at least once a day. Four years later, the world has heard of Gluten Intolerance, even in the far-reaches of Hawaii.

We were staying at the amazing Grand Wailea resort. It was beautiful and lush, with incredible landscaping and art. In many ways it was similar to the Hilton Hawaiian Village on Oahu, but far more elegant.

The hotel breakfast buffet gets high marks from me: they had gluten-free cereal (Gorilla Munch) on the buffet! Not "we can get you something from the kitchen." On. The. Buffet. They had a yogurt parfait station, so I used Gorilla Munch instead of granola, and added nuts and dried fruit.

The hotel restaurant Humunumuokanapa's was not as easy. However, they did manage a salmon entree for me, eliminating the sauce that normally comes with it, and substituting a citrus butter sauce. The restaurant was soooo expensive though, that I really felt that they could have done better than a piece of nearly naked salmon for $40. Bu then, at those prices, I might have felt that way, even if I wasn't gluten free.

We ate at a luau in Lahaina -- The Feast of Lele. This was incredible. Regarding the show itself, I've been to two luau's in Oahu, and the one at Disney World, and this was in a different class all together. Food wise, they could not have been more accommodating. I had told them I was GF when I made the reservation, and when I checked in they immediately said "which of you is gluten free?" I didn't need to remind them. They were all prepared for me. Every course that came out, the server either told me it was safe for me, or brought me a separate entree. Even Disney has never impressed me this much, and they are my standard for Gluten Free Accommodation. And the food was delicious. We were so full, we didn't even eat dessert, for fear of exploding.

The other big win in Maui was Mama's Fish House on the north shore. Many years ago, I read about Trader Vic's restaurant, and I thought it sounded so cool. When I finally got to go to a Trader Vic's (in Washington, D.C.) it fell short of my expectations. Mama's Fish House was everything I had wanted Trader Vic's to be! The atmosphere of elegant Hawaiian kitch is hard to pull off, but they did it so well. They were also very knowledgeable about gluten, and knew which entrees were safe. The server even brought me some wheat-free soy sauce (tamari) on the side! After mooning over my husband's terryaki meals for days, it was so nice to finally have some soy sauce. I had Opa, a very meaty fish that is almost like chicken. It was fabulous, and the presentation was beautiful. It was like a work of art. I also had a Lava Flow, which is a pina colada with strawberry syrup drizzled down the side. It was delicious, but more importantly, the server went way way out of her way to ensure it was gluten-free. She and the manager actually went out to the freezer to find the original packaging as the bar didn't have the ingredients list. I hadn't even asked if it was GF. They just took it upon themselves to ensure it was safe for me. They earned my everlasting affection for that!

I also need to mention Joy's, a little health food store in Kihei (east side of Maui). After so many rich meals, we were relieved to find this little oasis of "normal food." When people talk about "homestyle" cooking, they usually mean fried foods (at least here in the South). But the food my mama made was never chicken fried steak. We ate low fat, low salt, with lots of veggies. So for me, this was "homestyle." Mark had a turkey and avocado sandwich. He had it on bread, but it was also available in a rice wrapper or wrapped in kale, both great GF options. I had vegetarian chili with tortilla chips. I tasted their soup of the day, which was potato (very good) and they also had smoothies, so there were lots of good choices for the Traveling Celiac.

Gluten Free Bama Goes to Santa Fe

From my mother:
Steve and I flew out on Friday to Santa Fe. I took food with me, since you don't know what will be showing up foodwise on the road. We were upgraded to first class (both ways!!!!) so I was able to eat some of the shrimp salad and the fruit salad. We went to the art auction site early in the evening and they had a little munchies buffet, so we ended up skipping dinner Friday night all together. I ate mostly celery sticks myself—with a little glass of sparkling wine. We stayed at the Hotel Santa Fe which has a very nice small restaurant called Amaya. The staff there was very knowledgeable and we had breakfast there both Saturday and Sunday. They made off menu breakfasts for me of eggs, potatoes with a little paprika and a side dish of beans. Saturday night we had dinner there as well and the meal was spectacular. It was a very reasonably priced prix fixe menu, and I ordered the salmon. It was supposed to come with a blue cheese risotto, but for me they served some very nice little diced potatoes with some pearl onions with a sort of pesto like seasoning. They also served me some extra vegetables, including some small roasted carrots that were quite nice. The meal started with a salad the had diced jicama in it and a very light lime dressing. The dessert though was bowl-licking good. It was two small desserts on one plate – a very nice crème brulee and the real killer dessert – espresso pot de crème topped with whipped cream. Whoa! That's when I wondered if I could get away with picking up the little cup and licking it clean.

We did skip lunch both Saturday and Sunday, since the breakfasts were a bit late to coordinate with the auction times. We went to the car both days though while the auctions were in progress and items we were not going to bid on were up, and ate crackers and potato chips and fruit. I should note that the Hotel Santa Fe is within walking distance of a Whole Foods Market and I walked over there –going through the Santa Fe Farmer's Market on the way. I would have loved to buy some of the creative chili wreaths, but worried about getting them back on the plane undamaged.

Sunday after the auction we drove down to Albuquerque and using the GPS found Paisano's which was a wonderful oasis in the gluten-y desert. We split a sausage stuffed Portabello Mushroom with a very tasty spaghetti sauce and I ordered pizza!!! Wow. That was wonderful. There were many dishes that I could have ordered, but the one that I never get is pizza. And it was very good pizza too. We took our leftovers – Steve had pizza too—in separate little cartons (his was “normal”) and kept them over night in the refrigerator in our hotel room and ate pizza for breakfast before the trip back.