"Hello, my name is Dick, I'll be your waiter tonight"

After a hectic week I decided a little quality time with my good friend was in order.  We spent most of the day outside (my favorite).  We discussed where to go to dinner, tossing around ideas.  She knows that I am a little more selective.  I mentioned that I heard Olive Garden had a gluten free menu. 

So we go, and it's packed.  We're lucky to get a table quickly.  That's where we meet Dick, our waiter.  He gives us our menu, I don't see a special section, so I ask for the gluten free menu.  One the menu are four choices, no prices.  I scan the regular menu.  I find something that looks like the picture above.  The only thing that could possibly have gluten is it, is the Venetian Apricot sauce.  So I start asking questions, which my waiter said things like "well it's not on the gluten free menu"  and I would counter with "what are the ingredients of the sauce!" Clearly at this point I have identified that this looks to be the most appetizing.  Needless to say I did get it, without the sauce.  But before my meal came, I was served this salad

Yes those are croutons you see.  The thing about it, is that the waiter acted overly interested and overly professional.  He also continued to ask me to gluten myself....what a tricky guy.

I picked croutons out with care.  But you would have assumed...

Needless to say, being a celiac and eating at a place life olive garden where the bread sticks are endless is like window shopping in Paris with no money.  It's a huge tease.  Bordering on not worth t.  Sorry Olive Garden, I give you a rating of one star.

I also made peanut butter cookies this week.  I reduced the amount, because who am I kidding, I live alone.  I used one cup peanut butter, one cup sugar, 2 eggs and 1 tablespoon vanilla (I halved that amount) Easy easy.  And really moist.  That looks like just peanut butter but trust me this is mixed.  I did do some research on the calories of this, it wasn't pretty.  Let's just say we'll be doing some cardio because of this little indulgence.

Oh!   I forgot to mention that I added dark chocolate .  Mostly because I had them and I recently read that dark chocolate makes you smarter or something (okay I skimmed the article).

I wanted to talk a minute about a resource I found http://www.livingwithout.com/.  It has lots of ideas.  I will also say that the name is misleading.  I actually scoffed when I first found it, "like hell I'll be 'living without'".  And I will also say that because I am actually digesting food properly, eating has become a favorite past time. No more feeling sick after eating!  I have noticed what has become a little bit of a bulge around the midsection...so I need to find the balance of life.  I think balance is what we all seek; more than happiness, love or wealth. Without a balance the ride just isn't worth it.