Chains Of Indian Restaurants
As a coeliac, one of the safer places to eat is an Indian restaurant. Especially, if they are one that uses gram or chickpea flour, like most good ones do!
But what is surprising, is that we’ve had lots of restaurant chains with an Italian theme, but I’ve never really come across a nationwide chain of traditional Indian restaurants.
Years ago, I ate with C and a couple of friends at a restaurant in Doncaster, which was part of a small chain. I wasn’t sure of the name, but it was something like Aargh.
Yesterday, when thinking about eating in Manchester, I thought how easy it would be, if there was a well-known Indian chain, that could be searched. Using such things as Trip Advisor is always a bit hit-and-miss, but if you’ve eaten in one of the chain and know the standards are acceptable to you, you know you’re probably safe with another. It’s probably one of the reasons, I eat in Carluccio’s so much!
I did find the restaurant and it’s called Aagrah and according to their web site, they have twelve restaurants.
Was My Dinner Last Night What It Said On The Packet?
When I came back from Huddersfield last night, I was a bit peckish.
One of the problems had been that the only gluten-free sandwiches available in the Marks and Spencer in Piccadilly station was cheese and pickle.
Yuck! Only Cheese And Pickle!
I do eat quite a bit of cheese, but I generally only eat ones with the extra mould in them like Rochfort. And for some reason cheese and pickle sandwiches are not of my liking.
I did think about stopping off in Islington at either Carluccio’s or my favourite Indian restaurant, but as it was so cold, I decided to see what I could get in Marks and Spencer’s at the station and then get a bus home immediately. So I bought one of their roast pork dinners for the microwave, as that would mean I’d be able to cook it quickly.
Roast Pork With Cider Sauce
It is a favourite of mine, as I find that the sauce calms my throat well. It’s a bit sticky and I suspect like ginger cake, it absorbs the rhinitis and transfers it to the acids in my stomach.
Can I be sure I was eating pork, without a full DNA test?
It certainly tasted like pork and the meat was light and in slices, so the only other thing it could have been was perhaps a very plump bird.
So I doubt that it was anything but pork and I certainly don’t think it was horse.
But reading the ingredients, were the Apples Bramleys, the Cabbage Savoy or the Oil Rapeseed?
Surprisingly the mashed potato, which I’ll admit was nice contains double cream. The other surprising ingredient was the lemon juice in the roast pork.
It certainly didn’t contain any of the dreaded gluten.
Crazy Ticket Prices
Yesterday, I went to the football at Ipswich. I’ve always found evening matches difficult and expensive, as I’ve never really found a sensible gluten-free restaurant or cafe in the town and usually I have to pay through the nose, to come out of London in the rush hour. Yesterday though, I decided to come early on the four o’clock train and then go to Woodbridge to have a curry in the Royal Bengal by the station, before getting a train back to Ipswich for the match.
I’d expected to have to buy two return tickets, one for Liverpool Street to Ipswich and return and another for the short journey between Ipswich and Woodbridge. But I was sold a return from the Zone 6 Bounday to Woodbridge for just £20.95. This compares with the two tickets I bought on Saturday to get to Ipswich for a total of £18.25. So the extra journey to Woodbridge cost me £2.70. An Off Peak Senior Day Return would appear to cost £2.80 bought on the Internet.
So it would appear I got a bargain. There was also no problem using the effectively one ticket to do two journeys.
I also saved twenty pounds by not travelling in the rush hour, which was enough to pay for the meal.
It would be nice to have a decent gluten-free restaurant somewhere between Ipswich station and Portman Road.
A Good Gluten Free Party
Tonight, I went to the launch party for Celia lager at the Regent Pub in Islington.
The pub supplied some of their gluten-free pizzas and there was also a selection of savouries like quiches from the WAGFree Bakery in Brixton.
What more could a coeliac want?
Everybody seemed delighted with the beer and the accompanying food.
I’ve already virtually finished the twenty-four bottles of Celia lager I bought a couple of weeks ago from Deli Divine and ordered some more yesterday. So at least I’m voting with my wallet.
Am I Finally Solving My Childhood Health Problems?
I wasn’t the healthiest of children. We lived in a very cold part of London a few hundred metres from Oakwood station and to say our house was cold would be an understatement.
I seemed to spend at least one term of each school year off sick with a problem that my doctor had no idea about. I’m not particularly sure which term I had off, but I do know in my first year at Minchenden it was the Spring term, as no-one could understand why after a good first term, I deteriorated in the next.
Other memories of the time, are saucepans of cotton handkerchiefs boiling on the gas stove. As after all there weren’t any tissues in those days.
I can also remember panicking at times and having fights with my mother as she struggled to clean my ears out, as they were rather full of wax.
But it all seemed to disappear, when I was thirteen or so, and I can’t remember any problems after my first year at Minchenden. Perhaps that was after, my grandmother died and I got to have the big sunny room at the back of the house, which was much warmer. This death may be more significant than I think, as it finally gave my father control of the business and finances in the family were much better and we started to have longer and more holidays. Soon after we bought the house in Felixstowe, where of course the air was fresher and it wasn’t quite as cold.
Going to Liverpool was probably a good move, as it faces to the west and for a city in the 1960s, the air was probably pretty good.
I met C in 1966 and really since then I didn’t have too many health problems until after she died in 2007. When I was diagnosed with coeliac disease in 2003, i thought that would be the explanation of my my childhood health problems.
I should also say that I’ve always said that I liked being at altitude and seemed to feel better in places like Denver. I also flew light aircraft a lot and loved going up high.
But it wasn’t as after C died, the runny nose started to return and I put it down to hay fever. But tests have shown it is nothing of the case, but just rhinitis and a very runny nose.
So are there any other factors that might come into it.
My grandfather died of asthma and pneumonia in his forties and I suspect he carried the coeliac gene, like my father probably did. I have no proof of that except that none of the women in that line of my family have ever given birth and undiagnosed coeliac disease is a cause of failing to conceive. My father definitely had breathing problems and suffered badly from catarrh He was always taking menthol tablets and he used to give them to me, but they made little difference to my problems. So perhaps, what my father and I had were different, but the older I get, the more I think our problems were similar. But of course, he was never diagnosed with coeliac disease and he smoked a pipe.
When I met C I was just 19, so for forty years of my life I lived with her and it was if she warded off the rhinitis. That is really a silly idea to even think it. But last week my GP suggested I get a Sinus Rinse to wash the muck out of my nose.
It got me thinking. C was a great lover of deep hot baths and usually had one every day. To save hot water, she’d always leave it for me afterwards and I would get in and often wash my hair. Now she laid back into the water to wash hers, but I knelt and put my head forward under the water. Afer she dued one of my first actions was to put a proper shower into the bedroom.
So did this daily bath to keep my sinuses clear? And did the shower make it all worse?
I don’t know, but I have certainly felt a bit better since I’ve had a morning bath.
The bath seems to have helped another of my childhood problems that has returned. As a child I used to suffer badly from cramp, when I was asleep. I used to get out of bed and put my foot on the cold lino. This symptom started again, when I moved here.
This post is very much a ramble, but underneath everything there seems to be a pattern emerging.
But at least nothing seems to be life-threatening. And of course I grew out of it once.
Call To Scrap Gluten-Free Food Prescriptions
This article on the BBC’s web site, talks about a call in a learned journal for gluten-free prescriptions to be stopped on the NHS.
I have had gluten-free prescriptions in the past, but quite frankly, living where I do now, to take them would be a waste of my time and the NHS’s money.
So what specific gluten-free foods do I buy?
1. A few ginger cakes from Waitrose, as I find they help my dry throat. I can’t make cakes any more and to be fair, I haven’t got any cake tins.
2. I usually have one loaf of Genius bread a week, which I can buy from any number of outlets locally, like Waitrose, Sainsbury or the Co-op.
3. I’m not much of a biscuit person, but I probably eat one pack a fortnight. I actually prefer genius toast with Benecol and jam.
4. As you see from this blog, I do buy the odd ready-meal like the venison from Marks and Spencer. But these are the standard product.
5. I buy some of the EatNatural gluten-free breakfast cereal. I get through about a packet a week.
6. I do buy a specialist gluten-free beer called Celia over the Internet.
If I take out the beers, which are £2.10 each, I probably spend under ten pounds a week on specific gluten-free food. Although of course, I do spend quite a bit more on quality fish, meat, vegetables and fruit.
If I had to get gluten free food on prescription, it would mean going to the surgery and back. Probably I’d walk, which would be good for me, but I have better things to do with my time. I’d then have to go to the pharmacy to collect it.
So for people like me, this would be no inconvenience at all.
Obviously, for those on a very limited income, it might be more of a problem.
But the real key to a successful gluten-free diet is to eat lots of natural foods like meat, fish, fruit and vegetables. None of these cost more if you are a coeliac, as they’re all naturally gluten free.
The expensive gluten-free items to buy are bread, biscuits, cakes, sandwiches and beer. But it could be argued that most people eat too much of these anyway.
If gluten-free food was stopped on the NHS, the only people who would complain, would be the chattering classes, who are probably allergic to nuclear power, HS2, fracking, the Supersewer, the Congestion Charge and using public transport. Many though, like me, will probably have their lunches in upmarket cafes like Carluccio’s.
I would apply the money saved in the NHS, by using it to subsidise the cost of quality gluten-free bread, pasta and perhaps some cakes and biscuits. So for example a gluten-free loaf would then cost very much the same as a quality gluten-rich one.
That way all coeliacs would benefit.
It would also create jobs. Just think of the quality sandwich shop, where the owner makes his own sandwiches to order. So you want gluten-free bread? – No problem!
We don’t have a coeliac health problem over diet in this country. We have a health problem over diet. So let’s solve them all together with a proper integrated policy to get everybody eating well.
You won’t get everyone to eat better, but at least you’ll get some avoiding the problems of a bad diet.
Eating Off The Menu
On Saturday in Manchester, I noticed that Carluccio’s were serving vitello tonnato as a starter. Now it is one of my favourites.
So today, when I ate with my son in their restaurant near Oxford Circus, he negotiated a large portion for me, to eat as a main course. It went down a treat.
Coeliacs like me, often find that what is on the menu can be easily modified by the removal of an ingredient, from a dish with gluten to one that is totally gluten-free.
A part of Carluccio’s gluten-free menu is created by taking the standard dishes and removing something like bread and it is a technique used in quite a few restaurants.
But some restaurants aren’t so flexible, when it is obvious to those with rudimentary cooking skills like me, that simple changes can make a meal gluten-free.
These will not get my custom!
I’ve talked here with respect to coeliac disease, but it equally well applies to other dietary and other preferences.
I also remember a few years back, when I spoke on the radio to a well-known celebrity chef about his attitude to providing gluten-free food. He said, that providing you need it, when you book the table, no good restaurant should ever refuse to provide something suitable.
He said, that if they do, then they are not a good restaurant! And they are not worthy of your custom!
Marks And Spencer Get Their Timing Right
Last night, I tried one of Marks and Spencer’s new FullerLonger meals.
Marks And Spencer’s Venison
As you can see it’s slow-cooked venison in a red wine and onion sauce.
It has only been about a couple of weeks and note the “New” on the packaging.
With all the horsemeat problems, this problem just says impeccable timing by Marks and Spencer, although there is some beef stock and gelatine in the product. And the only allergen is a small amount of skimmed milk!
Twenty Three Celias
I’ve now unpacked all the beer and they’re sitting on the kitchen worktop.
Twenty Three Celias
There was twenty four, but one got drunk.
My Celias Arrived Yesterday
At about ten on Wednesday morning, I ordered 24 bottles of Celia lager from DeliDevine.
Last night just as I was sitting down to my supper, there was a ring at the door and on looking out of the window there was a van from Fedex.
I opened the door and the jaunty driver put the 24 bottles inside.
I know you might get served a little quicker down the pub, but just over 24 hours to get a heavy parcel delivered, isn’t too bad in my view.
The Celia lager is very much worth drinking and I’m starting to add used bottles to my recycling box.
As it’s also available in some pubs, you can actually try before you buy, as I did a few days ago.
It’s also better than the Estrella Damm Daura, that I have to carry home from Waitrose.
The Anonymous Widower 