Eating out with SIBO: Road Food

Clouds over Mass Pike, enroute to Lenox in 2013, my early SIBO days.

There are two ways to go on a road trip with SIBO. 1) Be prepared. 2) Wing it. 

If I'd gone with Option One, I'd have packed myself a nice cooler filled with assorted hard cheeses, 2 or 3 freshly hard boiled eggs and some low-FODMAP veggies like blanched green beans, sliced zucchini and raw carrot sticks to snack on. 

Instead, I left for Montreal with no food in the car and did the best I could with Option Two. 

Four hours into the 5-hour drive, I filled up with gas in Swanton: last stop before the border. It was after 1 PM and I hadn't eaten anything yet all day, so I ordered what I call a "deconstructed sandwich" at the service station sub shop. For protein, the choice was between egg or tuna salad. I went with egg.

A "deconstructed sandwich" means you ask to hold the bread, and then keep it simple—lettuce, tomato and black olives, in this case. Not the highest quality vegetables here, as you can see, but the impromptu salad plate pictured above did the trick.

Coming home, I fared a little better after accidentally getting diverted off the main highway into Stowe, Vermont. Right off the ramp I lucked out with Maxi's, an all-day breakfast joint.

Maybe the waitress was quizzical when I ordered, but the kitchen did a nice job with this customized Spinach and Mushroom Scrambled Eggs (hold the onions, no home fries, no toast, please). They had several good-looking omelets on the menu, too, but only the scramble came with spinach.

If I'd wanted more on my plate, Maxi's also serves bacon and sausage. But again, "keep it simple" is my rule, as well as "minimize the meat" when possible. Besides, standard issue bacon likely contains sugar and no doubt is chemically cured. As for what comes in a roadside pork sausage, your guess is as good as mine. But (organic aside) it's hard to go wrong with cheddar, eggs and fresh veggies.

Happy trails...

xo Diana