Hot Salad Bar

 

Unless you prepare it yourself, in your own kitchen, you can never be sure if a dish or a meal is going to be totally SIBO-safe. And then there's life in the real world, where restaurants exist. Newbies are wise to dine at home for a while as they get symptoms under control and adjust to a new way of cooking and eating. Fortunately, that phase doesn't last forever!  I've been on this journey long enough to feel comfortable taking a few risks with eating out. In general, I find salad bars and hot bars a pretty good bet. Today's lunch-on-the-go features sauteed vegetables, chicken salad and a ripe avocado-tomato medley. Besides needing to pick out the sautéed onions, the selection was near perfect. Thank you Maple Farms in Hadley, MA. It was delicious!

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

Eating out with SIBO: Breakfast (Veggie Scramble with Hollandaise)

 

One of the hardest times to have a digestive disorder is when you go out to eat. Until you figure out how to navigate a menu (hint: side dishes are your new BFF) and get comfortable asking the waitron to Hold Everything (well, not quite everything!) restaurant dining can be daunting. So I thought I'd share some Sexy Sibo tips and start a new feature here on the blog: Eating Out with SIBO.

Today's topic is Breakfast. The first meal of the day is super easy to enjoy outside the home if you tolerate eggs and lactose-free dairy because eggs, low-starch vegetables and aged cheese are all legal on the SIBO-specific diet. You just have to remember NO BREAD, and in the early stages, NO POTATOES. This means you can enjoy omelets and veggie scrambles (with lots of veggies, or a side of greens, please) to your heart's content. Add uncured bacon or sausage if available, and you are so inclined.

Eggs Benedict can be ordered without the English muffin. I know it sounds funny, but just ask for a nice, thick slice of tomato on the bottom. Or do what I did here: Put on your nicest smile and order the Veggie Scramble, no toast, no homefries, hold the red onion, substitute tomato and add a side of Hollandaise. (Don't worry about Hollandaise sauce: it's just an emulsion of egg yolk and liquid butter, plus SIBO-safe seasonings: lemon juice, salt, pepper.)

The wonderful folks at Bread & Butter, a wonderful new breakfast joint in Amherst, MA, didn't bat an eye when I ordered this up the other day, and it came out just how I wanted, perfectly scrumptious.Yay!

As for your hot beverage, go with black coffee, black tea or herb tea. (Some restaurants do have heavy cream in the kitchen and will share upon request. Heavy cream contains only 3% lactose and is tolerated by lots of SIBO peeps, so ask for it if you like! Otherwise, stick with black.)

Bon appetit!