Surviving abroad without being glutened (part 1)

Travelling abroad gluten free

This June I was faced with the daunting task of sticking to my gluten free diet on holiday where I don’t speak the local language. We were heading to Cerbere, a small village on the border of France and Spain, for a week. Before setting off I printed off the gluten free passport gluten free dining cards for Spanish and French, along with a detailed list of green, amber and red French foods. This was downloaded from the French Coeliac society website, called AFDIAG, and I found it by searching ‘Interdit’ (forbidden) in their search bar. I also packed the Spanish and French phrase books.

            We set off from Liverpool to Carcassonne early in the morning. At Liverpool Airport we went to Frankie and Bennys for breakfast. I ordered bacon and eggs on toast, without the toast. When it arrived it came on toast! There was no time to get a new one made before the flight so I set off hungry, and ate my emergency peanut butter sandwich on the flight.

            On our first day we saw the sights of Carcassonne and ate lunch in a restaurant in the main square of the medieval city. This is Carcassonne:

I had a duck only cassoulet- a traditional dish of white beans, sausage and duck. I chose the duck only version because I thought the sausage would not be suitable. When ordering we asked if the waiter spoke English and he sent over one who did. I told him I couldn’t eat gluten and presented my piece of paper. The girl next to us in the restaurant was English and spoke French; she offered to translate things for us. The waiter seemed to understand and took the list off to show the chef. He returned and confirmed he thought it was ok. The cassoulet was delicious and I suffered no symptoms from eating it.

            Next we went to a French supermarket, Giante Casino to buy supplies. In the Bio section, which means organic there was a small gluten free section. I got some gluten free pasta, which was very good, just the same as that from the UK. I also got some gluten free bread- Schaer Rustico, which is from Germany. It was a long-life rustic fibre loaf, which tasted very good.

 We ate in for dinner- a salad with some Parma ham and cheese.

            For breakfast my favourite is avocado on toast, which went very well with the Rustico bread. On the second day we went down the Spanish coast stopping off at some of the seaside towns. We went for lunch at a tapas restaurant called El Racó de Port in the town of Llança.

This is the restaurant: 

The waiter seemed to understand the Spanish version of the gluten free passport. Everything was suitable except for the things that were deep fried, and the Spanish omelette. The meal was very nice; we had sardines, manchego, Spanish ham, patas bravas and more. In the evening we ate in and had pasta.

            On the third day we went into the Pyrenees and visited the Abbaye de St Martin:

We ate lunch in a small village called Cateil/ Castel at a restaurant called Relais St Martin. I had the plat de assaitte de jour (dish of the day). This consisted of a melon and ham salad with roast vegetables, ham, cheese, fries and aioli (garlic mayo) it really was delicious. The women was very impressed with the gluten free passport I showed her and understood it well. In the evening we ate at a restaurant called Amphitryon on the seafront of Collioure. The restaurant was very busy, I showed the waitress the piece of paper and ordered Paella, which she said was ‘just rice’ so would be ok. The paella was a bit tasteless and disappointing. I tried to order dessert but it was all too much for the waitress. Her section was full of customers annoyed by her slow service and forgetfulness. She had obviously just left the restaurant to cry (rubbing eyes, makeup smudged) and I asked if the crème catalane (similar to a crème brulee) was gluten free. She said it wasn’t, I asked her what was and she suggested the profiteroles or apple tart. I knew neither of theses would be so I decided not to have anything. This made me worry my main course hadn’t been gluten free either but I had no obvious side effects from it.

            The next day we explored the neighbouring towns and stopped for lunch in Port Vendres at a place called La Fringale. This is the view from the restaurant:

I had the salad Estivale, which was melon and ham again- very nice. Much to my excitement we found a place in Collioure called Framboise Chocolat that had a sign outside saying ‘biscuits sans gluten’. The first time we tried to go in it was closed but in the end I managed to get some biscuits. I bought some pistachio and some chocolate biscuits. The were very good, particularly the pistachio ones as the chocolate ones were a little burnt. They were hard biscuits, similar to biscotti, which is traditional for the region. We ate in for dinner, creating our own cassoulet, which was very good.

            The next day it was raining so we decided to explore the city of Perpignan. This is Perpignan in the rain:

We had lunch in a restaurant in the central square. Again I ordered a salad, presenting my piece of paper. The salad was supposed to be Roquefort and walnut but the walnuts were removed leaving only lettuce and Roquefort. This was a disappointment and very boring. Perpignan had a very nice market going on the day we visited- Saturday. One of the bread stalls had gluten free bread, made primarily of quinoa. The loaf was quite dense and tough, but tasted nice. In the evening we went to Les Clos de Paulilles restaurant and vineyard between Port Vendres and Banyuls sur Mer. We arrived at 6.40 but they weren’t serving dinner until 7.30 so we had to spend the time trying and buying vast quantities of wine. The menu was set, with a choice of two or three things for each course. Although they didn’t speak much English the staff were very thorough in their discussion. To start we had a tapas plate, most of which I could eat with the exception of a few things on bread. Then I had sea bass with pak choi, which was delicious. For dessert I had cherry soup, which was very nice. Overall, the meal was very good.

            That concludes the first of my two gluten free holiday blog posts. You may be wondering why I’d finish after 5 days when I was only going for a week, you must be forgetting the French air traffic control strike!