Surviving abroad on a gluten free diet (part 2 of 2)

This post concludes my experiences on my holiday in France and Spain in June this year. If you haven’t read the first part, you should read that first- entitled ‘surviving abroad without being glutened (part 1)’

On the sixth day of our holiday we visited Banyuls, a nearby seaside town. I had a bit of a craving for tuna steak, so we headed to ‘restaurant de la plage’ which was one of many restaurants on the sea front. The thon (tuna) steak we had was very tasty and mine came with green beans instead of rice and salad, which was a bit random. The beans were excellent though- drowning in garlicky olive oil. The tuna was plain but excellently cooked and slightly rare. In the evening we ate in and had a salad.

The next day we went into the Pyrenees and stopped in Ceret for lunch at hotel Pablo Picasso. This is the bridge in Ceret:

I had a cheese salad, which involved lettuce and chunks of four different cheeses. When I showed people my ‘gluten free passport’ I’d printed off some people tended to over react and exclude other things I could have eaten. They usually excluded the dressing from salads which made them fairly bland and disappointing. In the evening we ate at La Dorade in Cerbere, we chose the 32 euro menu because it contained the most stuff we wanted to eat, only to come to realise that the most expensive menu also had the largest portion sizes. The starter was seabass with an avocado and potato stack, which consisted of a two sizable fillets of seabass, and a large stack of avocado and potato with a buttery sauce. The starter was really delicious but hugely filling, it was at least the size you would expect a normal main course to be. The main course was scallops which were huge and there were eight of them, by this point I was getting pretty full so my Dad ate most of my main course, and most of my Mums too! For dessert there was not a lot I could eat, I’d been keen to try the crème catalane, but she said this contained a small amount of flour. In the end I got a bowl of strawberries with cream, which was very nice and not too filling.

            Before I get on to the tedious return journey and it’s meals (or lack of them), allow me to take an important digression to… ice cream. Ice cream is an important part of any summer holiday and I was not prepared to for go its pleasure on account of my gluten avoidance. At first I was weary of two things- cones and wafers. At most ice cream shops in the UK they stick a wafer into your ice cream before giving this to you and I had always assumed this was based on tradition from Italy/ France/ Spain. However, I found this not to be the case and didn’t see any ice cream shops in France or Spain with wafers. Cones are obviously to be avoided, and usually I would watch the process of scooping out the ice cream to check that there were no crumbs dropping into the tubs before committing to getting any. I basically adopted a policy of just eating it and not asking, a policy I have also adopted with hot chocolate and milkshakes and has not caused me any obvious problems so far. I would choose flavours that don’t obviously have gluten in, avoiding ones like cookie and cream flavours. I would ask for a tub and go for a scoop of chocolate and pistachio as they are my favourites. Another option is to choose the ice cream flavours furthest from the server, which will have had cones above it less often and be less likely to be contaminated. Obviously not all people avoiding gluten would want to take this risk, and would either try to ask or avoid this pleasure. Personally I think as most ice cream is gluten free and there’s no reason why it shouldn’t be, the risk is worth it.

We were supposed to be leaving France on 11^th June from carcassone but that was the day the French air traffic control decided to strike. Our original flight was cancelled and we managed to book a second flight for the same day from Girona so set off in our hire car to Girona. On the way we stopped in the beautiful town of Narbonne, here is a picture of the square in the cathedral:

We had lunch at a restaurant called L’Estagnol which had been recommended in our guide book. The waiter understood my needs and I ordered a steak tartare, which is like a raw beef burger. It was really tasty and I’d been hoping to get a chance to have one before leaving France. We also stopped in the seaside town of Roses, in Spain here is the beach there:

We went to a slightly tacky and very cigar smoky tapas restaurant for dinner, the options were very limited as many things were deep fried and battered. I was only really able to eat bits of fish- sardines and anchovies, and salads. I wasn’t allowed the chips and was told I could have the chicken wings but when it came out it looked like it was battered so I didn’t trust it. The food I was actually allowed to eat was alright, but didn’t fill me up at all.

            We headed to the airport to find out second flight was cancelled. It was quite a late flight so we had to book on a flight for the next morning, from Barcelona airport. As the next flight was supposed to be early we didn’t eat breakfast in the hotel. The airport was very sparse in terms of shops and there was only one café, I had a salad with candied fruit and chicken for my breakfast, which was alright but a bit odd. The café actually sold a gluten free chocolate donut type thing which I ate later on, but it really was disgusting and I couldn’t eat it! It was very dry and hard with this slightly chocolaty, sticky, sickly filling. The flight was delayed by 3 hours but I only found the rest of the airport half an hour before we had to board! There were more restaurants including a steak restaurant, which I really wanted to go to, but there was no time left. I got a plate of meats and cheeses and had it with some left over gluten free bread that I still had. It was ok but it was quite stale and it still didn’t fill me up, I was still hungry. Once we were on the plane we were told it would be another three hours before we took off, very frustrating! 

Overall, I managed my diet fairly well abroad despite very limited knowledge of the language. In future I would have a bit more 'contingency food' around in the car just in case I get caught out and hungry. It would have been particularly useful for the journey back.