Lobster and Corn Bisque

My wife and I had a great dinner to end 2011 on tonight at Old Hickory Steakhouse at Gaylord Opryland Resort. During Christmas season there’s not just great Christmas lights, ICE! and DreamWorks animation characters around, there’s fantastic gluten free dining too! Each of Gaylord Opryland’s restaurants has gluten free options, some even gluten free bread and beer. Old Hickory, while not offering a specific gluten free menu, the chef will come by and walk you through all the options ensuring there is plenty for you to enjoy!

Tonight we started off with the Lobster and Corn Bisque, well… after we started off with a glass of wine of course. I’m one of those people who when I see any bisque on the menu, I have to ask. Knowing that other Gaylord properties have this on the gluten free menu at their Old Hickory Steakhouse, I was looking forward to it and boy, did it deliver. All the rich and creamy bisqueness anyone could ask for!

Filet Mignon

Next up was dinner. We both had the 8 oz. filet mignon topped with Maytag bleu cheese with asparagus and hollandaise sauce and bleu cheese and thyme potatoes au gratin as sides. When we talked to the chef, the potatoes had to be altered, so make sure your waiter know about your gluten allergy to ensure that you don’t have problems later.

Overall, everything was absolutely fabulous! As I’m typing this, I’m still basking in the glow of the meal. If you get a chance and have a special occasion coming up, I highly recommend celebrating it at Old Hickory!

Locations: Gaylord Opryland Resort in Donelson, TN
Price: $$$$$

See Old Hickory Steakhouse menu

Visit Old Hickory Steakhouse’s website

It’s the rainy season in Nashville and well, what goes better on a rainy day that soup and a sandwich. Being Celiac, that’s not always an option. Thanks to Jason’s Deli gluten free menu though, it’s possible. Several months ago I was in Dallas for work and our driver overheard me talking about gluten free beer. His son worked at Jason’s Deli there and told us that they started serving gluten free bread and the whole staff was trained on how to handle the sandwiches to eliminate cross contamination as much as possible. As soon as I found this out I went straight down to the one on West End.

Today I enjoyed the Santa Fe Chicken Sandwich: Natural, grilled chicken breast, bacon, Swiss, guacamole, tomato, Russian dressing, on gluten free bread and a bowl of Tortilla Soup and it hit the spot. The folks behind the deli counter were great and asked me if I wanted my bread toasted warning me that it would contaminate it with gluten bread and made sure that I was safe.

Locations: West End, Cool Springs and Murfreesboro
Price: $$

See Jason’s Deli gluten free menu

Visit Jason’s Deli website

One of my favorite things to do with my wife on the weekends is dinner and a movie. Dinner has become standard at Yolo’s in Green Hills. They have a small dedicated gluten free menu and the staff is very helpful on making other dishes gluten free as well. My favorite dish is the shrimp and grits. The sauce is great and the chorizo adds a little extra kick to it. It’s great on their Sunday brunch menu and their dinner menu. Other great gluten free items are the Chilean Sea Bass, Blackened Salmon and the White Cheddar Burger. Their gluten free menu is not online, but you can pretty much pick out the items. Enjoy!

Visit Yolo’s website.

Watanabe in East Nashville on McGavock is most favorite sushi restaurant around. The staff will help make any roll gluten free and are great to work with. One of my favorite reasons for going is that all of their rolls that contain crab use real crab meat instead of fake crab meat that can contain gluten elements. Plus it just tastes so much better than the fake stuff! The green goddess roll is my favorite, without the tempura flakes of course Also just ask, they normally have a gluten free soy sauce available.

Tell Evan I said hello!

Visit Watanabe online.

Recently my wife bought a Groupon for Amerigo’s on West End. She had been trying to use it for weeks with me and I kept pushing her to go with a friend instead since the last place I wanted to go is yet another Italian restaurant where I couldn’t eat anything. Well… At least not anything that I wanted to. We were out running errands a few Saturdays ago and she cornered me into going. Thinking that I was just going to have a nice wine lunch, I was pleasantly surprised when our waitress brought out Amerigo’s own gluten free menu when I asked about options. The menu had multiple items on it, not the normal 5 items. I enjoyed mussels, which were not on the gluten free menu but they worked wihth me since they were slow at the time and some great salmon. The staff was more than accommodating and knowledgable about gluten issues. Check them out next time you’re on West End in Nashville or in Brentwood, Memphis or Jackson, MS!

While normally I stay away from people who use an image of wheat in their logo, we took the nephews to the Pfunky Griddle last weekend on Bransford Avenue. The restaurant is a cute place where people cook their own breakfast on a griddle built into your table. The nephews, 4 and 12, had a great time experiencing that. They have a gluten free pancake mix that was really good and all you can eat for $6.99 adults, kids 10 and under are $4.99. Of course to avoid cross contamination everyone at your table has to eat gluten free, but when you’re buying for the nephews, they can eat what you get

Back in April, I celebrated my birthday at the Wild Cow in East Nashville and had my first great birthday cake since being diagnosed with Celiac’s and having to go gluten free. Come to find out, it’s from a local bakery called Aunt April’s Gluten Free Bakery. I recently had the privilege of trying her gluten free cookies, bread, brownies and some muffins. All I have to say is YUM! The bread was the same bread used in a great sandwich I had at the Wild Cow which I used to make some sandwiches, cheesy garlic bread and well, it was so good I ate it by itself. It wasn’t spongy like most gluten free breads and didn’t fall apart like others. The cookies were nice and crunchy, the brownies moist. If you have an event or just looking for gluten free stuff around Nashville I highly recommend Aunt April’s Gluten Free Bakery’s products which can be found at the Wild Cow, Matteo’s Pizza, The Green Wagon East Nashville.