Are you torn between your love for ice cream and healthy eating? GaGa’s gluten-free Sherbetter may be just your thing. Sherbetter contains more butterfat than sherbet but less than ice cream, leading to a smooth texture, intense  flavor… and less calories. Triumph Dining tasters loved lemon Sherbetter, which GaGa reports outsold every flavor of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream at Whole Foods one year.  You can find GaGa mostly on the East Coast in high-end stores for $4.70 a pint.

An interesting sidenote: the Providence Journal reports that GaGa founder John King recently turned down an order request from an Atlanta-based convenience store chain because the chain’s own research showed that its customers “don’t care about all-natural products.”

In honor of our new grocery guide, Triumph Dining is pleased to announce a great deal for you, our readers. Through November 10th, if you order the Triumph Dining grocery or restaurant guides from Amazon, we will throw in a free set of six Triumph Dining Cards. That’s $11.95 in savings! All you have to do after ordering the books on Amazon is forward your confirmation e-mail to jennifer@triumphdining.com. The cards will ship separately from your order and arrive in about a week. Enjoy!

For a long time, parents have been worried about the food children collect while trick-or-treating. Everything must be hermetically sealed in a familiar brand-name package so that parents can be sure it doesn’t have razors in it! But what about candy that’s safe for celiacs? Well, we at Triumph Dining would like to give a grateful shout-out to Alison at Sure Foods Living for her concise and up-to-date gluten free and allergen free candy list. Now, all you have to suffer the day after Hallowe’en is a couple of cavities. Bon Appetit!

My father-in-law doesn’t eat gluten and hates cooking. Although he buys tasty gluten-free  bread, he’s not too charmed by its propensity to crumble in his hands. Enter the fuzzy logic rice cooker. He just measures rice into the removable bowl, rinses it a few times, fills the bowl with water or broth, and punches the “Cook Rice” button. That’s it. Now he wakes up every morning to hot fresh rice. It’s easy to make perfect rice, and the nonstick surface makes washing a snap. Furthermore, he thinks switching to rice has helped him lose weight; nothing goes better with a bowl of rice than a heap of steamed vegetables.

An extra bonus: You can also make quinoa, polenta, and other gluten-free grains in the rice cooker. But be forewarned: anything with oatmeal or egg in it tends to get pretty messy.

The Organic Bistro has come out with several gluten-free entrees you can find in the freezer section of your local supermarket. Triumph Dining taste-tested six of these products and found them all unusually filling, nutritious, and high in quality. The delightfully flaky Wild Salmon Meal includes a cut of salmon with a rosemary orange glaze, broccoli with walnuts, and a mound of cranberry brown rice pilaf for the reasonable price of $30 per six meals. Kay’s personal favorite, the juicy Sockeye Salmon Cakes meal, is low-sodium with 600 calories, 1 gram of Omega 3 fats, and 34 grams of protein. If your supermarket doesn’t carry Organic Bistro, you can order the meals online.

 Some people have their ‘food musts.’ Anyone remember Kel of ‘Kenan and Kel’ fame and his love for orange soda? Is that just me? Well I think if I had to pick my food must, it would be coffee. I used to do the sugar-pumped brew, but I’ve since graduated to a black cup of joe each morning with a dollop of low-fat milk, mostly to cool it down. I suppose the pump of caffeine each breakfast isn’t the healthiest, but when you pull those late nights and still have to get up bright and early the next day, than it definitely qualifies for food must classification.

This love of coffee (and an equally strong love of cookies) made be buy Pamela’s Products’ Espresso Chocolate Chunk Cookies. The espresso is a pop of flavor when you take your first bite. While this extreme flavor is the first thing to jump out at you, you’ll quickly recall the second part of product name: chocolate chunk. The chunks of chocolate in these cookies are sweet and melty, as if freshly baked. Is texture important to you? I’d classify it as crumbly-in-a-good-way: these aren’t soft baked cookies, but neither are they a semi-edible rock, like others. I personally enjoyed the texture because when I first saw them I figured they would be rock-eque but they easily break at each bite.

What I find enjoyable about many gluten-free products are the other health conscious elements that seem to accompany them. While don’t get me wrong, Pamela’s espresso cookie is a cookie, I’m giving it a healthy nod for its ‘made with over 70% organic ingredients.’ So my recommendation for you concerning this organic-conscious, coffee-flavored treat? Grab an Espresso Chocolate Chunk Cookie and a cool glass of milk and go to town. If your food must is a cookie but you want to make it yourself, take a look at what Deliciously Gluten Free Products had to say about Pamela’s Chocolate Chunk Cookie Mix.

We’re pleased to announce the first-ever $10k Challenge!

Triumph Dining is giving away FREE American Dining Cards until the end of August. There’s absolutely no purchase necessary; simply follow this link to get a FREE American Dining Card from Triumph Dining.

And, here’s the best part: We’re doing this to raise money for Celiac Disease Awareness! If we get 15,000 people to sign up for free dining cards, Triumph Dining will make a $10,000 donation in support of a national celiac disease awareness campaign. When we hit our goal, we’ll ask the gluten free community to help us decide which non-profit(s) receives the donation.

Together, we can build awareness on two fronts: With 15,000 more dining cards on the street, we’ll be educating more restaurants about the gluten free diet faster. And, with $10,000 funding behind a national campaign, we can diagnose and educate more Celiacs.

We’re working hard to give away as many dining cards as possible, but we’ll need your help to get to 15,000! Please sign up for a FREE dining card now and tell your friends about this offer.

Check back here for regular updates on the progress of our goal to give away 15,000 dining cards.

The FREE dining card offer is available at http://www.triumphdining.com/freediningcard.aspx.

Sick of your old tortilla chips? Dump the chips, and get strips. Green Mountain Gringo’s gluten free Tortilla Strips come in a couple varieties including organic blue corn. Personally, I think there’s not enough blue foods out there, so I went straight for those. They look a little more purple than blue, but hey, purple foods are rather rare too so I still felt like I was enjoying a pretty special treat.

Now if you couldn’t tell from the title of this entry, Green Mountain Gringo is all about the strips. “Not to be compared to any other ‘dipping utensil,’ the Strip was invented to go beyond sturdy and reliable to reach a whole new level of taste satisfaction. A solid rectangle of pure leverage makes it stable enough for the most aggressive dippers,” reads the blue Tortilla Strip product information. You have to appreciate their passion, don’t you? While I wouldn’t say it in those words exactly, I would say that I didn’t notice these Tortilla Strips break off in my guac.

While Green Mountain Gringo stresses the durability, I’d emphasis the taste and ingredients. Not too salty and a satisfying list of ‘no’s’ and ‘frees:’ no preservatives, no trans fat, GMO free, allergen free and, not least of all, gluten free.

While I used my Tortilla Strips to snack on some pretty yummy guacamole, you could test out that legendary durability with some of Green Mountain Gringo’s gluten free salsa. You can also try your hand at some bloggers’ gf creations. Check out Karina’s Kitchen’s tasty looking Blue Corn Chip Fritatta and Nachos Fabuloso for two creative blue chip recipes. Or if you want to eat some salsa and make it too, take a look at Cindalou’s Kitchen Blues for her Corn and Cilantro Salsa; this recipe looks good for all the cilantro lovers out there, and those who want a little spice with their Strip.

While I picked my Tortilla Strips up at Whole Foods, you can also order them at Green Mountain Gringo’s online store (a place for the Green Mountain Gringo enthusiast, with accessories that’ll let the world know where you fall on the strip versus chip divide.)

While wheat may be hidden in many products, some breakfast cereals passionately trumpet this ingredient, not only in their labels but in their names as well. Wheaties? Cream of Wheat? Come on, we get it already - you’re made of wheat! Perhaps this is ultimately helpful for the gf dieter, but it also seems like a taunt.

Maybe the fact that so many cereals are bursting at the box corners with wheat has driven several gf bloggers to take on the subject of gluten-free cereal. If you’re in the mood for a cold cereal that’s met with a gf blogger’s stamp of approval, check out The Gluten Free Blog’s review of New Morning’s Cocoa Crispy Rice or Allergic Girl’s thoughts on Erewhon’s Crispy Rice. Or even take a look at our previous posts on Rice Chex and EnviroKidz cereal.

But on the few cool June mornings that are left, sometimes a bowl of cold cereal just won’t cut it. You want something with a bit of heat, that will warm up your insides and be a satisfying beginning to your day. Afraid of gluten found in many hot cereals? Tell Cream of Wheat to ‘kiss my gf grits!’ because there are gf hot cereal options out there just waiting to be heated up.

I did a comparison of two rice cream cereals: Lundberg’s Purely Organic Hot’n Creamy Rice Cereal and Erewhon’s Brown Rice Cream. There are many similarities between the two: both are low fat, organic, obviously gluten free, and taste somewhat similar. However, while both advertise that they are whole-grain and made with brown rice, I think it’s Lundberg’s “oven-roasted organic whole grain California brown rice” that gives it a little extra something.

Also, Lundberg’s has microwave instructions, which does make it somewhat easier and faster to make for the completely cooking incompetent like myself (improv’ing your own microwave instructions for Erewhon’s, however, is completely possible - I did it). Although made for the stove, Erewhon’s hot cereal instructions also include an intriguing apple juice instead of water suggestion to give your cereal an added sweetness.

A word of advice when eating whichever cereal you choose: while I enjoyed my gf hot cereal sampler breakfast (adding some blueberries to give it a healthy but sweet kick), it is a heavy, stick-to-your ribs meal, so be aware. I’ve been eating lightly in the mornings for the last couple months and my stomach was in a bit of a shock at my breakfast change.

Update: I initially planned on doing a three way comparison of gf hot cereals so here it is! The third and final hot cereal I tried was Bob’s Red Mill Brown Rice Farina. While similar to the other two I tried in taste and contents, the Farina cereal has a unique quality: it’s texture. For those wishing to relive the days of grits, this cereal will let you do that. It’s grains of rice are less fine in texture and while you can alter the thickness and thinness of the overall cereal with how much you cook it (there are microwave instructions! yes!) the cereal is generally grainy. If a spoon full of rice grits in the morning is what you’ve been missing, try some and see if you have a new favorite breakfast.

If you haven’t noticed while browsing the shelves at your local grocery store, Stonyfield Farm is proudly proclaiming its recent gluten-free certification by GFCO on their yogurt tops.  While some of its products are still off limits, many others, like my sister’s favorite lowfat organic yogurt, have been given the green light for gluten-free dieters.  Since it was already in my refrigerator, I decided to reach for a spoon.

I’m rather picky about my yogurt, especially when it comes to texture.  I prefer those that call themselves ‘creamy’ or ‘whipped’ and have no smooth-defying fruit chunks.  Stonyfield Farm’s lowfat yogurts are made up of fruit, located at the bottom of the container, and plain yogurt on top.  If you have a chunky yogurt phobia like me, this is somewhat helpful; you can mix the yogurt to fit your desire.  However, I’m partial to zero fruit chunks so for me, the texture was okay but not great.

Out of Stonyfield Farm’s ten lowfat flavors, I’ve tried four: blueberry, raspberry, strawberry, and ‘Just Peachy.’  Each has a subtle and tasty flavor that I attribute mostly to the plain yogurt itself; while I usually pass if it’s plain, the unmixed yogurt tasted good just by itself!  And whether you’re dieting or indulging, Stonyfield Farm allows you to stick to your desired diet with their fat free, lowfat, and whole milk yogurt options.

If yogurt by itself doesn’t spark your interest, Stonyfield Farm has a database of recipes from pastas to desserts that use yogurt.  Either search for gluten-free recipes or try your hand at converting dishes into celiac-friendly delights.   (To be on the safe side, I’d make sure the gf recipes really are gf.)  And if none of these look good, check out Dianne at Gluten Free Journey’s tasting looking yogurt, honey, and walnut snack.  It’s looks both simple to make and like a good way to satisfy a sweet tooth.

If Stonyfield Farm’s flavors, calories, and fruit-lined bottom sound good, check out their store locator to find some yogurt near you.  And keep an eye out for more gf items from this company in the future.  While their yogurt, smoothies, and soy-yogurt  have been deemed gluten-free by the GFCO, other Stonyfield Farm products are in the process of certification.