Gluten Free Chow

See what I did there?  I’m referring to chow as food, but also as Chow, the fantastic restaurant, down in Bend, Oregon.   We were down there recently at a friend’s wedding. Luckily, some friends invited us to breakfast with them at Chow, otherwise I wouldn’t have known about the restaurant. They’re located in a cute little building (kinds looks like it used to be a house) not too far from downtown Bend. One great feature about Chow is that they use local food from farmers.

Their menu says they are happy to cater to gluten free and vegan requests. However, other than that callout, I didn’t see a lot of GF advertising.  Anyway, I just asked our waitress and she assured me they could substitute GF food in for most dishes.  In my case, that meant I was going to get the Ricotta Cheese French Toast (with GF bread of course) with caramel and apple butter.  She said they actually bake their own GF bread there, sweet!

As my meal arrived, I was amazed at the look and feel of the GF bread.  It was like real bread, the size, the shape, the sponginess (if that’s what you call it).  There’s no way you could get this if you went to the grocery store and bought some GF bread and made french toast at home.  And I’m happy to say it tasted as good as it looked.  The caramel and apple butter were great.  I added syrup to my liking. I gave the ricotta cheese a try, but it wasn’t for me.  I don’t think my pallet is there yet, heh.  It’s a bit of a different combination with the cheese in there.  It was easy to scrape to the side though.  Overall, it was the best french toast I’ve ever had.

If you’re in Bend, either staying or passing by, you really should try out Chow.  I’m looking forward to my next visit, hopefully to have a nice big sandwich at lunch!  Thanks to my friends for introducing me to Chow, and thanks to Chow for serving a great GF meal.

Thanks for reading.

GFTT