Interlude: My Vegan, Gluten Free, Low FODMAP Picnic

On a recent day off, a friend and I planned a picnic. I'm vegan, and she isn't. She follows a low FODMAP diet. She didn't think we could eat the same food, but I was confident I could figure something out. It's challenging since most beans are restricted, but tons of plants are low FODMAP! So she supplied a fruit salad and ginger beer (not shown) and I brought along what I'm showing you here. We ended up having the meal on her front porch rather than by the river as planned, because she was nursing a migraine, but we still had fun. (This is why you're not seeing any scenery photos.)

Our main dish was some rainbow onigirazu. All of them have spinach (which is okay on a low-FODMAP diet in small amounts, according to my research, but not in large amounts, so be forewarned), cucumbers cut into planks, and quick-pickled red cabbage I had made the night before. The ones on the right also have red bell pepper and avocado slices, while the ones on the right have maple Dijon tofu. This was an extremely impressive-looking dish, which she was primed to love; she asked lots of questions about how to make it, too. A resounding success!

Our sides were some gluten free crackers I made from a recipe at Bob's Red Mill and a simple carrot salad with lemony walnut vinaigrette (a recipe from Healthy Cooking for Two (Or Just You) (1995)). The carrot salad is plain and simple but pretty nice. She sent the leftovers of that home with me, however, and kept all of the crackers instead, so I guess I know which thing went over the best!

I also had some extras to add flavors where desired, in case anything wasn't flavorful enough. 

These are a peanut sauce I made to be low FODMAP and the end of my avocado mashed with some salt and pepper and lime juice. (Waste not, want not!) Onions and garlic can't be used on a low FODMAP diet so I had to get a little creative with the peanut sauce. It consists of natural peanut butter, Bragg's Liquid Aminos (soy sauce was out due to gluten), lime juice, a bit of water, and a few generous pinches of red pepper flakes. She made a point of keeping some of the peanut sauce, too, so it must have turned out well.

And I also made a dessert!

These are homemade coconut-pecan-caramel truffles I came up with using some filling from the German chocolate cake you saw a little while ago that I stuck in my freezer. They were easy to make because I already had the filling: You just need to drop balls with a small cookie scoop onto parchment paper and freeze them for a bit, then shape them into balls and freeze solid and coat them in dark chocolate mixed with a bit of coconut oil. They ended up a bit huge but they tasted amazing. If I were to make these again I might try doing it in mini muffin tins to avoid ending up with giant balls of chocolate but hey, I was trying to be convincing of veganism not meaning deprivation, and so giant balls of chocolate it was! I left the leftover truffles with her, because I had kept a stash at home.

She was really happy with all this and asked for all my recipes! Because I tend to cook off-the-cuff so much (recipes can guide me but I take liberties) it took some doing to write it all out for her, but I did. All in all we had a great meal in outdoors, and it conformed to all of our dietary considerations while being pretty and tasty. She also said that it helped her migraine to get up and about a little. Here's to meeting our challenges!