Restaurant Firsts

Guys. It’s been a big week. Not only did we GO TO A RESTAURANT for the first time with our kid, but then later WE LET THE KID EAT FOOD FROM A RESTAURANT. It seems like perhaps the two of those things would coincide, but alas, they did not. 

We ended up going to a restaurant because we were out running errands and needed some lunch. We packed a sandwich for our kid and the rest of us ate sandwiches from a sandwich shop. It was a good thing we packed food for her because there was not a thing that she could eat there. The kids’ menu included grilled cheese (nope), PB&J (definite nope), turkey and swiss (again nope). There’s a possibility that she could have had the turkey and swiss sans swiss, but some of the turkey had milk and some of the turkey didn’t and you just never know about garlic and I’m just not in a place to risk it so we just didn’t trust anything behind the counter. The prepackaged chips are usually in the clear, but this place had special (really, quite delicious looking) chips that were fried in maybe peanut (but also maybe canola or sunflower, can’t know for sure) oil. Other than the drink station, I wasn’t feeling great. All this to say, good thing we planned ahead and brought her lunch. She didn’t seem to feel too left out, especially since we were all eating sandwiches. Without COVID, this probably would have happened much sooner. I guess, technically, this was not her first time inside a restaurant- when she was a baby, before eating solid food, and before COVID, she had been inside, and even technically eaten (nursed) while there. But this was definitely a big, post food allergy diagnosis, step for us.

AND THEN… we actually let her eat food from a restaurant.

We were planning on getting take out and decided to go to the vegan restaurant by our house. We had been contemplating letting her try some food from here because out of her 4 allergies (milk, egg, peanut, and garlic)- 2 were definitely going to be safe at the vegan restaurant. My wife called ahead and they said there were no peanuts in anything the made there. An entire restaurant safe from 3 out of her 4 allergens! Best of all, the person my wife talked to was super helpful. They told her which sauces had tree nuts in them since a lot of dairy replacement things have tree nuts and just seemed to be very understanding about severe food allergies.

Realistically garlic was still an issue, though. The restaurant describes itself as “American and Latin Vegan Comfort Food.” This is how I read the menu:

• Pico de gallo (Probably garlic.)
• Guacamole (Yeah, garlic.)
• Ranch (Garlic)
• Bang Bang sauce (Delicious. Also, garlic)
• Garlic sauce (I'm going to go out on a limb and guess contains garlic.)
• Pretty much everything savory I am going to assume has garlic.

But. Guess what. There’s one nonsavory thing on the menu:

• Blueberry pancakes

Those… can’t have garlic, right? And they don’t have milk or eggs. And the nice lady said there was no peanuts. So, we were going to do it. We were going to give our kid food from a restaurant.

And…

*drumroll*

She ate three bites and didn’t die!

*dramatic fanfare*

Ohhh la la. Baby's first take out! Age: 2 years, 9 months, 0 days

She might have eaten more had she not also had chicken nuggets on her plate. But that kid loves her chicken nuggets. So we just won’t tell the nice vegan restaurant that she ate some chicken on the side of her delicious, safe pancakes.