Gluten-Free Friendship

I was just visiting NYC and staying with a dear old friend of mine who lives in Brooklyn.  Our friendship goes back to the summer after sixth grade where we met at an art camp.  We attended different schools, but had experienced parallel years of being ostracized by our circle of girlfriends.  We bonded one afternoon sitting on her balcony, sharing stories from our own traumatic sixth-grade years.  Our friendship was sealed on that validating afternoon, and since then continued to flourish over our mutual love of theater, art, and dance.  Our newest common interest is gluten-free living.  Both of our mothers happen to have Celiac's disease and for own health we both now avoid gluten.  The other night my friend and I cooked a delicious gluten-free dinner in her lovely Brooklyn apartment.  She had bought a log of polenta that was speckled with colorful quinoa, which we cut it into cubes and fried up to make gluten-free "croutons" for our salad.  We sprinkled the croutons onto a salad of butter lettuce, fresh sliced strawberries and a simple balsamic vinaigrette.  We cooked up some gluten-free pasta and topped it with sauteed zucchini and tomatoes.  She even had gluten-free beer for us to enjoy with our meal!  I only had a little, but it was quite refreshing on a hot summer night!  We finished off our hearty meal with a gluten-free brownie I bought at Tu-Lu's Gluten Free Bakery in the East Village.  As the breeze came in through the kitchen window, I was reminded of the origin of our friendship and felt so grateful to be sitting with her, 18 years later, sharing a gluten-free meal.