Bell & Evans Chicken Tenders

So if you're anything like me, there's nothing you miss more than breakfast. After that, though, there's nothing you miss more than bar food. Totally unhealthy, fried beyond belief, probably a few dollars more expensive than it should be with more than a few extra calories to boot. Call them appetizers or "the reason why one would eat at Fridays," but they're a simple staple and so, so easy to take for granted.

Case in point: Chicken Fingers. They're the heart and soul of every kid's meal at every restaurant in the country. We're reared on them. They're the safe choice, dippable finger food, breaded, fried, of dubious raising and meat color. So far as comfort food goes, there's not much more comfortable than this. I swear it was just about the only thing I ate from the age of five to fifteen and even the few years before I was diagnosed, I enjoyed lunch on Monday since I knew that the L.A. Cafe under Farragut West station had chicken fingers by the pound that day as part of the buffet.

Now, then it's possible to make your own gluten-free chicken fingers and occasionally I've been tempted. Occasionally. You can get breadcrumbs or make your own. We all know that gf bread is crumbly enough after all. It'd be a matter of mayonnaise and baking in the oven and some other things, but let's be serious here: chicken fingers aren't high cuisine. They're the opposite. Quick, disposable, comfort food. Making them sort of defeats the purpose.

I was pretty happy when I found of the existence of pre-packaged frozen gf chicken fingers. There are a few different option's. Ian's is one brand, though they're generally in nugget form. There are others. The cream of the crop, as it were, is Bell and Evans' Chicken Tenders, both in value and in taste. More than that, they're apparently healthier for you than the average. This is one of those strange windfalls of being gluten-free. You almost have to be healthier in your eating, even if you don't want to be. If McDonald's put gf McNuggets on the menu tomorrow, I'd rush and get them, but these, that happen to exist, be somewhat available at least (I've found them both at Mom's Organic Market and at one or two local grocery stores, though not all). There's a search feature on their website, but it's certainly not very inclusive. none of the places I've seen them popped up on my search.

So they're raised without antibiotics and they're air chilled instead of some more conventional taste-killing freezing technique. More practically, they're a great choice for when the rest of the family is getting fast-food or have to eat party pizzas or what not. Thirty minutes in the oven at 375 and they're good to go, and it's just like you're seven again, except for this time, since you're an adult you can not have any side if you don't want to and use four different types of dipping sauces (I'll talk about some of these later), and eat the whole box, because that's what adults can do.