Summertime in Chicago means outdoor street festivals and with a little advance work you can find some great g-free treats at the fests.
We ventured to the 30th annual Taste of Chicago on Friday night, the festival’s opening night of a 10-day run, and encountered a smorgasbord of some of the city’s best restaurants. Many of the offerings were off-limits — pizza, fried eggrolls, pastries and fried catfish. But I had checked out a couple food stands in advance and struck gold: g-free fare.
Armed with our advance knowledge, we ordered with confidence and an appetite at Robinson’s No. 1 Ribs and Las Tablas Colombian Steakhouse. Other places also offered g-free chow – the Adobo Grill is always reliable — but we wanted to check out places that we were new to us or, in the case of Las Tablas, we hadn’t visited since Amy’s celiac diagnosis.

I called ahead to two Robinson’s locations to make sure their tangy, spicy sauce was g-free. Both locations assured me it was, all we had to do was order the ribs without bread. I didn’t understand the bread comment until we got there and saw that the succuluent rib tips are served over bread so you can sop up the sauce. We told them to hold the bread and chowed down on six generous rib tips that, though somewhat fatty by nature, melted in your mouth and had very few bones. The ribs cost 12 ticksts. A strip of 12 tickets costs $8. 
Next, we hit Las Tablas Colombian Steakhouse. I had also called ahead and knew that the empanadas, which are made with cornmeal, would be OK and so would the skirt steak or chicken with plantains. We got the steak and an empanada combo. The steak cost 12 tickets and the empanadas (three of them, also with plantains) were 10 tickets. 
We don’t eat a lot of deep-friend food since we’re g-free, so the empanadas were a nice treat. The Latin American meat pies were slightly greasy, but the fried pockets were especially a treat for Amy. The three fillings were yummy - cheese, chicken and a spicy pork mixture. We’re going back for more.
The steak was the juciest, most tender skirt steak we have ever had. We can’t wait to make a visit to the restaurant and have a proper meal.
For dessert, we chowed down on two chocolate strawberries from the Dominicks grocery store booth. While not the best chocolate we have ever had, it was just sweet enough to be a satisfying end to a great meal.
We are going to try to head back to the Taste one more time, so I will let you know what else I find.