Gluten-free Eat Out in Brighton: Las Iguanas

Today we went to this restaurant called, "Las Iguanas" in Brighton :)

It is a British franchise restaurant that serves South American meals.

Initially, I was indecisive between another franchise Brazilian churrascaria, Preto where they serve all-you-can-eat meat and other dishes in a buffet style & Las Iguanas - their food was more like a fusion of Latin American cuisine.

But as soon as we got to know that Las Iguanas has gluten-free beer on their menu & offers 20%-off student discount, it became decisive - plus the former seems to have lots of dishes that may contain gluten.

Anyhow, it was very nice :)

Their gluten-free menu was just around 1/3 smaller than the usual menu, and they seemed to have gluten-free alternatives for their popular meals :) And the food was indeed very good. 

We ordered nachos, camarão a la criolla (prawns, coconut milk and garlic rice), sirloin steak, and 3 bottles of beer :)

And it was £41.08 ($63.65) all together using 20% off.

It was great considering we could have a little nibbles, two main dishes and alcohol to make us very happy and dreamy :)

Well, let's not think about how this amount of money can make us daily dinners for 2.7 weeks here though...(　；∀；) hihi

Anyway, here's my little comments on the food :)

Nachos!

It was nice & cheesy and the tortilla chips went very well with these lovely sour cream, guacamole, salsa, and jalapeño!

I haven't had tortilla chips for a long time - as sadly many chips in the market contain gluten. But these nachos were gluten-free & absolutely delicious!

Camarão a la criolla!

I got this Brazilian dish with prawn called, camarão a la criolla :)

"Plump prawns in a sauce of peppers, tomatoes, parsley, coriander,
garlic, paprika, coconut milk, cumin & lime. With chilli & garlic
buttered wheat & corn tortillas & piles of spring onion & garlic rice." (Source: Food menu on their website)

Hmmmm...yum! :)

Though I love prawns and I can eat them everyday, I usually never cook as my partner has an allergy to prawns.

So this was my first one in a long time and was heavenly delicious. Since they use coconut milk, it also reminded me of some good Thai green curry that I adore.

They offer both normal & gluten-free options, the changes seem to be just either corn or wheat tortillas :)

Sirloin steak!

David had this steak and seemed he enjoyed it very much :)

On the other hand, I had this little thought about the amount of food he got only because it was gluten-free.

It was nearly £17, but this gluten-free version didn't include any more side dish other than these 5 mini tomatoes, little amount of cucumber & green leaves, and herb sauce unlike the normal one that has good amount of chips.

Though this very attentive staff told us that they won't serve their chips as they fry all together with gluten-contained food and we agreed, and perhaps it was their considerate action to put these cucumbers...

I had this tiny little wish that they could've just included some small amount of gluten-free alternatives they have or even some baked potatoes, or increased the amount of salad just to make it a bit more filling as we emptied our stomach for this meal.

n.b. I'm not arguing here that all restaurants should fry chips or whatever separately from wheat-contained food as I understand the costs & effort. After all, I am still very grateful that those amazing restaurants with coeliac-friendly menu even exist :)

＊

This was on my birthday last year in other restaurant, and see how there's a huge difference between David's gluten-free burger and my massive wheat-buns burger, and he ended up not being able to have their fries as well. But perhaps mine was just massive as it had many beet roots in between..:D

＊

Anyhow, I guess this is how people on a gluten-free diet lose weight while we gain weight as we have too many choices and can even eat those fatty chips :D

Oh well...enough about that :)

Now, last but not least, here is the lovely gluten-free lager!

We've had gluten-free pilsner before from Pizza Express, but I kind of prefer this Daura from Spain :)

I don't remember much about the taste as I was pretty drunk after having one and a half bottles, but what I remember is it wasn't bitter but more fruity in my taste :)

Seems like we can get Daura Gluten-free Lager rather cheep from major supermarkets (4bottles for £6) :)

Overall, apart from my gluten-free portion struggle, the experience was great, we both enjoyed our food, staff was very very lovely, serving-time was perfect and with 20% discount on top!

So, there's nothing much to say now except it was "GREAT!" :)

Cheers!

xxxxx