Traveling Gluten-free - Are Gluten-Free Menus Good or Bad?

Celiac.com 05/25/2008 - When traveling should you go to a restaurant with a gluten-free menu or not—that is the question. It is important to let you know that because of your comments I can come up with discussions like this, so please keep them coming.  Let’s talk about gluten-free menus (this is, of course, only my opinion).

Gluten-Free Menu Pros:

• Gives the person a chance to order from a menu that was made for them.
• The restaurant should know about all the ingredients that will make you sick.   
  

• The staff often has no idea what gluten-free really means. The staff thinks that it is only wheat and not all the other items that are on our forbidden list. Sometimes they don’t even know that their restaurant does offer a gluten-free menu.
• The staff has not been properly trained.  That goes for the wait staff and the cooks or chefs who are making your meal.  Cross-contamination occurs and there is nothing that you can do about it.
• The restaurant is trying to do something nice for us but may be focused more on the extra money that can make with such a menu.
• The gluten-free menu is so small and only offers a few items, while regular customers have 50 items to choose from.
• We travel so far to go to one of these restaurants, when we could be getting the same or better service from a nice, local restaurant.
  

Celiac.com Sponsor (A12):
Let’s look at traveling options and my experiences.  I have traveled with my boys around the USA.  Normally we live in a tent and stay at state parks where it is cheap.  We have hit Gettysburg, Niagara Falls, Hershey Pennsylvania, Boston, Florida, Georgia, Colorado, South Dakota, Chicago, New York, and many more places.  I also have gone with my wife to Las Vegas, Washington and some more places.  I have traveled in the USA and do not plan my meals around gluten-free menus at restaurants—and I want to explain why.  I was in New York twice.  I went with my two boys and the other time it was just me and my wife.

The first time in New York with my boys we stopped at Nathan’s in Coney Island.  We watched them eat hot dogs on July 4th on the TV—you know every year somebody eats 50 or so of them.  So we traveled to Coney Island just to go to Nathan’s.  We went to Nathan’s and I waited until there was no line at the window (Rule 1—always wait until it is slow).  I approached the window with my boys (Rule 2, observe how they cook the item you are going to ask for—are they sloppy when they are serving the food? If so ask them to change gloves or give them a fork to get your food).  Noone was behind us so I knew it would be no trouble to ask for special help.  I told the server I have a special diet request and could they help me.  I asked if they had the package handy so I could look at the wrapper the dogs came in.  They go through a lot of dogs so it was right there.  After I reviewed the package I asked them if they could use a plastic fork to get me a couple of dogs. They did and they were great.  Ask for condiments to go, those had the ingredients on them.

Another time I was with my wife and she wanted to go to T.G.I.F.—at that time they had no gluten-free menu (they might now, I don’t know).  We went in at a slow time and I gave them my Open Original Shared Link and I also ate very well with no illness the next day. I used the two rules mentioned above that I always go by.

This year my wife and I went to Las Vegas.  My wife wanted to go to the Las Vegas Stratosphere Tower to eat while overlooking Las Vegas.  They also didn’t have a gluten-free menu, and she made our reservations.  She used Rule 1 and made it for the last reservation they would accept.  I asked for the manager and told him I have a special diet request and tonight I would love to have the duck breast if they were not marinated.  He said he would check with the chef.  A few minutes later the executive chef came out to our table to speak with us (this chef is well paid, and this is what I have been saying from day one to you about chefs in fine dining establishments—they care just like I do).  The fact that he had time to come to our table happened for a few reasons I believe:

• They were slow enough that the chef could take time away from the kitchen to help his customer.
• This is the type of place that cares what you think, what you say about their establishment to others—and they don’t want to make anyone sick.
• I was direct and to the point in what I wanted to eat and the chef could do it. When the chef came out I told him exactly what I told the manager about my illness and the nature of it.   I asked him if he could sauté me some duck breast. Duck breast was on the menu but it was with a terraki sauce and the soy sauce normally has wheat in it.  I wasn’t in the mood for terraki anyway, so this how I ordered my meal—and yes I did write it down on my Open Original Shared Link:

1. Sauté the duck breast in olive oil until ¾ of the way done.  Pull it out and put it to the side and deglaze the pan with white wine.  Add orange juice, a hint of pineapple juice and tighten it with corn starch or arrow root.  Add the duck breast, orange zest and a splash of lime juice.
2. Microwave some white rice.
3. Microwave any fresh vegetables.
4. No seasonings or garnish.
   

I have a few thoughts to share with you for when you start to look for gluten-free menus.  Gluten-free menus are good but they are not great.  If I was in Japan and I had to go out to a restaurant, I would want to go to a sushi restaurant.  I would not search around for a place with a gluten-free menu.  I am always going to use Rules 1 and 2 anyway.  In Japan I would look for the restaurant that cuts and serves the sushi right in front of me.  If I was in France, I would use the two Rules first, and also try to find a place that does table-side cooking.  If I was in Louisiana, I would do rule 1 and rule 2 then go to a restaurant that I know has a good reputation and give them my Chef Daniel form and enjoy my meal like everyone else.

You need to eat where you want to eat and not limit yourself.  How many of you would want to eat at Wolfgang Pucks restaurant?  Are you going to say that eating where there is a gluten-free menu will be better than eating at Wolfgang’s place?  What if you were visiting the Eiffel Tower in Paris or a bistro across the street from it?  It would be nice to have a gluten-free menu in those places, but it is unlikely. We have to come together as one group and order the same way.  In time I will convert menus at the cruise ships or the chains of motels that have chain restaurants.  Traveling is what we do and it doesn’t matter if you have to restrict your diet or not. We all love food and we will pay extra if we have to, but we must expect not to get sick. 

My ultimate goal is to be able to walk into any restaurant and have a great gluten-free menu. I would love to see a real gluten-free menu with lots of great entrées to pick from.  Ultimately it is up to us to educate workers in the places that we eat in about the gluten-free diet.   We need to come together and start standing up and saying that we are special too.

Chef Daniel.