Ruby Tuesday's - Cincinati Location

[Chalula88]

Me and my family just ate at Ruby Tuesday's (at Kenwood mall, Cincinnati) last week and had a terrible experience. I have Celiac, my sister has EE and can't eat gluten, among other things. We explained at length about our food allergies, asked them to cook our meat on foil and ordered off their gluten free menu.

I ordered dry rubbed ribs and my sister ordered a plain piece of chicken.

Well, they brought my sister her chicken covered in barbecue sauce (which contains gluten). We sent it back and their excuse was, "we didn't notice it was ordered plain". What??? After we spent fifteen minutes explaining our allergies???

My ribs came and looked great. But about halfway through I got this bite that tasted WAY different from the other bites. I flipped the ribs over and found a huge blob of barbecue sauce.

Their excuse was that the tongs had barbecue sauce on them.... Sure glad we spent fifteen minutes explaining just how careful to be with our food.

Despite my sister's chicken coming out plain, she ended up sick too (I suspect the grilled veggies she ate were possibly CC).

So anyway, they comped both of our meals and gave us $50 in vouchers that we will never use.

Just thought this info might be helpful. I'm not sure if the other locations are more careful.

[silk]

I had seen that RT's had a gluten-free menu and it used to be one of my favorite places to eat prior to being DX'd but for some reason I have never been brave enough to try it. I went once after my DX and ordered only a steak, green beans and mashed potatoes and as you did, explained my gluten-free issues and was sick before I left the restaurant. Will not go back again. Sorry you both had such a bad experience. It feels like one step forward and two steps back sometimes, doesn't it? I had dinner out with my husband tonight for our anniversary at a restaurant where the owner is also celiac and it was a wonderful experience. Dining out can be like playing the lottery....except with a losing lottery ticket I don't get brain fog!

[MaryJones2]

I don't think Ruby Tuesday has a gluten free menu. They publish an allergen list like many restaurants but that doesn't mean they understand the concept of cross contamination or that they will truly work to accommodate gluten free customers or actually provide a gluten free meal (like some other chains). I avoid them for these reasons. Unfortunately, I don't think you will have a better experience at another location.

[Chalula88]

My location does indeed have a gluten free menu. You can walk in and ask for it and they'll hand it to you. It also states on their website that it's available.

I do think restaurants should not be allowed to claim they have gluten free menus (or even gluten free dishes) if they're not actually going to worry about CC. There's a restaurant near me (Don Pablos) that has certified gluten free dishes, yet they don't use different fryers or grills.

I didn't mean to imply I was going to try another location, I'm not. I simply meant I can't speak for the restaurant as a whole, there may be some locations that do a better job.

[MaryJones2]

My location does indeed have a gluten free menu. You can walk in and ask for it and they'll hand it to you. It also states on their website that it's available.

Is it this menu by chance? Open Original Shared Link

If so I don't consider that a gluten-free menu - it's more of a well if you are gluten sensitive you can probably have this and be ok menu. IMHO, there is a huge difference between a restaurant that publishes an allergen menu/list (Chili's, Red Lobster) and a restaurant actually has a gluten free menu (Outback, PF Changs, Carabbas). In the end, it all comes down to educating employees on the importance of cross contamination and the consequences of not taking it seriously and companies that publish allergen charts tend not to educate their employees. It is possible to have a good experience but as someone pointed out you have to find a manager and get them to take you seriously.

[coffeetime]

I could have written the initial post. Last week we had planned on eating at RT before going on to the movies. We were given the allergy menu, discussed our order with the waiter and was shocked to have our burgers arrive on buns, the excuse from the management being there are no buttons on the register to specify gluten-free! WTF. By this time we didn't have time to go to another restaurant and wait to be seated, order, etc. so we clarified, AGAIN, what we needed. They said no problem--it took about 4-5 minutes to bring our "new order" out--same burger, now just missing the bun, crumbs were still on the plate I understand we take a risk when we go out to eat but seriously we explained it multiple times to multiple people and they still didn't get it. We didn't get vouchers, which we would not have used anyway, however an apology would have been nice. I think if we went into an immediate allergic reaction like with peanut allergies maybe they would take it a little more seriously. Sadly a lot of restaurants see this as a fad--like the low carb diet and not as a medical issue.

[cap6]

We have two Ruby's near us. One offers gluten-free (udis) bun and the other does not. I haven't had the courage yet to eat at either one although I do know that Udi's requires the restaurant to go through a cc training.