Finding gluten-free dining options not a huge problem, finding vegan dining options in Colorado…easy, but looking for both restrictive diets on one menu can be quite a task. When our office decided to do a lunch last week I took to the internet to do some research on the proposed restaurant. What I found was a pizza place with a gluten-free menu and vegan options listed, or so I thought. I guess I should tell you I am not new to navigating through dietary restrictions at restaurants or reading labels at the grocery store, I have a gluten and dairy intolerance and have been vegetarian or vegan for the past 5 years.
When I looked up the menu and nutritional information for this well-known Colorado pizza company, who I will keep nameless, I was excited to see there were options. This was the start of the problem, when I got to the restaurant and looked at the menu again I came to the realization their labeling was completely backwards from the industry standard. They labeled menu items that could NOT be made gluten-free with a “gf” and a line through it. For example, they listed a plate of nachos with a “v” for vegan and a “gf” with a line through it, so when first looking at the menu I thought this was a gluten-free and vegan option but in actuality it could only be served vegan. After being told I could not eat anything listed except for a salad, I ordered a Mediterranean salad with no feta. What I got was a plate of lettuce and tomatoes with the dressing on the side. Our server did his best with the information he had and the lack of training he received from his company. The story ends with me leaving work early feeling extremely sick and my co-workers trying to get information about what was in the dressing, with no luck. There was no nutritional information on their website for any of their salad dressings.
There is a happy ending to this story and a pizza restaurant with an ACTUAL gluten-free menu that included vegan options. I went to Arizona over the weekend and stopped in to get dinner with my family at one of our client’s restaurants, NYPD Pizza. Everything on the menu was clearly labeled with additional nutritional information available; they enlisted MenuTrinfo® to provide their nutritionals. I ordered a gluten-free pizza with vegan “cheese” and a few additional toppings, the rest of my family ordered regular pizzas to share. Our server had a co-worker bring out the two pizzas for my family and she brought out my pizza by itself. She was careful when she placed the pizza on our table so it wasn’t touching the other pizza crusts. She came back and checked on our table and asked me specifically how my pizza was…AMAZING! Everyone in my family was able to eat and enjoy their meals without worrying about me or what I was going to eat and if I would get sick or not. NYPD Pizza is already my families’ new favorite dining spot and the next time I’m in town we will stop back in.
When it comes to menu labeling it pays to do it correctly. Gluten-free labeling standards are soon to be (August 2014) set in place, this is done for a reason, not to confuse the customer and make them sick because they think they can eat something when it turns out they really can’t. When choosing a company to do your nutritional information make sure they encompass every ingredient on the menu, meaning dressings too. I just want to end by saying how much I appreciate restaurants like NYPD Pizza that are going the full mile and doing menu labeling and nutritional information correctly.
