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Preparing gluten free dishes

November 10, 2010 by Betsy Craig — pres, menutrinfo.com

Catering to the needs of customers who require gluten free dishes is a necessity for any busy restaurant. While it may seem daunting at first, by being informed and outlining kitchen rules for preparation of gluten free dishes in your establishment, you will be able to provide options for this growing demographic of customers with gluten free dietary needs.

Gluten can show up in some pretty unexpected places. Before serving prepackaged foods (on their own or in a recipe) thoroughly review to ensure they do not contain gluten. When a product contains gluten, clearly mark the ingredient in a uniform manner. Train cooking staff to recognize which ingredients contain gluten and to clearly communicate when they are included in a dish. Some unexpected items to review which may contain gluten are:

Dry Mustard
Instant Coffee
Blue Cheese
Meat and Fish Pastes
Imitation Crab
Chocolate
Potato Chips
Soy Sauce
Spices (particularly curry powders)
Lunch Meats
Icing
Imitation Bacon
Veggie Burgers
Thickening agents

Last, but certainly not least, when it comes to identifying gluten ingredients, know that wheat free does not mean gluten free. Wheat free foods may still contain ingredients objectionable to gluten free diets. Review all wheat free items closely to see if they still contain gluten.

About Betsy Craig

To date MenuTrinfo is responsible for menu nutritional information at over 100K US restaurants, food allergy and gluten free ANAB accredited training for hundreds of thousands of food service professionals. AllerTrain is the chosen food allergy training by NEHA providing continuing educational credit hours for those that take and pass its course. Finally, MenuTrinfo delivers food allergy confidence and allergen transparency to today’s food allergic consumer through its onsite division offerings, AllerCheck, Certified Free From allergens for spaces and food products which is an ISO 17065 certification and expert consultation and incident response support when needed.

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