I keep seeing Tweets from people with Celiac talking about restaurants and procedures to make sure items served are indeed gluten free. These conversations usually end with a Tweetebration about how restaurant such and such is “safe.”
Having owned a restaurant myself for about six years, I have to admit I am more than a little concerned for my celiac brethren when it comes to reliance on “procedures” to keep menu items gluten free in an all-gluten environment of doom.
Don’t get me wrong, I am all for restaurants making good efforts to serve their celiac customers. What I worry about is that people may tend to have a little too much blind faith and not quite enough healthy skepticism when it comes to dining out. It never hurts to stop and ask some questions before you jump in with both sets of teeth.
There’s one thing in particular that makes me cringe.
The dedicated fryer.
This sounds amazing, no, make that truly awesome, on paper. Imagine going to your favorite place that deep fries all sorts of poisoned breaded things. Imagine they say that you can eat their juicy, fresh-cut potato fries. Because they cook them in a dedicated fryer.
Sounds awesome, let’s go get some!
Not so fast. You restaurant owners out there – don’t flame me for what I am about to say – I am just trying to educate your customers so they can stay un-dead and you can stay un-guilty for inadvertently making someone no longer un-dead. Sorry I guess that last statement made un-sense. Gimme a break, it’s Friday!
A lot of things need to line up in the universe, without fail, and without exception, for the dedicated fryer plan to work.
- You have to believe that the dudes and dudettes in the kitchen never got so deep in the weeds during a mad lunch rush that they had to drop that chicken-fried-chicken sandwich in the dedicated fryer.
- You have to believe that there was never a brand new dude or dudette that was still learning the job and who didn’t know that you don’t cook deep fried Krispy Kremes in the dedicated fryer.
- If we’re dealing with a big restaurant or fast food chain, corporate has to have a clear policy and procedure. More importantly, they have to communicate that to hundreds or even thousands of locations. Even more importantly, each location has to abide by that procedure. And most importantly of all, each and every employee has to follow that procedure each and every time, forever, without fail and without direct supervision. Hmmm.
- You have to believe that when closing time rolls around, and the mad dash to get the heck out of there begins, the person stuck with the closing routine of filtering the fryer grease needs to jump through some hoops and invest some extra cleaning time. Most restaurants have just one fryer oil filter machine to strain the gunk out of the deep fryers at the end of each day. You have to hope that the person doing that stops, cleans the machine, and puts a brand new filter in it before filtering the oil in the dedicated fryer. And this during the Nascar “Finish my shift 500.” Not likely.
- You have to believe that no one in the kitchen ever lost focus, just for a second, and put a gluten-contaminated item in the dedicated fryer.
- You have to believe that the dedicated fryer is unlike most other fryers, and is not connected all in a row with the regular fryers where less than two inches separate one boiling and overflowing cauldron of poisonous gluten residue from the dedicated fryer. Oh, and you have to believe that fresh battered onion rings are not made in the adjoining fryer. That batter flies everywhere.
- Basically, you have to believe that, while your food is being prepared, the planets are lined up in peace and harmony, singing “I’d like to buy the world a Coke..”
So am I suggesting that you ban all restaurants trying to serve you a gluten free meal by developing and adhering to safe procedures? Not at all. I am simply suggesting that you exercise a little caution. Ask about the dedicated fryer. Many places may not even deep fry breaded items at all. That’s great news for you! While I am not 100% sure yet, I believe Five Guys falls into this category. Some of the more sophisticated restaurants may in fact have a real dedicated fryer that is isolated and safe.
So just ask. Before you find out the un-fun way that the procedures don’t measure up to your needs.
