How did you become involved in serving those who are gluten-free? I had a regular patron who had been coming to my restaurant for eight years, and she was a celiac. We would accommodate her dietary needs whenever she came and she was so happy that she talked to us about preparing a gluten-free menu for a wider customer base. We were concerned about cross-contamination and our small kitchen, but ultimately we were able to restructure the kitchen and especially the prep area. We trained the three full-time kitchen people and posted instructions in the back. We even switched to latex gloves to accommodate people who were allergic to vinyl. How often are you successful at meeting the customers’ dietary needs? We are able to do so around 90% of the time. We are a small restaurant with 50 seats and that has worked to our advantage, because we have a raw product and nothing is prepped in advance. Since nothing is premade, we are able to customize each order. What percentage of your clientele presents special requests with regard to food allergies? Around 80% of our clientele come to us with special requests regarding food allergies. Most of our clientele has heard of our willingness to accommodate food allergies and has contacted us before even coming to the restaurant. What is the process for making sure that your food is completely gluten-free? How do you select your ingredients and how do you train your staff? We work closely with our food purveyors, and we know their facilities well. We always check added ingredients. For example, with sun-dried tomatoes, you have to be very careful. Some companies will package them with a special coating, which allows the tomatoes to last a little longer but this coating is not gluten-free. We prefer to spend a little extra money to buy a product that has no added ingredients that might cause contamination of a gluten-free dish. In addition, we order multiple times, almost daily. In this way, we get fresh products, and we do not use a lot of preprepared sauces. In terms of training the staff, we work with the liaison for the Gluten-Free Restaurant Awareness Program. We also personally go over the elements of cooking gluten-free with every single person on our staff and we have prominently posted in our kitchen a list of do's and don'ts. How do you segregate your food to avoid cross-contamination? For our regular pasta, we have a pasta cooker that stays on the stove all day and cooks multiple batches of pasta. For our gluten-free pasta, we use a separate container and boil the water fresh each time.We have a small kitchen and we don't do any baking in there aside from the pizza, which is not gluten-free. We use a different pan and different utensils every single time we cook a gluten-free dish. We have two separate tables, one gluten- free and one not gluten-free. We use different color trays for different food items and these trays are cleaned regularly. What are the challenges you face when you serve a gluten-free meal? We have to make sure that, from start to finish, everyone -- the waitstaff and the kitchen staff -- is on the same page even in the midst of the evening rush. In order to guarantee this, we have a special gluten-free code that the waiter is required to put in multiple times when entering the order on the computer. From this entry, a ticket indicating that the dish must be gluten- free is printed and stays with the dish until it is presented at the customer’s table. Which recipes are the hardest/easiest to adapt to be gluten-free? The basis of Italian cooking is the sauce. Our sauces are fresh with simple ingredients -- tomatoes, asparagus, white wine, butter, to name a few -- and it is easy to make them gluten-free. We use Tinkyado brown rice pasta -- we like the texture and it cooks quickly. We cannot make the pizza gluten-free or the calamari fritti, but all of our other 10-14 core dishes we are able to make gluten-free. We are even able to make the bruschetta gluten-free by using a radicchio leaf instead of bread. What would you advise customers to discuss with the restaurant staff regarding the preparation of a gluten-free meal (i.e. cooking utensils, ingredients, etc.)? Be thoroughly aware of your dietary needs yourself first. Sometimes we get newly-diagnosed celiacs who have just discovered that they must be gluten- free, but they don't know what they can and can't eat. They walk in and say that they can't have anything and then they are pleasantly surprised when we bring them delicious gluten-free meals. The most important thing is to make your dietary needs known as soon as you walk in the door. It is best to talk to the manager and waitstaff and remember that the chef only knows how much the staff tells them and the staff only know how much you tell them. Understand that the chefs and the waitstaff would rather that you "over ask" than "under ask" because ultimately, no one wants you to get sick. Everybody has slightly different needs. One of our customers even requests dishes without balsamic vinegar, because in Modena, where a great deal of Italian balsamic vinegar is made, the caskets are sprayed with a chemical that she is allergic to. Finally, be clear with the staff every time you go to the restaurant: don't assume that since you're a regular, they will remember that you are gluten- free. |
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| INTERVIEW Anthony Avellino, restaurant manager Bistango 415 Third Avenue New York, NY 10016 |