Chipotle is (Mostly) Gluten Free!

On Saturday last I went to a Chipotle restaurant with one of my good friends (see Gluten-Free Girl's Day) and although I felt very confident about the status of the food I visited their website and submitted an inquiry as to the GF nature of the food.

Here is the response I received:

Dear Vittoria:

Thanks for writing to us; we're glad that you enjoy our Food with Integrity. Regarding Gluten, you can eat anything we serve except for our large burrito tortillas, our small soft taco tortillas, and possibly our hot red tomatillo salsa (there is a small amount of distilled vinegar in it which some celiac websites still say might be problematic, although most don't).

Everything else is fine for you to eat including our crispy corn tacos, our corn chips, and our burrito bowls (no tortilla).

If you are highly sensitive, you can always ask our staff to change their gloves and they would be happy to do that at your request. Additionally, since there is always the slight possibility of cross-contamination in our restaurants because our folks work with wheat tortillas all day long, we encourage you to carefully consider your dining choices.

You can find this and other Allergen and Nutrition information on our website at www.chipotle.com/faq.

Sincerely,

George Seno
Department of Gripes and Happiness
Chipotle

Kudos to Chipotle, and to George Seno, for the (mostly) gluten free menu and for this thoughtful reply. He obviously did some research and I really appreciate that. Chipotle gets my vote for being (mostly) gluten free as well as being environmentally responsible.

Chipotle believes in doing only one thing, and doing it well. You can choose a burrito, taco, burrito bowl or salad. The staff makes your meal right in front of you. You can choose your meat, your type of beans, rice and toppings, all as they prepare it for you. Watching someone prepare my food tends to give me a greater sense of security, but there's always a little nagging thought that tells me I don't know what happened in the back.

I had a salad with the chicken, black beans, cheese and corn salsa. I watched how they served it and all the staff were conscientious about not mixing spoons, or even touching the food with their hands. I am extremely sensitive and I had no problems.

The 42nd Street location was reasonably busy for a Saturday afternoon, but it both the dinning area and the staff were neat and clean and the staff were considerate.

*as a side note, notice how they have a little tree and a 'green' request not to print the email. More Kudos.

Gluten-Free Girl's Day

Two weeks ago one of my best friends was dumped by her live-in boyfriend (the swine!). I happened to have two of those promotional spa packages that you see guys hawking on 5th Ave or in Union Square. The ones who approach and as "where do you get your hair cut? When was your last hair cut?". I got talked into buying two for about $40, and I thought I would save it to give her later. (Note: they do charge you an additional registration fee when you get there, and they try to sell you more services.)

As soon as I heard about this I decided that it was time to use the 'coupons'. I scheduled appointments for us for the day that he was supposed to move out, two weeks after he broke up with her. This way she could get out of the house while he was packing, and get a great hair cut at the same time. She's super stoic so I needed to see her to get a read on how she was doing, she'd never say over the phone.

So she got the haircut, and ended up paying for highlights and I got a facial, eyebrow wax and massage. And I got talked into the delux facial (as I said they get you to buy more stuff once you're there and comfy and ready to indulge). She left with a fantastic new hair cut, and a huge smile on her face. I got a great massage and my first facial ever. My only complaint it that the facialist messed up my eyebrows, nothing that can't be fixed with a little eyebrow powder and won't grow out. Note to self: don't let anyone touch your eyebrows! Alfangi Salon was a retreat in itself, and it reminded me that you can have fun with your girlfriends with out having to focus on food. This also reminded us that even though we take concientious care of our bodies by working out and eating well we need to take time to take care of the outside once in a while.

After pampering ourselves we were famished and need to yak some more so we headed over to Chipotle. With my experience with other Latin food I was hopeful that I would be able to get a salad, it appears that all the 'fixin's' are gluten free, although the tortillas are made from flour. It's the next day and I have no symptoms so, Go Chiptole! I do have a request in to them for a full list of ingredients to determine if all of it is indeed GF.

My sweet tooth was playing tricks on my yesterday, so we decided that we would try to find the new Pinkberry on our way to Bed Bath & Beyond where she needed to get a few things for her newely vacated apartment. We've all seen the gossip mags with picture of celebs running around with their Pinkberry cups and we wanted to see what it was all about. The location was surprising but appropriate, on 32nd St in Korea Town, and it had a cute japanismo feel. The flavors are natural, coffee and green tea, all of which are GF and they have a number of fresh fruit toppings to choose from as well as unusual toppings like Cap'n Crunch and Fruity Pebbles. Not sure of the cleanliness of the spoons I had only the green tea flavor yogurt and it was surprisingly good. It tasted like yogurt, rather than sugar like so many others. Even though it's more expensive than Tasti D Lite or Columbo, I can say that this one is Gluten Free, and probably a lot healthier and eco-friendly as well. It will undoubtebly become one of my summer treats when I need to take a walk and escape from my office.