Serving Up Gluten-Free Food

A third-party food service certification program can provide the needed expertise and experience to help a restaurant or other food service environment offer proper training and establish and maintain appropriate standards. Established standards are important over time as new employees come on board.

Best Practices are Simple Steps

It is essential to evaluate with a critical eye reasonable steps that can be taken to avoid putting a food service at risk of cross-contamination. A kitchen or service setup often contains unnecessary risks that are simple to eliminate, such as recognizing the need to place pasta at the end of a salad bar to avoid the potential for cross-contaminating other food items, not storing gluten-exposed pans above those used for gluten-free preparations, and not cleaning surfaces with soap and water (which can spread gluten proteins) instead of sanitizers.

Food service operators should not let the concern of cross-contamination stop them from offering GF menu items. Often, the steps to prevent cross-contamination can be taken with minimal cost. An additional shelf may be needed to store things correctly, or more foil may be needed compared to what the food service previously had used. More often than not, new large equipment is not needed.

The following are three guiding principles that every food service should adhere to when providing gluten-free offerings.

Principle 1: Prevention of food safety hazards is favored over reliance on corrective actions after a problem has occurred.

Principle 2: Prevention of food contamination in the production of gluten-free foods must encompass all aspects of procurement, processing, and delivery of gluten-free foods.

Principle 3: Worker hygiene and production and storage area sanitation practices play a critical role in minimizing the potential for contamination of gluten-free foods.

Ensuring best practices is not an insurmountable ordeal—it is comprised of simple steps regarding food placement and kitchen procedures that may not have been considered previously. However, for food service establishments offering GF food items, understanding the risks of cross-contamination and establishing sound, documented procedures for avoiding those risks is essential to the safety of patrons and ultimately, a food service organization’s success.

Kupper is CEO of the Gluten Intolerance Group, which provides food safety certification programs, and is a registered dietitian and expert in celiac disease management. Reach her at [email protected].