SAN ANTONIO – Having Celiac disease or a gluten sensitivity can make eating out frustrating and make you miss the fun stuff like everyone else.
Celiac disease is an autoimmune disorder that causes the body’s immune system to attack the small intestine if gluten is consumed.
Gluten is in wheat, barley and rye products and most often found in bread, fried foods, pasta and even sweet treats.
In honor of Celiac Disease Awareness Month, here are some delicious spots in San Antonio that make tasty gluten-free dishes.
The restaurants tout themselves as gluten-friendly and do their best to not have any cross-contamination. None, however can say they are 100% gluten free, since other products that have gluten are present in their facilities.
Gigi Cupcakes:
Gigi’s Cupcakes doesn’t just serve delicious cupcakes and cakes, but they also make daily gluten-friendly brownies, cookies and cupcakes.
Daily gluten friendly cupcake flavors include wedding cake, triple chocolate torte and a seasonal flavor which right now is strawberry shortcake. A gluten-friendly flour blend is used in cupcakes and cakes -- which can be customized to many more flavors. Call ahead 2-3 days in advance for custom gluten-friendly cupcakes and 2 weeks for custom gluten-friendly cake orders.
Stixs and Stone:
It’s a Tex-Mex Asian fusion restaurant, that’s completely dedicated to being gluten friendly. If you have a gluten allergy, don’t worry, you can still order anything on the entire menu.
Owner and Chef Leo Davila said dedicating Stixs and Stone to being gluten-friendly was a personal choice.
“My little sister, Michelle, who’s our front of the house manager, our GM, she’s celiac,” Davila said. “Then I got diagnosed with a wheat sensitivity. I wanted to get back to eating food that I enjoyed eating growing up. And that was a lot of Asian food, which has a lot of soy sauce, and even a lot of Mexican food has a lot of flour. So we just wanted to find a creative way to cook, to bring back those same flavor profiles in a different new and fun way.”
Davila has worked many years perfecting his dishes that aren’t just “good” for being gluten-free.
“Gluten-free has a bad rap,” Davila said. “And you hear gluten-free and automatically used to see people’s faces turn their body language change. And what we’re trying to do is showcase that you can have a good meal without the addition of gluten.”
Freight Fried Chicken
Craving fried chicken? Good! Head to Freight Fried Chicken in the Pearl, which is owned by James Beard nominated Chef Nicola Blaque who also owns the Jerk Shack and the former Mi Roti. Chef Blaque created the concept of Freight Fried Chicken in honor of Black women who cooked and sold fried chicken and paved the way for future black entrepreneurs like herself. She said it was her customers that requested gluten-free fried chicken.
“If you can make gluten-free fried chicken for us and the only way to do it was we had to go all the way or no way,” Blaque said. “We only have two fryers back there, and so I just made the commitment to make all of our fried chicken and everything that goes in our prior to be gluten-free.”
At Freight’s Fried Chicken, you can enjoy gluten friendly fried chicken, chicken tenders and even sides like potato salad and chamoy pickles.
“Sharing our love of obviously fried chicken and being able to, you know, cater to a community that hasn’t been able to enjoy fried chicken in a long time,” Blaque said.
Here is a list of a couple of more places that offer gluten-friendly dishes:
Pizza:
Sandwiches/Burgers:
- Orderup (Try the chocolate chip gluten-friendly cookies!)
More places with delicious gluten-free options:
- Mama’s Cafe (Ask if they have time to make the onion rings gluten-free)