Hi Shannon,

Thank you for contacting us. I’m sorry to hear of your frustration. Could you please let me know which specific items your server told you were gluten-free?

As a note, our 12 Signature Sauces are gluten-free, as the wheat has been processed to meet FDA standards for Gluten Free foods. To expand, the wheat component in the sauces is part of the soy sauce solids. To make soy sauce solids, soy sauce is dehydrated. This dehydrated product is lab-tested by our manufacturer to be below the FDA standard of 20ppm of gluten which is required to label something as gluten free. Many guests with gluten disorders or sensitivities have consumed our sauces without issues, however if you feel that the product is not safe for you consumption, we understand and recognize your prerogative.

We do have several sauces that do not contain any wheat that you may feel more comfortable using. Those sauces are Black Thai Peanut, Not-So-Sweet and Sour, and Kung Pao…Yow!.

I hope this information has eased your concerns, but please do hesitate to reach out with any further questions.

Thank you,

Excuse Me?!!!

Everything that I know about this doesn’t jive with this response. I am working on getting more information about this. I did find on The Gluten Free Watchdog site this about “gluten removed beers” or omission beer and the article addresses the problems with hydrolyzed foods: https://www.glutenfreewatchdog.org/reportUploads/Gluten_Removed_Barley_Based_Beers_Jan_14.pdf

So, after some back and forth with the Gluten Free Watchdog, LLC on their Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/Gluten-Free-Watchdog-LLC-258784214186574/?fref=nf  here’s the conclusion. The restaurant is wrong. They do not have a gluten free menu. According to FDA guidelines a manufacturer cannot label their product gluten free if it contains wheat. Reading about the gluten removed barley based beers (link above) helped me to understand this process they are talking about. It is similar to what they are doing with the soy sauce.

Think of it this way: if you make a smoothie and add an apple to it (really pureeing it); once it is blended and broken into tiny pieces, is there less apple in your smoothie? If you can’t find any pieces of apple does that mean there is now less apple than you started with. The testing is looking for an intact protein and isn’t designed to find fragments, piece them together and measure them.

I am so grateful for companies like the Gluten Free Watchdog, LLC who are watching out for things like this! Please, if you have a question about something that is supposedly gluten free please contact the Gluten Free Watchdog, LLC. We have to be our own advocates and help one another! There is so much misinformation out there, make sure you are going to good sources who truly know what they are talking about!