I posted on my experience eating at Cactus Club recently, and was impressed with the number of menu items that the kitchen informed me are gluten free. at that time I ordered the Raincoast Greens, and really enjoyed my lunch. since then we have received several comments from our readers about the inconsistency from one Cactus Club to another with regard to gluten free dining. there are many locations, and it seems that not all of them have proven easy to communicate with the importance of gluten free for Celiac customers. more concerning was a comment questioning a few of the menu items we had been told are gluten free. yikes.
not wanting to mislead anyone in their search for safe gluten free dining experiences, and also not wanting to eat gluten mistakenly ourselves too, we decided to contact Cactus Club head office to get clarification as to which menu items are gluten free. we pointed out the blog post we wrote, and made specific reference to the comments we have received from other Cactus Club diners. we received a prompt email from Kaitlin, the guest services administrator for Cactus Club Restaurants. here is part of her reply...
"At Cactus Club Cafe, we are very aware of Celiac Disease, and strive to provide our guests suffering from a gluten allergy with an enjoyable meal. After reading your blog (and the comments) I discussed the matter with our Test Kitchen Coordinator, and we looked into some of the requests from your commenters. I am happy to report that the spicy pecans and the Cajun spice (found on chicken) are in fact gluten-free. The JD rib sauce, however, does contain gluten".
good news and bad news I guess. Kaitlin directed me to Cactus Club's Facebook page where there they have posted their Gluten Free Menu, which you can read online or download in pdf format. this menu list has been recently amended to ensure that each item is in fact gluten free. in addition to having this online menu guide, Kaitlin informed me that all locations would be notified as to the updated gluten free menu, and that the in-store gluten free menus would also be corrected and updated.
we sincerely hope that this will eliminate all confusion when dining at any of their locations, and all staff will be aware of it, and will have something to refer to if they are not 100% certain of what they are being asked, which is still a common occurrence, but changing quickly though!
our original post on Cactus Club has been deleted to avoid confusion. please refer to the new Gluten Free Menu! thank you Cactus Club! and thank you to our readers as well, and to those who left comments, you are helping to improve the safety and availability of gluten free dining in Vancouver and elsewhere! Andrea.
*update: the correct gluten free menu now appears on the cactus club website!!!
*update: the correct gluten free menu now appears on the cactus club website!!!
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4 comments:
We ate at the Cactus Club downtown Vancouver location (as it was practically across from our hotel). A super busy location, but they did very well in accommodating our gf selections. Food was very good and no issues! Thankful we were able to sit outside, as it was really loud inside the restaurant. Good service too!
My experience in Cactus Club Cafe on W Broadway 575 Vancouver last Monday 15 of November was not good at all.
I asked for the gluten-free menu mentioning I am celiac, from it I ordered Salmon. I ate half of the dish to then realised that the cereal below the Salmon was Barley. I could not believe it. I asked for an explanation to the waitress and she told me that the chef told her that "the barley does not have gluten"
Oviously they are not trained on this, but this is a very serious illness for us, the ones that suffered it.
I could see the barley grains but what happens with many other ingredients containing gluten that we cannot see????
Lya
thank you for your comment lya. andrea and i feel that your experience is unacceptable! we have decided to speak to cactus club again, and we will also provide another update to our blog post to make our readers more aware of the challenges,and in some cases, outright lack of awareness of what gluten is.
we dont want any more of our readers to have a bad experience from a recommendation we have provided on our blog, so thank you for taking the time to leave a comment.
i ate at cactus club recently myself, and while my dinner was fine, i was really disappointed in the menu itself.
more to come!
robyn
Hi guys - thanks for the blog, I just found out that I need to go GF and have no idea how to start. I also live in the Woodwards - maybe it's contagious (ha ha).
Anyway Cactus Club no longer has their gluten-free menu online - just wanted to let you know. I will maybe stick to Joey's.
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