More Gluten Free In New York

New York City!

I’ve travelled to New York four times in my life so far, twice as a celiac. What an amazing place! During my last gluten free trip to New York I ate an amazing and filing gluten free breakfast at Bloom’s Cafe, wonderful gluten free dinner at the famous Risotteria and lots of delicious sushi!

On this trip I found even more super gluten free spots! I just returned from a gluten free week in New York where my lovely husband and I stayed in the fantastic Williamsburg, Brooklyn. My favourite way to spend my days when I’m travelling is to walk around a city, exploring and soaking it all in. New York is so easy to explore by foot, especially when you are used to all the crazy San Francisco hills! I walked and ran almost 100 miles during my week in NY and I found lots of amazing, celiac friendly places to eat too! Good times. I can safely say that New York is one of the most celiac friendly cities I’ve had the pleasure of visiting and any celiac or gluten intolerant traveller headed here won’t have any problems finding a whole bunch of wonderful gluten free food.

Pala Pizza on 198 Allen Street does amazing gluten free pizza and I’m happy John and I decided to eat here to celebrate our first wedding anniversary. The first question we were asked was ‘Do you have any allergies?’ When I told our server that I was celiac he said ‘Great! Let me give you the gluten free low down of our menu.’ The staff are extremely well trained to understand gluten free eating and cross contamination issues. Gluten free options have their own preparation area in the kitchen and gluten free pizza is cooked in a separate oven. When our amazing pizza came out to us, it came on wooden slabs which were labelled as gluten free. I ordered their zucca pizza which is butternut squash puree,  pancetta, smoked scamorza cheese, mozzarella and fresh parsley. It was just as amazing as it sounds.

Happy with my pizza 😀

Amazing gluten free pizza!

Caracas Arepa Bar on 93 E 7th is a Venezuelan cafe offering a bunch of interesting dishes. My favourite restaurant in San Francisco is Pica Pica which is very similar which is why I couldn’t wait to try this place. The arepas at Caracas are almost identical to Pica Pica and extremely delicious but unfortunately they are the only things on the menu which are free from the threat of cross contamination as anything fried is fried in the same place as gluten containing dishes. I really enjoyed my arepa here but Pica Pica wins as everything they serve is 100% gluten free!

Nizza on 630 9th Ave is a fantastic Italian restaurant where John and I spent our final night in the city. It’s popular location and the fact that it was a Friday night gave this place a great atmosphere. Their food was pretty spectacular too. The asparagi con prosciutto was so flavoursome and delicious and the corn pasta was fantastic, especially the ziti pomodoro which I had. We also tried some of their gluten free bruschetta with pesto. YUM!!!!

Gluten Free Risotto Balls

Caracas, Arepa Bar

The following are other places I found on my wanderings which I thought looked great but I didn’t have time to try on this trip..

S’Mac on 345 E 12th is a mac n cheese place which offers lots of different gluten free mac n cheese options. How awesome! Any mac n cheese from the menu can be made gluten free for an additional cost.

5 Napkin Burger  is an upmarket burger joint chain with a few locations throughout New York (and also a couple of other cities in the States). I walked past the location on 9th Ave and it looked very popular. They offer gluten free buns for their tasty sounding burgers and a few fellow celiacs have mentioned to me how yummy they are.

Tu-Lu’s Bakery at 338 E 11th is a 100% gluten free bakery which offers a whole bunch of gluten free cakes, cupcakes, cookies, brownies, donuts, bread, panini and muffins. Yum!!

Friedman’s Lunch in the Chelsea Market does a variety of gluten free brunch, lunch and dinner options. Lots of their dishes sounded really good but unfortunately I didn’t have time on this visit to try this place.

Bistango  on 415 3rd Ave does a wide variety of gluten free options including pizza, pasta, bread and desserts. A number of people recommended this place to me so I’ll definitely have to check it out next time.

Pie By The Pound

Gluten Free Desserts!

Pie By The Pound on 124 4th Avenue does a huge selection of gluten free pizza, salad, sandwiches, desserts and beer. A few years back the owner of this place discovered he was gluten intolerant and now offers a whole lot of gluten free options.

Rubirosa on 235 Mulberry Street is another Italian restaurant with a gluten free menu. They offer gluten free pizza, pasta, antipasti and mains.

Gingersnap’s Organic on 130 E 7th is an east village cafe which serves 100% organic, gluten free, vegan and raw food!

I walked past Rawvolution on 504 E 12th street to see a chalk board menu outside saying that all of their desserts are gluten free.

Bad Burger on 171 Avenue A (They also have a location in Brooklyn) offers gluten free options.

Gluten Free Travel Tip: There are a whole bunch of great farmer’s markets around where you can pick up delicious fresh goods for cooking with, if you have access to a kitchen, or for nibbling as a snack if you don’t.

You can read about the other gluten free goodies I found in New York City including my trip to Risotteria and Bloom’s Diner in this post written after my last visit.

Yay for New York City and their great selection of gluten free options!!