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Hi, everyone,

I'm pleased that Jill was able get a message directly to the president 
of the company, and I'm also encouraged to hear that he realizes this 
represents a training and communication issue. I hope that bears fruit 
for us. Meanwhile, many of the responses I've had to the original post, 
as well as the letter from the president, give me additional cause for 
concern.

First, the vast majority of people who responded said that they've tried 
eating there, but always became ill. Two people reported that the 
managers of their locations told them that the GF pasta is prepackaged 
and frozen in a separate pouch from the manufacturer and warmed separately.

I'm concerned that, even if that information is true, the company 
doesn't seem to have a standardized process, as the explanation above 
appears to be different from the way the president described the process 
in his letter to Jill:

 >>When we cook our gluten free pasta it is always the first product we 
cook in the morning in freshly cleaned and sanitized
pasta cookers with fresh clean water.  We then empty the cooker after 
cooking the gluten free pasta and re-clean the
equipment before moving on to our regular pasta.  In addition, as orders 
for GF pasta come into the kitchen
we reheat the GF pasta order in its own pan and NOT in our large pasta 
cookers.  We go to great lengths to insure there
is no cross contamination during the preparation and cooking process.<<

(And adding to that -- they don't make the GF pasta in dedicated pots? 
You cannot simply "clean and sanitize" pots that are used to make 
regular pasta and use them to make GF pasta -- the residue from regular 
pasta is so hard to remove that Celiacs are urged to get new cookware, 
so I'd hate to think about trying to get commercial kitchen levels 
cleaned out of a pan.)

Finally, and most importantly, this wasn't simply a "communication 
issue." My daughter asked the server, who answered that they used the 
same water. She asked her to double check, and management confirmed the 
process. So either this one location (Deptford, NJ) doesn't have a clue 
and is waaaaay off the corporate grid, or else the training is spotty 
enough throughout the organization that we'd have to be immensely 
cautious. I wrote originally to warn about the chain generally because 
this is so basic a thing that I worried this indicated lax training 
throughout the organization.

And btw, one person noted that they'd had the same issue with Macaroni 
Grill, and we had the same issue with them in Wilmington, DE, as well. 
For us personally, there are a great many things we're willing to take a 
chance on in eating out, but pasta still seems to be on the very 
dangerous end of the spectrum.

Regards,
Deb

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