<<Disclaimer: Verify this information before applying it to your situation.>> FYI Over several months I have been reading messages about various experiences at restaurants like Outback Steakhouse and Applebees. I have had my own experience with a McDonald's. The first apparent misunderstanding is that these national chains are uniform. They are uniform, sometimes in name and advertising only. Any particular restaurant may be run by the national directly, run by a a group which holds the franchise for a group of 4 or 5 restaurants with the same name or run by an individual franchisee. Sources of food may be national, local or some mix of the two. McDonald's, for instance, has been given a monopoly by the states on the Massachusetts Turnpike and the New York Thruway. I stopped last fall at one and ordered the simplest thing possible, a plain garden salad. I had checked the posted ingredient list . There was nothing in it but vegetables. To my surprise it came with cheese and coldcut meat(whose ingredients were unknown). I rejected the salad and pointed out that it did not agree with the posted ingredient list. The manager responded that the list was an old one 2 years old and no longer was applicable. He further stated that McDonalds only advised them on some things but that their ultimate boss was the owner who held the franchise for 4 or 5 of the outlets on the Turnpike. I also learned that not all their food came from McDonalds. The regional McDonalds office told me that they had told all individual restaurants to remove the 2 year old ingredient listings some time before my stop. I ended up with a cup of tea since even Pepsi and Coke will not guarantee their products unless it is in one of their unopened containers. Even when the national chain has tried to provide information about gluten free products; in any individual restaurant's case there is no guarantee that it will be true. Each restaurant may have been given directives from national, but that doesn't mean that they are being followed. Individual franchise owners or owners of groups of restaurants can use their discretion in too many ways. They can add new dishes. They can buy some ingredients locally ( which may be of a poorer quality.) They may get some through these giant food services like Sysco, a distributor who appears to be increasing their national spread and may have been furnished with no ingredient listings. ( Sysco will not deal with individual consumers-they say work through the restaurant.) Some may buy some, or all their semiprepared foods through the national and have no idea what is in them. The national headquarters seldom police the performance of their directives adequately. I used to even eat at a 2 location franchise until I found out that the employees took turns being "cooks" in the kitchen. In short, the only "safe harbor" for celiacs appear to be one owner chef restaurant who know everything that is in their foods. The only exception to that in greater Boston is Legal Seafoods which has a list of ingredients for every dish served in every location. I cannot understand how a celiac can trust his/her life to a franchise restaurant even once. Hal De Bruyn in Boston