Paleo and Gluten-Free Menus: New Trends with Old Ingredients

By John Griffin CEC CEPC

Whether we should eat a diet similar to the hunting and gathering societies of our evolutionary past, which consisted of more meat, more nuts and berries, and less grain and refined sugar, is an open question.

But its clear that Paleo, gluten-free, and vegan diets are influencing dining trends, and cooks and chefs need to provide eaters with options to capitalize on the trend.

Chef Griffin explores whats behind these diet requests so you can understand what people will eat, what they wont eat, and why. He delivers guidance that will enable you to make customers feel welcome without buying expensive ingredients.

If youre creating menus for a restaurant or other foodservice operation, its important to keep diet trends in mind. Failing to inform customers where your food comes from and how its made will prompt them to go elsewhere.

Filled with dozens of Paleo, wheat-free, and vegan recipes that rely on standard ingredients, youll be equipped to please all of your guests, whether at a simple dinner party or in a highly trafficked restaurant, with Paleo and Gluten-Free Menus.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Sep 17, 2015
• ISBN: 9781491774632

John Griffin CEC CEPC

John Griffin, CEC, CEPC, is a culinary consultant and the culinary expert for a large company. He graduated from The Culinary Institute of America and is a certified executive chef and a certified executive pastry chef with the American Culinary Federation. He runs an organic farm in Tivoli, New York, with his wife, Suzy.

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Diet Trends and Definitions

Gluten Free – Gluten is a protein found in many grains, with wheat being the most well-known. It is an irritant to those with celiac disease, an auto-immune disease which causes the intestine to digest food products poorly.

Wheat Free – There are many people who feel that wheat, and the gluten that it contains, will contribute to symptoms of many conditions. This is becoming a very popular request, many times confused with, or accompanied by the gluten free request.

Paleo Diet – This is a style of eating based on the premise that we as humans will be healthier if we eat a diet similar to the diet we ate as we evolved into humans, the hunter / gatherer diet. It is contended that agriculture, and specifically grain production, is responsible for many human ailments.

Paleo Auto Immune Diet – This is a much stricter version of the original Paleo Diet, popularized by folks who feel that eliminating certain food groups will help them avoid certain health problems. This diet avoids all diary, all nightshade vegetables like potatoes, tomatoes and peppers, and legumes.

Free Range – A large segment of society is concerned with animal welfare, and will be looking for animal products, such as meat, dairy and eggs, which come from critters that have room to move.

Grass Fed - The most expensive meats are grain finished, in that they are fed corn so there will be more fat, and more flavor in the meat itself. Many customers, including those who follow the Paleo Diet, and those who are concerned with animal welfare, are asking for meat from grass fed animals.

Local – This is a difficult name to quantify in our menus. What does one mean by local? Does it mean food products grown within 100 miles, say, or is it 300 miles? Does this mean farm products grown locally or just products that are packaged locally. It is a very popular, but easily manipulated term.

All Natural – This is another word that is easily manipulated, to the point of not being believable. It is best to avoid all natural as a marketing term.

Foraging – A most interesting concept. On one hand, our patrons will want to have foraged goods, as it looks like the Chef is exploring our local fields and forests. On the other hand, you can certainly sicken people if you handle foraged food incorrectly, or you serve the wrong mushroom, for instance. Just be careful.

Vegetarian – This is a diet in which people do not eat animal products that come from animals which have been killed. So, dairy, eggs, and other animal products are permissible.

Vegan – This is a diet for those who will not eat any animal products whatsoever. This includes any meat, dairy, eggs, plus it includes such products as honey, as that is an animal product. Be very careful when you label a dish as vegan, as the smallest ingredient can be of animal origin. Most margarine has cassienate as an ingredient, for example, which is a dairy product, and not vegan.

Macrobiotics – This is a specific diet that comes from a philosophical belief that diet affects health, and that health affects peace. It is a diet based on Chinese principals of balance, and is based on locally grown grains and legumes, mostly rice, and not wheat. A small amount of seafood is part of the diet on occasion.

Allergy Awareness – People can be allergic to anything and everything. For the most part allergies are not life threatening, but they can make people not feel good. So, if someone says they are allergic to something, and they are served a dish including that something, they will not feel good when they get home. If they do not feel good when they get home, they will not want to return to your restaurant. If someone asks about an ingredient, your staff should be very careful how they answer.

Lost Diet Trends – There are always new diets. For the most part these are good diets, but are not understood, as readers and headlines concentrate on one simple phrase, rather than the whole concept. These diets may briefly reappear, but may no longer be considered important. A few lost diet trends include South Beach, Grapefruit, Cabbage soup, and Raw Food. It also includes such dietary stars as Sylvester Graham, who invented the Graham Cracker, and John Harvey Kellogg, who began the Battle Creek Sanitarium based on his dietary philosophy.

All Diets Change

Many of the latest diets are still around; some of them are mainstream, such as vegetarian and vegan. If you do not consider these two diets important when you make your restaurant of foodservice menu, you will suffer a severe loss of customers.

Other diets became quick fads, and faded as quickly. Some were lost due to their own silliness, and some from a lack of understanding. The grapefruit diet sounded wonderful, until someone actually tried it. The Atkins Diet was a huge trend at one point, and became old news about a year later. The problem, I think, was that the general public only focused on one simple element of the Atkins Diet, the no-carb element.

If you were to read Dr. Atkin’s book, and really worked with his system, you’d see that it is not just a no carbohydrate diet. It is a diet with a long term system, one that starts with no carbs, and gently transforms itself into a sustainable diet that can truly help to keep weight under control, and be a very healthy way of life. By only focusing on the first two weeks of the diet, or only reading the cover blurb, and not the entire book, the general public only got part of the