UPDATED SEPTEMBER 2019: NB CAFE ROUGE AT GATWICK AIRPORT HAS CLOSED. HOWEVER, THEY HAVE MANY RESTAURANTS OFFERING A GLUTEN FREE MENU ALL OVER THE UK.
We flew to Rome from Gatwick’s North Terminal and since I knew there would not be any meal for me onboard our British Airways flight to Rome we decided to have lunch in Cafe Rouge instead. I had called ahead and was told by BA that in Economy a special meal service is not offered on flights under 3 hours. This is a little shortsighted since when we flew to Lisbon last year on TAP Airways I quite enjoyed their gluten free sandwich. You can read my blog post here.
I haven’t been to a Cafe Rouge for absolutely years but remember when they first started expanding and they seemed quite exciting back then. How times change, eh?!
We were seated in Cafe Rouge right by the window. A true plane spotters dream seat!
I asked the waitress for the allergy list but she said they’d just changed their menu in the last week and so didn’t have an up to date version.
The menu was fairly sandwich / gluten heavy but there were some salad options including a salmon Nicoise which I thought was a good twist on the classic salad.
I went for steak and salad of rocket, spinach leaves, tomato and crispy green beans. The salad came with a dressing but I opted to have it plain and requested olive oil to dress it myself.
How did it taste? The griddled steak was well seasoned but was not the medium rare I requested. My steak and salad was £14.95 which I think is quite pricey for what I received.
Cafe Rouge have branches all over the UK and are a reasonable chain restaurant option for gluten free dining. Hopefully they will ensure their allergy information is distributed soon to all their restaurants and also publish it on their website.
Key information for Cafe Rouge at Gatwick Airport
PLEASE NOTE THIS RESTAURANT IS NOW PERMANENTLY CLOSED – BUT CAFE ROUGE DOES HAVE MANY OTHER OUTLETS AROUND THE UK OFFERING A GLUTEN FREE MENU.
I was at the Oxford branch the other week and the new allergy menu wasn’t available there either but the staff were fairly helpful. However when my salmon nicoise arrived the egg was missing – when I asked one was brought from the kitchen with the explanation that the chef thought eggs contained gluten 🙁
I find it a little alarming that a restaurant chain that goes to the trouble to produce an allergy menu doesn’t educate the people cooking the food!
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No way, that’s terrible from a chef. Might be worth contacting the Cafe Rouge Head Office and letting them know what happened? You’re right it’s alarming that they may not be giving adequate training to their staff.
I was told by a waitress last summer that I couldn’t have rice because it was full of gluten. At the time I accepted that perhaps the rice was seasoned with some sort of spice mix I couldn’t eat (I was in a Mexican restaurant) but emailed the head office afterwards to check. They sent a reply straight away saying that it was a “training issue they’d addressed”. I think this was partly a standard response but I felt better for contacting them and hope they will include allergy training for their new recruits.
Just what I was looking for, thanks for posting .
Looks great I’ll have to visit the cafe next time I’m flying via gatwick.