Last weekend I went to State College PA (a small town where Penn State University is located) with Jessika, her husband, and baby daughter, nickname Schnappi . One of their good friends was getting married and he was in the wedding. I tagged along to watch my beautiful 8 month old niece. While Jessika and her husband were enjoying a weekend of wedding festivities my niece and I had a lot of fun exploring the quaint college town. On our first day there we stumbled upon a quirky Austrian restaurant called Herwig’s Austrian Bistro (I really did stumble, it was extremely hot and my stroller pushing skills aren’t that great). I was starving and looking for a place to cool down and eat so we went on in.
It was a little early in the evening so Schnappi and I were the only customers in there at first. The entire restaurant’s layout is very open: there are many tables including a couple family style dining tables. The main kitchen is exposed so you are able to see the cooks preparing your food. The atmosphere is relaxed: you order your food at the main counter and the menu is written on a giant chalkboard which they change almost daily depending on what fresh ingredients they are working with that day.
For example, I was taking my time looking at the menu and getting Schnappi out of her stroller and the chef (who turned out to be the owner also) gave me a small cup of a fresh chilled beet soup to taste. All of the ingredients were from his organic garden, it was delicious and very refreshing. He asked if I had any questions, and of course I did — I needed to know what was gluten free! When I started asking if such and such had flour as an ingredient, he immediately asked if I had a gluten allergy and then told me one of his cooks, John, was just recently diagnosed with a gluten intolerance.
John came over and we started talking about being gluten free and how we felt significantly better when we cut gluten out of our diet. He was saying at first he thought it was going to be hard but in reality it has made him eat even healthier. Although being in a small town John didn’t have a great selection of gluten free beers and he is getting a little tired of drinking cider : ).
He helped me choose a dish that would be gluten free. I did have to ask for some substitutions with the side dishes but they did not get annoyed or charge me extra. I ordered chicken sausages with a cold potato salad and a green salad with a traditional creamy dill dressing. It was delicious! I told them I would be coming back the next day with my sister and the chef said he would make one of his Viennese specialties – a flourless chocolate almond torte which he says he makes gluten free, but as some of you may know just because cakes say flourless it doesn’t the chefs do not use flour (most bakers still put flour in the pan so these kind of cakes don’t stick. When I arrived the next evening I was very happy to see he kept his word. The torte was delicious! It was velvety, not too heavy, and the nut pieces really made the cake more dynamic in its flavor.
