Noodles & Co.

We had a totally awesome and totally gluten-free tasting at the Noodles & Co. on Ingersol ave the other night.  While I knew the Pad Thai was gluten-free, since it's one of my favorite dishes at Noodles & Co.  I had no idea that since April they have been serving gluten-free fusilli, so they can make a lot of their dishes gluten free!

We were honored to be invited in for a tasting by Caitlin. the manager at the Ingersol ave location and one of the other awesome staff members, Brittnie Ann.  Since Brittnie Ann is also the owner of Rogue Sweets, you know, the fantastic bakery that makes gluten-free cupcakes and cake-pops, she knew that I eat gluten-free and thought it would be awesome to host a gluten-free tasting for us.  Thanks again guys!

I was so impressed with the knowledge Caitlin and Brittnie Ann had about food allergies and all of the ingredients in their food products.  Unlike a lot of chain restaurants, Noodles & Co. sources as many ingredients as they can locally.  For example, they are featuring a fresh garden pesto dish with Iowa sweet corn that we got to sample, and it was amazing!  Light, but filling and wonderful to know they were using Iowa grown produce in their dish.

They served us one of their new popular appetizers, the edamame which you can get either hot or cold.  The tatziki-style sauce on the Med Salad was so good!  I'm so glad we got to try it.  We sampled their original sauce with rice noodles and fusilli noodles to taste the difference, and man were the fusilli noodles perfect.  Gluten-free noodles can be hard to cook right.  They are easily over or under-cooked but they have the timing down just right.

I love the Penne Rosa, which was the gf noodles in a spicy cream sauce with mushrooms, spinach and tomato.  So good!  And of course we got to taste the popular Pad Thai with sweet pea-nutty sauce and shrimp that always hits the spot.

It's great to see that they have so many options for folks with food allergies.  We threw another curve at them when we brought along my mom who is also lactose intolerant and they handled it beautifully by just eliminating the cheese and milk products from the dishes too.

We all had a great meal and I was impressed by how many local ingredients they use as well as how caring the staff was.  Caitlin said the company as a whole prides itself on being a fast-casual restaurant. but also in making sure every guest is happy, satisfied and has a great experience.  They are happy to adjust any dish to your liking or to go out of their way to make sure your dish is safe if you have a food allergy.

It's great to see them growing so much in the Des Moines area and supporting local charities as well!  It was fun to hear about all of the things they are doing in the community.  Look for their new store that just opened on Monday across from the Merle Hay Mall and another soon out west near Jordan Creek!  Thanks for being so awesome Noodles & Co.!

Ps. You can enter a business card at the front of the store to win a tasting of your own!!