Adventure #39: Promise Pizza

When we saw that ATX Gluten Free was having a Gluten Free Pizza Week, we jumped on the chance to try something new.  If you didn't know (and I didn't either), gluten free means wheat (and rye and barley) free.  I knew that gluten is the thing that gives dough stretch and chewiness because, if you've ever made pizza dough, you can see the gluten strands webbing the dough when you stretch it to transparency.  It's why flour, when wet, becomes dough instead of just wet flour.  Gluten is also a problem for people with Gluten Sensitivity and Coeliac disease (both of which do horrible things to your intestines).

There were several options around town for us to try a gluten-free pizza, but we decided on Promise Pizza.  I won't spout their official stuff, but everything about Promise Pizza seems to say "organic food is clean food."  I don't necessarily subscribe to that attitude, but from the sterile metal decor to the designation of drinks as "bio-fuels" and the use of company-owned Smart cars as delivery vehicles, it's clear that they are serious about it.



Here's what we thought of the food itself:

We got two appetizers, the stuffed mushrooms and the stuffed jalapenos.  Both were excellent.  The mushrooms were fresh and flavorful and the jalapenos were spicy (they're smaller than what you typically see for stuffed jalapenos because the jalapenos that are typically used in restaurants for stuffing are larger and bred to be milder).  The stuffing was cream cheese, sausage, and pepperoni.

We got "The American" pizza which was sausage, pepperoni, extra cheese, and mushrooms.

The breakdown:

• Toppings - delicious.  I really liked the flavors and amount of toppings.  They weren't anything special, but I didn't find that to be a fault.
• Cheese - good shredded mozz (we decided not to try their Vegan cheese so that we could focus on the difference a gluten-free crust had on the pizza)
• Sauce - too sweet for my taste

(and for what you came to find out...)

• Crust - it was crispy and delicious.  If someone had handed me that slice without telling me the crust was gluten free I would have been surprised at how good their thin-crust was without even thinking that it might not be made of wheat flour.

The downsides of the crust were that it was $4.50 extra and only came in the 10 inch size.  For someone who is dying for pizza (or who has a gluten sensitive child who is), the extra money might be completely worth it, though at $16.50 for a pizza that would easily feed only one person (maybe two if you stretch it with an appetizer), that's one expensive meal.

In total, I might be persuaded to try Promise Pizza again to try their regular crust, but the sweet sauce is a huge turn-off for me (they do offer a garlic and olive-oil "sauce" as well, which is what I would recommend you get if you don't like sweet sauce either).

-Karin