Kung POW!

Kung Pow has an unearned reputation as having gluten-free offerings. I was excited by this as I haven't had Chinese food in 3+ years (when I was diagnosed with Celiac Disease). When I researched the menu online, I was puzzled that there was only one item that was marked as "gluten free" (gf). I called the restaurant and spoke with the manager, Beau, and he assured me that they had lots of gf options. I was excited! Finally, Chinese food after the long, long gf desert of the last few years! We decided to revive our Christmas Eve tradition and went to Kung Pow for dinner. In the immortal words of Julia Roberts, "Mistake, BIG mistake. HUGE."The restaurant was quite busy. I asked for menus while we waited for a table so that I could strategize what I could have and/or share. I was again surprised that there was only one regular menu item and one special listed as gf, not the promised "lots." I did notice that at the bottom of the menu it said to ask your server about dishes that could be made gf. Once we were seated, I informed the server that I had Celiac and asked which dishes were gf. She said that she didn't have a list so I needed to pick an item off the menu and she would let me know if it could be made gf. I asked about the Mongolian Beef and her exact words were, "that's the one dish that can't be made gluten-free." Alright, fair enough. I asked if they had any gf dumplings (thinking they might have glutinous rice ones) and she said no. Finally we asked if the Shandong Beef and Honey Dry Fried Prawns could be made gf. She said yes. Hooray! We ordered that and the Tamari fried tofu. Christmas Eve was on!When the dishes arrived I again confirmed with the waitress that they were gluten-free. The fry on the shrimp was really exceptionally done and I hadn't known a gf batter that worked that well. She again stated that the dishes were gf. We ate. It was delicious! I was super happy to get to have Chinese food again. On the way home I started to feel ill and was pretty sure that they waitress didn't know what she was talking about. I came home and spent Christmas Eve with shooting stomach pains, nausea, and painful gas. Horrible things that included bloody poop, joint pain, nausea, and an eczema flare-up followed me through the week. It was a miserable holiday.I called Kung Pow, asked for the manager, and asked if the dishes we had were gluten free. He replied that they were not (apparently the shrimp are delivered frozen and breaded). When I informed him that his server assured us multiple times that they were gf, he told me that not all his servers knew which menu items were gf, even some of them who had been working there for a long time. He told me to come in and he'd go over the menu with me instead. I declined. As a Celiac I did everything I was supposed to do to improve my odds of having a safe meal--I researched it, called ahead, spoke to the manager, reviewed the menu, and checked in with the server multiple times during the meal. It's unreasonable that I need to schedule a one on one with the manager to get this information, after being poisoned, especially when the menu explicitly lists the servers as a resource for navigating gf options. This is structurally set up to fail people with food allergies/auto-immune disorders and sensitivities but it touts itself as an option for that same population. I will never return.TL/DR: If you have food allergies, sensitivities, or auto-immune reactions, DO NOT GO HERE, it is not safe.

Celiac friendly?

No