Making gluten-free tasty: CT pizzerias crack the code

Connecticut is serious about pizza. So serious, in fact, that Food & Wine named it the second-best pizza state in the country. (We’re coming for you, New Jersey.)

That means that when some of the state’s most beloved establishments started rolling out gluten-free pies, there were strict standards to be upheld.

And making a good glutenfree pizza crust is a daunting task to begin with.

“The right kind of chewiness is the biggest challenge,” says Brian Levy, a pastry chef and recipe developer based in Washington, Conn.

Still, the growing number of gluten-free diners proved to be too big a customer base for pizzerias to miss. So restaurants including Modern Apizza and Da Legna in New Haven, Good Old Days in Newtown, Colony Grill, with locations in Milford, Fairfield, Norwalk and Stamford, and Zuppardi’s in West Haven found a way to serve their gluten-free clientele.

For Ken Martin, co-owner of Colony Grill, an early adopter of gluten-free crust in 2012, it was much more about the customer experience than anything else.

“Even though this was a small group of people that were inquiring or wondering if we sold [gluten-free pizza], that was enough,” says Martin, adding that gluten-free pies make up about 2 percent of the pizzas Colony sells in a year, or 25,000 pies.

Colony gets its crusts, in a custom formulation, from Zeia, an Old Lyme bakery also launched in 2012 that makes gluten-free, nut-free, soy-free, corn-free, GMO-free, vegan crusts and sells them parbaked and frozen.

Martin says that having the crust parbaked so that it doesn’t need to be rolled out or handled extensively in Colony’s kitchens can help reduce crosscontamination in areas where wheat flour might be in the air.

Zuppardi’s gluten-free pizza isn’t on the menu, but a 12-inch, gluten-free pie is available for those who ask for it. Modern also only offers its gluten-free pizza in a small size. Good Old Days has both its square and thin-crust pies available gluten free, but only in personal pan sizes.

That so many gluten-free pies are only available in individual sizes speaks to the difficulty of making a larger crust.

“One of the challenges, of course, with doing anything gluten-free where you are rolling it out or stretching it out is that it requires elasticity, which glutenfree flours on their own almost completely lack,” Levy says.

In his home kitchen, Levy uses psyllium husks to bind his dough and help add a wheatlike flavor. Restaurant owners tend to be a little more guarded about their tricks.

The true purists, Frank Pepe Pizzeria and Sally’s Apizza, don’t offer gluten-free pies at all. “Our pizza dough contains flour. That’s how Sal did it,” reads the Sally’s website.

Still, for those who want to experience true, old-school Connecticut pizza or apizza without the gluten, options abound and are sure to increase with time.

Shutterstock Pizzerias have made great strides in improving the taste of gluten-free pizza.