Tuesday, February 7, 2017

Mindful Brewing

Mindful brewing

This is a cool spot, if you can get a parking spot. The inside is open. The atmosphere is trendy. There are bars downstairs and upstairs with an outdoor deck upstairs.  It was too cold for the patio the night in February I was there, even with the cozy fire pit lit.  I'm a sucker for fire pits, but not tonight. I'll have to come back when it gets warmer. 

The beer selection was enormous, but I didn't see any gluten free beers on tap. That's alright, it's hard to find a good gluten free beer.  They are a bottle shop, too, so there might have been some in the case, but I didn't look hard enough. I stick to the wine anyways.  There were wines on tap. I sat down at the bar and ordered a Chardonnay. 

The Chardonnay was fruity, light and not oaked, just the way I like it.  I noticed that they had a gluten free pizza on the menu and I had a craving for pizza.  They also had gluten free buns for the burgers, which was nice.  My second choice, though, would have been the salmon salad.  

I ordered the wild mushroom gluten free pizza because it boasted of oyster and shiitake mushrooms, a garlic purée, and four kinds of cheese. I love a cheesy pizza and oyster mushrooms are great.  I'm pretty sure I didn't get what I ordered.  

I know I shouldn't a gluten free pizza at a restaurant because I'm pretty sure they all use the same flat bread like frozen pizza crust, but somehow I thought with the right toppings, my pizza craving would be satisfied. 


What came out of the kitchen was two small pizzas with very minimal toppings.  I was told that you get two gluten free ones because the crust was smaller. But why wasn't I told that when I was ordering.  That might have swayed my decision. 

I'd be fine with a small pizza if there was actually something on it.  Where was the four cheeses? Where was the garlic? And the mushrooms were all button mushrooms! This didn't satisfy my craving for pizza at all. I should have ordered the salmon salad. I should have made my own doughy gluten free pizza at home.  In fact, the next day I did, any finally satisfied my pizza craving with my own two tiny pizzas.  Now this is what a tiny pizza should look like.  Someone, please hire me to work in a small gluten free corner of your kitchen so I can bake fluffy deep dish pizza crusts for you to serve to your clients!  My recipe is amazing.



I didn't get sick right away, so that was a plus.  But as the next day progressed, I became sicker & sicker. And I only ate food, other than Mindfuls'S pizza, that I made in my 100 percent gluten free kitchen, so what does that lead you to believe? 

The place was interesting enough that I might go back, but I'm not ordering the pizza again. I hear Dominos has a decent gluten free pizza. Maybe next time I should try that.

3759 Library Rd
Pittsburgh, PA 15234