GrubHub Says Philly Isn’t So Bad for Gluten-Free Eaters After All

Vindicated! (Sort of.)

Looks like my little rant last week about Philly’s very conspicuous exclusion from GrubHub’s list of best gluten-free cities didn’t go unnoticed. Yesterday, I got an email from a nice gal at GrubHub named Allie, who wrote, “While it is true that Philly didn’t make it to either of our lists, I wanted to share some specific information we found about Philly’s GF options.”

Okay, I’m listening.

Apparently, when you sort the data another way and look at the most popular gluten-free restaurants nationwide among GrubHub users, as well as the most popular gluten-free menu items at restaurants across the country, you get two hits for Philly. On the first front, the Couch Tomato in Manayunk comes in as the fifth most popular gluten-free restaurant in the country, as far as GrubHubbers and their ordering habits are concerned. It falls behind Bountiful Eatery (#1) in Chicago; Sanford’s Restaurant (#2) in Astoria, New York; Gangadin Restaurant (#3) in Studio City, California; and Dosa ‘n’ Curry (#5) in Somerville, Massachusetts.

As far as the most popular gluten-free menu items in the GrubHub database, the QUICK FIXX at 15th and South clocks in at third, with GF GrubHubb users eaters digging the build your own pizza option. Not surprisingly, gluten-free pizza comes up a lot on that list.

Allie then sorted the results again to give me data on the 38 gluten-free restaurants in Philly that GrubHub has in its database. The five most popular GF restaurants here, as well as the top menu items, are as follows:

  1. The Couch Tomato Café, Manayunk – Crispy Breadsticks
  2. Slice, Rittenhouse Square, Italian Market and Sewell, New Jersey – Americano Pizza
  3. Pure Fare, Rittenhouse Square and Center City – Roast Turkey and Honey Mustard Sandwich
  4. The QUICK FIXX, Center City – Build Your Own Pizza
  5. Mumbai Bistro, Washington Square West – Lamb Vindaloo

What do you think, gluten-freers? Agree? Disagree? Sound off, please.