BD’s Mongolian Grill – The SAFE Restaurant

I had the pleasure of talking to Ken Leetch, the General Manager, at BD’s Mongolian Grill in Bolingbrook.  He was nice enough to take the time out of his busy schedule to discuss their safety practices with me.  This restaurant can be allergen free, gluten-free,  Paleo, or Vegan.  You pick, and they will try to accommodate.  First off, BD’s Mongolian Grill is one of my favorite buffet type restaurant.  Most buffet type restaurants are not very safe for Bean with her peanut allergy, due to cross contamination issues.  I was comfortable taking her to BD’s before, but now that I know more about their safety practices I am confident that BD’s would be a safe place for her to eat.

If you have never been to BD’s Mongolian Grill, it is essentially a place where you pick the ingredients and then take it up to the grill.  It’s amazing stir fry.  You can purchase one bowl or unlimited bowls.  With your bowl, you also get their soup and salad bar.  Their soups recently changed to being 100% home-made in-house by BD’s.  After you start off with the soup and salad, then you take your bowl and go up to the buffet and choose your ingredients.  You have several choices of meat, vegetables, noodles, sauces, and spices.  Once you have all your ingredients picked out, you can take your food up to a grill to be cooked.

Some of the safety practices they follow are:

• Temperatures are checked on the food lines every few hours to make sure everything stays cold and fresh
• The tongs are constantly changed to avoid any cross contamination
• If you are concerned about possible cross contamination due to a food restriction or allergy, they will make your bowl from fresh ingredients in the back that are kept segregated
• Also, they have an Allergy Friendly cooking station.  It is a separate place to have your food cooked to avoid allergens in your food.  The pans are used one time before being washed, and then they are heated up to 200 degrees to burn off any remaining allergens
• There is a MAC or MAM (Market Area Manager or Market Area Coordinator) walking around the food area, in a black chef coat.  They can help create meals, give ideas, and also can provide you with a nutritional brochure.

They also have a .pdf file on their website that lists every single ingredient used in all of their items.  If you are on the go, there is an Android and Iphone app called BD’s Go Mongo.  The app lets you create-a-bowl, choose all your ingredients, and view all the ingredients in the bowl you made!

Disclaimer: I did this review, because this is one of my favorite restaurants.  I was not given anything and did not receive any compensation in any way,  in order to do this review.  All opinions are my own and not influenced in any way.

 

Healthy Kids Options When Dining Out

We don’t dine out often, but when we do, I am always looking for healthy menu choices for my girls.  I was happy to hear about a program called Kids LiveWell.  I was actually supposed to attend a Kids LiveWell event this past Monday, but my daughter was having her Upper Endoscopy that day, and I was unable to attend.  I was really bummed out, because this sounds like such great program, and I was looking forward to learning more about it.

So many families avoid dining out, because the menu options are not healthy options.  Well, restaurants have heard our plea’s for healthier menu options for kids, and healthy menu options are increasingly becoming the focus of the National Restaurant Association (NRA).  In July 2011, the NRA created the Kids LiveWell program to help restaurants highlight healthy menu choices.  The NRA launched the award-winning Kids LiveWell program to make a healthful choice the easy choice when eating out with your family. It takes the guesswork out of identifying healthy meals for your children to eat.  The NRA developed this program in collaboration with Healthy Dining, who is a team of registered dietitians.  They work with restaurants to identify and validate the qualifying menu choices.

We typically tend to always go to the same restaurants because we know they have safe and healthy options for Bean.  One of her favorites is a local buffet restaurant, that offers a LOT of fruit & vegetable choices.  We know fruits & vegies are peanut free, and are a healthy choice, plus she loves them.  All restaurants who participate in the Kids LiveWell program have to agree to offer & promote a selection of healthy menu items.  I looked online, and was surprised to find several restaurants in our area that participate in the Kids LiveWell program and offer healthy menu choices.  You can find ones near you by clicking here.  There is also a Kids LiveWell app for Android and Iphones.  To learn more about the program, you can visit their Facebook page and follow them on Twitter.

This sounds like a great trend, and I hope more restaurants decide to participate.  The eating habits we learn as children tend to follow us through the rest of our lives.  Starting our children off right, and incorporating lots of fresh fruits & vegetables, will teach them how they should eat as adults and teens.  With so many children being overweight and obese, making the healthy option the “good” option to them, and pushing it in restaurants is a great idea!  Kids love going out to eat, and this allows them to still go out, and eat healthy!

Disclosure: I wrote this review while participating in a campaign for Mom Central Consulting on behalf of the National Restaurant Association. If I would have attended the live event, I would have received a gift bag and promotional items to thank me for taking the time to participate.  However, since I did not participate, I did not receive any promotional items or gift bag.  :0(