Inna’s Kitchen, a restaurant with gluten- and allergen-free dishes located in Newton Centre, is dedicated to making food that has an impact—both on the customer and the greater Newton community.

Owner Alex Khitrik’s business operates under his most important values, meaning he works toward producing quality, readily accessible food for his customers.

“It’s traditional food with a greater purpose,” Khitrik said. “Frozen meals and frozen food … yes, convenient. But also, if you sort of dig in, I focus on quality ingredients and healthy, wholesale ingredients and methods.”

Alex inherited the restaurant from his mother, Inna Khitrik. Her son’s ownership, Inna explained, is different from her own, especially because of Alex’s focus on gluten-free food.

“He wanted to concentrate and grow the business in a different direction,” Inna said. “Concentrate on this gluten-free product because our shop was the third location.”

Inna’s Kitchen originally had a location in Newton from 2011 to 2017, but they had to close to move to a space that would allow larger production and catering.

“It was quite busy there,” Inna said. “We had to produce extra, and we couldn’t do it properly, so we had to sell that business, and until we were looking for the commissary space where we could build out the kitchen with all this equipment, we went for two years at the CommonWealth Kitchen [in Dorchester].”

After having moved their business to Dorchester’s CommonWealth Kitchen location for about two years, they finally found space in Newton. There, they decided to produce fully gluten-free items, taking advantage of the fact that the space had not yet been contaminated.

“And that’s [when] we’ve become completely gluten-free,” Inna said. “It’s a new facility, we had a wholesale license and produced in bigger quantities. We always had gluten-free, but everything became gluten-free.”

After the restaurant went gluten-free under Alex, Inna decided to leave to pursue a career running her own business. At the same time, Alex decided to make more changes to the restaurant—changes that fully aligned with his values and vision.

“I was a solo driver and sort of had free rein and was able to make the decisions I wanted to make,” Alex said. “The first thing I got rid of was chicken and meat. A large part of that was for wholesale and, you know, just production and, like, just the feasibility. It’s just harder to work and hire people to work safely with chicken, like raw chicken, and also from a kosher standpoint, to have kosher certification, to have that stamp on our products.”

Through Alex’s hard work and dedication, he never let his values slip away through the continuous challenges he faced.

“I wasn’t ready to sort of quit and sort of had a grander vision and plans, like, it was very important for me to make it line up with my personal values, environment-wise, energy-wise, trying to make a difference,” Alex said.

The restaurant aims to create an inclusive community and provide a sense of purpose, allowing those who often feel left out to enjoy a meal that brings them together, Alex explained.

“We had developed our sort of niche, enabling people with allergies, especially people like families with allergies, to share meals together,” Alex said.

Customers continue to adore the restaurant and its environment, which is dedicated to giving customers the best of the best.

“[Alex is] trying to get everything right for the environment,” Inna said. “Create in the community, be around the community, and doing the right thing. He’s all for that, to make sure, to invite, [and] like comfort.”

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_{This story is from The Heights, an independent, nonprofit newspaper run by Boston College students with which the Newton Beacon has a partnership.}