I am producing a blog for a newsletter for the food service industry (main aim to encourage provision for the freefrom customer)
The blog post will highlight eating out with CD or food allergies on Holiday in the UK - anyone have good/bad experiences of Haven, or Butlins or privately owned sites would be good to hear from you. How did they manage information, choice staying safe, staff communication.
TY
Can I just mention this.....I do think it is great that different places accomodate different food allergies, coeliacs etc....but I have to be honest, I think it is an absolute minefield for them. A lot of people tend not to be just coeliacs for instance, they will have intolerances & allergies to other foods too so they can't possibly accomodate everyones needs. I also think we should take a lot of responsibility in choosing where we go ourselves. For instance I am a coeliac, I am intolerant to all grains/pseudo grains, dairy, soy, nightshade foods & nuts so I am a restaurants nightmare....but I do my best to choose places that serve fresh food not processed pre frozen food & steak & green salad or vegetables are my go to choice & I always think a good sign of a good place to eat is where they let you chop & change around with the menu with absolute ease. Before booking anywhere, I always ensure there is fresh meat/fish & veg/salad & then I know I am good to go.
One great place we stayed at which cater for a lot of people- so food can be more tricky - was The Manor Hotel in Okehampton, Devon, which is an activity centre & is also great for kids. They always have fresh salads, meat & veg & all their brown sauces ie gravy, red wine sauce etc are automatically gluten free, so it makes it easy for basic coeliacs & plenty of choice for other food issues. Apart from that, I choose my local restaurants & coffee shops with care & stick with my favoured few, The Onslow Arms in west Clandon & Maddalenas Coffee shop in Cranleigh, the latter two are fantastic places for gorgeous food & lots of flexability with their menus.
But again, I think the onus is on us to choose wisely as at the end of the day it is our responsibility not theirs.
I've stayed on Haven Holidays camps and found it quite difficult to eat out. chips are out as not done in a seperate fryer and fish only done in batter or breadcrumbs. pIzza is def out.Found in the restaurant only had a choice of salad for me. So I tend to cater myself. Which is not much of a holiday. Not sure why they can't do GF pasta or Pizza base. Or chips fried seperate or more choice for jacket potato fillings at least.As I would be happy to pay the extra cost if they were available. I'm in Spain at the moment and they seem to have their act together here mainly. And I have even been able to have Chinese here. They make it for me seperate and they do gf soy sauce ect.
Think Haven need to start getting their act together. Love to eat in their takeaways and restaurants. Instead of cooking on holiday. And if a resturant does have a gf menu I won't be going alone. So guaranteed more business. And makes a better holiday for me and my family and friends I go with. So Haven as I've stated to restaurant manager start catering for us. Not just tell me they cater for vegetarians an can I have that? No normally i cant. And great it's salad again!!!!!!!!!
The food industry seems to think that Free From products are the answer. And they are to some extent, but to be honest, I try to avoid them, and simply choose things that are naturally GF.
I have never been to a holiday camp (now there's a confession!) but find hotels are generally hopeless, and always need careful interrogation over ingredients.
I am looking forward to Pizza Express opening in my town!
Hiya,
My 3 year old grandson has wheat, dairy, beef, soya, raw egg and nut allergies and we couldn't get any decent food on holiday last year. We went to Park Resorts and they couldn't guarantee that the chips would be okay for him. Luckily we found a Sainsbury's near by so we could buy free from foods for him for us to cook in the caravan. It was still disappointing though as it would be nice to eat out for a change.
TT xx
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ILL from gluten free food. Again.
