Gluten-free with kids: restaurants, birthday parties and school trips

Children often eat away from home: in restaurants, at birthday parties, at nursery and on school trips. With a little preparation it works, without your child always being the exception.

Gluti offers guidance and is not a medical device. Its information does not replace medical advice.

How do I prepare a restaurant visit with a child?

Call ahead, as with any restaurant visit with coeliac disease, and ask specifically about what your child would like to eat. The kids’ menu is often the biggest problem: chips, schnitzel, pasta and pizza are exactly the dishes where the fryer, breading and pasta water come into play.

What often helps:

Having dishes from the regular menu adapted, such as a small portion of meat with potatoes or rice.
Bring a gluten-free snack for the wait. Otherwise hungry children reach for the bread basket.
Leaving out the bread basket or having it placed out of reach. Otherwise crumbs quickly end up on hands and plates.
Checking the plate before your child eats. A biscuit on the ice cream or croutons in the salad happen easily.

The most relaxed places are those that are entirely gluten-free. There your child can order anything on the menu.

How do I teach my child to ask for themselves?

The older the child, the more they can take on themselves. Young children mainly need a simple rule, for example: “I only eat what Mum, Dad or an adult who knows about it has checked.”

Older children can learn to ask for themselves. Practise at home with role play: What do I say, what do I ask, what do I do if I’m unsure? A good first sentence for children is:

“I have coeliac disease and can’t eat any gluten, not even crumbs. Is this made without flour and not fried?”

For teenagers going out with friends, the article What to ask in a restaurant with its card to show staff is worth a look.

How does a birthday party work with coeliac disease?

Talk to the hosts early and make it easy for them. Many parents want to help but don’t know what matters. Two approaches work well:

You bring the food for your child, especially a piece of cake that looks as similar as possible to everyone else’s. That way your child eats along without anyone having to change plans.
The hosts make something everyone can eat, such as a gluten-free cake from your recipe, or sausages with potato salad without flour in the dressing. Then go through the ingredients together beforehand.

Also watch out for things hardly anyone thinks of:

Many sweets are gluten-free, but wafers, biscuits, some chocolate bars and liquorice often contain wheat. The safest are those labelled gluten-free.
Play dough and salt dough are usually made from wheat flour. Young children quickly put their hands in their mouths.
Shared bowls of crisps or popcorn that everyone reaches into with biscuit-covered hands.

For parties at a restaurant or pizzeria, the same applies as always: call ahead and clarify what is safe for your child.

What is different about playing at a friend’s house?

Playdates work differently from a birthday party: they come up at short notice, and the friend’s parents have had no reason to think about any of it beforehand. A short message the day before helps more than an explanation on the doorstep with two impatient children standing next to you. Two sentences are enough: what your child must not eat, and that you are sending something along.

Send a box of your child’s own that they may help themselves from without asking. That is easier for children than “am I allowed this?” every time.

For sleepovers, breakfast is the critical point, not dinner. Bread rolls on the table, a shared toaster, a jam jar that a crumby knife has been in: that is exactly the kind of transfer nobody recognises as such, and a toaster cannot be made crumb-free. The simplest thing is to send bread, a spread and your child’s own cutlery. The article on cross-contamination explains why that is necessary.

What do I discuss with nursery and school?

A conversation with the head and the carers at the start is the most important step. Cover these points:

Lunch: Can the kitchen or caterer cook gluten-free, and how is it kept separate? A doctor’s note is often required for this.
Shared breakfasts, baking, celebrations: Who will let you know in time so you can send something along?
Crafts: play dough, salt dough, pasta necklaces and flour when baking.
A stash: a box of gluten-free snacks in the group room or classroom helps when someone spontaneously brings cake.

Give the carers the card below. It explains the essentials at a glance, including for cover staff.

How do school trips and summer camps work?

Get in touch with the teacher or organiser as early as possible and ask about the accommodation. Many youth hostels, school camps and holiday centres offer gluten-free meals on request. It’s best to check directly with the kitchen:

Is the gluten-free food prepared and served separately?
What is there for breakfast when the others have bread rolls?
Are there packed lunches for excursions, and what’s in them?

Give your child plenty of snacks that don’t need to be kept cool. How to plan food on the go is also covered in the article Gluten-free travel.

What do I do if gluten was involved after all?

It happens, even with good preparation. What matters most then is the reaction: no telling off, neither of the child nor, in front of the child, of the carers. A child who expects trouble will say nothing next time, and then you will not find out at all.

Ask calmly what it was, and write it down. Usually there is a point behind it that nobody had thought of, and next time it is known. How your child is afterwards, and whether someone should assess it medically, belongs with the practice treating them and not in a guide.

Card for hosts and carers

Hosts, nursery staff, teachers and the staff of a holiday centre get a card of their own. It also names the things nobody thinks of while cooking: play dough and salt dough made from wheat flour, biscuits in the play corner, the shared fryer. Alongside the cards for adults it sits on A card to show in a restaurant, ready to print for a lunch box or to pass on in a message.

The last line on the card matters most: if in doubt, give nothing and ask. That takes the fear of getting it wrong away from carers, and your child is not left sitting beside the others without an explanation.

How does Gluti help?

With children, places that are entirely gluten-free are the most relaxed. In Gluti you can spot them by the level “100% gluten-free”. There are no mix-ups, and your child can choose freely. Places that worked well can be saved as favourites so you find them again quickly. Ask every time anyway, because kitchens and routines change.