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Recently I posted regarding eating gluten free in Ireland. I received many 
informative posts. Here is my original post:

I just returned from two weeks in Ireland and one week in England. I had 
contacted the Coeliac (note different spelling of celiac) Society in Dublin 
and got a list of gluten-friendly restaurants.

I have to say that I really didn't need the list at all. The people in food 
service there are pretty savvy about celiac disease. It has a higher 
population ratio in Ireland; in other words, there are more diagnosed 
celiacs there per population than in the United States (1 in 4, I have 
heard).

All of the restaurant people were very accommodating and excellent in 
communicating with the chefs about flour in sauces, etc. They took great 
pains to make sure I didn't get sick. And, with one exception (which was my 
fault), I never once got sick.

The first two days I had a traditional Irish breakfast, which consists of 
fried eggs, bacon (kind of like Canadian bacon), sausages, Heinz beans, 
grilled tomato, and hash browns. The hash browns are actually little formed 
patties somewhat like potato cakes. I got my typical gluten headaches after 
these two breakfasts, and determined that it was the potato cakes. Sometimes 
flour is used as a binder in these patties, and I am sure they were used in 
the Irish version I had.

Many of the traditional Irish foods, such as colcannon (potatoes and 
cabbage, sometimes with milk and butter added) do not typically have added 
ingredients. I had a delicious traditional lamb stew that was just cooked in 
the meat to make a broth with added vegetables. Delicious! They are big on 
salmon and fresh fish and know many ways to cook it. I stayed away from 
stews with thick broths and sauces. In some cases, the waitperson was able 
to verify that the sauces were made with cream, wine, and/or butter only; 
then I could eat that.

One good food item to try is vegetable soup. This is usually made of 
carrots, a spice like coriander, leeks, and turnips or potatoes. Some of the 
vegetables are blended and put back into the soup, making it thick. So, 
don't discount thickened soups. Just ask what the ingredients are.

The best part of the trip was shopping for gluten-free goodies. They are 
available in most markets in Ireland, even in some of the small towns. For 
example, we visited Cong (where the John Wayne film "The Quiet Man" was 
made), a very tiny village of just a few hundred people. I went into the 
small market there and found some gluten-free bread!

Their gluten-free bread is available at Tesco, Spar or Super Value markets. 
You can also get marshmallow-type puffs over biscuit covered with chocolate 
and little apple pies, then little berry tarts; all delicious.

I have to talk about the bread though. It is great (toasted, of course), 
especially with Irish jam. All of the restaurants and B&Bs were most happy 
to toast it for me. I wish American manufacturers would try the Irish bread 
and get on the bus, for Irish gf bread is about 100 times better than any 
American gf bread I have ever tried! I bought several loaves while there, 
and shipped them back at an exhorbitant cost (over $100 for a small box).

Eating gluten-free in England was a bit more difficult, but only because the 
waitpeople usually didn't speak much English. The immigration is high there, 
and there are many workers who are French, Polish, or Iranian (especially in 
London).

The only real problem I had was on the flight over and back. I flew Delta, 
and my travel agent requested a special meal, which was printed on my 
ticket. When I got on the plane, however, I found that they do not serve 
gluten-free meals any more on Delta. The regular choices were pasta or 
chicken with gravy, both of which I turned down for obvious reasons. They 
offered me the vegetarian choice, but those meals (on both the flights over 
and returning) were laden with gluten in the form of pasta or pastry cakes 
of some sort. The airplane people are very ignorant of eating with 
allergies, and are not very helpful. I had to make do with a glass of milk 
and a banana on the flight over, and needless to say, after over 15 hours on 
planes, I was very hungry when I arrived. On the return trip, I brought a 
sack of food, half of which security wouldn't let me bring on board. What 
was allowed: cheese brick, apples (although I had to eat them on the plane 
as you can't bring produce back into the U.S.), and nuts. Not allowed: 
canned food of any kind, drinks, or puddings.

Good luck to you if you fly overseas!

And, here are the replies I received: (Note that the first post talks about 
wheat starch as an ingredient in the bread. I did notice this on some of the 
products and avoided it. There are breads available that do not have the 
wheat starch added, so I made sure I purchased those only. I didn’t want to 
take any chances since even a tiny amount of gluten makes me very ill!)

Post #1: My daughter lived in Ireland for six months and we visited her once 
while she was there.   I share your enthusiasm about the bread, which, by 
the way, tastes so good because of the added Codex wheat starch. I wish that 
the U.S. Celiac association would allow it, or at least allow celiacs the 
choice to purchase bread and other items (Ireland had Pringles with Codex 
wheat starch) with it.

My daughter lived with two Irish girls. They told us that they learned about 
celiac disease in their home economics classes in middle school. They not 
only learned about the disease, but how to prepare gluten free foods. 
Wouldn't that be great if we could teach about cooking for special dietary 
needs in our public schools!

I'm glad that you had a great trip.   It is beautiful countryside in the 
U.K. and Ireland.

Post #2: Haha- just read your post about flying to Europe with GF concerns.  
I went through Heathrow 4 times last month, and I actually got a doctor’s 
note in case anyone questioned my big sack lunch.  I was careful not to 
include any liquids, so that was okay.  (And yeah, the only good airline for 
GF meals that I know is Singapore Airlines.  Those guys are fabulous.)

Post #3: We just returned from London, UK with our daughter who has celiac 
disease plus milk and dairy IgG allergies and other environmental 
sensitivities.  It was a risk going as she hadn't been feeling well (nausea 
whenever she ate, acid reflux when she didn't eat), but it was a family 
reunion had been planned for a while so we took a chance.

As many have said before, London (and presumably the rest of the UK) is 
great for gluten free food.  Every restaurant we went to had waiters who 
understood or their chef understood --  she never had a gluten reaction the 
entire trip!!  So I agree with those who say that if you
travel to the UK, don't sweat the list of gluten free restaurants -- you can 
eat something safely almost everywhere.  We went at busy hours and never 
asked hours or days ahead of time, so we felt we were being quite reckless, 
but we never had problems.

However, for those who have multiple food allergies, it is more difficult = 
or at least you can be assured of a much shorter list of food possibilities. 
  We were staying in a flat and so had access to a
kitchen.  The only food products we could find that were gf plus dairy and 
egg free were a soy pudding (according to our daughter - quite delicious), 
vanilla and chocolate sandwich cookies (a bit dry but fine for tea), and 
some sandwich rolls (also a great find-- wish I could find them locally!!).  
Everything we found was at Tesco (one of their larger stores - not stocked 
in their express stores).  Labeling is very specific so it is easy to figure 
out what you can and can't eat.  I hear that Tesco is thinking about opening 
in the US -- I can't wait!!!

Eating out, we almost always ended up at Italian restaurants and ordered the 
lemon chicken with rosemary potatoes.  We did have a successful Indian meal 
as well, but the unfamiliar spices or something (not gluten) upset our 
daughter's fragile system.

By the way, after the first few days (in which it was hit or miss whether my 
husband and daughter would stay as she still felt dreadful), our daughter 
rallied and was better for the last five days of our
10-day trip.

Post #4: I read your post with great interest and agreed with much of what 
you  said.

We flew British Airways.  They have many different food options -  gluten 
free, low protein, low fiber, high fiber, low uric acid, vegan,  kosher, 
Indian, Asian, fruit plate -- just to mention a few.  However,  gluten-free, 
egg-free, dairy-free is not one of them.  So we got the  fruit plate (what 
could be wrong with fruit?) -- and it turns out that  they think anything 
containing fruit is OK for the fruit plate.  So for  breakfast, they had 
fruit yogurt (with milk), fruit roll (with wheat),  fruit bar (with wheat 
and oats), an orange juice (our daughter can't  drink as she has acid 
reflux).  A complete zero for us. Also, they served Kelloggs Corn Flakes 
that I don't  believe is gf any longer (the UK version contains barley).

On the way back, we packed more food for the plane trip so we weren't  so 
reliant on the airplane food and that worked out better. One the way back 
(older and wiser), we brought  turkey jerky, turkey in lettuce wraps (using 
frozen peas in the package  to keep them cold), almonds, and cookies.

I really can't fault British Airways, as they tried to accomodate our  
special situation with the food they had on hand.  But it seems the  lesson 
with celiac disease is that you have to look after yourself.

All in all, I am ready to move to the UK.

My summation: I wish the airlines would have some simple meals available for 
allergic individuals. However, since that is unlikely to happen, I wish that 
there were provisions for allergic people to purchase food just before 
boarding the airplane. Currently, there doesn't seem to be any shops where 
you can pick up quick snacks that can substitute for meals before boarding. 
Sometimes you can find candy or nuts, but generally not much more than that. 
Is anyone out there listening? Here is a real niche market that someone 
could fill for flyers!

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