A Dairy Free Christmas With Holland and Barrett

For someone with food allergies, Christmas can be quite a tricky time. My daughter is allergic to dairy and this time last year I was still breastfeeding, so I also needed to be dairy free so she didn’t react to my milk. I found socialising around Christmas a bit of a minefield. No cheeky mince pie at the Christmas Carol concert for me, unless I’d thought ahead and packed one in my bag.

Day to day, I find I always need to think about the food my daughter it going to be eating, if we’re eating out – I check out the menu before we go. If we’re going to a friend’s house or a party I have to prepare dairy free alternatives in advance so that she doesn’t feel left out. I imagine this is only going to get trickier as she gets older.

At Christmas there are added things to think about – advent calendars, selection boxes, mince pies, lots of cake and goodies that my daughter most probably cannot have. As she is approaching 18 months, she is not fully aware, but she is inquisitive and very much wants the same as what her older brother is having. She has also well and truly learnt the word cake – which she is remarkably good at shouting very loudly.

Last year I did a lot of baking. Vitalite makes a good substitute for butter – although has a slightly wetter consistency and oat milk a good alternative to milk. If you don’t tell people, no one seems to notice either. Oat milk for example makes rather awesome yorkshire puddings. This year I still plan to make a dairy free Christmas cake myself… more to follow.

But, day to day it’s not always practical so I end up raiding the Free From aisles in the supermarkets. I don’t always think of Holland Barrett when I think of things like Christmas food, although I have reviewed from their Free From range before. But they do have a quite extensive Christmas range – have a look.

We have been sent the dairy free advent calendar, dairy free selection box and dairy, gluten and wheat free mince pies to try. It’s really nice for my daughter to have her own dairy free chocolate advent calendar like her brother and a selection box for Santa to bring too.

We couldn’t resist trying the mince pies – it’s never too early for mince pies is it? The flavour of the mince meat was absolutely delicious, really rich and full of flavour. The pastry was tasty, is a little soft which is often a problem I find with free from pastry.

Have you found any great free from Christmas finds?

*This is a collaborative post.