Ridiculously Easy Guide to Holiday Travel with Food Allergies

Ridiculously Easy Guide to Holiday Travel with Food Allergies

Ridiculously easy guide to Holiday travel with food allergies.

Visiting family or friends over the Holidays? Or planning a vacation?

Are you concerned about traveling and eating safely with your food allergies?

We understand completely all the “what if’s” when you/someone you love has life-threatening food allergies. We’ve been there!

Cake in the Living Room, Anaphylaxis

Many years ago, we were newly diagnosed with multiple anaphylactic food allergies. As we were new to this food allergy life, when a family member insisted on getting a bakery cake for dessert, we said “no”. After recently seeing our daughter have an anaphylactic food allergy to pancakes, it was too fresh & scary. Terrifying actually.

As our allergist had given us clear recommendations: unless it was a completely free-from #Top9 allergens, bakery treats were a firm NO!

As you may expect, our refusal to eat this cake didn’t go over well with family member(s) and we left the family get-together upset & humiliated. In fact, I was in tears. Feeling like we were being portrayed as horrible people, denying our child and family time together.

Now, after 20+ years of being a food allergy family, we have developed many strategies to minimize the possibility of having a reaction. And you can use these travel tips to make your Holiday travels even easier. Really.

🧳 Especially helpful for all kinds of trips: Grab the Food Allergy specific Ultimate Packing List here.

Traveling with Food Allergies – Flying and Train

Traveling with food allergies is challenging. If flying, there’s little control over what other people are eating, touching, etc… but here’s all our best tips specifically for Flying with Food Allergies Guide.

Oh, don’t forget translation cards if traveling internationally. What we use for many years for translation cards: Select Wisely.

Oe Equal Eats Translation Cards. If you use our code AnEasyJourney you receive a 10% discount!

As traveling by train is similar in many ways to traveling by plane, those food allergy tips work for train trips as well. Always clean and disinfect seat belts, window shades and all buttons.

Especially necessary is bringing your own food allergy safe food. When deciding how much food to bring with you, always consider delays and cancellations. And if it’s Wintertime, weather delays happen frequently. And travel makes everyone hungrier – so, more food the better!

Since we’ve been on this food allergy journey for over 2 decades now, have a lot of experience with packing foods that can stay fresh for a long time.

Our favorites: Orzo pasta salad made with olive oil, not mayonnaise, cut up fruit and veggies & wraps made with crunchy cucumbers, (#dairyfree) cheese or Sun Butter & jam sandwiches.

Although these foods do not require refrigeration, keeping them in a backpack cooler does extend their life. This is the one we use for many years: Backpack Cooler Bag.

Ridiculously Easy Guide to Holiday Travel with Food Allergies: Holiday Car Trips

Traveling by car is by far the easiest way to travel when you have a food allergy. Because there is usually a lot more space, you can pack a large cooler with all kinds of delicious food allergy-friendly meals, snacks and Holiday goodies.

Although if you are renting a car, follow above tips for cleaning the car like seatbelts, steering wheel, handles and knobs. Often, we see peanuts, nuts and pretzel crumbs in rental cars.

If we travel by car, highly recommend having a pre-made meal or two so that you can eat quickly on arrival. Even better if you pack some Holiday treats like cupcakes & cookies. Food Allergy safe, of course! Know which luggage fits all of our safe foods & clothes? This Bric’s expandable spinner luggage holds EVERYTHING! As well as having a TSA approved built in lock. 🙂 Makes a great gift too!

Also, helpful: research a few allergy-friendly restaurants along your route. You never know when you’ll need a break or stopping for traffic to go down, makes sense.

😊 Our Food Allergy Travels & Life Private Facebook Group has many restaurant suggestions for all over USA & World – ask here (you must still vet for your specific food allergies):

Food Allergy Travels & Life | Facebook

Ridiculously Easy Guide to Holiday Travel with Food Allergies: Accommodations

This ridiculously easy guide to Holiday travel with food allergies wouldn’t be complete without making sure that you are staying in the best type of accommodation for your food allergies. Whether you plan on spending the Holidays at family or friends or choosing another accommodation type, make sure that you feel safe.

We all have relatives/friends that are super supportive of our dietary restrictions. In fact, two of our family members are so amazing at cleaning out a pantry shelf for our allergy safe foods & only serving our food allergy safe foods, that it is relaxing upon arriving!

This is not the case everywhere we travel. I am sure you understand this! So, if you feel it’s better for your family to get a vacation rental or hotel, then make these plans. Your safety comes 1st, Always. Read that again.

Here’s an entire post on helping find the best accommodations for food allergy travelers: Vacation Safely & Inexpensively.

Holiday Food Allergy Meals Made Easy

No matter which Holiday you are traveling for, we have LOTS of easy, adaptable food allergy recipes for Holiday yumminess!

Fall & Thanksgiving recipes.

Romantic Food Allergy recipes.

And don’t miss out on all of our reels, travel tips & more – follow us on our Instagram where there are MANY #foodallergyrecipes

35 Amazing Holiday Gifts for People with Food Allergies

35 Amazing holiday gifts everyone with food allergies will love! We update our Gift Guide every year with thoughtful & meaningful gifts that those of us with dietary restrictions will really enjoy!

Holiday gifts for everyone – most are very easy on the budget and exactly what your family/friends would like to receive.

So, grab a cup of coffee/tea/wine/beverage of your choice and let’s get gifting!

Click: 35 Amazing Holiday Gifts for People with Food Allergies.

Ridiculously easy guide to Holiday travel with food allergies. See how easy that was?!

🎄 Are you traveling for the Holidays?

🙂 Have any great recommendations?

Share on our Instagram Cindi — An Easy Journey (@aneasyjourney) • Instagram photos and videos – we love to hear where you’re going and about your past Holiday travels.

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