Dairy Free Abroad - Margarine

[Leelaka]

Hi. Both my children have a rare medical condition which means they must have lactose free diets (for life.) Does anyone have any tips for travelling abroad. We went to Spain a couple of years ago and managed to source many things such as Soya milk, but could not find any dairy free margarines or spreads. We had to instead make do with "Peanut Butter", despite the title. With greater restrictions now on hand luggage, we may not be able to take as much with us next time. Any thoughts......Many thanks. Lee :)

[Lou C]

Hi,
Where is it you are travelling?
When we were away earlier in the year we bought some flora which was dairy free, there was also some margarine which had a picture of a cob of corn on the front....I think it was called "maiz" but not sure.......I usually translate a list of milk dericatives on the free translation siteand work from that when checking labels.
Lou x

[Leelaka]

Many thanks for reply. We haven't deicded where to go yet, hoping for some ideas. Initial thoughts are Spain or Malta (the latter as quite English so hope to be able to manage diet better.). Interesting regarding Flora as UK version I think contains milk. We do have a "diet passport" which contains the words for milk, but still struggled to find a spread last time. Lee :)

[Copper]

The Flora in UK does contain milk.

[Jo Sawyer]

We have been on our hols to greece twice with Jamie now (including this summer), i just devoted a whole suitcase to his food bought a plastic underbed storage box with lid and filled it with the longlife soya milk, pure, alpro yoghurts etc (i then taped it in case of any leaks) with a covering note from his pediatric dietician. The airlines never even questioned its contents - infact they suggested that we check the suitcase through on the manual check-in used for soft holdalls to minimise the damage. p.s. just watchout as two of the milk cartons did leak due to the pressure on the plane, but it was well worth the effort for the peace of mind !

[miche]

Thanks Jo thats interesting to know. My son has a severe dairy allergy, he is now 12, we would all love to go abroad and sit on a beach with guaranteed sun but the thought of trying to purchase dairy free products abroad seemed difficult. Wasn't sure if we could take all that stuff on the plane. We tend to stay in hotels for 2 or 3 nights if we go anywhere (any longer would cost a bomb as theres 5 of us), it guarantees 3 meals a day if we can't find anywhere else. Did you ever eat out in the restaurants and how did you get on. We normally do self catering but its nice to have a break from cooking.

[Jo Sawyer]

Hi Miche, yes we did eat out in restaurants, one of the reasons we chose greece is because their diet is so much healthier and based on cooking with olive oil. We tended to go to the more traditional restaurants where Jamie ate lots of fresh fish with rice or chips, barbecued skewers of pork, chicken & lamb etc and if we were in any doubt or he didn't fancy anything on the menu (he is only 4) they would always boil us an egg. I buy rice crispies out there for breakfast with the soya milk and there is plenty of fruit . The only rash Jamie had was heat rash - we aren't used to so much sun up north!

[Johanna]

I've taken my dairy and egg allergic son abroad since he was 14 months old, and we have never (touch wood) had a problem. I have either got translations when there, or taken translation cards from Allergy UK. We always eat out in the evening and I have found the indigenous of the countries very sympathetic and they go out of their way to ensure his food is egg and dairy free. Also, after finding good restaurants we would return there.

The supermarkets in Spain sold soya milk and yogurts - he did without spread and just had marmalade on toast. I would review ingredients as I do at home. We've always done ok.

The hardest I found was going in a bar run by English (to watch football!!!) and trying to get them to understand that certain food could be potentially fatal for my son was really difficult!