Dairy Free, Coeliac Travel Guide | Walt Disney World Edition

My social media spam may have given away the fact I was in Florida a few weeks ago, spending time in all the Disney World parks and the both Universal Studios parks. Before going, as usual, I crammed my (already horrendously overweight) suitcase full of my snacks and breakfast items just incase America didn’t have any food, and then I was on my way!

To give you a feel of my friends and I; we’d booked a breakfast buffet before we’d booked time off work or booked flights. Oops. Luckily everything worked out and we were off to the Contemporary Resort, ‘Chef Mickey’ for a character breakfast. With characters walking around including Mickey, Minnie, Pluto, Goofy and Donald, it was a great atmosphere for breakfast!

I must admit, I’m not a lover of buffets. They’re an utter nightmare when it comes to cross contamination with everyone using spoons in different dishes, it stresses me out even thinking about it, no thank you ma’am. I did therefore plan to order off the menu and my friend upon booking had told them of my dietary requirements and they said it was no issue.

I did get some fruit off the buffet, but the rest I ordered off the allergy menu given to me without prompt when we arrived! I got three ‘Mickey Waffles’ and two cinnamon donuts, and as you can tell from photos, was pretty darn happy about that fact. As with many of the allergen friendly foods in Disney, they’re usually free from more than one thing – these waffles were free from gluten/ wheat, egg, dairy, peanuts and tree nuts, fish and shellfish. The donuts are free from these too except they do contain eggs. The chef brought them out to me so I could again quiz him on the allergies and were served with maple syrup. Honestly so delicious my mouth is watering writing this.

You could have ordered more but I was stuffed and aware I wanted to run round Disney like a lunatic so didn’t want to be overly full, so I asked for a bag and I ended up taking one of the donuts with me. This turned out to be the best decision because I ate it later on stood in a queue and I was pretty happy with myself.

These waffles I believe are offered in other resort buffets, at the Floridian I think – but do check that!

Next up – a long day and a few sugar highs later, we stopped off at Tony’s Town Square Restaurant at the top of Mainstreet for some dinner. We booked on the day via the Disney app and once again just let them know I was dairy and gluten free.

Upon arrival I was given an allergy menu and when the others got their bread and oil, I was given mine – these two cute little rolls which were each individually packaged and warmed up so nothing could have contaminated them – fab. They were so lovely and what a nice touch, I can hardly ever eat the bread that comes for the table.

Since we were at Lady and the Tramp’s restaurant, I couldn’t not have spaghetti could I? (Or stop myself singing Bella Notte over and over again in my head) I switched the white wine sauce for tomato marinara because I don’t like any other sauce really, but this was accommodated easily and I enjoyed one of my fave meals – shrimp pasta (gluten free obviously!)

This was a lovely meal and the staff couldn’t have been friendlier or more helpful, I’d definitely say this is worth a visit before the fireworks – make sure you book though, it’s very popular!

One of the stand out highlights of my Disney eating (besides the waffles… always remember the waffles) was my allergy-friendly chicken strips and chips. As a kid in Disney, I remember for two weeks at a time I used to live on these chicken strips, and since no one can tell you what to eat on holiday (soz mum) no one could stop me. Now, these ones admittedly aren’t the same American batter that those ones were (bubbly and crispy is what I mean by my bad ‘only I will get what I mean’ description of American batter which is truly irrelevant to everyone else.) But, they were so yummy! Pure white chicken in a breaded coating with french fries and a frozen strawberry drink which was definitely needed in the boiling weather, this went down a storm and I was a very happy camper indeed, Disney spirit refuelled.

As you can see from the menu, there’s so many options! I believe I’m correct in saying the ‘allergy friendly’ are free from all the major allergens, but since I was just focused on dairy and gluten, make sure you check that!

I’d like to own up to being a total Harry Potter nut, I grew up with the books and films so the whole thing is pretty special to me. I was in my element to finally get to go to The Wizarding World of Harry Potter in Universal, total crazy excited eyes in every photo that only my mother will enjoy. Again, I was having a bit of a nervy B about eating in Universal and though I really wanted to eat in the Leaky Cauldron for atmosphere and to pretend I was a Hogwarts student, I assumed there wouldn’t be a free from option. I decided there’s no harm in asking though, so we went in and I asked to have an allergen menu and talk to a chef, and lo and behold I could eat the chicken sandwich minus the mayo and after telling the chef everything I can’t eat, I felt much safer trusting them! It was delicious and I was just so happy that I could eat here, proves you can never just assume you can’t eat somewhere, in the American theme parks they really do have great food for us all!