Best CS dealing with food allergies?

[PJB71]

Hi thanks for that, it was very kind of youxx

Here you go: http://www.divvies.com/

They are no nuts, no eggs, no dairy. My DD only has the nut allergy, but she still thinks they're the best cookies!

 

[thejman]

My children eat the Divvies cookies and really enjoy them. I have tried them and thought they tasted good. I don't think they are gluten free, but I am not sure.

 

[squirrel]

I had enough snack credits last year that I brought home a box (12 pkgs) of the Divvies Chocolate Chip Cookies for my lactose intollerant niece.

 

[snorris49]

Disney does sell French Meadow brownies and cookies and they are gluten free. I saw them at our the Mara, Sunshine Seasons, and Main Street Bakery....I buy them at home, and they are pretty tasty.

 

[cinderella73]

They have never had the Divvies cookies at Cosmic Rays or any counter service before when I asked. ( last year)

Did anyone ask for them to replace the kids dessert at any of the table service locations?

I think they should always have them on hand as a replacement. When you order a meal and end up not being able to have half of it they should price adjust or substitute something.

 

[clanmcculloch]

They have never had the Divvies cookies at Cosmic Rays or any counter service before when I asked. ( last year)

Did anyone ask for them to replace the kids dessert at any of the table service locations?

I think they should always have them on hand as a replacement. When you order a meal and end up not being able to have half of it they should price adjust or substitute something.

My daughter's been able to have brownies (gluten, dairy free; I think maybe nut free too but I'd confirm) and ice cream (dairy free among other things free) at every disney owned TS restaurant we've been to. Every resort CS location we've tried has had them as well. Brenda from special diets sent us a list of which CS locations at parks carry them as well. This is true of any of the allergy foods. Just contact Brenda ahead of time and she can tell you where you can get different types of special allergy foods including Divvies.

Disney is amazing regarding making sure that kids have alternatives. This is one of the main reasons we keep returning to WDW. Of course we only go to Disney owned TS restaurants because we know they carry alternatives and for CS locations we only go to places that have been confirmed to us by Brenda as carrying alternatives. Doing tons of homework before we go makes for so much smoother of a vacation.

 

[happymommy]

In the past, we had a good experience with restaurantasaurus (sp?) in AK. I do think they've changed recently, as I didn't like our meal last year. But in the past, my DS couldn't eat the chicken nuggets, but wanted the kids' meal (he was under 10 then). The manager came over and spoke to me, substituted a hot dog (no bun, damn Disney uses Interstate bakery, which makes Wonder bread, which a few years ago added dairy to all their breads) for no extra charge. Plus, when she went back to the kitchen, she had them change their gloves to put together my son's meal (it was even written on our ticket "change gloves"). I really appreciated that.

My son does well with Japan's Yakitori House (although I think their food has gone downhill so bad that I don't like it), but he loves rice and their chicken is safe for him, the service has always SUCKED but that is fine, my DH is Korean and some Korean restaurants have great food but horrible service.

I don't think calling ahead helps for CS at all. And it's really hit or miss - I didn't know about Divvies as an alternative for desserts anywhere. Most places, last December, they said all we could get was a chocolate chip cookie (which my DS can't eat) so many went in the trash at the end of the trip. That is annoying - I would have loved something HE could eat! No one wants that nasty no sugar added applesauce - eeeewwwww.

We ordered Divvies cupcakes for a birthday party a year ago - I felt too lazy to bake for my DS. Well, the kids liked them well enough, but they were dry and tasteless if you ask me. I'd rather have baked my own; I make pretty good dairy and egg free cupcakes, and the Divvies are not cheap. Lesson learned.

There is a gluten/dairy/egg free cookie to DIE FOR from Alternative Baking Company in the US. I don't dare buy them, as I'd eat the whole thing - they are huge and about the calories of 2 poptarts, and they are moist and so good! I don't know if WDW carries them (doubt it) but I think Amazon does.

 

[cinderella73]

My daughter's been able to have brownies (gluten, dairy free; I think maybe nut free too but I'd confirm) and ice cream (dairy free among other things free) at every disney owned TS restaurant we've been to. Every resort CS location we've tried has had them as well. Brenda from special diets sent us a list of which CS locations at parks carry them as well. This is true of any of the allergy foods. Just contact Brenda ahead of time and she can tell you where you can get different types of special allergy foods including Divvies.

Disney is amazing regarding making sure that kids have alternatives. This is one of the main reasons we keep returning to WDW. Of course we only go to Disney owned TS restaurants because we know they carry alternatives and for CS locations we only go to places that have been confirmed to us by Brenda as carrying alternatives. Doing tons of homework before we go makes for so much smoother of a vacation.

I did a lot of homework but when I arrived at the cs locations I was told had alternatives not one of them did. Table service was much more prepared. Brenda and I had discussed safe / non safe meals and locations . I guess I was just disapointed that everytime we ate at a CS ( cant possibly do all ts unfortunatly) they didnt have any alternatives like I had been told they would. I paid full price for a 2 chicken strips and had a hungry kid.

Now the guy over at the hot dog stand area in MGM ( Cant remember the name but its across from where you enter for Fantasmic) was really really great with us and made sure that since my son couldnt have any of the buns he had a choice of another side or extra hotdog. I thought that was really sweet of him.

Disney is great dont get me wrong. They are better at meeting allergic kids needs than any amusement park place I know of. Just saying it could use some consistancy and tweaking.

 

[ashley0139]

I have a gluten allergy and have always been so impressed by how they handle it. At the Christmas Party last year I had those gluten free cookies and they were delicious. The brownies are great too. So yummy, I had them for breakfast. Ha.

Could someone please tell me about the gluten free pasta? I have never had it at Disney before. Is it available at all the resorts, in addition to Pop. And what about the CS and TS? Like, would I be able to go to the Italian restaurant and have gluten free pasta?

I love the options at Cosmic Rays now as they have the rotisserie chicken with mashed potatoes and green beans. I ate that several times my last trip.

If anyone has any other tips for eating gluten free in the world I would love them!

 

[sherabby]

They have never had the Divvies cookies at Cosmic Rays or any counter service before when I asked. ( last year)

Did anyone ask for them to replace the kids dessert at any of the table service locations?

I think they should always have them on hand as a replacement. When you order a meal and end up not being able to have half of it they should price adjust or substitute something.

My son had brownies (Divvies) and a different brand of chocolate chip cookie (not Divvies) both in June and in August at Cosmic Rays this summer. His allergies are dairy, peanuts, tree nuts and fish.

 

[clanmcculloch]

I did a lot of homework but when I arrived at the cs locations I was told had alternatives not one of them did. Table service was much more prepared. Brenda and I had discussed safe / non safe meals and locations . I guess I was just disapointed that everytime we ate at a CS ( cant possibly do all ts unfortunatly) they didnt have any alternatives like I had been told they would. I paid full price for a 2 chicken strips and had a hungry kid.

Now the guy over at the hot dog stand area in MGM ( Cant remember the name but its across from where you enter for Fantasmic) was really really great with us and made sure that since my son couldnt have any of the buns he had a choice of another side or extra hotdog. I thought that was really sweet of him.

Disney is great dont get me wrong. They are better at meeting allergic kids needs than any amusement park place I know of. Just saying it could use some consistancy and tweaking.

I'm shocked that so many places that Brenda said would have specific brands of foods didn't. For our last 3 trips we've been on strict allergy diets and among those 3 trips, only once did we encounter a place not having what Brenda said they would. We did encounter a few places that didn't know that they had items and they had to check around and eventually found the items, but only one time did they actually not have the items. They called over a higher level manager (park level) who was aware of the fact that they had been sold out for several weeks, but that was the only instance.

We do tend to do most of our CS meals at our resort. I do speak to a chef at our resort ahead of time and they're always prepared for us. We limit which CS locations in parks we'll go to based on who carries what (like Sunshine Seasons or the American Pavillion at Epcot; last year they carried special allergy chicken nuggets though no desserts at ABC Commissary at DHS). Park CS locations are more difficult when you have multiple food allergies but we manage to do it successfully at least a few times each trip.

Oh, there was one other issue we had with specific allergy foods, but I can't fault Disney for this one. The frozen bananas were recalled during the peanut recalls last year. My daughter was in tears over this. A recall isn't something that can be planned for though and I don't consider this to be Disney's fault.

If you upgrade to the DxDDP then you COULD do all TS meals if you wanted to. My family couldn't handle it, but some love it.

I have a gluten allergy and have always been so impressed by how they handle it. At the Christmas Party last year I had those gluten free cookies and they were delicious. The brownies are great too. So yummy, I had them for breakfast. Ha.

Could someone please tell me about the gluten free pasta? I have never had it at Disney before. Is it available at all the resorts, in addition to Pop. And what about the CS and TS? Like, would I be able to go to the Italian restaurant and have gluten free pasta?

I love the options at Cosmic Rays now as they have the rotisserie chicken with mashed potatoes and green beans. I ate that several times my last trip.

If anyone has any other tips for eating gluten free in the world I would love them!

Get the latest and greates lists of which locations carry which gluten free items from Brenda. Something else we did when choosing TS locations was to google Disney gluten free and read all sorts of reviews of who got what at which locations. If I recall, allears.net has a decent gluten free area. In my experience, the Disney owned TS restaurants all have gluten free pasta though you can never be sure of the shape that you'll get. It's quite tasty. Other than food courts, I haven't had pasta at any CS locations. I'm told Sunshine Seasons at Epcot carried it when we were there last but we didn't try it. We were told we'd need to order ahead which makes sense since it takes a while to cook. Chances are they don't have a fresh pot of water boiling so even just that requires time.

The Pop chefs are amazing. We spoke to chef Dan before heading down last time and he was ready for us. Some of the best meals I ate during our last trip were in the Pop food court. Regardless of which chef is working at the time, you'll get a delicious meal. I think chef Dan was the most creative though. He would ask us what kinds of foods we like and he came up with some amazing dishes. The fresh ginger asian shrimp noodle stir fry that he made with all sorts of wonderful fresh veggies (he told me he had a special order of veggies in that week because he also had a vegan guest he was ordering for) was to die for. Being dairy free as well, you wouldn't believe how grateful I was to eat a huge plate of yummy loaded nachos. He special ordered foods in for us. The fried chicken they made was also amazing. Chef Dan had been to a food conference and saw Kinnikinnick muffins and Silk yogurts so he picked them up for us as well. I felt SOOOOO well taken care of and spoiled in fact. He made it hard to book somewhere else for our upcoming trip.

Many CS locations carry gluten free hamburger buns or breads. Find out from Brenda which ones these are. I'm told that at the Main Street Bakery you can order a to go boxed sandwich lunch if you order ahead of time. I'm planning to check into the animal kingdom picnic meal when we go in December. I want the fried chicken.

 

[ashley0139]

Get the latest and greates lists of which locations carry which gluten free items from Brenda. Something else we did when choosing TS locations was to google Disney gluten free and read all sorts of reviews of who got what at which locations. If I recall, allears.net has a decent gluten free area. In my experience, the Disney owned TS restaurants all have gluten free pasta though you can never be sure of the shape that you'll get. It's quite tasty. Other than food courts, I haven't had pasta at any CS locations. I'm told Sunshine Seasons at Epcot carried it when we were there last but we didn't try it. We were told we'd need to order ahead which makes sense since it takes a while to cook. Chances are they don't have a fresh pot of water boiling so even just that requires time.

The Pop chefs are amazing. We spoke to chef Dan before heading down last time and he was ready for us. Some of the best meals I ate during our last trip were in the Pop food court. Regardless of which chef is working at the time, you'll get a delicious meal. I think chef Dan was the most creative though. He would ask us what kinds of foods we like and he came up with some amazing dishes. The fresh ginger asian shrimp noodle stir fry that he made with all sorts of wonderful fresh veggies (he told me he had a special order of veggies in that week because he also had a vegan guest he was ordering for) was to die for. Being dairy free as well, you wouldn't believe how grateful I was to eat a huge plate of yummy loaded nachos. He special ordered foods in for us. The fried chicken they made was also amazing. Chef Dan had been to a food conference and saw Kinnikinnick muffins and Silk yogurts so he picked them up for us as well. I felt SOOOOO well taken care of and spoiled in fact. He made it hard to book somewhere else for our upcoming trip.

Many CS locations carry gluten free hamburger buns or breads. Find out from Brenda which ones these are. I'm told that at the Main Street Bakery you can order a to go boxed sandwich lunch if you order ahead of time. I'm planning to check into the animal kingdom picnic meal when we go in December. I want the fried chicken.

Thank you so much for all this information!

This may be stupid, but who is Brenda? I've been dealing with this for so long, I usually don't bother doing anything special and just order whatever is available. But you are making this sound so good! Ordering fried chicken is unheard of. And we may be eating at Tony's for lunch so I would love to have some pasta there.

We are staying at All Star Movies though probably won't be eating there much at all.

I would absolutely love any links you can give me. I love Disney, but I don't know a ton of online stuff and where to look.

 

[clanmcculloch]

Thank you so much for all this information!

This may be stupid, but who is Brenda? I've been dealing with this for so long, I usually don't bother doing anything special and just order whatever is available. But you are making this sound so good! Ordering fried chicken is unheard of. And we may be eating at Tony's for lunch so I would love to have some pasta there.

We are staying at All Star Movies though probably won't be eating there much at all.

I would absolutely love any links you can give me. I love Disney, but I don't know a ton of online stuff and where to look.

Brenda is in charge of special diets for WDW. Her contact info is in one of the stickies above on this board. My service provider is flaking on me right now so I can't get into my email to look it up for you. The stickies are full of great information.

With the fried chicken, be aware that it takes a good half hour of waiting for your food at a food court. They have to make it from scratch. To me, it was TOTALLY worth the wait, but it is important to be aware because you want the rest of your party to get their food at the same time as you get yours so you'll eat together. We typically order our allergy food and then go to the gift shop and look around while waiting for our food. I only order these kinds of things at my resort. The park locations won't have the same flexibility to make anything you can think of. They're much more limitted in their supplies. We always take breaks back at our hotel so eating at the hotel makes sense for us and we really enjoy it. I'm hoping that since the picnic in the park is something that's ordered a few hours ahead of time to be picked up at a preset time that they'll be able to do fried chicken there. Cross your fingers for me.

Enjoy your trip and your dietary freedom at WDW.

 

[itradehilton]

Is the GF picnic fried chicken lunch available on the DDP. My DS would love to eat real fried chicken again at a restaurant. At home we just smash up GF potato chips and use that as the breading for fried chicken.

 

[DisneyMom5]

I just asked my son and he said they are not dry. He can have wheat but not dairy and he loves them. WCC also had another brand of chocolate chip cookies that were safe and they were really good. He loved them but I cannot remember that brand name. They were in a yellow package. I'll have to check out our local health food store for them the next time we shop there. They were a soft cookie and very moist. They were also kept in the freezer so a bit cold when they came out.

Were they Enjoy Life Foods? [www.enjoylifefoods.com] We got those at Tusker House. They are a great Top 8 Free company, and we buy a lot of their products.

I did a lot of homework but when I arrived at the cs locations I was told had alternatives not one of them did. Table service was much more prepared. Brenda and I had discussed safe / non safe meals and locations . I guess I was just disapointed that everytime we ate at a CS ( cant possibly do all ts unfortunatly) they didnt have any alternatives like I had been told they would. I paid full price for a 2 chicken strips and had a hungry kid.

Now the guy over at the hot dog stand area in MGM ( Cant remember the name but its across from where you enter for Fantasmic) was really really great with us and made sure that since my son couldnt have any of the buns he had a choice of another side or extra hotdog. I thought that was really sweet of him.

Disney is great dont get me wrong. They are better at meeting allergic kids needs than any amusement park place I know of. Just saying it could use some consistancy and tweaking.

Did you follow up with Brenda when you got home? I think they could use that information to improve customer service.

I have a gluten allergy and have always been so impressed by how they handle it. At the Christmas Party last year I had those gluten free cookies and they were delicious. The brownies are great too. So yummy, I had them for breakfast. Ha.

Could someone please tell me about the gluten free pasta? I have never had it at Disney before. Is it available at all the resorts, in addition to Pop. And what about the CS and TS? Like, would I be able to go to the Italian restaurant and have gluten free pasta?

I love the options at Cosmic Rays now as they have the rotisserie chicken with mashed potatoes and green beans. I ate that several times my last trip.

If anyone has any other tips for eating gluten free in the world I would love them!

Some seem to, some don't. I believe some say "with advanced notice."

Contact info for Brenda/WDW special diets:

specialdiets@disneyworld.com

Brenda Bennett
Special Dietary Request
Executive Offices
Walt Disney World Resort
407-824-5967

 

[clanmcculloch]

Is the GF picnic fried chicken lunch available on the DDP. My DS would love to eat real fried chicken again at a restaurant. At home we just smash up GF potato chips and use that as the breading for fried chicken.

The Animal Kingdom picnic takes CS DDP credits. I don't know for sure yet that it's GF. I'm hopeful! At Pop it was.

Were they Enjoy Life Foods? [www.enjoylifefoods.com] We got those at Tusker House. They are a great Top 8 Free company, and we buy a lot of their products.

OMG they have Enjoy Life products at Tusker House? I wasn't aware. We have an ADR for the Finding Nemo package at Tusker House so I'm really excited to know this. Both of my girls LOVE Enjoy Life foods. I wouldn't have even thought to ask for them (though most likely the chef would have mentioned, but it's great to know that I should ask if he doesn't). You've just made my day. Thank you!