I have written lots of Christmas gift guides in the past and always tried to include food!  Being someone who is led by my tummy a fair bit it’s only natural some gifts would be of the edible kind.  I think food makes a wonderful gift idea.  If you’re not sure what to get someone you can always rely on the fact they will need to eat!  But you do have to think carefully about the dietary needs of the recipient.  Otherwise whatever you buy might well go to waste or make them unwell.

Not everyone can eat whatever they want.  Some people have restrictive diets that can make buying food gifts tricky to say the least!  I hadn’t really considered those that have special dietary needs until very recently.  To be honest it was mainly when my sister in law went gluten free due to digestive problems.  Suddenly you become aware of what a minefield eating food is when gluten can trigger such adverse reactions.

Gluten Free

If you have time you can go down the homemade route.  The BBC good food website have lots of gluten free recipes to tempt your taste buds!  Funky Fudge and Cinnamon Star Biscuits both look like would make appealing edible gifts.  But I do understand that homemade takes a lot of time and effort.  Instead you can always shop around, just be careful to look for a gluten free label you really don’t want to get it wrong especially if they have celiac disease.  It can be very serious as the digestive tract attacks gluten as it sees it as a problem for the immune system!  Then it responds accordingly which can have a negative impact on the intestinal wall.

Vegan Gifts

For those of you who choose to avoid animal products in their diet you can search for vegan gifts for sale at Yumbles.  This site which I recently stumbled upon is a real-life saver if you want to keep your gift recipient completely happy in their quest to be animal product free!  I love the A Kind Mama’s Kitchen mini vegan donuts, they are adorable.

I would have thought donuts were usually generally okay for vegans.  But they can contain dairy and egg!  Both of which are excluded in this delicious handmade gift!  I prefer to use a site like this as left to my own devices I would probably make the wrong call and buy something inappropriate for a vegan!

Diabetic Friendly

Ideally you want to avoid carbohydrate rich food in any gifts you buy.  Instead aim for fruit (avoiding grapes and raisins for the sugar content), nuts, cheese or red wine.  I think its nice to give diabetics a food gift they can enjoy because there are so many sweets and chocolates around at this time of year.  They will want to join in the festivities just with a little bit more thought for the chosen gift.  It’s worth bearing in mind that diabetic chocolate can be laxative so its not necessarily a good substitute to the real thing!

From now on I will have to try and make my Christmas gift guide as balanced as possible so there is something for everyone regardless of their dietary needs.