Earlier this month it was my daughter’s 21st. Just like her 18th, my daughter wanted to make sure we were catering for special diet needs. We needed to cater for gluten free, coeliac, dairy allergy and intolerance, egg free, paleo and vegetarian.
We wrote up a menu to display on the food tables. We also labelled each dish so people new if it was okay for them to eat or not. For the labels we wrote on small post it notes and stuck them onto skewers. There were two main food tables one for the normal food and one for the special diets recipes. We also went around with most dishes before leaving them on a table.
The Menu
Here’s the menu showing the different options to cater for the different dietary needs:
| Normal Recipe | Special Diets Adapted Recipes |
| Finger Food | |
| French Onion Dip – V | Yumi’s Dips – GF, DF, EF, V |
| Cheese platters – GF, EF, V | |
| Mexican Layer Dip – GF, EF, V | Special Mexican Layer Dip – GF, EF, V, Lactose free |
| Fairy Bread – V | GF Fairy Bread – GF, DF, V |
| Wedges Cheese Melt – EF, V | Sweet Potato Wedges Cheese Melts – GF, DF, EF, V |
| Cheerios | |
| Mexican Meatballs – GF, DF, EF | |
| Ham & Pineapple Skewers – GF, DF, EF | |
| Spring Rolls – V | |
| Pull-apart Flauta Ring | Special Pull-apart Flauta Ring – GF, DF, EF |
| Garlic Bread – V | Cauliflower Garlic Bread – GF, DF, V |
| Brazilian Cheesy Puffs – GF, V | DF Brazilian Cheesy Puffs – GF, DF, V |
| Vol-au-vents – EF | |
| Party Pies | |
| Sausage Rolls | Sweet Potato Dough Sausage Rolls – GF, DF, EF |
| Potato Dough Sausage Rolls – GF, DF | |
| Dessert | |
| Fruit Platters | |
| Choco & Caramel Dipping Sauces – GF | |
| Liquorice Slice | |
| Rice Pudding – GF, EF | Coconut Rice Pudding – GF, DF, EF |
| Golden Syrup Dumplings | |
| ‘2’ Birthday Cake | “1”Birthday Cake – GF, DF, EF |
How we adapted some of the finger food recipes
Many of the recipes on the left were easy to adapt so that more people could enjoy them. I was going to make a Dairy Free French Onion Dip. However with the bought Yumi’s Dips we decided that there was enough options. We just used lactose free cream cheese and vegan cheese to make the Mexican Layer Dip lactose free.
We thought wedges would be a nice gluten free option. I could not find commercial wedges that were gluten free. So I made my own sweet potato and potato wedges so that some were gluten free. The Mexican Meatballs recipe has an egg in it but I just replaced it with a Chia “egg”.
To make the gluten, dairy and egg free Pull-apart Flauta Ring I made wraps with a sweet potato & egg free version of the Grain Free Dough from Life Changing Foods. I also made them using vegan cheeses. The Brazilian Cheesy Bread uses tapioca flour so its naturally gluten free. For the Dairy Free version I just used dairy free cheese. Again I used the grain free dough and Chia “egg” to make the sausage rolls to cater for special diet needs.
Making the special diets Pull-apart Flauta ring 
Special Diets Pull-apart Flauta Ring with Sweet Potato Dough Sausage Roll behind 
Special Diets food
How we adapted some of the desserts
For the dessert fruit is an obvious choice that most people can eat. However we wanted to make sure that there was other options as well. My mother made the rice pudding using her recipe which is naturally gluten free. I then made a dairy free option by using coconut milk instead of milk. For the cakes we made a normal cake and a gluten free, dairy free, egg free cake. My daughter who decorated her own cake was very careful to only use gluten free lollies on the cake suitable for those with special dietary needs.
Need Help with creating your own special diets menu
As you can see it’s fairly easy to adapt a menu to cater for all sorts of special diets. If you would like help with finding or adapting recipes for a special occasion, I’m happy to help.
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