A few weeks ago we were kindly sent our (best ever!) food hamper from Ocado as an introduction to their “Free From” allergy friendly range of foods. As a family with milk intolerances and a nut allergy in the house, I’m always curious about new ranges of foods. Milk intolerance we mostly handle with a general ‘not too much’ approach now, but Amelie has quite a severe reaction to cashews and pistachios (and therefore by default also mangos) and we are now also beginning to wonder if gluten causes her some issues too. So new foods we can be very sure about are always welcome.
The Ocado hamper causes much excitement on arrival (it also came with a gorgeous jug, two glasses and a bottle of Ginger Wine which, ahem, didn’t make it to the photo) plus a Sistema lunch box which I love.
Here is what we thought of the foods…
The chewy sweets were a huge hit, really nice and juicy and over far too soon! I loved the cassava crisps and will definitely be getting something similar again. I’m not a big fan of crisps as a rule, especially the ‘keep eating them till your sick’ feeling they give you and I loved the delicate flavour and feel of the cassava. The chocolate buttons didn’t do it for any of us, perhaps because sometimes if you can’t have something, it is almost better to just give up and not try to have a replacement. I’m not sure how successful milk free milk chocolate can ever be.
On the other hand the gluten free Dino biscuits and pasta was a hit and so was the pasta sauce. All tasted good and had a nice feel to eating them. I’ve not tried the cheesebread mix yet, but I will update when I do.
For all of us the big hits were the two snack bars; the banana one was scrumptious and the nutty one great, though Amelie couldn’t have it as it has cashews and pistachios in it. It was in fact exactly that sort of bar which was how we discovered the original allergy, as my dad kindly brought her one (it was milk free!) and she projectile vomited on us within about 2 minutes of eating it. Finding it in the hamper was a good reminder to check labels even when you think of something as being allergy safe; it’s not that long since we accidentally gave Amelie a pasta sauce from a cheap range that had powdered cashew in it as a thickener.
From my point of view, being an addict of the stuff, I loved the Freenut Butter. It really tasted exactly like the peanut version, which might make it a good alternative for camps where there are children with peanut allergies. Personally, I loved it on toast with my new and very yummy jam 😉
All in all, I’d say I felt really positive about the range. It was well labeled and described, the tastes were good, the packaging attractive and it felt very much ‘normal’ food rather than food for people who ‘can’t’ have things. Well done Ocado 🙂
Disclosure: We were sent the goodie bag for free. All opinions are our own.
I think that dairy free ‘milk’ chocolate has improved significantly since I first went dairy free… certainly I seem to be eating a lot of it at the moment! I think after a long period of not eating dairy you ‘forget’ what things actually taste like so the ‘looky-likies’ aren’t quite so bad?