Friday, January 28, 2011

Allergy Friendly Jelly Beans

I was out shopping this morning and came across a brand of candy, Gimbals, that is free of all 8 of the top allergens, peanuts, tree nuts, milk, eggs, gluten, soy, fish and shell fish.  Considering that doesn't happen very often, I just had to share my find.

Abigail's birthday is next weekend, and she wants a chocolate cake with pink frosting.  She also wants it decorated with all of her favorite symbols...rainbows, peace signs, hearts and stars.  I'm actually getting off quite easy with this one.  To avoid mixing so many colors of frosting, my original plan was to use the Rainbow Twizzlers Twists to make the rainbow on the cake.  However, on the shelf right beside the Twizzlers was a bag of gourmet jelly beans, in 41 flavors and a ton of colors.  I was pleasantly surprised to see this allergen label on the back:


I think Abigail is going to really enjoy sorting through the colors and to help form a large multi-flavored rainbow on the cake.

I found the bag of jelly beans at Wal-Mart for a little over $3.00.  It doesn't meet my healthy food standard of non-GMO, no artificial flavors or artificial colors, but it is for a birthday cake after all.

P.S.  I was able to find organic, peanut/tree nut safe jelly beans online from both Surf Sweets and The Jelly Bean Planet if you're neither in a hurry or on a budget.