The Magic of Food Allergy Friendly Cupcakes: How Your Child with Food Allergies can be Included at Celebrations!

The allergen free cupcake has a very important role in your child’s food allergy journey.

I get it. When your child has a food allergy, one of the hardest parts besides worrying that they will be safe is the thought that they will be missing out. The idea of your little one having to be excluded during one of the best parts of a party (cake time) makes your heart break. It also shatters all the expectations you had for them to share in one of the best rituals in life. I truly understand this as a food allergy parent for over nineteen years.

So how do you make it OK for your kiddo at a party so they feel included and enjoy cake time?

You provide them with a delicious allergen free cupcake that they ONLY get when there is a celebration. Sounds rigid, I know, but hear me out as I share our “safe cupcake” journey and how my daughter with food allergies was not disappointed but excited to have a safe substitute cupcake at all the celebrations she attended throughout her childhood.

As a food allergy mom for over nineteen years, I can tell you it is possible for your child with food allergies to have their cake and eat it too;) They can feel included in all of party festivities. It may look a little different, but if you set it up well, your child can be safe and feel included.

Set expectations for your child before attending a celebration

It’s important that you call ahead to a hostess to find out if the food at a party is safe for your child. You want to minimize the risk for them and planning ahead is essential. (You can learn when to call a hostess, and how to approach them (and so much more!) in my e-guidebook, How to Keep your Child with Food Allergies Safe & Included at Every Age)

If your child cannot safely eat the party cake, let them know the day of the party (in an excited voice) that they’ll get to eat yummy cake too at the party and it will be safe for them. Explain that you’ll bring a safe delicious cupcake/piece of cake for them. This will help reduce their anxiety of the unexpected and minimize disappointment as they don’t have to hear, “you can’t have that” just as the party cake is presented. They will know that they’ll have delicious cake and not be left out.

Find your go to food allergy friendly cupcake/cake recipe

The idea of just picking up some cupcakes at the store seems like a great luxury when your child has food allergies. But you can find some safe cake alternatives to buy depending on your child’s food allergens. However, I know oftentimes you need a safe cupcake in a pinch for a party and buying allergen free products can get very expensive. That’s why it’s important for you to find a safe and delicious cupcake recipe for your child. It took me a while to find mine when my daughter was little but today it’s much easier to find great allergen free recipes online.

My daughter, Elisabeth, has been allergic to eggs and peanuts her entire childhood. The vegan movement wasn’t as big when she was little so there were no safe cake substitutes I could buy. The only way for Elisabeth to have a safe cake/cupcake was for me to bake it. Thankfully, I have always liked baking (cooking, not so much, but I learned to enjoy it more with a great podcast in my ear!).

For some reason when it snows my baking itch comes out. When my daughter was a toddler, I tried baking so many recipes while replacing the egg with various things. Over the years I found flax meal to be the best substitute with any recipe that calls for two eggs or less (1 Tbsp flax meal + 3 Tbsp water = 1 egg). But prior to that discovery I baked and threw away treats I made over many many snowy days when my daughter was a toddler.

One day, I had so many baking fails. The glass brownies were the last straw for me! When I say glass brownies, I mean these were brownies that were smooth and hard like glass. Eating one would have broken a tooth. My frustration was beyond! That one day I made three different desserts that were peanut and egg free and wound up trashing them all. I felt so defeated and wanted to cry. In the midst of cleaning up all the bowls and pans I had used, my husband suggested using recipes that don’t require eggs. At the time, I didn’t even think such recipes for baking existed. Though I’m aging myself, this was before any of the fabulous allergen free baking blogs came along. But I found a great cookbook called, Bakin’ Without Eggs, by Rosemarie Emro. A whole book of recipes that are egg free! My allergen free baking and snow days were changed forever – this book was a game changer for me.

In Bakin’ Without Eggs, I found my go-to recipe for chocolate cake – find the recipe HERE. It’s delish! My family loves this cake and I’ve gotten so many compliments on it over the years.

Where to find your go-to cupcake/cake recipes

You can easily find many allergen free cake and cupcake recipes online. But all you need is one good go-to recipe. Everyone seems to have a preference on their favorite allergen free cake recipe so get baking and try out a couple to see what you like (your family will be happy to be taste testers!). Also remember, the more you do something, the easier it gets!

Wacky Cake is very food allergy friendly. Many of these recipes are frequently shared by food allergy moms on social media and many food bloggers. Wacky Cake is also known as Depression Cake or War Cake. It was originated during the Great Depression because Wacky Cake is made without milk, butter or eggs which was hard to come by at the time.

Here is a standard Wacky Cake recipe by All Recipes. In addition, My Cecelia, a food blog written by a fellow food allergy parent, has a Gluten Free Chocolate Wacky Cake recipe (You can find icing recipes here too).

Again, my ALL TIME favorite one bowl chocolate cake recipe is in my blog post, 3 Baking Recipes Every Food Allergy Mom Needs! This is an easy nut and egg free recipe I’ve been making for years and that party guests have raved about. I’ve also made it dairy and gluten free and you cannot tell it’s any different. It’s delish!

To find additional allergy friendly cupcake and cake recipes, check out a favorite site of mine, Allergy Awesomeness, created by another food allergy mom. There are tons of allergy friendly recipes that are free of gluten, dairy, egg, peanut and tree nuts. Here’s Allergy Awesomeness’ cupcake page!

Another very popular site food allergy moms love is Nora Cooks. She’s vegan so her recipes are egg and dairy free. Here’s her cupcake page!

Please don’t be so hard on yourself when it comes to cake decorating!

Regarding cake decorating skills, please don’t feel like you need to be as good as a contestant on The Great British Baking Show to be successful at making a great birthday cake or cupcakes for your child. I know that seeing all of the beautiful cakes parents post on social media can make you feel like you’re not good enough (I have felt that way sometimes too). But just remember that your three year old is not looking up cakes on Instagram. Your kiddo will be excited to be the center of attention on their birthday and if you use some of my tricks (detailed below) with their favorite character, I guarantee it will be a hit!

My daughters were always very happy with their homemade cakes and my guests were impressed at their birthday parties. You can be sure that most people at your parties order their cakes from a bakery, so they will be impressed with any of your baking efforts. You got this!

How to easily make your cakes look great

To make cake decorating easier use character cake toppers or edible pictures. Both require less decorating but have a big impact.

When either of my daughters had a large birthday party I would make a layered 9×13 cake as well as cupcakes. I often used cupcake toppers with my daughters’ party theme to decorate the cupcakes. (You can easily find great cupcake toppers on Amazon.)  My daughter had a pretty cake for blowing out her candles but we were able to quickly pass the cupcakes out to the kids – and they loved the cupcake topper! Then we’d cut pieces of the cake for the adults.

I will confess, as my daughters got older I just moved to birthday cupcakes altogether. Luckily, cupcakes were super trendy at their friends’ birthday parties and way easier IMO. It’s worth investing in a good quality tiered cupcake stand. It presents well for your child and you can layer multiple candles.

Tips for icing cupcakes [ pun intended 😉 ]

To make my daughter feel special with her substitute allergy friendly cupcake at a party, I tried to make it look extra pretty. I used an icing tip instead of a knife to spread the icing. If you want to give it a try, here’s how. Use a fat icing tip. I use Wilton’s 1M. You can also use Wilton’s 2D or 2A tips. Check out this video to learn how to ice your cupcakes using an icing tip! The more you practice, the better you’ll get. You can do it!

If you don’t have an icing bag, you can use a gallon ziplock bag as a substitute. Just place the icing tip into one of the bottom corners of a gallon ziplock bag. Cut a VERY small piece off the corner of the baggie so a part of the tip pokes through (if you cut too much, the tip will come out of the bag with the icing). Fill the bag with icing towards the corner with the tip. Do not zip the bag closed. Twist the baggie at the top of the icing to create pressure for the icing to come out. Hold the bag directly above the cupcake with one hand at the twisted part and with your other hand squeeze the icing out (see the video link above). You can swirl the icing around the cupcake to make it pretty 🙂  Not only did this little swirl make my daughter feel special, but it’s actually much faster to ice the cupcakes this way!

How do you keep your child with food allergies included at other’s celebrations?

My strategy: Have an allergen free cupcake in your freezer at the ready at all times and ONLY give them cupcakes/cake for a celebration.

Ok, I bet you’re thinking I must be a super strict mom. No, actually the opposite. I always had egg and peanut free treats for my daughter including store bought safe cookies, candy and chips. And sometimes I would bake cookies and muffins. In fact I regret giving her too much junk when she was little. I was trying to compensate for all the things she may have seen throughout the day that she could not eat. But I never made cake/cupcakes for the family unless there was a celebration. I wanted cake to be a special treat that Elisabeth was excited to get at a party. And my strategy worked!

It’s key to have safe cupcakes available in the freezer as there will always be a school celebration or friend’s birthday party. I would make a batch of cupcakes, leave a couple out for Elisabeth for the celebration and freeze the rest to have on the ready. That way, I would have a cupcake available for last minute situations and wouldn’t have to bake every time she got invited to a party. A tip…hide the cupcakes in the back of the freezer so no one asks for them. I do admit that I would give both my daughters a cupcake if they were around when I was baking (and of course let them lick the spatula/bowl/spoon ;). But since I was not baking for every event it was still a rare treat.

I often reflect back with Elisabeth, who is now a young adult, about when she was little and how she felt about having food allergies in various situations. She said she never felt excluded at cake time during parties. She couldn’t wait to get her safe cupcake! And as I got better at swirling the icing on top, she often got jealous looks from friends at a birthday party because she had the pretty swirly pink icing (and sometimes with sprinkles)!

How to freeze cupcakes

After your cupcakes have cooled and you’ve iced them, put them on a plate and place it in the refrigerator so the icing can harden. To cover with foil, put toothpicks into the cupcakes at the corners of the plate. Just rest the foil around the plate gently. After the icing hardens later in the day or overnight, gently wrap each cupcake in parchment paper leaving a little extra space over the icing, and place them in a freezer baggie.  Try to keep them right side up inside the bag. Place the baggie in the freezer without resting anything on top so they freeze without getting smashed. Once the cupcakes are frozen they are easier to store. If you freeze your cupcakes the same day or at minimum the day after making them, they will stay fresh and taste just as delicious as when you made them.

BTW, allergen free store bought cake and cupcakes freeze well too! You can find allergen free cupcake brands at Snack Safely: Click Here! (create a Custom Safe Snack Guide on Snack Safely to find cake/cupcakes excluding your child’s allergens)

To defrost a cupcake, try to remember to take one out of the freezer the night before your child has to attend a party and place it in the refrigerator. Put the cupcake in a single cupcake holder to protect the icing (so it still looks great when your child gets it). There are many disposable single cupcake holders you can find online. I use a hard plastic reusable one.

Your child with food allergies can feel included at parties. You just need to plan ahead. Buy or bake safe allergen free cupcakes, keep some in the freezer to always have one at the ready and save them just for celebrations!!

*Please note I’m not paid by any of the outside resources linked in this article. They are simply helpful to me and I hope they help you too!

To learn the most important things you need to know to care for a child with food allergies, get Food Allergy Education Essentials (click here to get the FREE pdf in your inbox- and don’t worry, I will NEVER share your email address – I hate that too!)

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Hi, I’m Debra Bloom and I’ve been a food allergy mom for over 19 years. I’m the founder of Food Allergy Parenting, creator of The Safe Snack Guide, and co-founder of Snack Safely. I’m a food allergy parenting coach passionate about teaching you how to keep your child with food allergies safe and included while living fully. Sign up for my newsletter to get guidance and support right in your inbox! (I’ll never share your email and no spamming – I can’t stand that either!)

Learn the system I used to keep my daughter safe and included throughout her childhood!! – get the guidebook, How to Keep Your Child With Food Allergies Safe & Included at Every Age. It’s what I wish the allergist would have handed me many years ago to learn how to navigate raising my daughter with food allergies. But doctors only diagnose disease- they don’t help with lifestyle. I learned throughout my daughter’s childhood working behind the scenes to keep her safe and included so she could do everything.

How to Keep Your Child With Food Allergies Safe & Included at Every Age is a practical guidebook to help you go from fear to confidence while raising your child with food allergies. I share food allergy parenting education, unique tips, lived knowledge, perspective and heart.  CLICK HERE to find out more and start reading!