Halloween and food allergies: sweets, chocolate and good habits

On Halloween night, children come home with a bag full of sweets from all over the place, often without their original packaging. For a child with an allergy, the evening needs a little planning. Here is where allergens hide, and the habits that let everyone enjoy the party.

Where do allergens hide?

• Chocolates and bars: almost always milk, often soya (lecithin), sometimes tree nuts, peanuts or wheat (wafer, biscuit, puffed cereals).
• Caramels and spreads: milk (butter, cream), sometimes hazelnuts.
• Nougat, praline, marzipan: tree nuts (almond, hazelnut) and often egg (egg white).
• Liquorice: often contains wheat flour, so gluten.
• Marshmallows and meringues: egg in some recipes.
• Home-made sweets or baked treats: no label at all. Best to set them aside.

A useful detail: under EU rules, "wheat glucose syrup" and "dextrose" are not considered a source of gluten. They are not highlighted as an allergen.

Halloween-specific traps

1. Mini sizes: small sweets wrapped one by one and sold in family bags do not always carry the ingredient list on each wrapper. It is on the big bag, which the child does not have.
2. Loose sweets: in shops, allergen information for loose sweets must be displayed in writing next to the product. Once in the child’s bag, it is lost.
3. "May contain traces of…": this statement is voluntary. Its absence does not guarantee there are no traces. Your allergist will tell you whether your child should avoid these products.
4. Recipes change: a sweet that was fine last year may have changed. Read the label every time.

The evening, step by step

1. Before: keep a stash of safe sweets that you have checked. Your child can swap what they are given for their own sweets.
2. During: the golden rule, nothing is eaten before getting home. The emergency kit goes along on the round, and the adult with the child knows how to use it.
3. Back home: sort the sweets together. Anything without a readable label goes in the "swap" bag.
4. For parties and snacks: let the organiser know and offer to bring your child’s snack.

If children knock on your door, think of them too: small non-food treats (stickers, glow bracelets, pencils) please everyone. In the United States, a teal pumpkin by the door shows that you offer them.

What askadèle can do for you

• Scan the barcode of the bag or box: askadèle tells you straight away whether the product suits your child’s profile, traces included. If a small wrapper has no barcode, scan the big bag bought in the shop.
• Take a photo of the label when the product is unknown: the app reads the ingredient list.
• Child mode: your child scans by themselves and sees a simple answer, YES, NO or "ask a grown-up".
• Recall alerts: if a product you have scanned is recalled because of an allergen, you are notified.

Scanning, the verdict and child mode are free and need no account.

Open the app and scan a product.

In case of a reaction

Follow the emergency plan prescribed by your child’s doctor and call 112 (in France, 15). This guide gives general pointers: it does not replace advice from your doctor or allergist.