Coeliac Disease

Working in a restaurant, I am often questioned about certain menu items in terms of allergies, which is nothing abnormal. But that got me thinking; what about alcohol? I am aware that animal products are used in fining for wine and certain other products, so vegans steer clear, so I thought I should investigate different allergies to provide a resource for anyone who would find this sort of thing useful, starting with Coeliac disease.


For those who don't know, Coeliac disease is a problem with the autoimmune system that causes an intolerance to gluten. Gluten is found in wheat, rye, barley and oats (although this is currently being researched), which as you can imagine, includes a number of different types of alcohol.


The obvious alcohols that may include gluten are beers. However, due to the way that the barley malt protein is processed it becomes quite degraded, so only small traces of gluten remain. While I wouldn't go recommending to a customer that beer is therefore safe for them to drink, it is possible for someone to explore this option themselves if they are a Coeliac sufferer.


Wheat beer can potentially be a different story. Coeliacs have been shown to be more sensitive to the gluten proteins found in wheat to that in barley, so if choosing to drink beer, wheat beer is probably not the way to go, and neither is boutique beer, which has been generally shown to contain higher levels of gluten.


Something to also be conscious of is the use in gluten in some icing/superfine sugar preparations. If using this for cocktails it would be best to check the labelling just to be safe.


Virtually all distilled spirits are gluten free, even those containing wheat, due to the processing they undertake when they are distilled (the gluten peptide is too large to be distilled). The only thing that you need to be careful about, in general, is anything added after the distillation process that may contain gluten. A few Coeliacs still report sensitivity to grain based alcohol, so be vigilant.


If wanting to find absolutely gluten free alcohol, try Green's or Bard's Beer, or, you can try making your own gluten free beer using this recipe.