Happy Halloween! Or Rather, The Halloween Post That Never Was

Skull Jelly

Two inexpensive skull goblets filled with Hartley's Lime Jelly = the easiest gluten free home made Halloween food ever. I was going to write about the merits of jelly being gluten free but I can't. So you'll just have to enjoy the photos and read my explanation if you so desire.

Photos By The Glutenite

I began writing this post and then stopped to email Hartley's for gluten free confirmation. I've been eating these jellies through the gluten free years and have always been confident to do so because of the ingredients listed on the packs. I just wanted confirmation though and in a strange turn of events later that same day I discovered that the gluten free oyster sauce I had been eating wasn't gluten free at all. So all the more reason for confirmation of the jelly.

I heard nothing back until today when I got this response to the question of "Are your jellies gluten free?"

Thank you for your recent enquiry regarding products with gluten.

All our products comply with current European Union legislation regarding fourteen most common food allergens. The fourteen allergens covered by this legislation are: Cereals containing gluten (e.g. wheat, rye, barley and others), Crustaceans, Eggs, Fish, Peanuts, Soy beans, Milk (including lactose), Nuts (e.g. almond, hazelnut, walnut and others), Celery, Mustard, Sesame Seeds, Sulphur dioxide and sulphites at concentrations of more than 10mg/kg or mg/l, Lupin and Molluscs. All the EU allergens and their products used in the manufacture of foods must always be named in ingredients lists with reference to the allergen. 

We have also conducted risk assessments at our manufacturing sites to define which allergens pose a high risk of cross contamination.  We will then take a decision whether to exclude such allergens or whether to include as an ingredient and to label accordingly.  We feel that this decision will give our consumers a more informed choice when purchasing our products.  However, we would like to confirm that we have strict controls and policies in place to ensure potentially allergenic ingredients are managed at each stage of production, both within our factories and the factories of our suppliers, in order to prevent any cross contamination.

We will therefore be recommending that for the most up to date information on our products, the ingredients list on the product should be referred to for detailed information and the presence of a particular allergen or any cross contamination.

We hope that this information is sufficient for your purpose.  However, should you have any other queries, please do not hesitate to contact us.

A yes or no would have been preferred but at least I got a response, I'm still waiting on the oyster sauce one. So I can't tell you how wonderful jelly is because I have no confirmation that it is indeed gluten free. What I can say is that Hartley's jellies do not have any listed ingredients that are gluten and they don't have any allergen warning of gluten on the pack. Take from that what you will.

Interestingly, Rowntree's jelly was not on the Nestle list. So I can't recommend that either.

This is the gluten free jelly post that never was *sigh*

I would email them back asking is your jelly gluten free again but I can't see a different response coming. It would end up as some email farce where I get long winded replies and I then end up with my email responses getting shorter and shorter;

Your jelly gluten free?

Gluten free jelly?

Jelly gluten?

GLUTEN?

I'm not going there.

In other news I braved buses today. I got sneezed on several times by a child and encountered a rather large man talking to himself in the voice of the one with glasses from the IT Crowd. He was reading aloud the weekend TV guide adding a whistle here and there, I stuck it out a few stops then moved. To another deck.

Long weekend beginning in a few hours here, over and out until Tuesday.