Northern Europe

If you want to go abroad for a few days and are craving good gluten-free food, I'd recommend going to the Nordic countries. They are rather close to Russia - especially Finland: the Helsinki-Petersburg train takes 3.5 hours - and they are basically gluten-free heaven on Earth.

I have been to Norway, Sweden and Finland (I don't know about Denmark or the "further" countries) and my gluten-free experience was equally satisfying in each of the three.

My first example may not be your first priority but I think it illustrates rather well what I mean: the only 4 European countries in which McDonald's (and many other fast food chains) offer gluten-free hamburgers are Norway, Sweden, Finland, and then Spain. This obviously implies that the great majority of other restaurants include gluten-free options, and with a very low risk of cross-contamination.

This also means that calling the hotel before your trip to ask for a gluten-free breakfast is unnecessary! Most hotels have a gluten-free corner on their breakfast buffet and will give you toasted bread on demand. The same goes for cafes, which most often store at least one gluten-free (and good) item.

So, really, the main issues when going there is that food and (especially) alcohol are really expensive, and that you may nevertheless decide never to go back home!

If you have any information on Denmark or, say, the Baltic countries, do let us know! It would be interesting to see where it is easy to travel as a celiac.

Airlines

Two weeks ago, I flew Aeroflot to go to St Petersburg and had booked my ticket with a gluten-free snack not to have to bring my own food. And I really regretted it. The standard snack did not look delicious, but the gluten-free one was really, really badly done. Instead of the standard sandwich, I had a piece of boiled chicken (not even salted), with two slices of cucumber stuck between two rice crackers. And it really tasted like they had assembled it 3 days earlier - the cucumber slices had no taste and their juice had made the crackers all soggy.

In short, if you are planning on flying Aeroflot, I'd advise you to bring your own food..

I have had a really good experience with a few other airlines though . Last year, my boyfriend and I went to Turkey for a week and we flew Turkish Airlines (surprisingly..). Although I had exactly the same meal on the way there and back, it was definitely my best gluten-free experience on a plane! They had a really nice bread, which they'd heated prior to serving it.

Then there's China Southern which made things simple, but correct: a fruit plate, rice crackers, and shrimp with rice.

Have you had any good/bad Airline experiences you'd like to share?

Astrid