If your child is in primary school and has special dietary requirements due to a diagnosed allergy, intolerance or medical condition, please register their details by completing our special diets registration form.
If your child is in secondary school there is no need for you to register with us. All allergen information is available at point of service.
Please note that this form does not allow you to save your progress so please make sure you have all the necessary information ready.
For more details, or to find out if you need to register, please check out our FAQs.
Please note that this form does not allow you to save your progress so please make sure you have the following information ready. For more details, or to find out if you need to register, please check out our FAQs. Our Special Diets team are also always on hand to answer any questions.
Please complete our online Special Diets Referral Form.
Our policies relating to special diets requests are in line with Allergy UK guidelines and advice from the NHS and British Dietetic Association. We ask for medical evidence as this often allows us to get a better understanding of children’s dietary requirements, particularly in complex cases. Unfortunately, we also receive a number of requests for bespoke menus, some of which are based on food preferences rather than medical requirements. As some requests are also quite restrictive, we like to be sure these diets have been recommended by a child’s doctor or allergy specialist. We are happy to accept letters from a child’s GP or dietician, any clear hospital test results or an allergy action plan.
If you are unable to provide supporting documentation for any reason, we simply ask you to provide some additional information, and this is handled by our Company Nutritionist on a case-by-case basis. If you are unsure, please get in touch with our Special Diets Team.
If you are having problems uploading your medical evidence or photo, there may be a way for you to reduce the image size depending on what device you are using. Alternatively, you can simply select to opt out of uploading any attachments when completing the form, then email them to us separately at specialdiets@edwardsandward.co.uk.
The photo is attached to a hard copy of your form and stored in the kitchen. These are then used to help our team identify your child when helping them to select appropriate meals. We recommend a clear, passport style photo. If you have any concerns about this, please feel free to get in touch with our Special Diets Team.
Meat free options are available every day as standard so there is no need to register with us if your child is vegetarian.
All schools are provided with a vegan menu which they can make available to anyone on request.
Some of our sites offer Halal options. For details, please contact your school directly.
We use vegetarian gelatine across all our sites, so it is suitable for all.
Unfortunately, we no longer accept paper or posted special diets referral forms. If you have any problems with our online form, please contact our Special Diets Team.
You will receive a confirmation email to let you know when your registration has been processed. This email will include any relevant menus, nutrition or allergen information, copies of which will also be sent to the kitchen. This process is usually completed within 3 weeks, however, times may be longer during peak periods or for new schools or pupils starting with us in September.
In some cases, we may need some more information before we can finalise your registration. Our Special Diets Team may try to contact you by email or phone so please make sure your contact details are correct.
If you have not received an email, please check your junk or spam folder, or get back in touch with our Special Diets Team if you have any concerns.
We base our adapted menus on your school’s standard options. We try our best to keep these as similar as possible but dietary restrictions and product availability mean this is not always possible. In particularly complex cases, our Company Nutritionist will work with you to find the right balance.
If you have any questions or concerns regarding your menu, nutrition or allergen information, please contact our Special Diets Team immediately.
The process of ordering from adapted menus varies from site to site. Please get in touch with your school directly for more advice.
If there has been any change to your child’s personal information or dietary requirements, please email our Special Diets Team. You will not need to resubmit medical evidence for existing allergens, however if you are adding allergens, we will need copies of any new evidence you have to support this change. We do not require medical evidence to remove allergens.
If your child no longer needs a special menu for any reason, you must confirm this with us via email before they can be put on the standard menu and/or removed from our system
Our allergen information lets you check what allergens are in your school's menu.
Please note this information is subject to change.