Hershey’s Gluten Free

Reece's peanut butter cups (by Hershey's)

Last week I called Hershey’s….

I explained to the man who answered my call that I was looking to find out which of their products are gluten free as this is not apparent on their labelling.

He gave me this short list (confirmed as gluten free by Hershey’s corporate Headquarters):

• Original Hershey’s Kisses
• Milk chocolate bar (1.55 size)
• Milk chocolate bar with almonds (1.45 size)
• Coco
• Baking chocolate
• Chocolate chips
• Chocolate syrup

My response of ‘Are these really the only products you have that are gluten free?’ was met with an explanation that Hershey’s do have other products where none of their ingredients contain gluten but as these haven’t yet been checked?!? they cannot be added to the gluten free list.

I was told to check the labelling on any products not on this list as there shouldn’t be any hidden ingredients. If a product contains rye, wheat, oats or barley it will be stated on the label. If there is the possibility of contamination of one of these grains this will also be included on the labelling.

Sooo, basically, if there are no obvious glutenous ingredients and no cross contamination warning then we can assume that the product is gluten free.

I took the man’s advice and looked at the back of a Reece’s Peanut Butter Cup (made by Hershey’s) wrapper…there were no obvious glutenous ingredients and no cross contamination warning. According to Hershey’s customer service that means I could safely eat this but can I really trust them if they are not willing to put it on their ‘gluten free list’ and officially confirm that this product is gluten free?

My question to you Hershey’s…..’Why would these ‘assumed’ gluten free products not be on your gluten free list if they are in fact gluten free?!?!?

UPDATE: (March 2012) I called Hershey’s again and was given the same gluten free product list as above. Clearly their customer service people haven’t been given any new or updated information regarding the gluten free status of products because I was given almost word for word the same spiel as the last time I called. Again I was told that many of their other products are gluten free but they can’t confirm this?!? In products with no gluten containing ingredients Hershey’s have procedures in place to eliminate the chance of cross contamination. This sounds good but we celiacs need a more confident list of gluten free products from your company rather than just leaving us to read the labels and figure it out for ourselves.

This information is also relevant to Cadbury’s chocolate in the US as it is manufactured by Hershey’s.

UPDATE: (April 3rd, 2012) It looks as though Hershey’s have finally updated their gluten free list to include more products! This list was updated only a couple of days ago and now includes products like Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, Almond Joy and Mounds bars. Fantastic!!

Hershey’s state that ’For your convenience, the current products listed below have been fully evaluated and qualify as gluten free using standards proposed by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Please note this list is not all inclusive as we have other gluten-free confections.’ So these products listed should contain less than 20ppm and be safe for celiacs. Thanks, Hershey’s!