7 Simple Back-to-School Gluten-free Recipes for Kids to Make Themselves for Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner, and After-School Snack
Back-to-School Recipes for Gluten-free Kids jumped to the top of our to-do list when we read the results from our latest Little Northern Bakehouse subscriber survey.
Why? Because listening to what matters to you is the first step to creating content that helps our gluten-free community thrive.
Discovering 35% of our subscribers have gluten-free kids in their household, are a grandparent, family member, family friend, or play an active part in a gluten-free child’s life1 showed us we could do more for gluten-free kids and their families.
This collection of gluten-free children’s recipes has been carefully curated to help 6 to 12-year-old kids learn and use age-appropriate cooking skills to make gluten-free, allergy-friendly meals they’ll love.
Keep reading Back-to-School Recipes for Gluten-free Kids to get two gluten-free breakfast ideas, two gluten-free lunch recipes, two easy weeknight gluten-free dinners, and a gluten-free after-school snack kids can make themselves!
Or click a section title in the list below to skip straight to the gluten-free back-to-school meal your kid needs most right now:
- Kid-friendly Gluten-free Breakfast Recipes
- Gluten-free Lunch Recipes for Kids
- After-School Snack Ideas for Gluten-free Kids
- Kid-friendly Weekday Gluten-free Dinner Recipes
Kid-friendly Gluten-free Breakfast Recipes
With a speedy gluten-free toast they can eat on the way to school and a hot breakfast for weekday mornings with a little more wiggle room, these kid-friendly gluten-free breakfasts take only a few minutes more than a bowl of cereal.
Easy Plant-based Gluten-free Unicorn Toast
With a little unicorn magic, this fun and fanciful toast topper has the power to turn grumpy weekday wake ups around with a rainbow of gluten-free joy!
Whip up a pastel pallet of plant-based cream cheese on the weekend and set out sprinkles or berry bits on Sunday night. Then let them load up the toaster, hand them a spreader, and empower your kid to start their day with a smile and a slice of gluten-free safety.
Get the gluten-free Unicorn Toast how-to here!
Egg-, Dairy-, and Gluten-free Waffle Maker French Toast
This allergy-friendly hot breakfast is so easy, your grade-school kid can cook it in the time it takes to tie their shoes and zip up their backpack.
How? Mix the 4-ingredient batter before bed and have them heat up the waffle iron while they brush their teeth—then they’re just a dunk and a waffle maker cycle away from a weekend-worthy breakfast on an average school-day morning. (Be sure they learn to unplug before they take their first bite!)
Try the Waffle Maker French Toast recipe tomorrow!
Gluten-free Lunch Recipes for Kids
With a hot lunch that helps your littles learn to love leftovers and three tasty tacos they can pack for school, these simple, kid-friendly gluten-free recipes fill lunch hour with unexpected fun!
Easy Gluten-free Toast Tacos 3 Ways
A rolling pin, a cup or cookie cutter, some high-protein spreads and simple fillings are all your kids need to make these gluten-free toast tacos. Whether your kid is a sweet-toothed fruit fiend or seeker of savoury snack-style bites, this easy recipe is sure to delight!
Help them with the oven and try the hard-shell toast version at home. Or switch up the sandwich routine and take the soft-taco version to school where they’ll have the coolest lunch in the class—especially since they packed it themselves!
Get the trick to making gluten-free Toast Tacos 3 Ways!
Leftover Mac ‘N’ Cheese Grilled Cheese Sandwich
Even the best eaters’ appetites go up and down between growth spurts—but the silly surprise in this sandwich will show them they can finish their favourite foods later! So, save that half-eaten helping of yesterday’s mac and cheese for a quick come-home-for-lunch meal your kid can make in minutes.
(Skipping the flip with a sandwich press makes this recipe a bit easier for kids to cook. But with a spatula, some stove-side supervision, and a little practice, almost anyone 6 and up can pick up the sandwich flipping skills to make this gluten-free grilled cheese in a frying pan!)
Share a new skill with this Mac ‘N’ Cheese Grilled Cheese recipe!
After-School Snack Ideas for Gluten-free Kids
Snacks are mid-day fuel for busy kids on the go, whether they’re self-serve at home or packed for after-school care. But bite-sized snacks don’t have to come in a box or a wrapper—healthy DIY gluten-free snacks can keep kids satisfied even when sports or activities mean a later dinnertime.
Healthy Gluten-free Snack Skewers
From plant-based pizza to (nut-free) PB & J, almost everything tastes better on a stick! With a hot option to have at home before heading out to soccer practice and two packable options for away-from-home snacking, these gluten-free snack skewers are the perfect opportunity for kids to start learning basic knife skills (even if it’s just cutting sandwiches into bite-sized squares!).
More suggestion than recipe, there’s plenty of room for picky kids to choose ingredients they like or leave out ones they don’t—it’s the concept that counts!
(Skewers bring more than just the fun factor to this snack. They also help keep small slices from sliding around in transit from the playground to the swimming pool parking lot and make these easy to share with siblings or teammates. But for safety’s sake, skip the skewers with kids tempted to act out swashbuckling storylines!)
Start stacking with these healthy snack skewer combos!
Kid-friendly Weekday Gluten-free Dinner Recipes
For gluten-free kids—and especially those with dairy, soy, nut, and other food allergies—pizza can be tricky territory away from home. But when they can make it themselves, these two gluten-free weekday dinner ideas give them the power to take pizza back!
Gluten-free Three Cheese Pizza (Dairy-free)
With a Little Northern Bakehouse pizza crust, a simple marinara sauce, and their favourite dairy-free, allergy-friendly cheese on your grocery list, your school-aged gluten-free kid can declare it Pizza Night any day of the week—and make dinner for the whole family!
With no need to worry about cross-contact and complete control over toppings, learning how to use oven mitts and a pizza cutter are the only safety items standing between your kid and Gluten-free Pizza Empowerment!
Perfection as-is for margherita pizza aficionados and picky eaters alike, this recipe is also a base built for any safe topping your family craves.
Add the ingredients for this dairy-free, gluten-free Three Cheese Pizza recipe to your grocery list.
Quick and Easy Gluten-free Plant-based Pizza Bagel
Gluten-free or not, kids’ list of likes and dislikes can change as fast as their on-and-off-again appetites. But with our gluten-free bagels in your freezer, pizza sauce in your pantry, and plant-based cheese in your fridge, you’ll never make double dinners again when your kid learns how to make this recipe!
Whether it’s suppertime and your gluten-free kid claims they’re not hungry, or you’re making something everyone else at the table loves and they won’t touch, invite them to DIY their dinner, pizza bagel style!
(And it doubles as an at-home after-school snack for ravenous pre-teens, too.)
Arm your gluten-free grade-schooler with this easy emergency backup Pizza Bagel recipe!
Get more tips on encouraging gluten-free kids to cook from Create Kids Club founder, kids’ cookbook author, and Registered Dietitian Jodi Danen. Sign up for our Oh, Crumbs—Let’s Talk Gluten-free on-demand video series to watch her talk, Managing Back to School and Gluten-free.
Got gluten-free teenagers, too? Check out our collection of Back-to-School Recipes for Gluten-free Teens to help older home cooks in training grow their gluten-free kitchen skills.
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1 Based on 625 complete responses to the 2025 Little Northern Bakehouse Email Subscriber Survey conducted February 4 – 14, 2025 (5.7% response rate generated a statistically significant sample of Little Northern Bakehouse subscribers at a 95% confidence level, margin of error of +/- 5%)