Shake it up with a Dairy Free, Gluten Free, Vegan & Nut Free ‘Milk’ Shake in ShakeAway

Maybe it’s the resurge of Vintage charm or maybe it’s just Ireland’s response to the Cupcake craze… Either way Milkshake bars have been popping up all over the city! I’m more of a fruit-filled smoothie girl myself and due to my milk allergies I tend to take little notice of ‘milky’ trends but I couldn’t help turning my head when ShakeAway opened up on Upper Liffey Street (Dublin 1) and announced themselves to be all-inclusive with more than 150 shakes which include allergy friendly options like:
- Dairy free/Milk free
- Gluten free
- Vegetarian
- Vegan
- Egg free
- Nut free

I haven’t had a milkshake in over 5 years but in the interest of ‘research’ ;) I tried out one of ShakeAway’s Vegan monstrosities. If I had it over again I probably would have gone for Ginger Nut with added Wheatgerm but hey, the bright colours, loud music and the tweenies all around me hazed my judgment leading me falsely towards a Pineapple selection!

What are milkshakes? I have often felt left out when people go to Eddie Rockets and have milkshakes (F being a prime suspect!). It’s always one of my poor-me moments because in my head I think that I love them so much and am really missing out. So even though I’m deferring on sugar right now I skipped on into ShakeAway to indulge my childish desires!

To my surprise my taste buds reminded me, within seconds, that Milkshakes are very similar to melted ice cream – something that I’m not a fan of. Not to mention the copious amount of sugar! This aside, I was also disappointed that there didn’t seem to actually be any pineapple in my milkshake – woe... But on the plus plus plus side F tried it and said that it was very ‘milky’ tasting and that he wouldn’t necessarily know that it was vegan. In addition to that, he also thought that the 'pineapple' flavouring was trés artificial which was a pity. (UPDATE: ShakeAway just informed me on Twitter that they definitely use real pineapple in their milkshakes which is GREAT news! I suppose that it just tasted extra sugary to me because I have been off sugar for so long, which can often happen. But thanks ShakeAway for making your milkshakes that much less of a guilty pleasure for all the food allergy milkshake lovers out there!) On a purely vegetarian note, F got Nutella & Banana but mourned his favourite Vanilla. It's always hard to try something new when you know what you love!

So... the verdict is: This is not a health blog! This is a food allergy blog which means that ShakeAway is awesome because their menu is marked plain to see:

(v) is for vegan which includes dairy free and egg free with 40 flavours for dairy free and/or vegan diets ranging from fry’s orange cream, maple syrup, sesame snaps, ginger nuts, apricot, tic tac mint, weetabix or good old trusty vanilla!
(nv) is for NOT vegetarian – all bar 26 shakes, mainly located in the ‘Sweety’ section
(ng) is for NOT gluten free – all bar 79 shakes, mainly located in the ‘Biscuity’ and the ‘Cakey’ sections, understandably!
Something that I find really novel is when a company says everything is gluten free EXCEPT the ones marked… it just creates a sigh of happiness…
It also says on the menu that if you are Nut free ‘talk to them’... there are, unfortunately, no listings on the menu to pre-guide you.
Note: There is an added price for the dairy free shakes due to ‘the high cost of soya ice cream’ which is a very real reason.

€3.25 regular (+€0.99 for dairy free)
€3.95 large (+€1.49 for dairy free)

But if you want to pump up the er, ‘healthy’ additive ratio you can include
- Bran
- Energy
- Malt (not so healthy, but it’s a choice)
- Muscle Builder
- Protein
- Wheatgerm

So far there is only one ShakeAway location in Dublin but it's centrally located. There is a new ShakeAway coming to Abu Dhabi (United Arab Emirates) in October (in the Al Wahda Mall) and the home of ShakeAway is in the United Kingdom which therefore features ShakeAway locations in 44 UK cities.
There was also something about Australia on the website too but I can’t figure out if it’s still in Biz..

Shake it, SHAKE it, Shake it…

ShakeAway
Upper Liffey St
Dublin 1
Tel: 085 214 7959
Web: www.shakeaway.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/pages/ShakeAway-Dublin-official/125931010763662?sk=wall
Opening Times: mon-sat 11:00-19:00; sun 12:00-19:00