Crossed Grain certified gluten free beers: what the trademark means and which UK brands carry it

If you are coeliac and you want a beer, the question is not whether the label says gluten free. It is who tested it.

The Coeliac UK Crossed Grain trademark is the answer to that second question. It is the only widely visible symbol on a UK beer label that tells you an independent UKAS accredited lab has measured the gluten and a third party has audited the brewery. Everything else is a self declared claim, including beer from excellent gluten free craft brewers with their own house testing.

What is the Coeliac UK Crossed Grain certification?

The Crossed Grain trademark is a voluntary certification run by Coeliac UK. Products carrying it have been tested in a UKAS accredited laboratory to contain 20 parts per million (ppm) of gluten or less, and the manufacturer’s production facility is audited annually. The scheme is recognised across Europe through AOECS, the Association of European Coeliac Societies, with over 23,000 certified products in total. The 20ppm threshold itself is required by law for any “gluten free” claim; the trademark is what proves an independent party has actually checked.

Why the Crossed Grain symbol matters more than a “gluten free” label

UK law says any beer labelled gluten free must contain less than 20ppm gluten. The same threshold applies whether the product carries the Crossed Grain trademark or not. At first glance the certification looks like a fancier way of saying the same thing.

It is not. The legal label is a self declared claim. The brewery does its own testing and signs off. There is no mandatory third party audit, no required UKAS lab, no inspector walking the production line.

The Crossed Grain trademark adds three things on top. Independent testing in a UKAS accredited lab. An annual audit of the brewery’s production process and ingredient supply chain. Verification of the recipe and the manufacturing flow alongside the finished product.

For coeliacs comparing two beers on a shelf, that is the difference between somebody’s own homework and an independent grade.

The difference between gluten free and gluten reduced beer

There are three tiers of gluten free beer in the UK market, and the Crossed Grain trademark sits across them rather than on top.

The first tier is naturally gluten free, often shortened to NGCI (No Gluten Containing Ingredients). These beers are brewed from grains that contain no gluten in the first place: sorghum, millet, buckwheat, brown rice. No enzyme is added because there is no gluten to remove. In the freefrombeer directory, two breweries fall into this category: Altgrain in Southend and Green’s, brewed in Belgium.

The second tier is enzyme treated barley beer, often called gluten reduced. The brewery uses a regular barley grain bill and adds a prolyl endopeptidase enzyme (commercially Brewers Clarex) that breaks the gluten proteins into smaller fragments. If the finished beer tests below 20ppm by R5 ELISA, UK law permits the gluten free label. US regulators disagree and prohibit the “gluten free” label on enzyme-treated barley beers, on the basis that the R5 ELISA test struggles to accurately measure hydrolysed fragments. Most breweries in the freefrombeer directory use this approach.

The third tier is the Crossed Grain trademark itself, which sits across the first two. Either type of beer can qualify if it passes the lab test and the annual audit. The symbol guarantees the verification process; it does not specify the brewing method.

The practical order for most coeliacs: a Crossed Grain certified beer brewed from naturally gluten free grains is the gold standard, a self declared gluten free beer with no certification sits at the bottom, and Crossed Grain certified enzyme treated beer is in between.

Which UK gluten free beers carry the Crossed Grain certification?

The list is short.

Bellfield Brewery in Edinburgh holds the licence for its core range, including Lawless Village IPA, the Bohemian Pilsner, Jex-Blake Mosaic IPA, Daft Days Porter, Craft Lager and Fire Island IPA. Bellfield publishes its testing data openly and reports results below 10ppm. Bellfield is one of the few breweries in the directory holding an active Coeliac UK licence.

BrewDog also holds a licence, currently on Punk IPA GF (the Vagabond Pale Ale was discontinued around 2021). It is enzyme treated barley rather than naturally gluten free, but it is the most widely available Crossed Grain certified beer in UK supermarkets. BrewDog is not in the directory.

Westerham Brewery in Kent has held the trademark licence for its Freedom Ale; current certification status is unconfirmed, so check the Coeliac UK Live Well Gluten Free app to verify before purchasing.

For a current view, the Coeliac UK Live Well Gluten Free app shows the Crossed Grain badge against every certified product and includes a barcode scanner.

How to spot Crossed Grain certified beer in shops

The symbol is a small circular mark showing a stylised wheat ear with a horizontal line through it. It usually sits on the front label or near the ingredients list, and is the same mark whether the beer was certified in the UK by Coeliac UK or in another European country by an AOECS member society.

Three quick checks in store. First, the symbol on the can. If it is not there, the beer is not Crossed Grain certified, regardless of what the rest of the label says. Second, the Coeliac UK Live Well Gluten Free app, whose barcode scanner tells you whether the product is in the certified database. Third, the “contains barley” allergen line in the ingredients. UK law requires that declaration on barley based gluten free beers; if you want a naturally gluten free option, that line tells you to put the can back.

A supermarket gluten free shelf will usually contain a mix: a Crossed Grain certified product or two, a handful of enzyme treated beers with no certification, and occasionally a naturally gluten free import. The symbol is the fastest filter.

Browse the full directory of gluten free beers in the UK, including the Bellfield core range and the naturally gluten free options from Altgrain and Green’s.