I've eaten my way through forty countries with Type 1 diabetes. I've navigated street food markets in Bangkok where I couldn't read a single label, sat through seven-course tasting menus in Italy without a carb count in sight, and somehow survived a two-week road trip through the American South — a place that treats sugar as a food group. And through all of it, I've kept my blood glucose more or less under control.
I say "more or less" because the truth is, eating abroad with diabetes is never seamless. There will be miscalculations. There will be surprise highs from a rice dish you thought was fine. There will be the particular panic of sitting in a restaurant in rural Portugal, realising you need fast carbs now and the only thing on the table is sparkling water and napkins.
But there's also so much joy in it. Food is how you understand a place. And diabetes — once you stop fighting it and start working with it — doesn't have to stop you from experiencing any of your travels.
So, here's what twenty-plus years of eating abroad with Type 1 has actually taught me.
The carb count is never what you think it is
This is the thing nobody tells you clearly enough before your first international trip with diabetes. The same dish, made in a different country, can have a completely different impact on your blood sugar:
Pasta in Italy is typically cooked al dente, which digests more slowly and hits your blood sugar more gently than the overcooked version back home.
Japanese white rice, on the other hand, tends to spike me faster than almost anything. Mexican beans? Slower than you'd expect.
Indian dhal? Depends entirely on the lentils, the cooking time, and whether it was made with ghee.
None of this is a reason to avoid these foods. It's a reason to approach them with curiosity rather than rigidity.
My rule when eating abroad with type 1 diabetes is to start with a slightly conservative dose, eat, and watch. I'd rather correct a mild high two hours later than end up hypo in a restaurant where nobody speaks my language.
Research the local food culture before you land — not when you're hungry
I always spend an hour before any new trip researching the food landscape. Not to restrict myself, but to arrive prepared.
What are the staple carbohydrates?
Is the local bread dense and heavy or light and fluffy?
Is sugar added to savoury dishes (it is, frequently, in South-East Asian cooking)?
Are portion sizes enormous (America, I'm looking at you) or modest?
The Diabetes UK travel guide is a useful starting point for general principles, as are online diabetes communities and forums where people share real experiences — not clinical estimates — of managing blood glucose in specific destinations. Type 1 forums in particular are full of travellers who have road-tested everything from sushi rice to injera.
This kind of research doesn't take long and it pays off enormously.
Arriving in Japan already knowing that ramen broth often contains hidden sugars, and that a bowl of tonkotsu is going to behave differently to a bowl of miso, means you're not starting from zero every meal.
👉 Food is only one piece of the puzzle when travelling with diabetes. If you're still putting together your overall travel plan — medications, documentation, what to pack — my full guide to travelling with diabetes covers everything from the pre-departure checklist to managing your supplies on the road. Worth reading before you even open a suitcase.
Always carry fast-acting carbs everywhere. No exceptions.
This sounds obvious. It isn't, because abroad you get comfortable. The holiday atmosphere, the distraction, the walking everywhere — you forget. And then you're standing in the middle of the Marrakech souk at lunchtime, your CGM screaming, and you've somehow left your glucose tablets in the hotel room.
I've done it. Once. Now I carry glucose tabs in every bag, pocket, and jacket I travel with. Abroad, I double my usual supply, because I know I'll be more active than usual, eating at unpredictable times, and almost certainly miscalculating at least one meal.
Local options exist in most countries — fruit juice, fizzy drinks, sweets — but in a genuine hypoglycaemic episode, you want something you know and trust, in a dose you can measure. Don't rely on finding a corner shop in the right moment.
Navigating restaurants when no one speaks your language
This is where I've had to get creative over the years. A few things that genuinely work:
✅ Learn three words in the local language. "No sugar," "without sauce," and "what's in this?" will take you very far. Google Translate's camera function — which lets you point your phone at a menu and get an instant translation — has become genuinely indispensable for me. It's not perfect, but it's transformed the experience of eating in countries where I can't read the alphabet.
✅ Ask for sauces on the side. Restaurant sauces are often where the hidden sugars live, especially in Asia and the Americas. If you can separate them out, you can eat the main dish and decide how much sauce to add — or skip it entirely.
✅ Don't be afraid to eat simply. Some of my most diabetes-friendly meals abroad have been the simplest ones: grilled fish and vegetables in Greece, a mezze plate in Lebanon, a plain rice bowl with pickles in Japan. You don't have to eat nothing interesting to eat safely.
✅ Talk to the restaurant. This is more effective than people think. Most restaurants, especially locally-run ones, are happy to tell you what's in a dish, adjust a preparation, or flag the sweetest items on the menu. People who make food from scratch usually understand food. Chain restaurants are harder — they're working from central recipes they can't modify.
👉 If you're flying to your destination, my guide on CGMs At Airport Security covers everything from scanner safety to your rights at the security checkpoint — and it's worth a read before you get to the gate.
Buffets, street food, and the unknown When Abroad with Diabetes
Buffets are a diabetic's nightmare and a diabetic's dream, in roughly equal measure.
The dream: you can see everything, you can pick exactly what you want, you can go back for seconds of the protein and skip the second portion of white rice.
The nightmare: the serving sizes are limitless, it's easy to eat more than you planned, and you've got fifteen dishes to estimate rather than one.
My approach at buffets: plate it all up before I inject. Decide first, then dose. It sounds simple but it changed everything for me.
Street food is different — it's improvisational by nature. I love it, I eat it, and I accept that my glucose will probably do something unexpected. A small correction dose later is not a failure. It's just the cost of eating a perfect fish taco on a beach in Mexico.
Heat, alcohol, and the things that make everything harder when travelling abroad with diabetes
Two things affect blood glucose abroad more than any food: heat and alcohol.
Heat increases insulin absorption significantly. In very hot climates — and I've spent weeks in Morocco, Thailand, and Sri Lanka managing this — insulin works faster, lasts shorter, and your sensitivity can shift dramatically from one day to the next. I tend to reduce my basal slightly in the first few days of a hot trip and watch my overnight numbers carefully.
Alcohol, particularly wine and spirits, can cause delayed hypoglycaemia hours after drinking — often during the night. Abroad, where you're more likely to be drinking with a meal, staying up later, and sleeping differently, this is a real risk. I always eat properly alongside any alcohol, never drink on an empty stomach, and run a slightly higher target overnight when I've had wine with dinner. A higher-than-usual pre-bed snack can be a sensible precaution.
👉 Long-haul travel throws another variable into the mix: time zones. Crossing them doesn't just disrupt your sleep — it can throw your entire insulin schedule off in ways that aren't always obvious. I've written about this in detail in Insulin Across Time Zones, which is worth reading if you're planning anything more than a short-haul hop.
Don't forget: your medication needs to travel well too
All of this planning around food is only useful if your insulin, Ozempic, Mounjaro, or other diabetes injection or medication is actually viable when you need it.
Eating abroad with diabetes means your medication management needs to travel as well as you do — and insulin or type 2 diabetes injections that's been left in a hot hire car, sat in checked luggage in an unheated cargo hold, or stored in a hotel minibar that fluctuates a lot is medication you can't rely on.
👉 Keeping insulin at the right temperature when travelling takes more planning than most people expect. My guide on How to Keep Insulin Cool When Travelling covers everything worth knowing, so your medication arrives in the same condition it left in.
And if you've ever had the sinking feeling of not knowing whether your insulin is still good after a long, hot day of sightseeing — you'll understand why I never travel without a proper insulin cooler now. After years of improvising with wet cloths and hotel ice buckets, 4AllFamily's Medical Coolers are the single biggest improvement I made to my travels now.
Food abroad is one of the great pleasures travelling
I want to end here, because I think it matters.
Managing diabetes abroad is genuinely more complicated than managing it at home. The food is less predictable, the labelling is non-existent, the schedules are chaotic, and some days you'll get it completely wrong. That's not a failure of your diabetes management. That's travel.
The question isn't whether you can eat freely abroad with Type 1. The question is whether you've got the right tools, the right knowledge, and the right attitude. I've eaten tagliatelle in Bologna, pad thai in Chiang Mai, mezze in Beirut, and jerk chicken in Kingston. I've had highs I didn't expect and lows that came from nowhere.
And I have never once wished I'd stayed home.
The information in this article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. Always consult your GP or diabetes care team before making changes to your insulin regimen or travelling with medication.
👉 Eating abroad with diabetes is manageable — but it's worth knowing what to do if things go further wrong than a rogue bowl of rice. Severe hypos and DKA are rare, but they're more likely when you're travelling than when you're at home. I've covered both in detail — symptoms, what to do, and how to prepare — in my guide to diabetes emergencies abroad.
💬 We'd Love To Hear From YOU!
Eating abroad with diabetes looks different for everyone — a different country, a different insulin regimen, a different relationship with food and risk. If you've found something that works brilliantly, or had a meal abroad that completely threw you, I'd genuinely love to hear about it in the comments below.
Where have you eaten that surprised you — for better or worse? Is there a destination you've been nervous about, or one that turned out to be easier than expected? Any restaurant tricks, carb-counting hacks, or hard-won lessons from the road?
Drop them below. The more we share, the easier this gets for all of us.
