Pesto in lunch box - nut free school

Fucking dangerous. I wish people like this could be reported to the police, not just the school. Why do they think their convenience trumps someone’s life. Most shop bought pestos in the jar are made from cashew nuts, not pine nuts. They are deadly for someone with a tree nut allergy.

Only the fresh ones in the refrigeration all are made from pine nuts – but even so, some people also have a pine nut allergy.

Your friend is a selfish dick. Report her.

This is actually not true, most store bought pestos are made with cashew nuts. I know this as my husband has an allergy and we can’t have them in the home, even though he is fine with seeds/pine nuts

Why should the child have to give up her delicious lunch because someone might DIE?!

@WhereIsMyJumper 1. The big difference is education (and in practice this often means schools) are compulsory. Farms aren't. 2) of the kids that I know ow who are very allergic, they do go to things like cinema but try to sit away from other people. They often don't do playdates at other people's houses and stay away from other people eating food, go to restaurants that don't usually serve their airborne allergens e.g. go to pizza places if they are allergic to peanuts etc.

Summary for those of you who are just catching up with the thread:

"My child has a life-threatening condition that requires an occasional minor adjustment on your part"
"FUCK YOU I WILL HAVE MY PESTO"

also:

"You don't know your own allergies. Let me mainsplain them to you... blah blah..treenuts... drupes... seeds... and therefore you will be okay if you just unclench... blah blah... why do those unfortunate allergic wretches even leave the house... how inconvenient for the rest of us... blah blah..."

My nephew has a nut allergy and pine nuts are one of the nuts that he has to avoid, so I always assumed everyone with a nut allergy was also allergic to them.

My son loves pesto and I always either make my own or buy the nut free one for school. There are so many nut free pestos, I think you should say something again to her.

@Throwaway75 I'm sorry to read this. I assume you carry an epipen which hopefully gives you confidence & a degree of comfort day to day.

I have an allergy to dogs & one lick brings the area licked out in welt like hives. If my husband pats a dog then holds my hand my eyes become itchy red & swollen. I feel this is nothing compared to the worry of a nut allergy. Everyone should adhere to rules in schools where there is someone dealing with this.

Peanuts are legumes anyway. If somebody specifically told me to avoid tree nuts I would pack peanuts whilst assuming that I was doing everything „correctly“…

Everyone keeps repeating the ‘pine nuts are seeds’ bollocks and the ‘pesto has cashew nuts in it’
Yes, we know. This has been said a dozen times already.
But can’t someone answer my question above please?

I agree. I have a mild tree nut allergy and have had a small amount of pesto on a few occasions (normally when I didn’t realise it was on bruschetta) and my throat starts itching straight away.

Aren’t all nuts also seeds?

A pine nut allergy is quite rare afaik. But some people are allergic to pine nuts (whether that’s due to a nut allergy which includes pine nuts or pine nuts specifically).

and as PP said: storebought pesto usually contains cashews.
it is however super easy to make nut free pesto at home….

Most commercial pestos have cashews in them as they’re cheaper. Absolutely not fine!

I’m exactly the same, pistachios, cashews and pine nuts are my worst allergens (recently found out the hard way that psyllium husks also trigger it). I think it’s quite a common co-allergen.

My niece has a severe nut allergy and went into anaphylaxis from pesto - someone had mistakenly added it to a recipe.

Nuts in schools issues aside please don’t give anyone with a nut allergy pesto!

It would never have occurred to me that pesto had nuts in it, but then I can’t stand the stuff so never go near it. If one of my children had tried it elsewhere and asked for it in their packed lunch I’d have given it to them without a second thought.

When I used to supervise lunchtimes in a school with a nut ban I could see that it was adhered to most of the time but there was always the odd occasion when a Dad or someone who didn’t usually make the lunch would include a peanut butter sandwich, or one of those little tubs of apple and peanut butter from M&S.

This is why nut bans are pointless. Even with the best will in the world, bans do not work. A child who has a severe allergy needs to be protected by good hygiene and by educating the people around them.

So I think everyone should listen to Richard Osman's brilliant lecture on Nuts on the unbelievable truth. Most "nuts" are not nuts. But they might still be allergens. So if nuts are banned because of allergies and if you don't know anything more specific than that, it is best to avoid anything known as a nut, be it a fruit or a seed or a drupe or a legume or indeed a nut!

https://www.reddit.com/user/pfobwpfo/comments/18ohqi2/nuts/

Me neither.

My DS has terrible reaction to pesto as he has a dairy allergy and cheese is the worst culprit. he's been excellent ever since reception at self monitoring. I would rather he and other allergy kids sat on a NF/DF/etc table as i appreciate allergens will creep in

My cousin had anaphalaxis egg allergy and she always sat apart too, schools cant be egg free so she had to learn to mitigate risk from a young age.

My SIL also gets unable to breathe if she's near a kiwi- luckily these weren't as common in the 80s!

Usually the nut free allergy people can’t eat seeds either.

My son is anaphylactic to milk. Can I ask to ban all milk products from the school?

The allergy charities are not in favour of nut free schools.

Shop bought pesto is literally hiw we found out our child was allergic to nuts...because of the cashews so no it's not ok.

Someone clearly has no direct experience of food allergies.

Surely no allergy is the ‘usual’ experience or it wouldn’t be an allergy. If everyone or even the majority reacted that way, the substance would be classed as poisonous to humans. The point is that we take precautions to protect people, whether their reactions are ‘usual’ or otherwise.

Someone doesn't know their nuts from Thier seeds and legumes!

I give DD pesto pasta for school lunch all the time. No one else touches her lunch and I'm not stopping unless the school specifically says no pesto.