to think that being a fussy eater in someone else's home is actually quite rude?

[wrathomum]

And never even to TRY new things? Or appreciate the efforts of the host (who has multiple food sensitivites) to cater for everyone and try to provide healthy fare? And to not even feel a little bit bad about being fussy?

Agree with bogey. There is a difference between genuine allergy etc and being a right pain in the arse!

penis google diarrhoea immediately after eating and then tell me it's not possible.

Diarrhoea after eating is because of the reason i posted above. Your system is pushed into overdrive by you eating so everything in your bowels is evacuated. Your prawns wont even have touched the sides of your stomach by that point.

It is a digestive issue, not a food issue!

See, having DC's with severe allergies, I wouldn't have thought myself of it being an 'intolerance'. But ISWYM. I have always been moaned at for my fussiness in not eating coconut.

And Squeaky - are you saying that the allergies I and my DC have are a 'modern ailment'? Despite having had extensive allergy testing on the NHS due to them? Despite MY food allergies having been diagnosed well OVER 20 years ago? (OK, not the red wine, but when I first drank red wine and went into anaphylaxis, my allergy consultant told me that of course I would be allergic to it, I was allergic to kidney beans and tea, as if EVERYONE knew that red wine ALSO had tannins in...)

I think i understand what SQueaky means. Allergies to food where very rare when I was a child, i dont think I knew anyone who had one, but now they are commonplace.

I read an interesting article that suggested that enviromental factors, GM, higher amounts of artificial ingredients etc have made us hypersensitive and therefore more likely to develop allergies. In that respect, i think that the sheer amount of allergies that have been diagnosed in the last 20 years does indicate that it is a modern problem, from modern issues.

Also, a food allergy may have killed someone in the past but be put down to other things, before modern post mortem technology was available.

Oh, so if I went to the doctor and said 'prawns go straight through me' instead of understanding the immediate reaction I was delicately trying to describe I'd get a lecture instead about how it wasn't the prawns coming out the other side? Very helpful. I suspect the advice would still be to avoid prawns.

No, he would tell you that its gastrocolic reflex and would test you for bowel problems if the runs were bad and regular.

Oh and as for getting stroppy, you are the one who insisted that eating to shitting could be done in 10 minutes, we simply pointed out that it wasnt. What your doctor says is nothing to do with us!

But what's the point in going for tests when I can just avoid prawns?

No Couthy not at all, and that is why I said "some people".

Our diet (by that I mean in general "our") is completely different now to what it was 30 years ago. Additives and pesticides, and lots of other crap is put into our diet, and I truly believe that has contributed to the allergy increase.

I am a strong believer in you are what you eat and that your health is very much down to your diet.

When I was a kid, people rarely ate processed, frozen, prepacked, or tampered with food. It was mostly cooked from scratch without preservatives or additives other than salt or sugar. Very very few people had allergies.

Nowadays almost everyone has some sort of "intolerance". They may well have, but I bet a lot of it is very easily avoided by a change in diet back to unprocessed, basic food.

I dunno, you were talking about going to the doctor, not me!

bogey I have looked this up, you know, I know. But if you say that 'prawns go through me in like ten minutes' then that is enough for people to know exactly what you mean without necessitating a TMI biology lesson. Or so I thought.

Yes, I do agree about processed food, but unprocessed doesn't have to mean basic. We eat a wide variety of different cuisines as standard, from Italian to Morroccan, from African to Indian dishes.

You just have to be creative with your flavourings and avoid things that certain people can't eat.

And cook from scratch.

Raffles , I do understand what you are saying, but to be fair, the italians have eaten that way for hundreds of years, and do enjoy much better long term health with a diet that is rich in veg, olive oils and less stodge!

I have nothing against incorporating european foods into the british market at all. We could certainly learn plenty about healthy diets from the mediterranean regions.

But now you've wittled it down to just avoiding prawns, so how does just having to avoid prawns mean you can't engage in a meal without being traumatised?

Yes bogey I was having a conversation about going to the doctor prompted by sock asking me if I'd been to the doctor and penis telling me what the doctor would say. If you are going to butt into a conversation about doctors, expect doctors to be mentioned.

I'm a fussy eater, I loathe onions, never have them in anything and check at restaurants to make sure they're not in the sauce etc. However as a guest I smile and swallow (trying not to chew).

Obviously there's a difference between allergies and fussiness though, allergies should be catered for and explained in advance.

Again Couthy, I do agree, and I probably worded it badly myself.

As an example, and apologies for using Spag Bol as an example again.. .. all those jars of bolognaise sauce in the supermarket, from celebrity chefs to own brand basics.. nobody needs them!.. it is so easy to make it from scratch without jars that have preservatives in, or powders that have colourings in them..

The same with curry.. you wouldnt expect to go into a restaurant and see them tipping a jar of Sharwoods into the pan!

If you make it yourself, you know exactly what is in it.

well excuuuuuuuuse meeeeeeeeeee [channels Steve Martin]

Oh dear god sock prawns is a shorthand for a few foods that cause that effect, I also mentioned certain sauces in my original post replying to squeaky's question about why I don't eat many foods.

But knowing that certain foods trigger this effect is going to make me more reluctant to try new foods if I suspect that they might cause this effect, no?

I don't know where your idea that I'm traumatised has come from.

Blimey, cant you?! You have been banging on about how terribly difficult your life is and how no one understands blah blah.

Enjoy your matyrdom

martyrdom even

I'm not a martyr. I just don't see why on a thread full of people banging on about how shit fussy eaters are that fussy eaters shouldn't be allowed to defend themselves.

But at the start of the thread you wernt fussy you had what sounded like a debilitating eating disorder