To ask people who have food allergies or whose DC have food allergies

[LetsTryAFreshStart]

when you're eating out and you want to know whether a particular dish contains something you're/your DC are allergic to, would you ask the person serving you before you ordered it if it contained x? Or would you just order it and then kick up a fuss afterwards when you realised it contained the ingredient you're allergic to and make a fuss about not being told it contained it?

I imagine most people would go with the first option, no?

I know this is an odd question but I do have a (very boring) reason for asking.

If people truly are allergic they will ask 1000 questions or not eat out. There's so many bloody self-diagnosed allergy sufferers that make a big song & dance for a bit of a rash or a dose of the squits and are often so fucking inconsistent with their imagined issues. It really pisses me off - can you tell?

I am always slightly amazed that people with allergies eat out. You are totally putting your trust in some random stranger aren't you?

Depends how severe your allergy or intolerance is. Eggs, for example I ALWAYS have to ask in restaurants as even eating them can make me instantly start to sway on the spot and fall asleep depending on how egg heavy the dish is.
Milk, though? It's different as it can give really bad stomach pains and diarrhoea symptoms within hours (sorry, TMI.)
Not life threatening, but still horrible to go through. So you would think that those on either scale mentioned in my post would SAY something.
If someone has a genuine allergy or intolerance, they'd speak up. Either that or they'd be faking or harbouring a masochistic tendency.

Shellfish will kill me. It is in my best interest to make sure it's not in my dish.

My dad also has a nut allergy. I get exasperated because he doesn't always check. But his allergy is nowhere near life threatening so I suppose he feels he can take the chance. I consider this irresponsible though!

A bit like the PP as well as my allergy to nuts I'm intolerant to soya the reaction being more along the lines of an upset stomach in the short term.

Soya crops up in an amazing number of things. I don't mention it in restaurants though because the key thing is that my nut allergy is dealt with and I don't want to distract attention from it. I just avoid ordering things with a high likelihood of containing soya and hope for the best.

My sister is allergic to nuts. In a lot of ways I think that's one of the 'easier' ones for eating out with as it's not a key ingredient to a lot of meals like something like eggs is. Still a pain for her but thankfully places are much more aware than they were and more helpful. Also nuts is an allergy people know about more than other less common allergens.

She always avoids things like Christmas pud when eating out though

I'd ask first. And I do ask if something sounds like it might have lactose in (I have an intolerance, not allergy, but still don't want to throw up) but once in a while I get caught out and a totally innocent sounding sauce has had cream chucked in.

My son has several severe allergies (nuts, eggs and others). We always ask before eating out, a few days in advance if we can. We have given up on fast food joints as you have no idea what has been in the fryer previously. Generally, we find italian style restaurants are safe for him, the pizzas are usually OK. The bigger chains normally have an allergy information sheet you can check to see which foods are safe. Indian and Chinese restaurants are completely off limits.
Not checking the ingredients until you have received the dish, like in the op, is madness in my opinion. It is always worth checking, otherwise you could end up in hospital, or worse.

Also, to the poster who said they are amazed about people with allergies eating out. It is a total pain but as long as you check and make the restaurant aware I think it is worth doing. Why should a person with allergies miss out on eating out with their friends / family?

I have multiple allergies and ds1 used to as well.

I always asked (unless the menu specifies something is, for example, gluten free and even then I'd mention it when ordering). And I don't usually ask the wait staff but ask to speak to the chef (depending on the type of restaurant).

The woman was mad - its actually quite likely that a cake/pudding will contain nuts. I must admit I wouldn't think to ask if the gluten free cake was free of shellfish though and would be quite taken aback (AND ILL) if it was.

I'm quite anal about my sons allergies and usually check menus online before going to a restaurant and will ring and check if they can guarantee a safe meal. When ordering I always ask the server about ingredients and allergens and quite often the chef will come out to be certain that he can get it right.
It is really important that people with allergies make servers aware of their allergies when eating out. A stranger cannot possibly know that you have allergies if you don't tell them.
Christmas pudding is something I would expect to contain nuts. The woman was in the wrong to blame anybody but herself for ordering Christmas pudding and not checking whether it contained nuts.

I am allergic to most nuts and sesame seeds. I haven't had anaphylactic shock yet, but when I eat something that contains nuts or seeds, my lips, mouth, nasal passages and throat swell up, my digestive tract burns and eventually I am sick. It also makes me headachey, dizzy and brings on my asthma. No idea if this is counted as a severe reaction or not? I also react, although not as badly, to cross contamination. I am apparently in danger of having an anaphylactic shock at some point, so I am prescribed an epi pen.

However, my parents never really believed I had allergies and therefore never took it seriously (bizarre!!) they always claimed it was all in my mind (I have proof now as I had blood tests in the hospital in my 20s which proved it). Anyway, because of this I have never been particularly care or worried about the allergies.

When I eat out, which I do, unless it is something I would expect to have nuts in or which sometimes does sometimes have nuts in, thenI don't ask or mention my allergies to the waiter. I just don't order things like Christmas puddings which contain nuts usually and I tend to ask with other desserts. I wouldn't mention my allergies if ordering a cheese jacket potato and therefore I may well send it back if it came out with a side salad with sesame seeds on (for example) as I would reasonably expect the dish not to have nuts or seeds on it. If I ordered a burger in a bun though, I would always ask if it had sesame seeds on it as about 50% of the time they do. If I didn't ask and the burger bun did have seeds on, then that would be my own fault and I wouldn't complain.

Could it just be very nutty and customer doesnt like them.
I dont like nuts in chocolate cake - ruins it and i would expect menu to say.
Just like my choc cake at work xmas do had alcohol in and as pg i didnt want it

But naty if you don't like nuts, you just say you don't like nuts or say nothing, if you didn't think to ask. you don't kick up a fuss and insist you're allergic, when you are not.

I'm mildly lactose intolerant. If I'm going through a particularly sensitive phase (usually around my period) I take care to choose something without a significant amount of dairy, unless I have some lactase pills on me. Most of the time, I might play russian roulette, then hope I don't fart my way around town, afterwards, or worse. If I'd not bothered to ask on a day when it mattered to me, then realised, after ordering, that a sauce was quite creamy, then that's my stupid fault. And that's a case of milk not liking me, rather than me not liking milk.

Even though I might suffer ill effects from the unexpectedly (because I didn't bother to ask) creamy sauce (unlike if I merely didn't like cream), it would be preposterous of me to pretend that I was allergic to dairy.

Did you ask if your cake had alcohol in before ordering? Did you pretend you were allergic to alcohol, or did you honestly say that you're avoiding alcohol because you're pregnant? The two are very different.

Somethingfunny If your nasal passages and throat swells up then yes this counts as a severe allergic reaction. I remember having a conversation with DS's consultant about how to know when to use an epi-pen. If there is any swelling in the throat this is apparently the time as it may obstruct your airways.I was givne hell for not using on on DS who had badly swollen lips and blisters inside his mouth and complained of an itchy throat. Apparently I should have used it at this point.

With the alcohol cake i was very annoyed as it wasnt on the menu we'd been given to select from.
I very subtly pushed it away once i realised. And would have complained (if it hadnt been work do and i hadnt told anyone) a little bit of alcohol maybe but it must have been a main ingredient.
I agree it wouldnt have been right of customer to do what i said but maybe easier than saying 'i hate nuts and this is full of them it tastes awful'
I have never previously had alcoholic choc cake so wouldnt think to ask but think it is unusual enough that they should have said on menu. I would ideally return it saying it wasnt what expected by description, as i would if something unexpectedly contained blue cheese (erghh)
I can see why people lie about allergy as if you just dont like something and say roast without gravy, you get it, or ice cream without cream. Service can be very lax. Of course that would be not what was ordered and be fine to be corrected.
I know a bit of alcohol cake would be fine but i didnt want to eat it and it did ruin the meal for me (not least because it tasted awful)
To be fair it said a lot about the posh restaurant as there also wasnt enough veg, shared round the table the last people had 1 brussel sprout etc (always hate sharing veg as you have to be polite and theres never enough and some people dont want x but want all the carrots)

Bottom line customer cant complain about xmas pudd with nuts unless they are from abroad where they may not eat it because they should at least suspect it.

Customer was VVVVVVV U.

I have an egg allergy and even if I order chips I always point out that I can't eat anything with eggs in, just in case they decided to put mayo or coleslaw on the plate.

Responsibility lies with the allergy sufferer to make their allergy v clear.

I only really check if it is something I would expect to have bananas in, like a smoothie. I have on occasion been assured that the smoothie I ordered definitely doesn't have bananas, only to smell them as soon as the drink was near me (and obviously not drank it) at which point I will complain.

If I had a more common allergen to deal with like eggs or milk, then I would always ask, but generally it's fairly obvious that your average pasta dish etc won't contain bananas so it's not something that comes up often