Nuts.

[goodbeans]

DS had this message in his nursery diary: 'Please can you avoid pesto because of nut allergies within the nursery'.

This was in reference to him having been sent in with pasta and green pesto (DH on lunch duties, he forgot the rule). I did find it annoying though, as pesto is made with pine nuts, which are seeds and not nuts, despite the misleading name. (I know that some red pesto is made with cashews, and so I would never use that in food intended for nursery, although I suspect that most staff wouldn't question it as it could easily be mistaken for a regular tomato sauce...)

Anyway, I would like to send a note to the following effect back: 'We always avoid sending any food into nursery that contains nuts. However, pine nuts are seeds (despite the misleading name!) If there is a child with a seed allergy at nursery then we will of course be careful to avoid sending any seed containing foods in DS's lunch.'

AIBU to reply like this to nursery? Or is this weird kind of blanket ban (based on a misnomer) normal?! If it is then I will just suck it up, but it is frustrating given that it doesn't seem to have much basis in common sense.

So yes, in a nutshell, (see what I did there ) YABVVVVVVU.

Don't be that parent. Pesto is not a necessary food stuff-it won't cause you any hardship to send in a cheese sandwich instead and the health of your child will not be affected by that choice in any way.

YABU

As PPs have said, lots of ready-made pesto (green as well as red) contains nuts - on that basis it's reasonable for the nursery to just ban pesto tbh.

Sesame seeds are now one of the 10 most common food allergens & while other seeds are less common, crossover with treenut & peanut allergies is frequently observed in people with seed allergies.

So would a child who has a nut allergy be likely to have an anaphylactic reaction if another child was eating seeds?

Genuine question - we're not a nut-free school but it's always useful to know what other schools do.

The main issue would be one of cross-contamination, and with v young children or SN children, the risks of exposure via food sharing. It is - fortunately - rare for allergies to be so severe as to be airborne & I'm afraid I'm not certain about airborne seed allergies (other than that cooking with sunflower seed oil, for example, could trigger anaphylaxis in the same way cooking with nut oils can, but obviously that falls outwith the scenario in question).

Haven't read the whole thread (sorry), but worked with a man who was horribly allergic to pine nuts but fine with actual nuts. Better safe I guess.

Lljkk- Pesto is a basic common food. I would assume all kids eat pesto.

Mumsnet Post Of The Day.

loz DS is fine with nuts and highly allergic to pine nuts.

I miss pesto.

Pesto? My dds thinks its her lucky day if she gets a munch bunch!

Artandco - I LOVE the idea of a kids Thermos, but nursery H&S rules mean that hot/warm meals are off-limits too.

Thanks all, I hadn't realised that so many pestos contain cashews, which would of course explain why nursery has chosen to ban it.

You could always ask the nursery if you're ok to use the seed based pesto rather then the nut one? Ask if there's s seed allergy or if it's just nuts

EastMidsMummy

I think I was in my 40s before I heard of it; I don't know how I managed without such a basic foodstuff 'til then.

If you have a vegetarian child who hates cheese, it can be quite tricky to find sandwich foods that look "normal" enough for the child-sized food police. My kids were teased for eating tofu, sushi, various leftovers that "looked gross", etc.

For some people, it is actually a pain to avoid hummus (sesame) and pesto (pine nuts), in addition to all the obvious things like peanut butter.

Obviously I would have done it if someone in school was actually allergic to those foods, but a blanket ban can be pretty inconvenient if no one is genuinely affected by sesame or pine nuts.

If you have a blender you can make a really nice nut free sauce - whizz up a bunch of basil, some parmesan, garlic. Season with a bitt of lemon, salt and pepper.

I'm a lifelong nut allergy sufferer (serious anaphylaxis etc). I'm not allergic to seeds. I do react (though not as bad) to pinenuts.

Pesto is often cashews as mentioned. Either way it'd be an issue for me.

Have you tried making your own though? I do one with kale blitzed up. It's fab. No nuts.

Slot of pesto contains cashew nuts, which my boy is allergic to. Can't have it in the house. I went to school with a child who only had to be in the same room as peanuts and would have a life threatening re-action so the school are well within their rights

I wouldn't really make it dependent on the botanicaly correct term for nuts (and I'm a biologist too and dc's primary school is "nut"free due to a child with severe allergies) but assume that they mean everything that people commonly refer to as nuts because peanuts aren't nuts either, they are a legume. It would become impossible to have a reasonable policy.

"For some people, it is actually a pain to avoid hummus"

Hummus is so ridiculously easy to make that it would be simple to make it without tahini. In fact, we don't even like the taste of tahini so I make it without it anyway.

It's quite hard to find any pesto that doesn't include cashew nuts.
DS2 is allergic to peanuts but we have to avoid all nuts from his diet. We were also told to avoid pesto, even making my own with pine nuts as the pine nuts often have nut traces from processing.
However DS's school doesn't ban nuts or peanuts and I support that fully.

Actually a lot of brands moved from cashew to walnuts,which is a pain as ds is not allergic to cashew but allergic to walnuts. He isxalso allergic to seeds such as sesame and poppy but not pine nuts.
Pine seeds are not nuts when i investigated last.

Nicknamed
Ds is allergic to both chickpeas and sesame.
Nut bans are pointless and no professionals support them

DH has a nut allergy and also reacts to pine nuts, as does my other friend with nut allergy. There does seem to be a link. There are plenty of other pasta sauces you can use for your dc, perhaps not as convenient as pesto but still available. Don't take the note personally, they had good reason to remind you.

I won't go into detail here as I would never want to cause anyone upset, but I know of a child with a nut allergy who died when a classmate gave her some nuts in the playground.

Our local nursery has a blanket ban on anything containing nuts, and I would assume that is because there is at least one child with a known allergy. I think nursery has to be even more stringent about these rules. Young kids get food everywhere, and given that people with allergies can react severely just by touching an allergen, I think it's sensible. We're not talking about an inconvenience, it is potentially fatal.

There are only a couple of brands of nut-free pesto. One, I can only find in Waitrose but it is often out of stock. The other, I can only get in a health food shop.

I have a tree nut allergy and react to almonds, although that was the allergy that started last, in my teens rather than in infancy.

Are you doing this just to prove a point that you know more than the people that run the nursery? It is coming across that way.
My nephew is allergic to peanuts but also reacts to shop bought pesto. I think you could just make something different?