If you tell them the restaurant that your child has a dairy allergy don't complain when they won't serve the child dairy!

[Cwtches123]

Relative is a chef currently working at a restaurant at family resort in the UK. He is always happy to cater to allergies but is getting increasingly frustrated by those who make a huge fuss about ordering a special main and then deciding to order a dessert full of the allergen!
Last week a family made a huge fuss that everything had to be dairy free for their child, no problem, all dishes dairy free, then they said child wanted the same dessert as sibling as it looked nice. Siblings dessert was full of dairy, parents insisted this would be ok (after previously stated child had severe dairy allergy) restaurant manager refused to serve it.
People like this give genuine allergy sufferers a bad name, I'm glad the restaurant called their bluff!
Parents were furious that the restaurant would not serve dairy to the child they had said had a severe dairy allergy!!!!

This happened to me with a friend.

She insisted she was GF so I catered the whole evening GF and even bought gf stock cubes.

Went out with her 3 days later and she was stuffing herself with bread and samosas......

Never again!!

Oh I know. I took a class on a school trip to another country. We had a several teens with dietary requirements such as vegetarianism, no pork and a couple who had allergies and sensitivities.

We teachers each had a list in our pocket, shared it with the youth hostel and made sure that everyone was given food they could eat. I mean, they're teens so they can sort themselves out to a large extent but sometimes the hostel had to cater for them specifically.

By Wednesday the kid with the gluten allergy was eating cakes and biscuits because his naturopath had said he needed to increase his exposure to it... OH FOR FUCK'S SAKE.

I really didn't expect it was this common for people to lie about allergies!

Many, if not most, people who claim to have allergies are lying, mistaken or exaggerating.

Some people who claim to have allergies will die or be seriously harmed by low-level exposure.

The fad of avoiding gluten has made gluten-free food much more available, which is good for people with coeliac disease.

The fad of avoiding gluten has made life much harder for people with coeliac disease, as it's assumed that a request for gluten-free food results from faddery and therefore low-level (or indeed high-level) contamination doesn't matter.

And this is why we cannot have nice things: because there are always pisstaking cheeky fuckers.

My DP does have an actual allergy. He gets mouth ulcers if he eats walnuts. But he just if asked says he has a mild allergy, but does not need separate prep areas or anything. Just needs to avoid eating the actual nuts.

thegirlwholived

And don't say allergies if some cross contamination does not matter. Or explicitly say some cross contamination is fine. Because catering for someone with actual allergies is bloody difficult.

I don't think there's anything wrong with asking a restaurant to remove cheese from a dish if practical and then having ice cream for pud. But don't also claim a severe allergy! My friend has been cutting dairy severely recently and has found her asthma much better, but she herself says occasionally she just says fuck it and suffers the consequences. But she's never pretended we'll kill her with cheese.

My plea to people with allergies is let me know how it works for you. Then I know what precautions to take or not bother with.

Son has an intolerance, it can make eating out quite hard. I can't imagine how you eat out with the sort of allergy that requires an epi-pen. Even with detailed allergen guides many staff are clueless/careless. People messing them around won't help this.

I dislike cream. I just ask if desserts come with cream and if yes if they can remove it. I don't claim an allergy because I don't like the taste.

I have a gluten intolerance and always make sure to say that because I am not allergic to gluten. I can eat a small amount but know my limits, it is not life threatening, I get quite bad stomach pains etc if I eat to much. It's very very different to an allergy and I get annoyed when people use the allergy card when it's just an intolerance.

I was a chef for years it’s a difficult job for almost always not much more than minimum wage.
I think the worst instance of this was when a lady came in and explained she was vegan (not an allergy but still) we had nothing suitable so I went to every effort to do her some pasta + sauce (dried is usually vegan - ours was too before anyone comments) and a basic salad. Ensured no cross contamination took place and worked very hard doing my usual dishes and what was effectively a freestyle dish so she’d have something to eat. She’d come in with her husband and I always try to go the extra mile rather than turn someone way.
An hour later the waitress came to me and said the vegan customer was very appreciative but later ate some of her husbands dessert despite being told by the waitress it was not vegan. Customer responded “oh but he won’t eat it, it’s okay, it’ll go to waste otherwise”
Fuck my life, basically.
But as a chef when someone is a vegan, vegetarian, coeliac or has an allergy/intolerance you can’t risk not taking it seriously. Depending on the specific diet you could be looking at everything from the loss of the entire business if a customer dies/is hurt by an allergic reaction or some very bad press from a scorned vegan.

I have a dairy intolerance. I have to explain I’m a ok with slight cross contamination but having something with dairy in it makes me bad. I’m also vegan.
I’ve had people sneak dairy into my food because they thought I was being faddy! Then look uncomfortable when I can’t leave their loo for an hour with me gasping “I must of eaten milk” and a load of horrid noise and smells coming out!
I will not knowingly eat dairy!

I don't not expect people to cater for me either, I will just be very careful about what I eat so it doesn't affect me too badly.....I never eat bread and I do not miss it at all ...or pasta

Agree completely with the restaurant in this case. DS had a milk allergy until aged 7, and now aged 9 is outgrowing an egg allergy (he cannot eat raw or lightly cooked egg yet). He is also allergic to cashews and pistachios. We still avoid eggs and all nuts while eating out as such specific , even though he eats well cooked egg and other nuts at home, as I don’t trust others to be as on top of his allergies as we are.

I'll never forget one of the Beavers turning around and saying he was allergic to nuts. My jaw hit the floor and I was told I went white as there had been nothing on his medical forms when he went to camp, and we were lucky in that it was a nut free camp because of another child being highly sensitive.

When his parent turned up to pick him up we 'had a word'. Turns out that he choked on a nut once, therefore he had been told he was allergic so he wouldn't be given them. I have never been so relieved in all my days!

But as a chef when someone is a vegan, vegetarian, coeliac or has an allergy/intolerance you can’t risk not taking it seriously.

You might be on slightly sticky ground kicking out someone with an allergy, although it would be interesting to see how a court would define "reasonable" adjustments.

But it would probably be fine to say, as reputedly a place in Texas did to kd lang, that the only thing they had for a vegetarian was the advice to get out of town. No court is going to find that restaurants have an obligation to cater for cultural/religious diets, for the simple reason that almost no restaurants that serve dairy and meat would be able to cater for frum Jews.

blueskiesandforests
Im sorry but you were wrong. DS 23 has tree nut allergies and seed allergies, he would have eaten the non nut chocolate. The contains traces warning is a bit meaningless. Again the other chocolates would depend what the actual nut was. DS is ok with peanuts(not a nut) and he is ok with cashew. My DH is only allergic to Brazil nuts and can eat all other nuts

I have a bad reaction to a medicine that my doctor has said to treat as an allergy and never have it. There are alternative medicines to do that job and if I have to write medical issues/allergies on a sporting form then it goes down as an allergy.
Thankfully it's something that doesn't affect anyone else and there's no catering to me. I only have to check if it is an ingredient in some combined all in one type medicines if I've asked for painkillers from someone.

DD1 had a lactose intolerance for a while after a severe bug. Milk gave her cramps and diarrhoea, but yogurt and cheese were ok in small quantities. I was clear to say 'milk intolerance' as her issue. She kept 'drinking other children's milk' at nursery I found out that they were pouring her a glass along with the others as it wasn't a real allergy, so I started putting her into nursery the following day with cramps and diarrhoea (not bug related) and they soon stopped.

One day about a year after it started she randomly asked me for a glass of milk and she was fine from then on.

Real allergies are scary. I've seen all kinds of reactions. I used to monitor the patients having grass/tree pollen injections to desensitise them, and the adrenaline would be right next to me.

Some medications contain egg and I've no time for 'I don't like the taste of egg' people who claim an allergy. I did once have a patient say they were allergic to adrenaline - turns out they had it in a dental injection and it made their heart race. I pointed out it wasn't an allergy, but a normal effect. I hope I helped cure their idiocy allergy that day.

It is different for a medicine as no one is making it at home, so there is no cross contamination issue.

The NHS (as if it hasn’t got enough to do) should issue allergic or intolerant cards that restaurants can ask to see, before they start doing things like using separate utensils, or massively altering menus.

I think, when eating out, there should be an element of ‘you’ve made your bed’ with people who have elected to be super fussy about what they eat. Expecting to be able to carry on with their previous lifestyles and expecting businesses to essentially offer bespoke products for the same price as standard strikes me as being another example of the sort of entitlement that exists in society these days; self-centredness masquerading as assertiveness and ‘rights’. Maybe if there was an ID scheme it would enable restaurants to charge a premium for offering these kinds of services.

ReflectentMonatomism

In the industry as it is today in the UK I’m pretty sure any establishment treating vegetarians like that would take quite a hit financially via bad press and reviews.
Killing someone with an allergy could potentially cause the entire business to go down the toilet - ive seen that happen too. It just isn’t worth the risk.
All I can say is I’m happy I no longer work in catering!

Maybe it is an intolerance but with a child it is easier to say allergy.

Following bowel surgery I have a lot of food intolerances and so I can tolerate a little but not a lot of dairy, gluten and pulses. I get so ill that I often eat substitute shakes because they don't make me ill. I can at the most eat one meal a day and avoid lots of things. Depending on what I have eaten on previous days and how I am feeling I can eat things and get away with it. Sometimes to be polite or just out of boredom I will eat the same as everyone else but will usually regret that.

I don't make a fuss in restaurants though

@QuitMoaning: I think we could nearly be related!

DP's "vegan" niece had Yorkshire pudding and trifle when we cooked Christmas lunch for the entire extended family a couple of years ago.

If I had gone to the trouble of cooking her a vegan main, I quite possibly would have killed her ...

My daughter is intolerant to dairy. Thank goodness she is not allergic. If she was allergic I would really struggle with her eating outside the home. But she is very intolerant to dairy and can manage to get past 1st step of the dairy ladder, at the moment she can’t manage stage 1. While it won’t kill her it’s very sore and uncomfortable for several days for her if she does have dairy.

I am still amazed at the number of places that don’t understand that the whole meal needs to be dairy free so she can’t have vegetables with butter on. There are also a suprising number of cheifs who think eggs are dairy.