In response to the OP, we had this a few years ago. We had had no electricity for a few days due to a storm and after 3 days of sandwiches, we went to The Ivy, which is a chain my daughter had eaten at several times before. Their fish and chips was dairy free. However after sitting there for ages, they told us they could no longer guarantee it is dairy free as they had used the fryer for something else so there was a risk of cross contamination. I wasn’t annoyed at the chef, I was annoyed that they had changed their policy so it was no longer a safe place to eat.
However, j am also aware there is always a level of risk involved. Sometimes eating out is unavoidable.
At home, I have a process. I always do hers first so there’s no danger I could get distracted and use the wrong knife etc. I always dish hers up on the plate on the right so I know which is hers. Generally, I don’t use butter, cheese or milk in my cooking, but I still feel it’s safer to have this process. If I were to use butter in my mash, for example, I would dish hers up first, give it to her, then do the others so I know I haven’t made any mistakes.
When she has had issues, it’s has almost always been out. Once, she had one lick of ‘milk free lemon sorbet’ (she always licks the spoon first) and she said it hurt her tongue. I said it was probably because the lemon was sharp but she didn’t have any more. Within 15 mins she had had her epipen and the ambulance was rushing her to hospital. That was her first time and it was horrific. I asked the hotel after for the ingredients of the ‘milk free sorbet’ as I was genuinely worried she had developed an allergy to something else and the first ingredient was ‘lactose free milk’. That is not milk free.
The second time was with a prepackaged cake from Tesco. She had had this cake several times before, Hundreds probably. I took one with me to meet her after school before a club. She took a bite and said it was the most delicious cake she’d ever tasted. I said it’s the same as always and she said it wasn’t. I said don’t eat any more. She stuck her tongue out and it was covered in spots. I rushed her home and read the ingredients. My heart sank as they had changed them - no warning on the packaging. She spent 2 nights in hospital after one mouthful.
The most recent time was in Paris. I have a French degree and masters so can speak thr language and absolutely wasn’t a language issue. I imagine it was cross contamination. That was the worst yet. All she had was 2 chips. She ended up with 2 ambulances as the first couldn’t stabilise her enough to get her to hospital so called for a second with doctors. I won’t go into details about what happened to her, but it’s the worst experience of my life.
This is why it’s dangerous when people just refer to nut allergies as severe. People then think ‘oh it’s only a milk intolerance’ when actually it can also be life threatening.
We never eat out socially. When we go away I take bread, rice milk, cakes, crisps, dairy free chocolate etc but I can’t take enough for a week holiday. She usually has a boiled egg and fruit for breakfast as that can’t go wrong. Then we will make an assessment if she eats anything at lunch or dinner or just has the food I took. She would only ever have plain chips or pasta and some fruit.
After the experience in Paris, my GP suggested I had ptsd, which could be the case as it still keeps me awake 3 years later.