Would you have eaten the pudding?

[NoSourDough]

I have celiac disease and just a few crumbs of gluten will cause at lease 3 weeks of damage and illness for me, so eating out means I have to be very careful.

I’m on holiday in a UK destination, gone to a hotel restaurant, made it clear I have celiac disease, asked for the gluten free menu.

Main course, all is well.

Pudding time, I ask for a gluten free Sticky Toffee Pudding. DH asks for a normal one but with vegan ice cream (he is lactose intolerant).

A different waitress brings both puddings out, both in the same coloured bowls and is temporarily perplexed with regard to which one has the vegan ice cream.

i make it clear that one should be gluten free. She disappears and comes back and gives me the one that she says is gluten free.

We start eating, DH tastes his and says his ice creams tastes normal and not vegan.

i have a mouthful of pudding and spit it out - fearing that I’ve actually got the gluten pudding.

I decide not to eat mine as I cannot take the risk.

When waitress returns, I explain my dilemma, that I cannot take the risk and I want the pudding taken off the bill.

I couldn’t believe her reaction. She spoke to her manager, and said “it was 100% gluten free” with such an attitude and as I went to answer, she walked off.

They did take off the pudding on the bill but it was the fact they didn’t take it seriously and that it felt I was making a fuss about nothing. Why they didn’t put the food in separate coloured bowls or flag it is beyond me.

i did want to speak to the manager but it was mayhem outside in reception and I just wanted to leave. I will be leaving a review online.

Someone who is lactose intolerant won’t usually react to a small amount of lactose (eg a mouthful to taste it). It’s not the same as coeliac disease where a tiny amount can make them extremely unwell for weeks. I’m not sure why you feel sorry for restaurants having to have “two different flags”. It’s not really that difficult. I would say having to have whole separate preparation areas and utensils for people with coeliac and other allergies is hard, but a couple of flags. No.

I don’t think I’ve seen an answer to this. Was the husband ill? Or did he just have some particularly nice ice cream with his nice desert?

PS I’d have eaten the dessert.

He did eat it (he risked it basically - intolerances and autoimmune diseases are two different things). He is ok so far but the night is still young so to speak…with ice cream it will be a mild upset stomach for him.

For me, at least a week on the sofa, time off work and a month for my small intestine to begin the healing process.
On the scale of probability, it was “probably” not gluten. But because of their poor practice and her confusion, how could I risk it? Until you have been so very unwell with celiac disease (or any food related disease) it’s hard to understand what we go through.

I understand that for him it’s less risky and consequential than for you. I just think you’re probably being unreasonable to pull up a restaurant on their dietary requirement practices when one of you ate something that you had said you couldn’t eat, and you didn’t pay for the other one. If your husband is fine tomorrow will you still leave a bad review?

I think your problem here is actually the waitress’ perception of why people eat gluten free. It’s clear she want taking the allergy seriously and that might be because she comes across more people avoiding gluten for all sorts of reasons other than actually being coeliac.

I think you’re missing the point. I want to leave a bad review as they failed to do the bare minimum to ensure that my auto immune disease was priority. I shouldn’t have even had to question if my food wasn’t gf. It was their responsibility, not mine.

I wouldn’t have risked it either and in this case I do think a review is warranted so that others with allergies or intolerances can be aware.

I’m not missing the point. We just disagree. I think restaurants should absolutely do everything to protect people from allergens.

I don’t think you’re unreasonable for not eating the pudding, I wouldn’t have either.

I do think you’re unreasonable for leaving a bad review. If you rightly think that food that you’re served should not contain certain ingredients, it’s hard to complain about that when one of you ate the meal. You kind of gave away the moral high ground.

God yes, won’t someone please think of the poor restaurants.

They’re the true victims, imagine having to put little flags into a dish to let customers know that they’re safe to eat a food free from allergens? Just imagine? Hard, isn’t it? Just awful.

Really we should just round up people who are so stupid and selfish as to have allergies, despite restaurants catering for them with special adapted menus. Maybe a public flogging will sort them and their fussy ways out. And chuck in a good flogging for those foolish enough to have a spontaneous anaphylactic allergic reaction too.

Poor, poor restaurants.

I wouldn’t have as they seemed a bit cavalier about allergens. I think many places underestimate how serious coeliac disease is.

DH and I are both lactose intolerant. I honestly can’t tell the difference between vegan ice cream and dairy stuff now so I am forever putting my trust in restaurants. I think it’s only once I had a reaction that made me question whether I’d been given a cows milk product. Unpleasant but clearly not the same as gluten reaction for a coeliac. DH uses lactase pills sometimes. I’ve just cut all cows milk from my diet.

As someone with coeliac disease I don't think you're being unreasonable at all. It's a constant worry and if you don't get 100% assurance from your server that they know what they are serving you, it's difficult to confidently eat what you're given.

My DH would probably have ordered the gf pudding also, to save confusion, but of course you should not have to do that.

Ha ha, yes, having a serious medical condition is the "moral high ground" 🙄

OP, I would also be contacing their local HSA. They take allergen handling very seriously, and it's clearly time for this establishment to improve their training and food handling.

@Charabancobviously having an allergy isn’t moral high ground 🙄 complaining about restaurants being slack on allergens when you eat them anyway is odd.

Are you missing the bit where the OP did not eat the pudding?

Gluten free food tastes different, did your dh not notice that?

Coeliacs are the second most maligned group after vegans when it comes to eating. So many people assume we are just attention seeking whingers who like to spoil things for others and make everything difficult. You should see some of the comments every time one of the hate rags runs a story on someone being made ill by gluten, not being given the meal that they had ordered etc.

Not always. Especially sticky toffee pudding, with a topping.

Our chef made a brilliant gf sponge cake. Nobody clocked it.

No. But her husband ate his despite it containing things (he guessed) he couldn’t eat.

But the OP didn't. Because the OP has a serious medical condition.

You have clearly never worked in catering. It is a really serious thing to not know which pudding is GF.

How do we know they didn’t know what pudding was gluten free?

People who have not experienced how unwell coeliac makes you just don't get it. They assume at worst it's a bit of a bad tummy and at best you're just fussy. In my case before diagnosis my skin was sallow, my hair was falling out, I was developing peripheral neuropathy, dizziness, toilet issues etc. I started to be scared that there was something really terrible wrong with me because of how awful I felt. Going gluten free has given me my life back.

As a coeliac 1. I wouldn’t have eaten it, 2, I’d have asked it to be removed from the bill and 3. Yes, for the attitude of the waiting staff I’d leave a review.

it is EXHAUSTING trying to eat out safely as a person with coeliac disease. The least the waiting staff could do is not treat you like a massive inconvenience (even though we are one)

Read the OP's first post:

A different waitress brings both puddings out, both in the same coloured bowls and is temporarily perplexed with regard to which one has the vegan ice cream.

If she didn't know which one had the vegan ice cream, she didn't know which one was GF.

Yes, keep reading

My son has coeliac disease and there is no way I'd have let him eat the pudding.

I also think including the mix up on the review is a perfectly reasonable thing to do, other people with coeliac disease need to be warned that there is a cavalier attitude amongst staff to confirming whether food is gluten free.