Nursery packed lunches - allergens list feels overwhelming!

[Querious]

Hi all, NC’d for this one! Never thought I’d be this kind of person to question an allergy policy in schools as I have lots of friends and family both currently and in childhood with dietary requirements like coeliac/ severe nut allergies/ vegan etc which I’ve always tried my best to accommodate when hosting them at mine or going out places to eat. However, my DC’s nursery have created such an exhaustive list of banned food in packed lunches that I’m really struggling to put together something healthy ish that a 3 year old will eat! Not allowed:

• egg (incl mayo and as an ingredient)
• nuts (incl coconut)
• seeds
• fish
• Chocolate
• sweets

I try to cook/ bake most things we consume and keep mainly low UPF but I’m not a zealot about it. Because of this however, the teachers are routinely removing things from my child’s lunchbox for fear of causing a reaction. In the short return after Christmas this has included greek yoghurt with strawberries blended into it (questioned the seeds so replaced with a packaged yoghurt), a sandwich made with wholemeal bread (seeds), a sandwich made from white focaccia (had some black flecks in - pepper, but they couldn’t be sure), hummus (homemade with no nuts but they couldn’t be sure!!), beetroot brownies (too much chocolate), sausage rolls (queried egg glaze, it was actually milk) and a piece of cake (as cakes are made with egg).

Genuinely tearing my hair out to figure out what I can put in a lunchbox that ticks all the nursery’s boxes plus my own lower UPF plus my DC’s picky habits - plus isn’t the same thing every day! For ex DC won’t reliably eat white bread, probably because we don’t buy it, prefers the hardest crustiest uncut bread you can buy 😂 I can’t afford school lunches and the menus aren’t great from a UPF perspective. Help! AIBU to think this is really difficult?

Wow yourself

My child is allergic to things I ate all the time and in pregnancy. I eat a very healthy varied diet. So do they. Educate yourself before you casually spread offensive and ignorant misninformation.

Science has a long way to go in explaining allergies. They have yet to be prioritised on a governmental or national level, or within the NHS.

Personally I believe there is a genetic component connected with an immune response. Both my husband and I have siblings with food allergies though we don’t ourselves. But our child does and there’s don’t. I know of several other families with multiple people with allergies. But that’s purely anecdotal.

you can promote healthy eating and cutting out UPF without castigating people with allergies

offensive information is only so because of guilt which you shouldn’t be!

my message was absolutely NOT about bad choices made by parents which are personal and none of my business but the food industry which gives us crap!

So yes, please do educate yourself as your reaction says a lot!

Gosh and a second!

No…absolutely not saying anywhere in my post that it is people’s fault. I was talking about the food industry 👀

Well, maybe word your comments more carefully if you don’t want to be misunderstood.

And now they will provide « breakfast for everyone »!

Don’t get me wrong, it needs to be there but it should be GOOD food! As in « not just filling the belly’s » but actually feeding the bodies.

No,

I will continue to do as I do because I can clarify for all people in need of 👀

Can see there is no point responding to you. I don’t have guilt kindly don’t suggest how I feel. I posted to correct what you said. I’m pretty educated about allergies and the food industry already but always responsive to learning more. Says a lot that you felt the need to tell me as an allergy parent to educate myself.

Can you clarify what 👀 means? 😅

I used your words so I won’t apologies for you being offended.
Also, there is a difference being educated in food allergies and food industry.

Oh a smarty pants!

Interestingly Finland had a ten year allergy programme fairly recently (ended 2018) which reduced allergy and asthma issues dramatically with the focus moving away from avoidance and towards tolerance and resilience. Allergy diets in nurseries were reduced by 43%-65% in most regions (up to 80% in some regions) and no anaphylactic reactions were observed in these settings (I assume this refers to the ones specifically analysed for the report) so increased exposure to allergens and viewing mild symptoms in children not as allergies but as immune development, along with increased exposure to nature in nurseries, had a drastic impact on allergies. Benefits weren't just seen in children, in conscripts the levels of allergies and asthma were also reduced, and asthma hospitalisation across the whole country was reduced a lot, cut in half for children.

That sounds interesting @Natsku.
Must look that up, thanks.

Allergies run in my family unfortunately. Many of the newer drug treatments for various conditions are antibody based, and people with allergic tendencies quite often react. So it’s not just about diet. I’ve had an anaphylactic reaction myself to a biologic prescribed for a chronic and debilitating condition and it was very scary. It also means my condition is untreated at the moment. The impact of allergies can be far greater than those lucky enough not to have them sometimes realise. Anything that helps reduce them at a population level is to be welcomed.

My brother has a lot of severe allergies, I don't think there's ever been a time that his skin has been good but luckily he does well with the new treatment he has (some kind of injections, maybe antibody based) but he hasn't been taking them regularly since moving to Finland as he hasn't got a prescription here yet but hasn't gotten too much worse so I think also the difference in air quality here has an impact.

I wish him well.

Do you have the link? It is interesting!

https://www.jacionline.org/article/S0091-6749(21)00559-5/fulltext

It also looks at the issue of mould in homes, preventing mould could prevent some allergies, also pre/probiotic regimes. And helping asthma treatment by treating allergic rhinitis in all asthma patients - I experienced that when I had my first asthma check up in years (because I just hadn't bothered to get a check up, felt like my asthma was pretty well under control) and the doctor prescribed hayfever treatment and I've needed my blue inhaler maybe a couple of times in the two years since then, before that I needed it maybe once a month on average.

Definitely do post its with the ingredients list and have a conversation. I’ve seen this from both sides as I’m a childminder and have had my sons childminder remove home made foods she thinks were unhealthy but I’d made egg and chews muffins that she thought was cake.

once had a child in my setting anaphylactic to egg and allergic to milk and soy. While I hadn’t banned foods I’d been very clear we have allergies in the setting absolutely no sharing food no cake from home for birthdays etc. and I’d said I would not charge for food and preferably I’d provide their food. One parent insisted she did her kids food and told me she wouldn’t send egg or milk as she was friends with the other parent and knew the allergies. Wasn’t an issue because I didn’t allow sharing of food and was vigilant but there was regular unsafe foods she hadn’t picked up on. Same when I nannied for allergy kids people get offended when you check their foods but the volume of missed allergens is significant. I think if it’s not your child living with the allergies or your job to keep a child safe the level of head space you give to monitoring ingredients is just not enough for nursery to trust a child’s life to it

Mould is/can also be cause for pans/pandas and so many neuro development issue…on the other side there are mal-nutrients which cause so many mental health issues.

with the surge of children being given a diagnosis…looking at the root cause seems really really like a good idea.

the vaccins are also in line as it looks like it may « stress » the bodies of little children too much creating a whole lot of issues down the line. It is discussed that today it is starting to be an issue rather than « before » because of the increase of vaccins given AND the timeframe that gets smaller…

Thank you. As someone who grew up with food allergies, that weren't even respected in my own family, I appreciate this post. My own father can't even be bothered to remember what foods I'm allergic to, and I'm 40!

This is an exhaustive list
my 3 all ate in nursery as there was a chef and kitchen and this eliminated this sort of thing as they controlled the menu around allergies etc

there was a recent indecent at a local school with someone with a coconut allergy and someone taking in a tub of celebrations including the bounty’s!! Then there was snickers and the nut situation

The child opened it to share with their classmates near Christmas and the parents got an awful email and they’d just tried to be kind, materialised English wasn’t their first language and they hadn’t understood the emails and stuff on the school website 😱

do it the night before then like I do

You shouldn’t be feeding your child cake at all, from a strictly nutritional POV. They contain far too much refined sugar and white flour to be a regular feature of a packed lunch for a baby or toddler. but the OP asked for suggestions so in the spirit of being helpful I provided one. 🤷‍♀️

Could you link to the guidelines? I'm curious about what is different.

We didn't have anything like this from my child's nursery or childminder, no restricted foods, both settings catered but people regularly sent in homemade cakes for sharing. Staff would withhold and ask parents at pick up.

Are you not able to consider that not every cake is made like that?