An allergy in a young child is stressful enough at home. On holiday, you also have to contend with unfamiliar food.
An allergy in a young child is stressful enough at home. On holiday, there’s the added challenge of unfamiliar food. Yet we often hear that parents only mention this on arrival, whereas getting in touch beforehand usually makes all the difference between uncertainty and peace of mind.
Many small-scale accommodation providers prepare their own food in kitchens that are not equipped to ensure strict allergen separation. If a host says it’s ‘no problem’, they may mean that an ingredient will be omitted. But that doesn’t prevent cross-contamination. In the case of cow’s milk, eggs or peanuts, this can lead to dangerous situations.
You can give yourself a lot of peace of mind by checking a few things in advance that really make a difference when it comes to allergies. For example, you could first ask exactly how the food is prepared: in the accommodation’s own kitchen, or by an external caterer. That tells you a lot about how easily a host can accommodate your requirements. You can also ask if a separate pan or chopping board is available, so you can be sure that no traces of an allergen are left behind by accident. And you can check in advance which supermarket is nearby, because a Jumbo with an extensive range of allergen-free products is really quite different from a small village Spar.
You can also always ask about the fridge – not whether there’s one, but how big it is. A mini-fridge sounds handy, but it’s too small for bottle feeds, opened jars or medication that needs to be kept cool. It’s good to know this in advance, so you don’t have to improvise when you get there.
What surprises many parents is how quickly a language barrier can lead to a misunderstanding. If your host speaks a different native language, ‘lactose intolerance’ might be interpreted as ‘lactose-free milk is fine’, whilst your child is actually not allowed to have cheese or butter either. That’s why you should always ask for a brief verbal confirmation. And you can even enquire about the kitchen utensils: silicone spatulas retain fewer allergens than wooden ones – a small detail, but in the case of a severe allergy, precisely the sort of nuance that matters.
Practical considerations also come into play. You can ask whether the fridge has a freezer compartment for ice packs. Or whether there’s a kettle in the room for preparing bottle feeds or sterilising teats. These are questions that parents sometimes only ask once they’re already standing in the room with a hungry baby, but asking them in advance brings so much peace of mind.
By checking these sort of things in advance, you’ll arrive at a place where everything’s already sorted, and you can start enjoying yourself straight away.