The other day I ate a plate of fries at a restaurant. The staff swears they use peanut oil to fry everything. I am strongly allergic to peanuts. Nothing happened.
I, too, am emergency-room-visiting, epipen-carrying-allergic to peanuts.
It's hypothesized that peanut oil is (generally) not an allergen. This is because the part of peanuts which people are allergic to is peanut protein, and the refining process for making peanut oil requires heating the nuts up to a point which burns away the protein.
Caveats: cold-pressed peanut oil is still totally poisonous, and not all peanut oil was refined very well, so I still give it wide berth when I'm aware of it. But I do think this probably explains your french-fry mystery.
Aaron is allergic to "some kind of nut, [he doesn't] remember which one." Occasionally, he'll eat something and then exclaim to me, "Oh! My tongue is kind of swollen!" And yet I AM THE ONLY ONE WHO PANICS. OR CARES, EVEN.
Generally, peanut allergy (which is the most-fatal star o the nut allergy circuit) is cumulative, which means it gets worse every time. I draw two, possibly both spurious, conclusions from this:
a) it would behoove him to figure out which nut it is, in case he's increasing a cumulative nut allergy and
b) if it is peanut allergy, he's still at a pretty nonthreatening phase in it (i.e. I felt a little swollen and would barf upon peanut-eating for my whole childhood; it wasn't until I was 19 or so that my whole body started to swell up and turn red after the ingestion of "goobers".)
is benadryl, anyway. The last time I went to an emergency room they just gave me like four benadryl and I fell asleep like a floppy little histamine-free dish towel.
A good portion of the sinking "I've eaten a nut" feeling is the knowledge that I'm going to be unconscious or in a benedryl-induced fog for the next 12 hours.
I'm curious: Did you know before you ate them that they were fried in peanut oil? If so, why did you eat them? On the other hand, if you did not know,and this led to your eating all of the fries, what caused you to suddenly learn they were peanut-oil-ized? a reaction? But you say no. I think you must have decided to try one. Having survived you decided to continue pushing your luck. It kind of reminds me of your (non) reaction to honey nut cheerios!
Yes, it is a strange puzzle. Well, the menu clearly says that they "proudly" use only peanut oil to prepare their fried foods, and so I have scrupulously avoided all their platters of fried seafood, etc. I ordered a burger, and, of course, fries, somehow overlooking that they are, obviously, fried. At the end of the meal it came to mind all at once that they must have also been fried in the peanut oil. I interrogated our server, who attested that she had seen the very oil come out of a container clearly labeled as peanut oil.
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I will blind you with science
Date: 2008-05-03 06:01 am (UTC)It's hypothesized that peanut oil is (generally) not an allergen. This is because the part of peanuts which people are allergic to is peanut protein, and the refining process for making peanut oil requires heating the nuts up to a point which burns away the protein.
Caveats: cold-pressed peanut oil is still totally poisonous, and not all peanut oil was refined very well, so I still give it wide berth when I'm aware of it. But I do think this probably explains your french-fry mystery.
Blinded by hangover
Date: 2008-05-03 06:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-03 08:13 pm (UTC)a) it would behoove him to figure out which nut it is, in case he's increasing a cumulative nut allergy and
b) if it is peanut allergy, he's still at a pretty nonthreatening phase in it (i.e. I felt a little swollen and would barf upon peanut-eating for my whole childhood; it wasn't until I was 19 or so that my whole body started to swell up and turn red after the ingestion of "goobers".)
p.s. the magic elixir
Date: 2008-05-03 08:14 pm (UTC)Re: p.s. the magic elixir
Date: 2008-05-04 01:20 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-03 04:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-03 08:59 pm (UTC)On the other hand, if you did not know,and this led to your eating all of the fries, what caused you to suddenly learn they were peanut-oil-ized? a reaction? But you say no.
I think you must have decided to try one. Having survived you decided to continue pushing your luck.
It kind of reminds me of your (non) reaction to honey nut cheerios!
no subject
Date: 2008-05-04 01:19 am (UTC)