How to Live with a Sesame Seed Food Allergy

Living with a sesame food allergy can be challenging. These tips will help you get through it safely.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

1. The most important rule is to have an emergency plan in action should you have a reaction. This means carry your medications with you and know how to use them. It also means getting to the hospital if you need to.

2. Avoid foods that typically contain sesame seeds. Many foods contain sesame seeds or sesame oil that are not obvious to everyone. They typically include, Italian breadcrumbs, tahini sauce, ginger salad dressing, hummus(chickpea dip), Asian barbecue sauce, multi grain bread, and Halva candy bars.

3. Alert friends and family of your allergy when invited over for dinner. Its a good idea to ask ahead of time what they are cooking because they may not be aware that they are cooking with products that contain sesame seeds.

4. When eating out, be sure to tell your waiter that you are allergic to sesame seeds and oil when ordering. If possible, speak directly to the chef.

5. Italian Restaurants.
   Anything that has breadcrumbs will have sesame seeds. Some popular menu items to avoid are: meatballs, eggplant parmesan, chicken parmesan and veal parmesan. Be aware that some restaurants actually use sesame seeds under their pizza crust. Always be sure to tell your server that you have a sesame allergy but do be reminded that sometimes the cooks themselves don't even know they are using sesame seeds in their breadcrumbs.

6. Japanese Restaurant.
   Sushi rolls are typically covered in sesame seeds. Ask your server to prepare all your rolls without seeds. Be sure to stay away from any rolls that contain sauces since they may contain sesame oil or seeds and this is easily missed by the chef for some reason. Ginger salad dressing is also a usual suspect in a Japanese restaurant. Avoid it unless you are absolutely sure of what's in it.

7. Chinese Restaurants.
   Many dishes are sprinkled with sesame seeds and some sauces contain sesame oil. I like to stick to very basic dishes like steamed mixed vegetables with tofu and have garlic sauce on the side. On many occasions, I have inadvertently eaten something that contains sesame oil even after discussions with the waiter or chef. My advice, be absolutely sure you have your emergency meds with you incase of accidental ingestion.

Tips & Warnings

• An excellent alternative to frying with Italian bread crumbs are panko bread crumbs. They are completely plain and very crispy. Usually you will find these in the Asian isle of the grocery store.
• Another "filler" alternative to bread crumbs is a riced potato or even white bread chopped up very fine. (Potato works great in fish cakes, white bread works great in meatballs)
• If your allergic response to sesame seeds is so high that even one seed may cause an anaphylactic reaction, be very careful about the restaurants you chose to eat in. They are very small and easily appear on dishes accidentally.