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How to collect your team’s dietary requirements without getting it wrong
Six questions, one message you can paste straight into Slack, and the fourteen allergens UK law actually names. Written for whoever got handed the job of ordering lunch.
Why “any allergies?” is the wrong question
Ask a room “any allergies?” and you will get silence, then a hand at 11:45 on the day. People do not want to be the difficult one. They will not shout their coeliac diagnosis across an open-plan office, and they will quietly eat nothing rather than make a fuss.
So do not ask the room. Send a message, give people a private way to answer, and ask the questions that actually change what you order. Here they are.
The six questions
These are the only six that change the order.
Is it an allergy, or a preference?
Both matter, but not equally. An allergy is a safety issue; a preference is a courtesy. You need to know which one you are dealing with before you decide what can share a platter.
If it is an allergy — how severe?
“It gives me a rash” and “I carry an EpiPen” are different orders. Ask directly whether anyone carries adrenaline. If someone does, that allergen should not be in the room at all, not merely on a separate plate.
Coeliac, or avoiding gluten?
People use “gluten-free” for both and they are not the same thing. Coeliac disease is an autoimmune condition, not a diet. Ask which it is — it changes how seriously the kitchen has to treat cross-contamination.
Any faith-based requirements?
Halal, kosher, no pork, no alcohol, fasting periods. Ask once, properly, and you never have to ask again. Getting this wrong is remembered far longer than getting the sandwiches wrong.
Vegan, or vegetarian?
Not the same, and a vegetarian option is not a vegan one. Egg, butter, milk and honey are the usual traps — the quiche, the mayonnaise, the pastry.
Anything else we should know?
Leave one open box. This is where you find out about the pregnancy, the medical diet, the thing nobody had a category for. It is the most useful question on the list and the one everybody forgets.
The message — paste this into Slack, Teams or email
Written so nobody has to out themselves in public. Change the details, keep the private reply.
Hi all — I’m ordering food for [event, date].
So that everyone can eat, could you reply directly to me (not the channel) by [date] if any of the following apply to you:
• A food allergy — and please tell me if it is severe, or if you
carry an EpiPen
• Coeliac disease, or you avoid gluten
• Halal, kosher or another faith-based requirement
• Vegan or vegetarian
• Anything else I should know about
No detail needed if you’d rather not — just tell me what to avoid and I’ll sort it. Nothing gets shared beyond me and the caterer.
Thanks!
The 14 allergens UK law names
These are the allergens a UK food business must declare. If someone names one of these, it is not a preference — it is the law that it is labelled.
Celery
Cereals containing glutenwheat, rye, barley, oats
Crustaceansprawns, crab, lobster
Eggs
Fish
Lupin
Milk
Molluscsmussels, squid
Mustard
Peanuts
Sesame
Soybeans
Sulphur dioxide & sulphites
Tree nutsalmonds, hazelnuts, walnuts…
What “may contain” actually means
It is not a legal term and it is not a promise. It means the kitchen has decided it cannot rule the allergen out. For a mild intolerance that is usually fine. For someone who carries an EpiPen, “may contain” means do not eat it. If you are ordering for someone with a severe allergy, you want a kitchen that does not have to say it at all.
Where we sit, since you asked
Our kitchen is dedicated nut-free — no nuts have ever entered it, so there is no “may contain” to write. Gluten gets the same seriousness rather than a caveat: a separate gluten-free fryer, separate gluten-free freezers, and gluten-free food built to gluten-free recipes rather than adapted. Gluten-free runs right through the menu, and coeliac customers order from us regularly. We are halal, with no pork or alcohol on the premises, and every item is labelled to Natasha’s Law.