Allergens, plainly: what you actually have to tell your customers

Allergens are the part of running a food business that keeps people up at night, and fair enough — for someone with a serious allergy, this genuinely is life and death. But the rules themselves aren’t complicated once you cut through the jargon. Here’s the plain version.

Know the 14

UK law names fourteen allergens you have to be able to account for: celery, cereals containing gluten, crustaceans, eggs, fish, lupin, milk, molluscs, mustard, tree nuts, peanuts, sesame, soya, and sulphur dioxide (sulphites). You don’t have to memorise the list today — print it and stick it inside a cupboard. You just have to know which ones show up in your cooking.

Made to order vs. made in advance

This is the distinction that trips everyone up, so slow down here.

If you cook to order — someone messages, you make it, you hand it over — you have to give accurate allergen information, but it can be written down or told to them clearly and consistently. A recipe card per dish, kept honest and up to date, does the job.

If you make food in advance and pack it before anyone orders — trays of lasagne in the fridge, brownie boxes ready to go — that’s prepacked for direct sale, and Natasha’s Law kicks in. Each item needs a label showing the name of the food and a full ingredients list, with the allergens emphasised — bold, capitals, or underlined so they stand out. Not a vague “may contain”. The actual ingredients.

Be honest about your kitchen

You cook in a home kitchen. If you fry samosas in the same oil you’ve used for fish, or your flour lives next to the peanuts, say so. “Made in a kitchen that also handles nuts, sesame and gluten” is a normal, responsible line to include. Customers with allergies are used to it and would far rather you told them than crossed your fingers.

The one habit that keeps you safe

Write the recipe down — every ingredient, including the sneaky ones (soy sauce has gluten and soya; many stock cubes have celery; ghee is milk). Keep that card next to where you cook. When a customer asks, you’re reading off a document, not straining to remember what went in three days ago. It protects them, and it protects you.

If you want the official detail, the FSA’s allergen guidance for food businesses is clear and free. Read it once, set your system up, and it becomes second nature.