Allergens are sneaky. Nobody has to put one into your dinner on purpose for it to turn up there. It can hitch a lift on a spoon.
Think about a knife that spread peanut butter and then went straight into the jam. Now there's a bit of peanut in the jam, and the jar looks completely innocent about the whole business.
The same happens with a toaster that's had bread in it, a pan that's had fish in it, and oil in a fryer that's already cooked something else. The food didn't change. It just picked up a passenger.
Washing hands with soap and water gets it off. The squirty gel that deals with germs doesn't — it's very good at germs and no good at all at crumbs.
Buffets are the trickiest of the lot, because everybody's spoons go visiting. If you're helping somebody with an allergy, keeping their food away from the crowd is a genuinely kind thing to do.
None of this is about anybody being grubby. Kitchens are busy and crumbs are small. It's just worth knowing about, the way it's worth knowing that puddles are deeper than they look.
I know how allergens travel. I don't know what's been happening in the kitchen you're standing in — the people cooking do, and asking them out loud is the best move there is.
Questions this page raises
Ezzie will have a go at any of these.