As restaurant reviewer for Wellington’s Fishhead magazine, I booked a table at Cafe Polo recently. Having taken down a name, number, date and time, the person on the end of the phone asked the now requisite follow-up questions in a tick-the-box sort of way. Did I have any dietary requirements? Was I vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free or afflicted by food allergies of any sort? “No”, I said, “I eat absolutely everything.” He perked up immediately. I think I made his day.
The food-intolerance trend – if I can call it that – is the cause of much private grumbling in the hospitality industry. Private, because restaurants really do try to please everyone all of the time and they wouldn’t want you to think otherwise. It’s why diners are asked upfront if they have any special needs, and why menus are planned and coded with options GF V VG or DF. Even so most restaurants can relate stories of misunderstandings where a plate has had to be returned to the kitchen because of a misplaced mushroom perhaps, or the overlooked presence of gluten. Sometimes that means meals for the entire table have to be plated up again so that everyone eats at the same time.
So what is happening here?
Are food allergies on the increase, or are we just identifying them more accurately? Are there more vegans/vegetarians out there or are they just more forthright about having their needs met?
Is there something about the gluten in modern strains of wheat, or the lactose in our milk supply that has increased our sensitivity to both? Or are we simply becoming a nation of picky eaters?
Pass the Salt 
allergies ..yes…..with medical certificat only……………..
Tricky one, especially the gluten intolerance issue. Whilst my wife would never describe herself as being gluten intolerant she does feel better, less bloated when she eats quality, artisan made bread. I can only conclude then that the problem is not so much with bread per se but with the quality of the bread we are eating nowdays. A baker friend of mine once told me that cheap bread is cheap because it uses “cheap flour, cheap sugar and cheap labour”………
Rebecca Rolls of Thoroughbread (gluten-free bakery) thinks the growing intolerance to gluten may have something to do with the newer strains of wheat. I think that’s why some people like to use the heritage grains. Certainly the more intensively our food is grown and the more processed it gets, the more impact it has on our health. I like Michael Pollan’s advice for a more natural diet – quite simply, don’t eat anything your grandmother wouldn’t recognise.