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| Beware! Allergens abound at most eateries. Photo: Dan4th/ Flickr |
Hanna Raskin's first waitressing job was at a small Greek diner in Michigan. In the 15 years since, she's worked at a chop suey joint in Mississippi, an exclusive Arizonan country club, a vegetarian eatery and an Irish pub. She currently picks up odd shifts at a seafood eatery in the North Carolina mountains, where she cracks crab legs for helpless tourists. This is the second in a series of posts.
My mother, who has a severe shellfish allergy, hasn't tasted seafood since the Eisenhower administration. Since she hasn't a clue whether crustaceans are salty, sweet or sour, she suspects they're lurking everywhere on the menu: "Now, does this cheesecake have any shellfish?" she'll ask her very patient server.
As a kid, I cringed at my mom's fastidiousness. Because really, who would put shrimp in granola? But with chefs now fusing ingredients at a breakneck pace and food allergies multiplying at an unprecedented rate, my mother isn't the only one asking. Twelve million Americans suffer from food allergies, and they're demanding that restaurants accommodate them.



Whole Foods has just put out a recall on its 










