Question:
I've always assumed being allergic to peanuts meant you'd be allergic to
peanut oil used in cooking or frying or whatever. Someone recently advised
me it isn't so. Have I been making my life more complicated than I need
to? Is whatever the allergen present in the nut, not present in the oil?
Answer:
I've always assumed being allergic to peanuts meant you'd be allergic to
peanut oil used in cooking or frying or whatever. Someone recently advised
me it isn't so. Have I been making my life more complicated than I need
to? Is whatever the allergen present in the nut, not present in the oil?
Classic allergies (hives, anaphylaxis) are supposed to be entirely
reactions to characteristic proteins. Food oils are supposed to be
*extremely* low in proteins because proteins spoil, adversely
affecting the taste and appearance of the oil. I have read reports
from people vigorously allergic to peanuts who accidentally ate peanut
oil with no ill effect.
On the other hand, I had a prompt and obvious reaction when I made the
mistake of eating potato chips cooked in corn oil. So it's clear that
Your Mileage May Vary. If your reaction is life-threatening, I don't
think the experiment is worthwhile.There are many, many different allergens in peanuts - or in any organic
substance, for that matter. You may be "allergic" to just a single
particular protein fragment, and that fragment could very well be either
be destroyed when peanut oil is made, or it could be left behind in the
non-oil part of the nut. On the other hand, you could be allergic to a
different protein fragment that is also present in the oil, or it could be
many different fragments.
This same reasoning is why some people are allergic to lots of food they
have never eaten - they are in fact sensitive to some fragment that
happens to be present in several different foods. This is most often seen
in food families, where people become allergic to all beans, for example.
But it is also possible to develop cross-family allergies in the same way.
Generally speaking, if you are extremely allergic to a food, a small
amount of the allergens tend to remain in all of the various forms of the
food, and so it's wise to avoid them all. But if your allergy is mild,
you may very well be able to tolerate some other forms. Heating/cooking
is another way thing that sometimes makes food less "allergic" (so you
might be allergic to unheated peanut oil, but after it has been used in
high-temperature frying, it might be OK - for example).
Our allergist told us that many (even most?) people who have an allergy
to a substance will not be allergic to the oil. The main problem with
oils, apparently, is that they run a very high risk of contamination
with the substance itself. For example, a pure peanut oil might not
cause a reaction but many actual samples of peanut oil will contain small
pieces of the nut. He advises severely allergic people to avoid
the oil as well as the nut.
