<p>There is an ingredient in many salad dressings that eats through my mouth and tongue. It never happens with salad dressings from the grocery store - just restaurant salad dressings. Some have left a gash as if I had been cut by a knife. It’s only an oral reaction - no hives or trouble breathing.</p>
<p>I doubt that an allergy skin test would pick it up - I have a pretty severe oral allergy to nuts and the skin test came back clean.</p>
<p>I’m amazed that I can’t “google diagnose” this. The only allergy I see associated with salad dressings is to eggs, and I don’t have an egg allergy.</p>
<p>The ingredients I can think of that are more likely to appear in restaurant dressings than in store dressings are olive oil, lemon juice, and balsamic vinegar.</p>
<p>Can you give further info about the type of restaurant and type of dressing?</p>
<p>Ask the restaurants if they use MSG on their salads
Chinese restaurants used to use a lot of MSG but got a lot of flack for it, so have cut back. </p>
<p>There are other things that restaurants can spray on fresh fruits/vegetables to keep them from wilting, and are acidic (kinda like lemon juice without the lemon taste) – could be that too. Best is to ask before eating.</p>
<p>Can’t be MSG because I am able to eat at all kinds of restaurants that use MSG in their food with no problems. I use olive oil, lemon juice and balamic vinegar at home with no issues.</p>
<p>About a year ago, I had a horrible reaction to beef quesadillas at Chiles. I asked them for their ingredients, thinking it would be easy to diagnose because hey, aren’t quesadillas just beef, cheese and tortillas? It turned out that there were *187 ingredients *in Chile’s beef quesadillas, including many chemicals with unpronounceable names. </p>
<p>I’ve tried to ask other restaurants for their ingredients but have had no success.</p>
<p>You can try bringing your own dressing and see if you still have the reaction. If so, then it is something on the salad, not the dressing. </p>
<p>Any particular ingredient seem suspicious? Since you have a nut allergy, do you inquire as to whether there is any possible any nut oil (ie peanut or walnut oil) used in the salad/dressing? Also, if you ask them not to put nuts in the salad, any chance nuts sometimes used in salads might have been in too close proximity to the salad?</p>
<p>Nitrites/nitrates are also used as preservatives, along with ascorbic acid, but I’d think you’d have a more frequent reaction if that was it, as they are used pretty widely</p>
<p>when i worked in food service, we put some kind of citric acid powder on the lettuce to keep it “fresh”. jym’s suggestion about bringing your own dressing is a good idea.</p>
<p>No problems with tomatoes or cilantro. I don’t actually eat a lot of fresh tomatoes, but I’ve had bad reactions where no tomotoes were involved.</p>
<p>The thing that has me stumped is that my first thougt is that it’s some random chemical. But you’d think that the cheap grocery store salad dressings would be more likely to be chemical packed than the dressings at a nice restaurant.</p>
<p>Well now I am confused. I mentioned the acidic additives earlier (post # 4) and you indicated you had no problem with lemon juice. Citric acid is a main ingredient in lemon juice. Perhaps powder form causes a different reaction.</p>
<p>OP can even do an ABAB design. Eat the same salad at the same restaurant with their dressing and with her own. Can order the salad with the dressing on the side-- If this reaction is instantaneous, she can ask for 3 plates-- eat one portion plain (no dressing) one with her own dressing and one with the restaurants dressing. Maybe we can publish the results in a peer reviewed journal? :D</p>