By Dr. Kim Perry, Executive Director
Each year we receive a handful of questions from riders with specific food allergies about our our meal plan. As someone who has multiple food allergies, I understand how important arranging your food is. I am allergic to more and more things these days: eggs, wheat, peanuts, mushrooms, and pineapple. I’m hoping that I don’t add any more to that list!
Unfortunately due to a number of constraints we cannot specifically address food allergies for our riders or staff. We cater 13 meals to 2,000 riders in 5 days, and use local civic groups like the boy scouts to facilitate snacks at over 25 rest stops. As you can imagine it would be extremely difficult, and dangerous to try to assure that specific allergens are eliminated from our meals and snacks.
I book the catering for the event, and I’ve come to the conclusion that it is impossible for our caterers and rest stop providers to keep those food allergies in mind. On most days of the tour I am surrounded by food that contains one or more of my allergens. As a result, I carry all my own food with me while at the tour. It is a very important week for me to be healthy, I have 2,000 of my friends to take care of so I try to control all my exposure to food very carefully.
We are very sorry at this time to not be able to offer gluten-free guarantees and to make sure that you can eat allergen free safely. I know that more and more people have dietary restrictions. And I hope like I did that once you find your allergens you are feeling happier and healthier.
I’m hopeful as more caterers and more facilities start to understand food allergies that we will be able to do more. This year in fact we are hoping to attract a gluten free food vendor to our tent city this year. If you know of anyone offering such service, please let us know.
If you can make suggestions on ways we can creatively help riders in this situation, please let us know as well.