I have anaphylaxis to dairy, peanuts, tree nuts, and seafood (fish/shellfish/crustaceans/molluscs/etc) and cannot have artificial sweetners. I have cruised with Disney twice and been quite comfortable with the safety of my food both times.
DCL handles food allergies a little differently than WDW, but they set a similar gold standard.
It is important to note the allergies on the reservation; if they haven't been already you can add them.
DCL also has a special services team you can call or email and speak to about the allergies and how they will be handled. In my experience, they are very knowledgeable and helpful. The info on how to contact them is on DCL's website.
The following is a mix of info I was given in advance and learned during our two cruises; however, other people may have had different experiences !!!!
- people with food allergies should eat the in main dining rooms for all three meals (I suppose one could call this a "strongly encouraged to") as the "quick service" locations do not have large kitchen facilities and may not be able to accommodate; (at the very least, expect that QS options will be limited if they can accommodate)
- that said, on our most recent cruise (Nov 2014, Fantasy), I did eat at the quick service places a few times -- each time I told the person who takes the orders that I had food allergies and they got a chef for me to talk with. Similar to WDW, except without them writing things down, the chef talked with me about what I wanted and how they would make it safe for me. NOTE: I chose things that I knew had a reasonable chance of being made-safe-able
- note that it is often VERY VERY VERY VERY noisy in the QS areas and very hard to hear the CMs (and I am guessing likewise hard for them to hear you). I have a "food allergy" notecard (4x6 pale yellow index card) with my allergies printed on it and was able to give that to the chefs -- it helped quite a lot. BUT, if you are going to try QS, I HIGHLY suggest you go at a time when they are not very busy and when there are not a lot of people around, thus making it quieter and more likely the chef and you can actually hear each other properly. Especially the first time.
- the first QS item I had was a hamburger and fries; the chef that time told me they had allergy safe chicken fingers available; I had those the next time.
- I forget how I figured this out, but I came to learn that a safe pizza was possible; I ended up having pizza twice: the chef used an Udi's pizza crust (I even saw him taking it out of the recognizable Udi's package), sauce, pepperoni and Tofuti's dairy-free "cheese" cheddar slices (he showed me the package and ingredients to ensure it was safe); he put it on aluminum foil then on the baking tray. YUMMY !!!! And awesome because it is so very rare to get safe pizza anywhere but in my own house. Because the kitchen area is visible to the guest area, I got to see him washing his hands (more than once), cleaning the prep area, getting the ingredients from cold storage, preparing it, etc. Kind of neat to see it all in action.
- on boarding day those with food allergies are supposed to go to the location on the navigator that people who need to make dining changes are to go to (i.e. on fantasy: Royal Court, using the side door not the main door); IME I introduced myself, they looked me up and they confirmed that they had my food allergies correct. then they gave me a menu for my dinner that night and I ordered what I wanted to have -- this gives the chefs time to make your meal as safe as they can given X hours notice. Note that the dining change time is only during a very limited timeslot of a couple hours -- this was our priority once we were on board and that window opened.
- each night at dinner in the MDR the head server has primary responsibility for allergy meals, but it may be them or it may be your server who actually does the most work (on our first cruise the head server was the one I dealt with almost exclusively; on the second the head server checked in on us and handled a few things, but the primary person was our server, who was excellent and well-informed on food allergies)
- each night at the end of dinner in the MDR you will be brought the menu for dinner the following night and asked to place your order -- this gives them almost a day to make safe food !
- I learned I could ask for a menu item we had already had that I really liked that that was not on the new dinner menu and they would try to get it for me -- each time I asked they managed to get it (the item I remember the most was an amazing butternut squash soup that I asked for a second night in a row
)
- once our server learned I LOVED the safe bread he had found for me, he made sure we had LOTS and LOTS -- they ran out the second night, and he made sure that did NOT happen again
- the day before
Castaway Cay at dinner in the MDR you will also be asked to place your order for lunch at CC. There is not a printed menu, so it is more of a conversation of the types of food they have and what you would like. you will be told where (which of the dining places) and after what time you can come have your lunch on CC (our was after 12 noon)
- at CC you go to the appointed location after the specified time and track down a CM and tell them you have an allergy meal and ask where to pick it up; they will direct you to the area to go to. there will be a CM there who will take your name and stateroom and may ask what you had ordered and they will go back and get your food.
- at CC at teh dining areas there are things like (commerical packaged) snack bags of (Lays?) potato chips (plain and BBQ I think), cut up (eg melons, watermelon) and whole (eg apple, banana) fruit, fountain ddrinks, and other additional items which may be safe to eat as well
- we never tried room service but i have read mixed messages on whether a food allergy person can order from them or not; certainly room service is in the same pile as QS: strongly encouraged NOT to because the kitchen facilities are not as extensive as the MDRs
As for reactions.
I buy an annual multi-trip travel medical insurance policy that covers pre-existing condidtions if they are stable for seven days before departure and which includes medical evacuation coverage. It covers upto $5 million. I also have a smaller level of travel coverage through work's health insurance plan that fully covers all pre-existing medical conditions, as long as the trip length is not over a certain number of days that I stay well short of.
I have a battery-operated portable nebulizer anyway but i bring extra meds for it. My doctor has prescribed me prednisone with specific instructions for how to take it and when to go see an MD should I need it while travelling (it is only for this purpose). i take measures to reduce my general allergen exposure when traveling (some i do at home normally, others are just for traveling).
I bring nitrile gloves and sanitizing wipes and any hotel room/stateroom we stay in gets surfaces we will/may/might use thoroughly wiped down as a priority when we arrive. It takes a lot of wipes.
I carry multiple epi-pens and auvi-Q/allerjects while travelling. I think this time I had 6 ? At all times on the ship outside the stateroom I carry at least one on my person, along with my asthma rescue inhaler and benadryl tablets. I have a couple different pouches they can go into, depending on the activity i am in. Most commonly, the pouch is one that i carry inside a cross-body bag (Disney makes a nice small navy one with the DCL brand on it; the neoprene pouch from Epi-Pen ccarrying an epi-pen, asthma inhaler and benadryl fits in it just perfectly along with an iphone
). I also have a good quality brand name waterproof pouch-thing that the epipen and inhaler in their pouch went into when i was snorkeling at CC -- I wore it while snorkeling; it has a strap that is intended to be cross-body but i wore it as a waist belt and the pouch-thing itself floats; it took a bit of getting used to since it floats; but i found a happy position for it and it stayed on me the whole snorkel. i am pretty sure i looked very strange to anyone watching
On our last cruise one night at dinner I had a mild reaction to the airborne seafood and had to leave the MDR mid-meal. I did not use the epi-pen (my emergency plan allows this given the mild single-system symptoms i was having at the time -- other people's may not !!!). Our server was great. He noted that a later night's dinner would have even more seafood in the air because there was a lobster item on the menu that most people would have, so at his recommendation I made arrangements to have my meal delivered to my room instead for that night. I missed the drawing night at Animators, but did have a great Animators meal in my room, dessert and all
I do not know how complicated of an anaphylaxis emergency the medical center can handle nor what their protocol is nor when they would decide evacuation is required, as I have not had to use them. My sister did have an eye-based allergic reaction to food at Cabanas (presumably cross-contaminated) on our first cruise that she got to visit the medical center for. They were prompt and very professional. As a result of that adventure, we decided to take a town car service to our second cruise so we could get on earlier and actually eat that first lunch at an MDR instead of Cabanas being the only option open.
Hope this helps some.
-SW
