Melissa Schwartz Nemeth, a 36-year-old mom from the Upper West Side of New York City with a severe sesame allergy, suffered anaphylaxis after biting into a chocolate chip cookie the barista confirmed contained no sesame.
While the staffer admitted knowing the cookie contained tahini, she had no idea tahini was a paste made from ground sesame seeds.
According to the suit, Ms Nemeth is still undergoing medical treatment months after the incident.
The suit alleges that she was at Oren’s Daily Roast in April with her 4-year-old and 18-month-old daughters in tow when she decided to buy a treat.
Her husband, Greg Nemeth, told the New York Post that his wife always asks whether a product contains sesame before biting into any food she does not prepare herself.
“You wouldn’t think necessarily that a chocolate chip cookie would have sesame seeds, but we always ask because you never know,” Mr Nemeth said. “It’s a life-or-death scenario every time she eats sesame.”
The suit says that she had told the barista of her severe allergy but was assured the cookie was sesame-free.
After a single bite, she began to feel the symptoms of anaphylaxis come on.
As she felt her throat close up, she asked again if the cookie contained sesame.
“They said, ‘No, no, it’s a tahini chocolate chip cookie. There’s no sesame,’” her husband said.
Ms Nemeth was bedridden for the better part of a week as she recovered from her reaction.
The lawsuit alleges the coffee shop “failed to listen” when she told them of her allergy, nor did they have the common allergen listed on any labels near the cookie display or on a menu.
New York currently has no requirement to list allergens on the menu.
Ms Nemeth previously sued an East Village Mexican restaurant in 2020 over sesame exposure which was eventually settled.
The NY Post report does not say whether Ms Nemeth had epinephrine on hand at the time of the incident and whether she administered it if she did, or if she was hospitalized as a result of her reaction.
We are grateful that tragedy was averted and she survived the incident.
As we always do when reporting anaphylactic incidents, we offer a few suggestions so that others might avoid similar occurrences.
We urge our readers never to consume an unwrapped food item that was not made at the venue, where they can speak authoritatively about how it was made. In this case, even if the cookie did not contain sesame, there was no way to know whether it was made on equipment that processed sesame or had been in contact with sesame at the venue.
As always, we urge those who have been prescribed epinephrine to always take two emergency epinephrine devices along everywhere, every time, and to administer the first when they first suspect anaphylaxis. It is imperative to administer epinephrine early after the onset of anaphylaxis to achieve the best outcome.
