Our Facebook page is full of great info!

While I try to keep the focus of these AllergyEats Blog entries on DINING with food allergies or intolerances, our AllergyEats Facebook page is taking on a broader array of food allergy subjects, driven by our fans.

I love this, since fundamental to AllergyEats is the concept of peers helping peers.  And while I will keep this blog primarily focused on dining with food allergies (and the core site as well), I will continue to encourage users of the AllergyEats Facebook page to help drive its direction. I strongly recommend that readers become fans of our Facebook page and active in participating in and initiating conversations. This is the benefit of being part of a community such as ours.

Here’s a sample of recent Facebook questions asked and answered by fans of our page (though often I have to re-post the question so it hits the home page of all our fans):

8/8: Does anyone have a good travel agency that knows how to deal with food allergy issues? We are in Baltimore, but I don’t think location matters much in this day and age. Thanks for any suggestions! — 6 responses

8/7: Can anyone recommend a jewish sleep away camp where they felt their child was safe? My dd attended Kingswood for 2 nights. No one stopped her from eating pasta w/ egg, nor did they call me after she got sick. — 14 responses

8/6: Has anyone with food allergies gone to colonial Williamsburg? — 8 responses

8/5: I was wondering if anyone had tried the Nomato products. I’m really interested in them, but I’m not sure if they’ll taste decent. — 0 responses

8/5: Any advice on attending a wedding with a nut allergic child? — 8 responses

8/3: Anybody else finding that more and more hotel restaurants are asking proactively about food allergies? It’s been a very surpring, yet pleasant surprise to me. — 9 responses

8/2: Has anyone found a Wendy’s that could accommodate gluten-free? — 11 respones

7/28: Has anyone taken a European Cruise with a child who has allergies to dairy, eggs, nuts, fish, shellfish and sesame???? — 9 responses

You can see that the questions cover a broad and almost random array of food allergy topics, and the community is really stepping up to help each other.  (I also post all questions on Twitter (@AllergyEats) and copy relevant answers back to Facebook).  So once again, I strongly suggest that you visit our Facebook site (click here) AND become a fan by clicking “LIKE” at the top of the page.  Then, feel free to post any food allergy questions you think our wonderful community can help answer.

I also want to thank everyone who has recently joined both our Facebook community and our core AllergyEats membership community.  On Facebook, we have just increased membership by 30% in a week!  Our 600th member joined on Wednesday and our 700th yesterday.  Our core site’s membership is growing just as aggressively.  Clearly, word of AllergyEats is getting out and people are responding nicely.  And as I always try to remind everyone, the more members we have, the more valuable our core AllergyEats restaurant guide AND Facebook page will be.  So please keep spreading the word and forwarding our link (www.allergyeats.com).

Also, please remember to rate any restaurant you’ve dined at recently on the core AllergyEats site.  Our ratings base is surging along with our membership, but we still have so much more to go.  The more you rate, the more powerful a guide AllergyEats becomes.