A Restaurant In Montreal Caters To Customers With Food Allergies Of All Kinds

Almost 70% of the world’s population is allergic to different kinds of food that is commonly found in popular dishes. Whether it’s gluten, milk products, eggs, shellfish, soy and all kinds of nuts, most people are allergic to something. Which is why when starting a restaurant, it’s important to make it clear on the menus which are items that have allergens and give customers the option to get allergen-free food as well.

To solve that problem entirely, a restaurant in Montreal – Zero8 – has a full-fledged menu without the eight most common allergens – peanuts, nuts, sesame, soy, fish or shellfish, eggs, milk products and gluten.

And it’s extremely popular, to the point where when the cost of rent was too much for the restaurant to remain open, regular customers encouraged owner Dominique Dion to start a crowd-funding project. Dion ran the project and the funds he raised allowed him to reopen the restaurant two years later.

When Dion developed a dairy and gluten allergy, he started to get interested in food intolerance and allergies, which led him to opening the restaurant and catering to a section of people that can’t eat out all the time and can’t properly enjoy what most restaurants serve. At Zero8, two chefs work on gluten-free recipes to give customers the best they can get, including a chocolate mousse and house-smoked duck poutine.

In conversation with Montreal Gazette, Kim Dufour, a regular at the restaurant said that Zero8 gives them an opportunity to dine in a stress-free and allergen-free environment. “To us it was pretty much a miracle. My daughter had never been to a restaurant before because it was too dangerous because of the cross contamination. At Zero8, they get it. They do their homework. They verify their suppliers, which is different from other places. Other places say, ‘Yeah, she’s fine, but you never know. We can’t tell you 100 percent.’”

While there’s only one restaurant so far, Dion’s crowd-funding project is still on-going so that he can expand and open in more locations.