US student dies from allergic reaction after restaurant changed recipe

Alison Pickering was on a first date when she suffered the allergic reaction. Photo / Facebook

A student in the US died from an allergic reaction after eating one of her favourite meals after the restaurant changed the recipe.

Alison Pickering, 23, went into anaphylactic shock after the restaurant, which she frequently dined at, put peanut sauce on her fish.

The student died just days before she was due to graduate.

“She would repeatedly go to the same restaurants and order the same dishes, you know. And that was a common thing,” her father, Grover Pickering, told CBS News.

In May 2023, Pickering, who in her spare time worked with children at a local church, went on a first date to a restaurant – which has not been identified – and ordered a plate of mahi mahi fish.

It was her regular order, but neither she nor the waiting staff knew that the recipe had changed to include a peanut sauce, according to her family.

According to her father, she “realised something was wrong” after “a few bites” and used her EpiPen and called an ambulance.

Although the student was able to walk out to the ambulance and talk to emergency responders, she later fell unconscious and died, her father said.

Pickering had been due to graduate from Tarleton State University in Stephenville, Texas, where she had studied agricultural communication for three years. In an internship in her final year, she worked teaching the disabled to ride horses.

According to an obituary published in a local paper, she died of a “severe anaphylactic shock from ingesting peanuts that were not disclosed on the restaurant menu”.

Pickering’s parents are now working to prevent others from dying because of hidden allergens at restaurants, arguing that ingredients should be clearly communicated to customers.

“It’s tragic and it doesn’t need to happen to anyone else,” her father said.