Having a hazelnut allergy is one of the most oddly inconvenient afflictions. Beyond the typical teasing for being an adult with a nut allergy, I’ve found that it is not even a particularly relevant allergy to have. Hazelnuts are not as ubiquitous as dairy or gluten. Nor are they rare, appearing just often enough, unpredictably, to demand constant vigilance. At Oxford, this vigilance surrounding hazelnuts is especially present at formal hall.
I am not alone. Food allergy diagnoses in the UK have doubled in a decade, as have hospital admissions for severe allergic reactions in the last twenty years.
Formal is one of Oxford’s most cherished rituals: a carefully choreographed, multi-course dinner where students don oversized gowns (though absent at some of the more progressive colleges), Latin grace is mumbled with varying degrees of confidence, and candlelight flickers beneath the watchful gaze of portraits whose subjects might seem faintly disapproving of your conversation. Yet, for those with food allergies or dietary restrictions, the theatrical excitement of attending a formal can be overshadowed by the anxiety and pre-planned negotiation that our presence demands.
If you have never had a dietary restriction, you have probably never given much thought to what happens after you submit one. For those of us who have, it is something we think about every time we attend a formal.
Dietary restrictions must be submitted in advance. Sometimes via a dining portal, sometimes by email, and sometimes just by tracking down the right person. The processes of submitting dietary information, nor the accommodations offered, are standardised across colleges.
As a student with an allergy, the accurate communication of that information is not a minor administrative detail – it is a matter of safety and belonging. Recently, I found myself curious about the behind-the-scenes process: how colleges receive dietary information, where and how it travels, and what care is taken to ensure that, by the time a plate lands in front of you, it is the right one.
Behind the scenes
Alicia Gardiner, Events & Bookings Systems Manager for Kellogg College, shared that their system begins long before any student sets foot in the dining hall. Guests book and pay for formals through UPay, a platform which many – but not all – Oxford colleges use. The dietary requirements section on Kellogg’s UPay is mandatory to complete the booking. Diners must either specify a restriction or explicitly state that they have none before they can complete the booking.
According to Alicia, this small design choice has transformed the process. “If you were talking to me two years ago when I could not make that box mandatory, I found it much more stressful”, she said. Previously, guests would click past the field and then email at the last minute with a sudden recollection of a shellfish allergy or a newly observed Lent.
From there, the process is an exercise in mindful redundancy. Two weeks before a dinner, Kellogg sends a confirmation email inviting students to update guest names or dietary requirements if needed. A few days before the meal, Alicia pulls a booking report and compiles a dietary requirement spreadsheet, which she shares with the kitchen and restaurant teams.
It is the next step that distinguishes Kellogg’s system from other colleges: they use pre-assigned seating, plotted in a program called Perfect Table Plan.
As Alicia explained: “It’s really easy to make mistakes if you don’t know where people are sitting in advance.”
Each diner with a dietary requirement is marked on the table with a colour-coded dot, signalling a different requirement to the service team. The diner’s place card will feature the dot but will not outwardly indicate the specific restriction a student has. As Alicia explained, dietary information is treated as personal information, and Kellogg has deliberately chosen not to publicise it. For example, pregnant guests may not want a card announcing this in front of their plate.
For guest night formals, the restaurant manager designates what Alicia calls an “allergy champion” – a member of the service team responsible for every guest with a dietary requirement that evening. While the rest of the team serves the standard courses, the allergy champion moves through the hall with the seating plan in hand, locating each coloured dot, and delivering the correct plate to the right person.
On any given formal evening, Alicia estimates that somewhere between 10 and 30% of guests will have some form of dietary restriction. Some are simple, some are complex. Alicia recalled one diner who submitted a three-page Word document detailing her restrictions. However complex the requirement, Alicia was proud to share that no one leaves the hall without the right meal.
Sarah Davidson, the Communications and Events Manager at Reuben College, explained that Reuben College operates on a similar system: guests register online, dietary information is compiled into a shared spreadsheet, and place cards are marked with a yellow dot to flag modifications. The specific restriction is also noted on the place card. The key difference is seating. At Reuben, students choose their own seats on the day of the formal. As such, events staff make note at the start of each formal of where any guest with a modification is sitting, so that the kitchen can ensure they receive the correct plate.
Sarah shared that her team is receptive to changing procedures to better accommodate the needs of any student. “If a student raises something, an issue from their side, we will see what we can do.” One change her team is currently considering concerns the place cards themselves: “We are looking into whether on the place card, we put the dietary restrictions only on the side facing the student [with the restriction].” This would make the information not visible to the person across from the student, as it currently is. The team is considering this not because students have raised it as a concern, but as a proactive measure to further improve the experience of those with dietary restrictions.
Of the kitchen’s ability to meet whatever request comes through, Sarah was confident: “I’ve seen a whole range of different dietary requirements or dietary preferences, and they’ve [the kitchen] never not been able to accommodate those.”
Richard Murphy, Catering Services Manager at Exeter College, echoed the value of UPay as an organising tool. “UPay is really good. Probably about half the colleges use it”, he noted. “As far as dietary requirements and allergies [it] does a lot of the work for us.” Exeter uses a free-text box for more unusual or complex requirements – Richard used a celery allergy as an example. This ensures that nothing falls through the cracks for students with less common restrictions.
When a student with a restriction arrives at formal at Exeter, their requirements are flagged automatically by the UPay system upon check-in, and they collect a ‘dietary card’ from the Hall supervisor. On most evenings, the system runs effectively from here. “If something does happen on the night of, we can then adjust.” Richard explained that this might look like a student clicking the wrong allergen box or misreading a menu. He notes, however, that this is rare.
Richard closed by stating: “The main point is that as long as students are upfront and honest about their requirements, most things can be achieved.”
At Queen’s College, Sean Ducie, Head Chef, shared that “accommodating dietary requirements is a major priority for us, and we work hard to ensure that our formal hall menus are inclusive, safe, and enjoyable for all students.”
At the menu design stage itself, the College takes a proactive approach. Sean explained: “When designing our menus, we focus on seasonal, local produce, and work closely with Good Food Oxfordshire and OxFarmtoFork to bring in produce directly from market gardens and small city farms. This allows us to offer fresh, diverse dishes while supporting local growers,” Sean noted, “alongside this, we aim to keep menus as naturally low‑allergen as possible.” The goal, he added, is to provide “an allergen‑free version of a dish that feels as close as possible to the original, so that no student feels like their meal is an afterthought.”
The other side of the place card
The systems colleges put in place tell part of the story. The students with yellow dots on their place cards tell the rest.
Psychologists and allergists have identified two primary types of anxiety that food allergy sufferers experience: anxiety about eating the allergen, and anxiety related to the social experience of having one. In the highly ritualised and formalised context of an Oxford formal, these pressures are amplified. Questioning a server mid-course can draw attention and disrupt the choreography of a meal. The anxiety is not merely about what is on the plate, but about what it means to be the one to have to ask.
Green Templeton College is frequently described as having one of Oxford’s best (and most expensive) formals. That cost, some students argue, buys a more considered approach to dietary accommodations.
During Michaelmas term, I was surprised to receive an email from Green Templeton’s dining staff asking me to clarify which nuts I could eat, as chestnuts were on the menu for a Christmas formal I was attending. The gesture was small, but it surprised me. It did not feel like an exercise in compliance. Instead, I felt confident that someone had actually read what I had submitted and taken the time to respond with care and precision. When I walked into the formal, I was confident that I could enjoy good food and company without anxiety or embarrassment.
Nandini, a vegetarian student at Green Templeton, found the college’s approach to accommodations generally impressive. She told Cherwell: “I genuinely find the vegetarian food at Green Templeton better than other colleges. For formals, since the expectation is just to have a nice meal, which doesn’t necessarily have to be healthy, I am usually more satisfied.”
Not all experiences at Green Templeton were as encouraging. Alina, a student who observes a halal diet, told Cherwell: “At Green Templeton, I’d say it’s pretty disappointing. I always put down halal, but normally get served a vegetarian meal, presumably that’s what happens if they aren’t going to do halal on a specific day. The only time I’ve had halal at Green Templeton is on a special guest night.”
Alina had a further concern: “I was served a vegetarian meal once, which the menu said had alcohol in it, which Muslims can’t have either. After a bit of back and forth, they confirmed that the version they served me was vegetarian and non-alcoholic, but that was a bit of a panic for me.”
Trinity College has also been reported as accommodating. Heewoon, a student at Trinity who does not eat fish, told Cherwell: “My college is very respectful about dietary requirements compared to other colleges, with multiple options.”
Abdullah, a Trinity student who observes a halal diet, told Cherwell his experience dining at Trinity has been “thoroughly pleasant,” praising the consistency, variety, and quality of halal options. He noted that even the vegan options proved generally agreeable, adding: “Trinity College strives to be inclusive of all students enrolled here. As a natural extension of that ethos, the dining experience reflects this commitment.”
At Balliol College, Alina found that although the alternative offered was a convincing vegan recreation of the meat dish served to others, the service itself revealed the system’s imperfections. After some initial confusion over which plate was hers, a server returned to confirm the dish was halal. Reflecting on the experience, Alina told Cherwell: “It was probably a reminder for them to pay a little more attention while they’re serving.”
At Cambridge, Hannah Mawardi, a student at Pembroke College writing for Varsity in 2024, recounted being served sesame – her allergen – three times, despite notifying catering staff of her serious allergy. The third incident ended with her in A&E, still donning her gown. She noted that she had later learned that catering had received the wrong dietary information entirely.
Whether at Oxford or Cambridge, the safety of participating in formal hall depends on the accurate communication of dietary requirements across multiple levels: when that transmission falters, the consequences can be life-threatening.
The small print
When contacted for comment, the University of Oxford stated that food allergy policies are set by the respective colleges rather than centrally and, therefore, the University does not provide university-wide guidance.
Natasha’s Law requires UK businesses to label or inform customers about the top 14 allergens, and all Oxford colleges must adhere to this legislation. This information is often on clear display at lunches and in buffet formats, but can be harder to trace at formal hall, where menus are not always distributed in advance – especially not to guests from outside the college.
Practical challenges compound this uncertainty. At colleges without assigned formal seating, students with allergies and dietary restrictions are often given simple place cards on arrival to place near their plate, indicating their needs. In theory, it is a simple system; in practice, when servers move quickly through a candlelit hall, plates arrive with little explanation. It can be remarkably difficult to tell whether the dish that has landed in front of you has been modified to your needs or is simply the standard meal.
A seat at the table
Some colleges are rising to this challenge: consider Kellogg’s allergy champions, Reuben’s proactive problem-solving, Green Templeton’s thoughtful emails, and Trinity’s consistent halal options. These are not novel innovations, but they make a real difference to diners with dietary restrictions. With food allergy policy set at college level, the problem is that such practices are not always shared or standardised.
Food is more than just sustenance. It is connection. It is culture. At Oxford, it is a central part of student social life. Inclusion does not end at being allowed into the hall. It requires that, once inside, every student has the same opportunity to participate. For students with food allergies and restrictions like myself, this principle is tested three courses at a time.
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