Every venue must inform guests about the 14 allergens of Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011 – in writing, without them having to ask the staff, and for online orders before the purchase. In Poland the information must also include a list of ingredients with the allergens highlighted. WP InPlate guides you through this for every dish and shows customers the allergens in the menu and in the order email.
This is not legal advice. Agree the details for your venue with the sanitary inspectorate, a food technologist or a lawyer.
In short
- For every dish, tick the allergens and fill in Ingredients with the allergens highlighted.
- For add-ons (e.g. sauces), tick their allergens.
- Check the list of dishes without allergen information and fill in the gaps.
- Optionally, put an allergen chart on your website and print it for your venue.
The list of allergens
Products → Allergens (and KDS → Manager → Allergens) shows:
- The 14 allergens of the EU regulation numbered 1–14, with a hint where they usually hide, e.g. “Celery – broth, stock, vegetable seasoning mixes”. These allergens can't be changed or deleted.
- Own allergens – you add them with the Add own allergen button when the rules change or you want to mark something else (e.g. kiwi). You enter a name (customers see it) and a “where it may occur” hint (only you and your team see it). An own allergen gets the next number from 15.
- A counter of dishes without allergen information in the menu.
Deleting an own allergen removes it from all dishes and add-ons – the confirmation window says how many it affects. Orders already placed keep it.
Dish allergens
You tick allergens in three places – they work the same:
- the product editor in WordPress – the Allergens (WP InPlate) section,
- KDS → Manager → Products – the product edit window,
- InPlate dishes – the dish form (wp-admin and KDS).
Every allergen is a tile with a number, a name and a hint. Clicking changes its state:
| Click | State | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| first | contains | The allergen is in the dish |
| second | may contain | Trace amounts – voluntary information, shown separately |
| third | none | The allergen isn't there |
Tick Contains none of the allergens for a dish that deliberately has none of the allergens (e.g. water). The customer then sees “Allergens: none” with an info icon in the dish window – on hover or tap the icon shows which allergens are meant (all from the list, your own ones too). The email says just “Allergens: none”. A dish without any ticks and without this field is not filled in – the customer then sees no allergen information at all, not “no allergens”.
Ingredients is the list of the dish's ingredients. Select an allergen in it (e.g. “wheat flour”) and click Highlight – the customer sees it in bold, as the rules require. A preview shows under the field.
A dish's sizes (e.g. a 32 and 40 cm pizza) have the same allergens as the dish.
Add-on allergens
In add-on templates and in a product's own add-ons, every “Yes / no” and “Quantity” item and every choice option has an Allergens: … link. Click it and tick the item's allergens, e.g. pesto sauce – tree nuts. A mandatory surcharge (packaging) has no allergens.
What customers see
- The menu card – a small Contains allergens note under the description (or “May contain allergens”, “Allergens in add-ons”). On mouse hover or a tap on a phone a tooltip with the list appears, e.g. “Allergens: Gluten, Milk · May contain: Tree nuts”. Tapping the note doesn't open the dish.
- The dish window – under the description: Ingredients with the allergens in bold, Allergens and May contain. Add-ons and options have their allergens in brackets, e.g. “Pesto (Tree nuts)”.
- The same note with a tooltip is in cross-sell suggestions.
- The order email, the thank-you page and the order in “My account” – under each item, the allergens of the dish and the chosen add-ons.
- The order label – the allergens under each item, if you turn on Allergens on labels.
- The order summary (the form) doesn't show allergens – the customer saw them in the dish window before ordering.
The order saves the allergens from the moment it was placed. A later change of the dish's ingredients doesn't change what the customer got in the confirmation.
Where exactly customers see allergens (on the card and in the modal, only in the modal, or not at all) is set in InPlate → Settings → Sales → Showing allergens – see Settings.
Checklist and bulk editing
In KDS → Manager → Products:
- a dish without information has the note Allergens: not filled in,
- the Without allergen information (number) field shows only such dishes,
- the Allergen for the products shown bar adds or removes one allergen in all products in the list – e.g. choose the Pizza category, the Gluten allergen and click Add. The panel asks for a confirmation with the number of products.
Allergen chart
The InPlate – Allergen chart block (or the [wp-inplate-allergen-card] shortcode) shows a table of dishes with filled-in allergens, grouped by menu category, and the add-ons from templates that have allergens. The columns are the allergen numbers, and the legend is under the table. The Print button prints the chart – you can put it by the counter or by the menu. See Blocks and shortcodes.
Good to know
- Use “gluten-free” only for dishes that meet the 20 mg/kg limit. WP InPlate never adds it by itself – no gluten ticked doesn't mean “gluten-free”.
- TV screens don't show allergens yet.
- Allergens on the order label are off by default. You turn them on in the settings.
- Update the allergens whenever you change a supplier, a recipe and the daily dish.