Need cashews for challenge but allergic to peanuts

[Beach Girl]

I am hoping someone can help me figure out how to find cashews that are free of peanut cross contamination.  I am allergic to peanuts and avoided tree nuts until two years ago.  My skin test and blood tests have always been negative for all tree nuts.  About two years ago, I had an almond challenge with Blue Diamond almonds which I passed. 

I am also allergic to milk, but I am fine with milk cross contamination.  I have always used Silk soy milk.  Now that Silk soy milk is on shared lines with cashew milk, we need to know if I am truly not allergic to cashews.  I was tested again recently and was negative.  I was scheduled for a challenge, but we cancelled when we could not find cashews that were free of a peanut warning.  We thought about using Silk cashew milk, but it has a warning for all tree nuts.  Plus we are wondering if we can be sure that the cashews that Silk uses for their cashew milk are free of peanut cross contamination.  There is no peanut warning, but I don`t know where the cashews come from that Silk uses.

Does anyone have any ideas?  The challenge is not so that I can eat cashews, but just to be sure that I can drink Silk soy milk which is now cashew cross contaminated. TIA!

[Macabre]

We have a thread for peanut free treenuts. 

Sources for Peanut FREE treenuts

[CMdeux]

Since your goal is to be able to consume Silk, it seems to me that logically, challenging with the Silk product that you are concerned about would be the most straightforward goal-- regardless of their sourcing, I mean.

That is, even if the Silk cashew milk is cross-contaminated routinely with almonds or some other tree nut, the most obvious challenge is to use the Silk cashew milk.  If you aren't sure of the sourcing behind it, then being scrupulous about sourcing cashews for your own challenge may not be that much help if you can't trust that the Silk cashew milk isn't cross-contaminated with other nuts after you've passed a cashew challenge.

Have you tried calling Silk to find out what they say re: cross-contact risks?  I might start there. 

[ninjaroll]

Turtle Mountain will batch test and have strict controls.  I would put one of their products in the running although CM has a more valid point to test with what you will be consuming on a regular basis.  It has higher validity.

[Beach Girl]

This is fabulous!  Thank you!  I called Tierra Farms from the other thread linked below and their tree nuts are all free of peanut cross contamination.

About Silk, I just want to make sure that I can consume Silk soy milk.  I figure if the cashew milk is cross contaminated with other tree nuts, but I pass the challenge, then the soy milk cross contaminated with the cashew milk should be fine.  We nixed it when my mom called Silk and they could not tell us if they are certain that the cashews in the cashew milk are free of peanut cross contamination.  My mother is a physician and she spoke with someone in upper management, not the regular telephone rep who reads a script.  She spoke with someone at the Corporate Office who seemed to understand the concern.  The woman was supposed to get back to her, but never did.  My mother has been leaving voice mails for a few weeks.  It does not look like we will ever find out.

If the Silk soy milk is cross contaminated with Silk cashew milk and the cashews are peanut cross contaminated, the allergist says I do not have to worry about peanut cross contamination in the soy milk, since it is so far removed (drinking something that is cross contaminated with something that is cross contaminated with peanuts).  But if the cashews in the cashew milk are cross contaminated with peanuts, then I really cannot drink it for a challenge.

The peanut free tree nut thread is very helpful.  I will order cashews from Tierra Farms for the challenge.

[Kaye Whalen]

I recently developed an oral allergy syndrome to almonds, so I switched to Silk Soymilk.  I had a similar reaction (but milder) upon drinking the soymilk as I do with almonds.  I have written to the company and am awaiting response.  I'll also try phoning them.  Just wanted others to know that I was the guinea pig, and what my reaction was to this product.  Even though the label says that they use strict allergen safety measures, the rest of the statement on the carton I bought (and on their website) is very ambiguous, and not clear as to whether or not there is any cross contamination with nut products.

[spacecanada]

Silk products have cross contamination with almond, coconut, cashew, and hazelnut.  Possibly others.  I broke out in hives and eczema before they started labelling for the almond cross contamination (and their almond milk wasn't available in our area yet, so I didn't know about it.)

They used to have a 'may contain' warning on their packages.  I haven't checked recently because they're off-limits for me.   

[CMdeux]

Yeah-- DD quit being able to do them about the time that they added the cashew line (big surprise)-- we didn't know that it existed (wasn't on the website, etc for another 12 months or so, but it was consistent enough we knew that SOMETHING had changed).


Silk also has had a TON of milk XC problems over the years-- fine for people like my DD who tolerated that much regular contamination, but not a good idea, probably, for people with super-low thresholds for reaction.