Reacting to restaurant food but never sure to what? Garlic is in a huge share of savoury dishes, often as powder you cannot see. Our test checks your blood for IgE antibodies to a whole garlic extract, as part of 300 allergens and allergen components including onion, celery and mugwort pollen.
Garlic belongs to the Allium family, with onion, leek, chives and shallot. Garlic food allergy is uncommon, but garlic causes trouble in two quite different ways, and only one of them is IgE.
The IgE route is the one this test looks at: antibodies that recognise garlic proteins and can trigger quick reactions after eating or breathing in garlic dust. The other route is a delayed skin allergy from handling raw garlic, common in chefs and kitchen staff. It shows up as cracked, itchy fingertips and is checked with a patch test, not a blood test. Both can happen in the same person.
After eating garlic, people describe itching in the mouth, hives, stomach cramps or, rarely, breathing trouble. People who handle garlic powder at work sometimes describe a runny nose, sneezing or wheezing. With spices in general, sensitisation often comes through pollen, particularly mugwort and birch, rather than through food first.
Swelling of the lips, tongue or throat, trouble breathing or feeling faint after eating is an emergency. Call 112 (EU) or your local emergency number. Do not wait for a test.
A positive garlic result shows that your blood has IgE that recognises garlic proteins. It does not tell you that you will react, or how strongly. Feeling bloated or getting heartburn after garlic is common and usually has nothing to do with IgE.
If onion and mugwort also show up, that points to a wider pattern. A doctor reads the result together with your history. Do not cut garlic out on the strength of a result alone.
Your finger-prick sample goes to the lab, which measures IgE to a whole garlic extract. A whole extract contains the mix of proteins in garlic, so it shows whether you are sensitised to garlic as a whole, not which single protein your antibodies recognise. Your lab report gives a measured value and class, from Negative to Very high, on the same report as onion, celery and mugwort.
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One finger-prick sample checks IgE to 300 allergens and allergen components, from birch and peanut to cat and house dust mite. Post it to the lab, and about 5 days after it arrives you get a value for every one. Our plain-English guide shows you how to read them. €399 in total, €1.33 per allergen.
They are different things. An allergy involves IgE antibodies, which this test measures. Bloating, wind or heartburn after garlic are common and usually not IgE. The test shows whether IgE to garlic is there; a doctor puts it in context.
That is usually a delayed contact allergy, not IgE. It is common in chefs and is checked with a patch test. A blood IgE test does not measure it. See a doctor or dermatologist about it.
Not automatically. Garlic and onion are related and often appear together in results, but that does not mean you react to both. The test checks both in the same sample, and a doctor can read the pattern.
