I’ve never needed glasses or contact lenses. Until now. I blame all the squinting at my screen during the last year, partly because I have attempted to zoom in on countless Nutrition Facts and ingredient labels in food products. I’m not analyzing them for any macro or micronutrient data, (in fact, I rarely ever consulted labels before my son started eating solids) — I’m scanning them for potential allergens. My sweet baby boy has multiple food allergies and it’s been a struggle, even as a dietitian, to find brands of foods that can keep him safe. Nothing is as precious to me as this little giggling boy, and ensuring I can safely filter out, literally, his allergens from my grocery selections lifts a weight off my shoulders, so the only weight I have to bear is his full throttle gleeful leaps into my lap. I can tell that a dietitian was involved in the algorithm used to create my new favorite online grocery shopping platform, Sifter.shop, because all of the Top 9 allergens are embedded in the filter (sometimes sesame gets abandoned in the fuss… but I was thankful to see it included!)
Sifter has over 100 dietary filters to uniquely customize a shopping experience. It has opened my eyes to new and exciting brands and products. When you’re an allergy mom, it’s really easy to get caught in a rotational rut of the same four or five meals. This might lead to picky eating later down the road, and that is not a nutritional nut I want to crack (allergy pun!), so I am in real need of diversity. It’s also really special to be introduced to brands whose mission compels them to donate proceeds back to food allergy research; several brands I found on Sifter do this, and I would never have known about them otherwise.
With nut and seed allergies in particular, it’s also indelibly difficult to find brands whose products have a low or nonexistent chance of cross contamination with other allergens. And while I’d love to meander through the aisles of the grocery store and call every brand’s hotline to confirm ingredient integrity, the pandemic and new motherhood severely limited my time and ability to shop in person. Sifter does all this legwork for me; I can simply add items to my cart from trusted retailers and shop with confidence. It even has a nifty feature called RecipeSifter, where I can drop my weekly recipes into its portal and it will recommend products for me. Nifty and ~sifty.
Baby doesn’t get to have all the fun; I have a unique profile for myself/my husband. I still get to enjoy all the allergens, so I’m always sniffing out new portable snacks to stock in my purse as we return to public life. Part of my pre-pandemic job was combing the grocery store aisles for new products to recommend to clients, now Sifter helps me accomplish this from the comfort of my mismatched athleisure at home so I don’t have to obey the inane one-way directional aisle laws at the supermarket. I can stop and smell the roses/nut butter, remotely.
This post was sponsored by Sifter [link to sifter.shop]. I received compensation, but all opinions are my own.
The information provided by Sifter is not intended to diagnose, cure, treat, or prevent any disease or medical health condition nor substitute for advice from your own healthcare provider. Sifter users are encouraged to check product labels to be certain product choices match personal preferences.
