DougiesMommy,
I'm so glad I could help! It can be really scary dealing with food allergies; I'm glad I could help a bit.
A further note on the buffets:
At the Crystal Palace, there were two "wings" of the buffet area, each meant to serve one half of the restaurant. They were mirror images of each other, except for one vital difference: only one had peanut butter on it; the other was kept clear of it. I thought this was a great way to deal with the problem of drops of peanut butter landing in nearby dishes, or on the counters, etc.
As for peanut oil:
I was told by the Priority Seating (PS) people in January of 2003 that WDW had stopped using peanut oil in nearly all of their restaurants, due to concerns over food allergies. They warned that a few places at Epcot still might be using it, namely the Nine Dragons Restaurant in China, and the Mitsukoshi Teppan Yaki Dining Room in Japan (using sesame oil). I was told by one chef that they thought that the Nine Dragons had stopped using it too.
If you get an update on the use of peanut oil at WDW, would you post it here? Thanks!
A note: The PS people only have information about WDW-owned restaurants; other restaurants like Planet Hollywood, Rainforest Cafe, and the Downtown Disney restaurants, for example, need to be queried directly.
Best of luck!
Smilies to you and yours!
--CAT
