What allergen management software actually does
Strip away the marketing and it's a handful of jobs: hold an allergen profile against every ingredient, work out which allergens end up in a finished recipe or dish without you re-typing them each time, keep that up to date the moment an ingredient changes, and produce something you can hand to a customer or an inspector — a printed sheet, a matrix, or a PPDS label for anything sold prepacked.
Everything else — invoice scanning, costing, stock, staff training, QR menus — is a different job that some of these products bundle in alongside allergen tracking, and some don't. Worth knowing which is which before you compare on price.
For the legal side of what UK allergen rules actually require, see our allergen law guide — this page is specifically about the software options for managing it.
What to actually check before you buy
The comparison
Three real options that all do allergen tracking as a core feature, not a bolt-on. Kitchen Control and MenuIQ are built for kitchens serving food live; FoodCore is built for a different job — small producers packaging food to sell, not a live kitchen.
| Capability | Kitchen Control | FoodCore | MenuIQ |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ingredient-level allergen tracking | Yes — core feature | Yes — with nested sub-recipe propagation | Yes — core feature |
| Cascades automatically to recipes & dishes | Yes | Yes | Not detailed publicly |
| Printed PPDS / Natasha's Law labels | Yes | Yes — allergens auto-bolded | Yes |
| Allergen matrix / sheet for the whole menu or range | Yes | Yes — updates automatically | Not detailed publicly |
| Who it's actually built for | Independent kitchens serving live — cafes, pubs, restaurants, takeaways | Small food producers packaging goods — bakeries, home bakers, market stalls | Hospitality groups needing allergens + nutrition + HACCP + QR menus together |
| Monthly price | £12.99 flat, one plan | Tiered plans, roughly £19–£65 depending on plan | Quote after a demo — not public |
| Free trial | 30 days (card required, not charged if you cancel) | 7 days, no card required | Demo + onboarding process |
| Bringing your existing data in yourself | Yes — self-serve spreadsheet import | Not confirmed | Ask them directly |
If PPDS/Natasha's Law labelling specifically — rather than allergen tracking generally — is the main thing you're buying for, see the dedicated PPDS & food labelling software comparison and the Natasha's Law guide for what the law actually requires.
Who each one is actually for
Kitchen Control
A single-site independent kitchen — cafe, pub, restaurant, takeaway, bakery-that-also-serves — that wants allergens, recipe costing and invoice scanning in one place, set up in an afternoon, without a sales call.
FoodCore
A small food producer selling packaged goods — a home baker, a market stall, a farm shop — who needs PPDS labels and a production/stock workflow more than live-service allergen checks.
MenuIQ
A multi-site hospitality group that needs allergens, nutrition/calorie data and HACCP tooling together, and doesn't mind a demo-led sales process to get there.
What a spreadsheet still does fine
If you're a genuinely small, one-person operation on top of your own numbers, a spreadsheet costs nothing and works — right up until a second person needs the same information at the same time, or you need to hand something to an inspector that looks like it was built for the job rather than bent into shape. See our full spreadsheet comparison for where that line actually sits.
Allergens are one part of a wider set of obligations — see our UK food business compliance checklist for where allergen management fits alongside registration, hygiene ratings and HACCP.
Allergen management software: common questions
What is allergen management software?
Software that tracks which of the 14 regulated allergens are present in each ingredient and recipe, then rolls that up automatically into an allergen matrix and PPDS labels — instead of someone maintaining a spreadsheet by hand and updating it every time a recipe or supplier ingredient changes.
What are the 14 allergens I need to track under UK law?
Celery, cereals containing gluten, crustaceans, eggs, fish, lupin, milk, molluscs, mustard, nuts, peanuts, sesame, soybeans and sulphur dioxide/sulphites. UK food businesses must be able to tell a customer which of these are in any dish, whether it's on a menu, over a counter or on a PPDS label.
Does allergen software replace a spreadsheet allergen matrix?
It does the same job — a grid of dishes against the 14 allergens — but builds it automatically from ingredient data rather than someone re-checking and re-typing it every time a recipe changes. See our spreadsheet comparison for where a spreadsheet still holds up and where it starts to break down.
Can allergen data update automatically when a recipe or ingredient changes?
In Kitchen Control, yes — allergens are tracked at ingredient level, so changing a recipe's ingredients or scanning a new ingredient label updates every affected dish's allergen status and PPDS label immediately.
Does allergen software cover PPDS labelling too, or just an allergen matrix?
That depends on the product — some tools stop at the matrix. Kitchen Control generates full PPDS labels from the same recipe data, since a label is really the allergen matrix plus the ingredients list in the specific format Natasha's Law requires. See our PPDS & food labelling software comparison for that side of it specifically.
Is allergen software worth it for a single small kitchen?
If you're a genuinely small, one-person operation who already knows every dish's allergens from memory, a spreadsheet or even a written list can work. It starts paying for itself once a second person needs the same answer, ingredients change often enough that manual updates get missed, or an inspector wants to see something more robust than a bent-into-shape spreadsheet.
Kitchen Control is £12.99/month, one plan, everything included — no separate allergen add-on, no per-location pricing, no demo required to see what it actually does.
START YOUR FREE 30-DAY TRIAL