Clinically and industrially relevant incurred reference materials to improve analysis of food allergens, milk, egg, almond, hazelnut and walnut

Measurement of food allergen protein concentrations against thresholds can improve allergen risk management and precautionary allergen labelling. However, such measurement suffers well known problems. The availability of well characterised reference materials (RMs) allows harmonisation of measurements between methods and across laboratories to help analysts provide meaningful information for risk assessors. We describe the preparation and characterisation of the first consensus informed industrially and clinically relevant multi-allergen matrix RM kit for five priority allergens. It consists of a medium analytical difficulty polyphenol-containing processed food chocolate paste matrix (a) devoid of allergens, and (b) incurred with five allergenic materials at the clinically relevant concentration of 10 mg kg-1 expressed as protein. The allergen raw materials: hens’ egg white powder, skimmed cows’ milk powder, almond powder (full fat), hazelnut powder (partially defatted), and walnut powder (partially defatted), are also available as RMs. Preparation, gravimetric traceability to the SI, homogeneity, and stability are described.