Meet Alpha-Gal Safe — Spot hidden mammal ingredients

Medical

Alpha-Gal Safe

Spot hidden mammal ingredients

What Alpha-Gal Safe does

Alpha-gal syndrome turns an ordinary grocery run into a minefield. The allergy isn't just to red meat — it's to a sugar found throughout mammals, and it hides in ingredients no generic allergy app knows to flag: gelatin in gummy vitamins, tallow in fried food, magnesium stearate in your pills, whey and casein in a protein bar, lanolin in lip balm, collagen in a supplement, mono- and diglycerides in ordinary bread. Reading labels becomes a second job, and the reaction that follows a mistake doesn't arrive at the table — it arrives four hours later, in the middle of the night, when nobody would ever suspect lunch.

Alpha-Gal Safe is built specifically for that problem. Paste or type any ingredient list and it scans the text against a bundled lexicon of 45 mammal-derived ingredients across foods, dairy, additives, medications and cosmetics, then returns a clear red, amber or green verdict with the exact flagged terms and a plain-language reason each one is risky. "Avoid" for gelatin and beef tallow; "Check the source" for the source-dependent culprits like glycerin and stearic acid that can be animal or plant; "Looks safe" when nothing turns up. It all runs entirely offline, so it works in the grocery aisle and at the restaurant table with no signal and no account.

The app's second half is the piece no reminders app or generic tracker can do: connecting a delayed reaction back to the meal hours earlier. Alpha-gal reactions characteristically land 2 to 6 hours after eating. Log your meals and, later, any reaction, and the timeline automatically surfaces the foods you ate inside that suspect window and highlights the risky ones — turning a pattern you could never see into an obvious link you can take to your allergist.

Because repeated tick bites can re-sensitize you and make reactions worse, there's a simple bite log too, plus a reference library of where mammal ingredients hide by category. Your foods, reactions and bites never leave your phone.

Alpha-Gal Safe is an educational organizer, not medical advice. The lexicon is a best-effort list and may not be exhaustive, and tolerance to dairy and other items varies from person to person — always verify with your allergist and read manufacturer labels. In an emergency, use your epinephrine and call 911.

• Offline ingredient checker: paste a label, get a red / amber / green verdict with the flagged terms and why • 45-term bundled mammalian-derivative lexicon across food, dairy, additives, medications and cosmetics • My Foods: a personal safe / caution / avoid list built from your own checks • Reaction diary with a 2–6h delayed-reaction timeline that back-links reactions to suspect meals • Tick-bite log, because new bites can re-sensitize you • Reference cards of hidden sources by category • 100% offline — no account, no upload, nothing leaves your phone

A look inside

Tap any screenshot to open the full-resolution version.

What's inside

• Ingredient check — Paste a label; get a red/amber/green verdict on hidden mammal ingredients.
• Delayed-reaction diary — Link a reaction to meals eaten 2–6h before it.
• Safe/unsafe foods — Your personal verified food list, offline.

Why we built it

People with alpha-gal syndrome can't spot hidden mammal-derived ingredients on labels, and can't connect a delayed 2–6h reaction back to the meal that caused it.

What makes it different

An offline ingredient checker with a 45-term mammalian-derivative lexicon plus a delayed-reaction diary that back-links symptoms to meals eaten hours earlier — the AGS-specific gap generic allergy apps miss.

Who it's for

Sandwich-generation caregivers, adult children of aging parents, and anyone keeping records for more than one person.

In one line: Spot hidden mammal ingredients

Try it

See the Spot hidden mammal ingredients for the full feature list, the info table, and support links.

Use Alpha-Gal Safe, found a bug, or have a feature request? Comments are open below — anonymous is fine.