Ariana Grande was forced to cancel two shows in her home state of Florida this week after having a serious allergic reaction to tomatoes. The singer said that her throat nearly closed. “Still feels like I’m swallowing a cactus,” she wrote. Grande concluded the message with an all-caps send-off: “There is NOTHING MORE UNFAIR THAN AN ITALIAN WOMAN DEVELOPING AN ALLERGY TO TOMATOES IN HER MID TWENTIES.”
She’s not wrong. Grande, whose full last name is Grande-Butera, is half-Sicilian and half-Abruzzese. This means that like most Italian-Americans (including this writer) Grande consumes more tomato products than she does water. We always leave the gun and take the cannoli.
Grande’s canceled shows in her home state — May 28th in Tampa and May 29th in Orlando — have been rescheduled to November 24th and 25th. The singer is still scheduled to perform tonight, where she’ll play the first of two back-to-back nights at Miami’s American Airlines Arena.
According to the New York Post, Grande’s sudden allergic reaction is actually fairly common: more than half of adults with food allergies were diagnosed with them later in life. So from now on, Grande will have to stick to pesto.
