Food allergies advice

UlrikeDG

Admin - CPS Technician Emeritus
I used to be on POFAK back when it was a Yahoo Group. However, now they charge $25 for posting access or even to read most of the forums (and I won't go into how angry it makes me, since I posted advice on those forums before they started charging!). Er... Anyway, those of you dealing with FAs, where do you go for recipes & advice?
 
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LuvBug

New member
a lot of times I take a recipe and alter it to fit our needs. I use to have a site bookmarked of alternatives to ingredients in cooking and baking. Probably depending on the allergy is how difficult that is.
Really Ive always relied on google for finding recipes, I just type in key words and look through them. I am a whiz in the kitchen though, I love concocting things.
ThePeach might have some good ones, I know one of her sons is allergic to a bit.
 

tchrgrrl

New member
I just modify existing recipes but the allergies in our house aren't as difficult to work around as some (chocolate and all dairy).
 

Lea_Ontario

Well-known member
I gave up on POFAK. Between the $25 fee, and that with "only" 2 allergies, of which only 1 is life threatening - it seemed that we weren't severe enough to count there, it wasn't welcoming in the least.

With Boo's allergies, I either modify recipes, or look to vegan recipes (his allergies are to dairy and egg, but we are also avoiding peanuts, treenuts and shellfish).
 
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Patriot201

Car-Seat.org Ambassador
I modify recipes.

I don't have to modify much, since my food allergies (albeit they are life-threatening) are "only" to fish and shellfish. Generally, the only time I have to modify recipes is when the recipe calls for Worstashire (how do you spell that?) sauce. Instead of using worstashire (however you spell it) sauce, I make my own brine out of salt and water. It works just as well.


I also modify LIFE.

My fish and shellfish allergies are severe enough that smelling the offending substances is enough to send me into an allergic fit. I can't go to any restaurants that sell fish or shellfish. I have to be REALLY careful who I talk to because if they have just eaten fish or shellfish, they could cause me problems. I have to be careful at work because I can't be around people's lunches if they have fish or shellfish.

You do what you have to do.
I don't particularly enjoy using Epi-pens or suffocating due to swelling, so I am MORE than willing to make modifications. :)
 

Jeanum

Admin - CPS Technician Emeritus
Staff member
DD1 is allergic to eggs and peanuts and requires an Epipen on standby at all times. I'm really not a regular on any particular online allergy forum.

I have an egg-free cookbook called "Baking without Eggs" by Rosemarie Emro, and have a few vegan or egg-free recipes culled from the local newspaper's food section and some mainstream magazines. I'm honestly not much of a baker or experimenter in the kitchen, and now just avoid products and recipes with peanuts or eggs rather than try to modify them. I had some disastrous results when I did try to experiment with standard recipes when I tried to come up with a passable egg-free cake for DD1's first birthday, lol. I made about half a dozen cakes that either disintegrated when I tried to remove them from the baking pan, or were pretty much inedible if they did survive extraction from the pan, lol.

For convenience, I like to use Cherrybrook Kitchen cake and cookie mixes which are egg and peanut free, or an eggless chocolate cake recipe MIL found in a women's magazine. Cherrybrook Kitchen also has some gluten free baking mix versions, but I don't think any of their mixes are dairy free unless you modify the instructions. Some mixes call for milk and/or butter, or may have dairy in the mix out of the box if I remember correctly. The Cherrybrook mixes and MIL's egg-free chocolate cake recipe turn out pretty well, but tend be kind of crumbly and more fragile than standard baked goods. They're not as moist and don't rise as much as baked goods containing eggs. My understanding is that eggs usually serve as a leavening and moistening agent, causing cakes and cookies to rise and helping to hold them together.

I do need to bake some safe goodies for Christmas Eve and Christmas day, and I'm going to try out some organic Nature's Path double fudge brownie mix that doesn't call for eggs. If those are a flop, then I'll revert back to the Cherrybrook Kitchen cookie mixes as a backup plan. ;)
 

Splash

New member
We don't give him solid food. I realize that is a bit more extreme than your looking for though!
Charlie gets very little in the way of food, because his immune problem gives him basically a revolving door of allergies. We know that big ones that he is truly allergic to (fish, shellfish, eggs, peanuts, tree nuts, avocado, papaya, mango, banana, peaches, apricots, anything latex based) but then because his IgE is so high, his body randomly reacts to things. So something he is fine with today could send him into shock tomorrow and be fine again by next week. Much easier for us to half starve ourselves and breastfeed exclusively. Although there are some foods he does have (mostly whole foods) and we're just really vigilant. If we DO make something that calls for something he can't have, but we want him to have it, we just substitute. Plus we have had to cut a lot out of our diet, and we just substitute for everything. The hardest thing to substitute or omit is eggs... they are so multi purpose!
 

Jeanum

Admin - CPS Technician Emeritus
Staff member
I double checked the Cherrybrook Kitchen baking mixes in my pantry, and they're all dairy-free out of the box. But the instructions for some varieties do say to add butter/margarine when preparing the mix, with the option of substituting dairy-free butter/margarine.
 

thepeach80

Senior Community Member
Are you looking for anything in particular? I'm still on POFAK b/c w/ all the problems we were having w/ Evan, I had to join pretty much. I'm thinking I won't rejoin in Feb though when my membership is up. The Food allergies board on babycenter is really good and they post a lot of recipes. I also host the 2 food allergies boards on She Knows, one is a cooking board w/ a lot of recipes posted. I'm dairy, soy, egg, and wheat free right now so I'm trying to find recipes myself to take to dinner on Christmas since I can't eat what anyone else brings (except the ham, lol). I have quite a few recipes saved and most I can just modify to meet my needs. I recently learned you can buy a gluten free flour mix from Bob's Red Mill to substitute in any recipe for flour. That's great b/c I never got the hang of flour substitutions. Also, I think at allrecipes.com you can put in that you're avoiding certain foods and it will find you recipes w/out that. PM me though (or post here) if you need something specific and I'll see if I can find it for you. I love a challenge. :)
 

Splash

New member
Are you really up for a challenge?
I want egg free brownies that don't taste like sawdust or have the consistency of unset concrete. And don't cost $12/batch.
 

thepeach80

Senior Community Member
Can you guys not do the ener-g egg replacer? That's always worked for us. Evan's first birthday cake had like 5 ingredients and I thought it was pretty good. lol It was dairy, soy, egg, gluten, wheat, and nut free. :)
 

Splash

New member
I have used that. I have pictures in my flickr of what the brownies turned out to be. Actually, I even have a blog post about those brownies. I'll go dig it up. I will say one thing though, they were NOT water soluble.

ETA- Here it is! http://faggotsonthethirdfloor.blogspot.com/2006/02/great-brownie-experiment.html
What that DOESN'T say is that I soaked the pan for HOURS and the tar pit had not dissolved at all. Still a rock suitable for shelter.
http://faggotsonthethirdfloor.blogspot.com/2006/02/revenge-of-tar-pits.html
 

didymama

New member
not sure if this will help, but the kitchen survival guide has a whole substitution section. not really geared to allergies, but might help since the subs are practical. we are lucky not to have any major allergies here, but we do watch david with soy. i am also suspecting some of nate's behavioral stuff is food related. my dad can't do garlic, so when he comes up here and we go out to eat it is usually a burger place or sushi. which is hard since our town is SO italian!!

any of there no-dairy folk ever try doing raw milk. we are going to try this. it still has the enzymes in it that get killed in processing so some people that can't do regular milk are fine with raw. and you don't use as much since it is richer. one of my friends runs a co-op for it.
 
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Jeanum

Admin - CPS Technician Emeritus
Staff member
I haven't tried the Ener-g product. I hadn't heard of it at the time I was trying to come up with an egg-free first bday cake, lol, and haven't tried using it since either. I'll have to give it a try some day.

DH took both DDs to story time and on a secret holiday shopping mission of some sort, so I'm taking advantage of the kid-free time and trying to get the baking done without little helpers trying to touch the oven. I have a batch of the egg-free Nature's Path brownies baking at the moment, and a batch of Cherrybrook Kitchen mix egg-free brownies cooling now. The Cherrybrook brownies seemed pretty moist and more like cake than a brownie when I cut them and moved them to the cooling rack. They're also very fragile on the edges and I'm not sure if these brownies will survive transporting to MIL's for Christmas Eve. They're too hot to sample for taste and texture at the moment. DH, aka Mr. Picky, will be our taste tester when he gets home.

One perk of egg-free baking: we can lick the bowl/spoon without worrying about raw eggs, lol.
 

LuvBug

New member
yeah DS's first b-day cake was a egg, soy, gluten, wheat, dairy, nut free carrot cake lol! It pretty much was carrots, applesauce, bananas, and some good flours that he could do. Then I used non-dairy topping as the icing. I actually thought it tasted good, it was just really really dense and moist.
 

LuvBug

New member
any of there no-dairy folk ever try doing raw milk. we are going to try this. it still has the enzymes in it that get killed in processing so some people that can't do regular milk are fine with raw. and you don't use as much since it is richer. one of my friends runs a co-op for it.

I have done raw milk, I like it for hot chocolate lol! Im a soymilk lover though, Ive never really liked the taste of straight milk(cow or not) so I never just drink a cup. I use it over cold cereal sometimes. Most any hot drink gets milk(raw or soy, usually soy) in it: chai, chocolate, coffee, ect.
I can get raw milk at a local dairy, I also buy my cheeses and butter there. They have never been a problem for me and really arent but pennies more than the grocery store.

ETA: I think DS has pretty much outgrown his allergies to most food, but I still have mine and figure might as well avoid them for him anyway.
 

UlrikeDG

Admin - CPS Technician Emeritus
Jean, I just recently discovered Cherrybrook stuff, but the store that carries them is not the one I usually go to, so I haven't actually tried any of their products out.
 

UlrikeDG

Admin - CPS Technician Emeritus
Nadia reacts to dairy, soy & corn that we know of. She's recently broken out with eczema, which was never an issue before, so she'll be seeing an allergist on Jan 2.
 

LuvBug

New member
Yeah I had bad eczema growing up and it wasnt until after I had DS did I find out that it was related to my food allergies. DS had an issue with his skin until I figured out it was apples and that is when I figured out my ezcema had been related. I use to vomit a lot and have eczema spells yet my mother never considered it to be allergies, it wasnt until I was in my teens did I take it into my own hands.
 

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