Allergy Story ~ Week One

I have to admit, when the nurse asked me to remove all dairy and eggs from ds4’s diet for a week I was overwhelmed…I honestly had no idea how I was going to be able to make it through an entire week of cooking and baking for my family without dairy and egg.

Well, some of the non-dairy substitutions were pretty easy to make.  Dh brought home some almond milk a few days into our non-dairy week…and ds4 LOVED it!  I had some with my cereal the other day, I think I actually prefer it over cow’s milk :) 

It also seems that there are many different foods that you can use to replace eggs such as vinegar, applesauce, and even a flax meal and water mixture.  The dairy-free and egg-free cake that I made for ds4’s birthday called for vinegar, which I assume replaced the egg…and it turned out pretty good.

However, I was having a very hard time coming up with non-dairy butter substitutions that I was comfortable using.  Many of the recipes that I came across used non-dairy margarine, non-dairy shortening, or vegetable oil to replace butter.  I have not used margarine or shortening in my baking for years…and I did not feel comfortable using it now.  So what to do?

Then I  remembered that I had an unopened jar of coconut oil in my cabinet…didn’t I read somewhere that coconut oil can be used to replace butter, shortening and oil?  Maybe it’s time to do some experimenting…One night I replaced the butter in one of our favorite fall recipes, Apple Crumble, with coconut oil…and it turned out great.  There was a slight coconut taste to the dish, but it was still very yummy :)

I wasn’t sure that we could do it, but we have managed to survive our first week of being dairy-free and egg-free…well, a couple of us non-allergy people have eaten a little bit of cheese {I have a fridge full of the stuff}, and my dh and the two older kiddos are still drinking regular dairy-full milk {I had picked up two gallons of the stuff the night before the nurse called}.  But for the most part we have eliminated much of the dairy and egg from our meals this past week.

It has taken a bit of pre-planning on my part, and a lot of research.  Thankfully I have found some very helpful resources that are making this change a bit easier.  I ordered a wonderful resource on going dairy free, aptly named Go Dairy Free ~ the author also has a website entitled One Frugal Foodie which features some really yummy sounding dairy and egg free recipes.  We had the Whole Wheat Vegan Pancakes for dinner one night…dh and ds8 declared them to be delicious…maybe even better than our regular pancake recipe!

He’s Allergic to What??!

When our youngest {now 4} was two, he had what I assumed to be a reaction to peanut butter.  It was a very minimal reaction…just a small rash on his left cheek…I checked with our family doctor and she confirmed that the cheek rash looked like a food allergy.  Needless to say, I kept the little guy away from peanuts and peanut products after that.

Our doctor suggested trying to introduce peanuts/peanut butter again in about a year.  Once again, a small rash appeared on his cheeks the day after he had peanut butter.  Ever since then we have just assumed that he had a peanut allergy…albeit a very slight one.  My other two kiddos still ate peanut butter and he never reacted to the oils that I am sure he was exposed to. 

We never had his allergy confirmed by allergy testing…and I had not yet exposed him to any other nuts for fear that he would react to them.  A couple weeks ago I figured that it was about time to get a referral to an allergist…I wanted to find out the severity of his peanut allergy, and also see if he was allergic to any other nuts.

Our primary doctor recommended that he get a blood test to determine the severity of his peanut allergy before heading to an allergist.  Imagine my surprise when a nurse from our doctor’s office called me last week to inform me that the blood test showed no allergy to peanuts!  Instead, it showed that he had a very slight allergy to milk and eggs…what?!! 

Um, wow…this little guy eats yogurt for breakfast at least three days a week, he has a cheese stick for a snack almost daily, lunches and dinners at our house usually contain at least some cheese, I use some form of dairy and/or egg in most everything that I bake {butter, buttermilk, milk, eggs}…ds4 has never complained of stomach aches, never had an ear infection, never vomited after eating dairy. 

Needless to say, I was shocked by this information.  The nurse asked me to remove milk {and all milk products} and eggs from ds4’s diet for the next week, and then make a follow-up appointment with our doctor.  So this past week I have been working hard to remove all dairy and eggs from what I feed ds4…not such an easy task considering almost all of the meals that I regularly serve {breakfast, lunch, and dinner} contain at least a small amount of either dairy and/or egg.  We also celebrated ds4’s birthday this week…so I had to find a dairy-free and egg-free cake recipe so the little guy could have a piece of his own birthday cake :).   

When I first began researching dairy-free and egg-free recipes, my initial thought was extreme gratefulness that my son’s allergy to milk and eggs is very slight.  In my research I have read about children who have severe allergies to not only milk and eggs, but also nuts, wheat, shellfish, etc. 

It also made me aware of how much I use dairy in my cooking…not that I think dairy is bad, but too much of anything can’t be that good. 

So now I am on a mission to adjust my cooking and baking…a mission that is just beginning…and one I will most likely be writing about more on this blog.