Category Archives: Allergy friendly recipes

Thermos-inspired lunches

4 Replies

There are 2 things that are promising to totally transform the look of M’s packed lunches for school in 2017. The first is the reintroduction of parsnips to his diet as I’m finally able to cook a crisp-like addition for his lunchbox, which makes them seem a lot more like those of his friends after a long time of feeling so very different. 9270635_r_z002a_uc1440961The second was thanks to a somewhat last-minute Christmas present from good ol’ Father Christmas, which M is absolutely thrilled with and can’t wait to try out now that the new term has started – an individual thermos flask complete with a folding metal spoon tucked neatly into its top.

He’s been considering the matter at great length and has already come up with a long list of meals that he is keen to try out over the coming months. From pasta dishes including lasagne, to risotto and stir-fry, the options are endless, but today’s maiden meal was new-found favourite, parsnip and apple soup. This simple meal is beautifully easy to make, which is something I’m extremely grateful for now that I’m back to work full-time and every second saved cooking is a second gainfully employed somewhere else. Even better, the range of herbs and spices that I can safely add to M’s meals means that I can img_12781create enough subtle flavour differences to his soups to provide some much-needed variety and keep him engaged in the novelty of his first hot school lunches in a long time.

For the launch of our experimental hot meals at school, I made a spicy apple and parsnip soup and included a few of the Rude Health mini rice crackers that have become an integral part of many of M’s lunch and snack times. Whilst nothing can really compare to the unquestionable delight of dipping some crusty French bread into a bowl of rich, creamy soup, the portion of homemade, and safe, parsnip and apple soup accompanied by a handful of rice crackers was everything that M was longing for it to be and that meant it was a resounding success. Over the coming weeks I’m looking forward to experimenting a little more with texture and flavour and will be looking at replacing the apple with pear as well as changing the herbs added to each bowlful. Most of all, I’m hoping that M continues to be excited about the prospect of enjoying a mix of hot and cold meals during the next few months of the school year.

Looking ahead

Leave a reply

bin4zq6cyae-dvx

The start of a New Year is always an opportunity to reflect on the things that have passed, but more importantly, to look ahead to the adventures that are yet to come. We had a 2016 filled with as many highs and lows as we’ve faced in previous years and I don’t doubt that 2017 will be equally challenging in ways that are both startlingly similar and scarily new. I’m looking forward to a year that will investigate new possibilities for M’s diet and seek potential answers for what’s going on in his body as well as watching as G tries out new opportunities and starts thinking ahead to the school subjects she wants to study for GCSEs – a conversation that has filled our end-of-holidays walk this afternoon. We don’t know exactly what this year will bring, but it’s always good to look back on everything that has brought us to this place:

Books HD

Christmas Countdown

1 Reply

The beginning of December has finally arrived. With it comes freezing temperatures, roaring log fires, Christmas trees, pantomimes, carol-singing and, in our household, some frantic last-minute plans for impending teenagehood and a quick anniversary celebration if we can only find the time to squeeze it in. And yes, we perhaps didn’t plan things too well – can you guess that I’ve heard those comments just the odd once or twice before?

These days most children seem to expect a chocolate advent calendar as a necessary part of the Christmas countdown, but what do you do when your child has allergies and can’t enjoy something that’s the same as all their friends? M has asked if we can bake enough of his safe gingerbread cookies for him and G to enjoy 1 everyday between now and the big day itself. It is, without doubt, one of those things that always features highly on any allergy parents’ to-do list at this time of year as it takes some time to find the perfect, safe alternative, but there are some really great options out there and I thought I’d share some of my favourites with you:

And not forgetting one for those much-deserving Mummies out there (it contains gin in case you couldn’t work it out)!

screen-shot-2015-09-21-at-16-54-31

 

A Mini surprise for a Big birthday

Leave a reply

At the beginning of October, I started my second new job since July after being made redundant just before the end of the summer term. This new position is a really exciting opportunity for me as I become Finance and Administration Manager for a local project and even though I never imagined myself being able to say this, I am now grateful for that redundancy as there is no way that I would have even considered applying for this post if I had still been working comfortably close to home. The biggest change has been the huge increase in my hours and I am fortunate that once again I have found an employer who has been understanding about our home situation with M and my current need to be able to work from home on a regular basis. Bearing all that in mind, you’ll understand why baking has dropped down to being a fairly low priority on my list and the presence of xxcakes or biscuits in our house has been practically non-existent. However, with Mike’s 40th birthday looming mid-month, I needed to find some time to attempt, yet again, a version of his all-time favourite dessert – Lemon Meringue Pie – that would not only keep him happy, but also allow G and M to enjoy it too.

Looking back at my blog posts from over the last few years, this isn’t the first time that I’ve tried to recreate this classic dessert, but every time something hasn’t quite gone according to plan, usually the egg-free, rice-based meringue for the topping. The discovery of both rice protein powder and rice vinegar on the on-line supermarket site, FreeFrom Market, suddenly made the prospect something more than a pipe-dream and the Friday before Mike’s birthday saw me desperately trying to whip up a batch of mini meringues, safe for all members of the family. I’ll be honest, the recipe still isn’t quite there and it’ll need some more tweaking to get my perfect meringue, but they tasted good albeit that they were a little stickier than I perhaps had in mind.

I had decided that trying to create one large pie really wasn’t going to be feasible when it came to either my few-ingredients short crust pastry or the meringue itself and so settled on baking mini pies that would be just enough for a rewarding mouthful. I converted a simple short crust pastry recipe to suit M’s allergy needs and, with a few adjustments along the way, managed to produce some fantastic pastry cases which, much to my surprise, baked beautifully and maintained their shape as they cooled. I had already decided to replace the lemon filling with generous spoonfuls of my M-friendly lemon curd and popped the filled tarts into the fridge to allow the curd to set before adding the final touches. As soon as the mini pies were chilled, set and ready to eat, I dropped img_12221a single mini meringue on to the top of each one before serving to my eager husband and child. I will add at this point that neither G or I partook in this particular delicacy – the sharpness of the lemon didn’t appeal to G and the sweetness of the meringue doesn’t agree with me and my T1D tastes. However, despite the fact that only 50% of the family chose to eat these birthday treats, they were extremely well-received and I am reliably informed by both the men in my life that the lemon zest in the pastry when combined with the sharp lemon and sweet meringue was a taste sensation they very much enjoyed.

Something sweet for the weekend

3 Replies

If there was one thing we were all in need of last weekend, it was a sweet treat and I really wanted to bake something that I hadn’t made before. M was keen for me to make an entry for Delicious Alchemy’s own version of the Great British Bake-off, the Gluten-Free Magic Bake-off, so I needed something that would feed both children as well as hitting the brief he gave me of “something spectacular Mummy“. Hiding in the kitchen cupboard was a packet of Delicious Alchemy’s Gluten and Dairy-free Vanilla sponge cake mix, an item I’d bought on something of a whim to go with the 5 bags of their Rice flake porridge that would keep da_bake_off_logo_2016M going for the next few weeks. I pondered on whether I could use the mix to bake similar cupcakes to those I would be making for M and settled on the classic flavour combination of pear and ginger that has served me so well in the past. I haven’t made pear and ginger cupcakes before, but combining my recipe for pear and apple cupcakes with that for pear and ginger cookies, I was certain that I was onto a winner.

I started with a batch of M’s cupcakes and carefully tasted the batter mix to make sure that the ginger wasn’t too overpowering, something I’ve been guilty of in the past. Satisfied that the flavour combination was exactly what I wanted, it was time to move on to G’s cupcakes and I couldn’t wait to try out the sponge mix. Such mixes are a convenience I don’t use very often, usually because they don’t meet our complicated allergy needs, but given our last 2 Decembers with M disappearing into hospital and missing G’s birthdays, I figured that anything that could make the whole cake-baking experience a little easier for whoever ends up making her a cake can only be a good thing. I was really impressed with the sponge mix and how easy it was to use. I followed the packet instructions precisely, including using an egg  –salted-caramel-1 I can’t remember the last time I used an egg in my baking – and then added my own twist of pear and ginger. A quick taste reassured me that the flavour was good and then, with M’s cakes already out and cooling on the rack, popped G’s batch in to bake. The results looked and smelled delicious and soon joined M’s to cool, whilst I moved on to think about the icing.

Now this was where I wanted to venture into something completely new. I perfected coconut oil icing for M about this time last year, so it was time to take that knowledge and use it to create a different flavour. I turned to my ever faithful companion on these allergy-friendly recipe hunts, Google and discovered this great recipe combining ginger cupcakes with a salted caramel icing. I’ll be honest, salted caramel is not really my thing, but a couple of months ago, M had asked if I could make M-friendly caramel for him and I decided that there was no time like the present to take on that challenge. Rolling my sleeves up, I followed the recipe carefully, tweaking and swapping out ingredients as necessary to meet our allergy needs. I started with making the caramel and was delighted with the result. It does have a slightly unusual flavour because of the rice cream used to make it, but it wasn’t bad for a first attempt and I was certain that M and G would both love it. Once the caramel had cooled, I mixed it in with the coconut oil icing and then piped it onto the top of my cupcakes. A sprinkle of crystallised ginger added the final touches and I ended up with some beautiful cupcakes to serve. G and M both loved the look of them, but to my surprise the icing proved to be just a little too sweet for my sugar-fiend, M. Nevertheless, they’ve been a hit in our household this week and it’s great to have found a way to make tasty dairy-free caramel.

img_11961

Rice Two-Ways

Leave a reply

When we made the decision to go elemental in an attempt to bring about a reduction in M’s chronic symptoms, I never imagined that the reintroduction of foods would be as fraught and intensely stressful as it has proved to be. In the past 12 months we have made absolutely no progress whatsoever and everyone is stumped about what the root cause of M’s problems actually is, with opinions fluctuating between complications from his EC, “simple” multiple allergies or a physiological problem with his gut. Whilst the teams of medical professionals involved in M’s care try to decide on what direction they should follow next, I’m left stretching my ingenuity to its very limits when it comes to preparing meals for my understandably fed up 10-year-old.

mixed_rice

I’m constantly on the search for anything that will make my cooking life that tiny bit easier and a lot more interesting and love finding products that are both M-friendly and a little out of the ordinary. Like many of you I’ve eaten rice for years, but generally just as boiled rice to go with a tasty chilli con carne or egg fried from the local Chinese takeaway and had never really thought much about it. Since rice has become the staple carbohydrate of M’s diet, I’ve come to love the versatility of this ingredient and continue to be delighted by the many versions of it I’ve uncovered along the way. Rice milk, rice porridge flakes, rice cereal, rice flour, rice crackers, rice noodles, rice pasta, rice vinegar and your choice of plain rice: long grain, brown, basmati, wild or black have an overwhelming presence in my kitchen cupboards and so now do 2 rice-based products that I’ve discovered over the summer.

img_08441First are Blue Dragon Spring Roll Wrappers, which do contain a small amount of tapioca starch, but are predominantly made from rice flour. Having recently perfected my own version of lemon chicken to satisfy M’s longing for some much-missed Chinese food, these seemed like a great addition to the repertoire and I couldn’t wait to make both M and G some M-friendly pancake rolls for dinner. If you’ve never attempted to cook with these before, let me tell you that they are not the easiest ingredient to use, but I suspect that a lot more practice will make a big difference. I set up my workspace next to the kettle, filled a shallow baking dish with boiling water and then painstakingly soaked the wrappers, 1 sheet at a time, before filling them with some thinly sliced chicken, cucumber, apple and pear that I had already prepared. img_08461I cooked them in 2 different ways, interested to see which my discerning duo preferred and was very much surprised by the results when they came in. G loved the bigger roll which was just prepared as I described above, whilst M told me he’d opt for the shallow-fried triangles every time. I am thrilled that the wrappers were so well received by both children and can’t wait to see what else I can cook with them as I’m sure that they are versatile enough to be used to create some sweet treats as well as the more traditional savoury dishes.

img_11031The other is a real store cupboard essential and I can’t begin to tell you how excited I was to discover this item when I was perusing the virtual aisles of the fantastic online supermarket that is the FreeFromMarket. As for when the box of Clearspring Brown Rice Breadcrumbs arrived, nestled in the midst of my other purchases, well, Mike and the children were all summoned by my squeals of joy and then left me to my celebrations, shaking their heads sadly in complete disbelief. I am sure that there are so many ways to use the breadcrumbs in my cooking, but I started by preparing a breaded, stuffed chicken breast along the lines of a more traditional chicken kiev. I made a coconut oil and herb mix, which I carefully squeezed inside the cut I’d made in the chicken breast, before coating it liberally with the breadcrumbs. 25 minutes later and img_11091dinner was ready with a golden brown chicken breast tantalising the taste buds with both its look and its smell. They really were delicious and neither child was very willing to sacrifice a mouthful of their meal for Mum to taste-test herself. Now that the summer holidays are over and we’re heading into the autumn, roast dinners will make a more regular appearance in our household and I’m hoping to use these breadcrumbs to create an M-friendly stuffing for us all to enjoy.

img_08531          img_11101

 

Summer Bakes

Leave a reply

tumblr_static_wendy2The first 3 weeks of the summer holidays were filled with clubs and camps and activities and I needed to create some M-friendly bakes that could be packed into a lunch-box or, in the case of
Over The Wall, included as a bedtime snack to share during the evening cabin chat session with the rest of his team. With M’s tally of safe foods still stuck at 5, I wanted to bake something new, something we hadn’t tried before, and where better to start than a quick search using my trusty internet search engine. There are not many recipes out there that incorporate those safe ingredients only, so I looked for some vegan and gluten-free suggestions and decided to do the rest of the tweaking myself where necessary.

The first recipe I found was for Pear blondies, a vanilla version of the ever-popular chocolate brownie without, rather obviously, the chocolate and I was intrigued to see if this could be made for M. Using apple purée as my egg replacer, I stirred my mix and then kept my fingers crossed as the small cakes went into the oven. The smell as they baked was amazing and, as always, a certain young gentleman appeared alongside me as I pulled the final product out, ready to cool. The quantity was enough to make a dozen bitesize blondies, which were perfect as a snack during his busy days. Both children enjoyed the blondies, with IMG_0762[1]M particularly keen on the small chunks of pear that had become melt-in-the-mouth and golden as they baked in the sponge mix.

My second new baking venture were Pear and Ginger cookies, which seemed to me to be a perfect combination of sweet and spice, something I was sure M would love. This was another easy recipe to whip up, made from the staples stored in my kitchen cupboards. The dough made an impressive 18 cookies and within minutes of them hitting my cooling rack, my hopeful duo found something important to do in the kitchen in the hope they might be successful in picking up a stray biscuit as they passed. However, whilst they were tempted to taste one straight from the oven, the lure of the lemon icing to be drizzled when the cookies were finally cooled was enough to gain me around 20 minutes extra before my store started to be depleted. These were an amazingly good bake as the rice flour didn’t make the cookies taste granular at all and the ginger was subtle enough to give a little extra heat without overpowering the sweetness of the pear. The children were both big fans of this bake too and I was intrigued to see which one M would settle on as his final choice for taking to OTW camp. In the end, much as he loved both of these new treats, he decided the pear and ginger cookies would be his cabin chat snack of choice and the empty pot returning from camp was all the proof I needed that they had been a success.

Home-cooked Chinese takeaway

5 Replies

chineseOne of things that I know M has really missed since his diet became so restricted is the occasional Chinese takeaway shared with the rest of the family. For as long as I can remember our young foodie has loved eating Chinese food and insisted on mastering the chopsticks early on, so the loss of that treat really did hit him hard. Thanks to the amazing team at our local Wagamama, M has been able to enjoy safe Asian food once again and recently I took the plunge and tried my hand at making him a Chinese-inspired meal too. It was never going to be the same as those fabulous meals we enjoyed in London’s Chinatown when the children were little, but hopefully it was a tasty replacement for a much-missed treat.

Lemon chicken is one of Mike’s favourite Chinese dishes and given the base ingredients of, well, lemon and chicken, it seemed to be an achievable goal for my home-cooked takeaway. For once I didn’t turn to my trusty sidekick, Google, for some speedy research, but instead just used the knowledge I’ve stored up over the last few years to see if I could come up with my own recipe for a delicious lemon chicken. I originally considered using lemon juice, water and sugar thickened with some rice flour to create the sauce, but a quick perusal of the fridge brought the last remaining half-empty jar of dairy-free lemon curd to my attention and I instantly decided that that was exactly what this recipe needed.

Having prepped the diced chicken to make a batch of my M-friendly chicken nuggets and with the rice simmering on the hob, I turned to making the lemon sauce, feeling a little like I was concocting a magic potion as I stirred spoonfuls of this with a dash of that in the cauldron saucepan. IMG_0637[1]I’m certain that the authentic Chinese recipe includes soy sauce, but with soya definitely banned from our repertoire for the foreseeable, I tweaked the sharp flavour of the lemon curd by adding a little more sugar as well as some salt, pepper and rosemary until I had a savoury sauce I was confident the children would eat. As I finished cooking the rice, chicken and sauce in my trusty wok, G and M drifted to the table drawn by the delicious smell, eagerly asking what was for dinner. The portions I served soon disappeared as did the children once their plates were empty, which, without a doubt, signalled a new and successful addition to my ever-growing list of M-friendly recipes.

Meeting a knead

Leave a reply

With so much of my time and energy focused on NEAW16 throughout May as well as coping with the aftermath of M’s broken leg, I unusually spent very little time in the kitchen for most of the month, other than to whip up the regular offerings for each meal. Having taken a much-needed short break to recover, it has been time to revisit some of the recipes I’ve spotted and saved over the last few weeks to see if they could be adapted to suit M’s current dietary needs. One of the foods he really misses having is bread and barely a month goes by without him requesting a sandwich made of “real bread”Kneading-dough-007 and not just rice cakes. A couple of years ago I took a Doves Farm recipe and adapted it to suit our then requirements, and it worked. It wasn’t brilliant, but M loved it despite its foibles because it met his needs. Over the last 18 months, I’ve mastered bread-like equivalents such as pancakes and flatbreads, but hadn’t ventured back into the world of bread-making…until now.

The biggest challenge for my current bread-making attempt was the yeast. We haven’t trialled yeast with M as yet and, to be perfectly honest, I don’t imagine we’ll be doing so for quite some time as the nutritional benefit to be gained by adding it to his diet right now is negligible. We will, without a doubt, get there some day, probably round about the time M wants to start drinking beer – though obviously my baby will never be old enough for that milestone to pass! – but it doesn’t feel like a priority for the time being. Instead, I switched on my trusty laptop and started looking for yeast alternatives or, even better, recipes for yeast-free bread and found this fantastic one by FussyFoodie.co.uk, which I was able to tweak further for M. I am, as ever, extremely grateful to those other allergy-aware cooks IMG_0458[1]out there, who take their time to share their recipes via blogs and other websites as their hard work helps make my efforts a little easier as I strive to create appetising dishes for M.

I baked my final recipe twice to try out both my bread-maker and my free form bread-making skills, as well as adding different flavours to see how the end results compared. The machine mixed loaf looked great, but I found that the ingredients hadn’t really been combined enough in the pan and ended up having to remove a good centimetre or so of rice flour from the bottom of the loaf before it could be enjoyed. The centre of the loaf also failed to cook thoroughly, though toasting slices of the bread before serving did go some way to resolving that particular crisis. Both M and G were suitably impressed by my efforts, which encouraged me to give it a go a second time. This time round I hand-mixed the dough, added some herbs for a different flavour and formed small bread rolls instead of a single loaf. IMG_0491[1]These worked much better in my opinion and M certainly enjoyed the crusty outside, reminiscent of a “real” bread roll, almost as much as the warm centre that had been spread with some coconut oil to replace the butter. I will definitely be baking this bread recipe again and may even try to co-ordinate my cooking so that M can enjoy his chicken burgers in a bap!

Lasagne – an unusual last supper!

6 Replies

I’ve been fascinated looking back over the last 4 awareness weeks and seeing how our approach to “Eating like M” has developed over time. When we first started in 2013, we chose to eat the foods that M could eat at the time, even if they were things he wouldn’t have touched with the proverbial barge pole such as mushrooms, tomatoes or courgettes and followed the lead of other EGID families by eating exactly the same as him on the Friday, including the much-dreaded Neocate Active. Year 2 followed a similar approach, though Mike matched M mouthful for mouthful on the Friday to truly understand what it felt like to be on his diet and again drank the obligatory pint of Neocate for full effect. By 2015, M’s diet had changed dramatically and when we hit NEAW15, he had only 3 safe foods he could eat. Despite initially rejecting the idea of eating like M, IMG_0496[1] Mike and I decided we would once again support him through what was proving to be an extremely challenging time and agreed to spend the week with just 3 foods making up our 3 meals with a litre of E028 to wash it all down for Mike.

2016 has taken us another step forward in our “Eating like M” adventures and this year saw G choosing to stand in solidarity with her brother and join in our week with just 5 safe foods. I am so proud that she decided to take part in this challenge with us and stoically managed the week without complaint. Once again, our week led to opportunities to share our family’s EGID story with others, including Mike’s discussions with fellow attendees at a fully catered RICS training course in London. He had expected the standard buffet lunch to be provided and had armed himself with rice-cakes and apples to get him through his day, so the hot meal that was prepared on request to meet these strict dietary requirements was a more than pleasant surprise.

One of the highlights of the week for me was our final meal on the Saturday night. I had been looking for the perfect opportunity to try out what was, to me, a completely new product and our last M-inspired dinner gave me that chance. I first heard about this product back in February at the #FFFA16, when fellow judge, Stanley Montwedi, founder of online shopping website FreeFromMarket recommended it to me and couldn’t stop raving about how amazing it was. IMG_0469[1]With NEAW16 in mind, I had ordered a couple of boxes from him and knew exactly what masterpiece I’d be whipping up next.

As a family we have always enjoyed eating pasta, but M’s food restrictions have made enjoying a variety of different pasta dishes almost impossible. Thanks to this new-to-me range of products, that is no longer the case. Rizopia Organic Brown Rice Lasagne was actually the winner of the 2015 Free From Food Awards Pasta & Pizza category and I must say that it was definitely a worthy winner. I used it to make a M-friendly chicken lasagne, layering strips of chicken with the pasta sheets and lashings of white sauce flavoured with basil and oregano. I didn’t pre-soak the sheets as per the cooking instructions, but given the limited sauce that could be added to my lasagne, we all found them quite chewy, so I think I will try soaking them beforehand the next time I cook it. And believe me, there will be a next time because the whole family was impressed with this dish. M enjoyed it so much that he asked for it for lunch and dinner 3 days in a row and was most disappointed to discover that it did eventually run out! The Rizopia rice pasta range includes lots of different shapes of pasta which are all safe for M and will add some much-needed variety to his meal-times.

IMG_0477[1]