Tag Archives: home cooking

“Run, run as fast as you can…”

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“…you can’t catch me, I’m the gingerbread man!”

To be perfectly honest, the last couple of months have been challenging ones. When we made the decision last year to move M to the elemental diet, we did so hoping that it would be the answer we were looking for and that he would finally find some relief from the years of chronic pain and constant bowel problems he’d barely been surviving. The great news is that his symptoms improved dramatically and for the first time in a long-time, M felt healthier and happier than ever before. However, despite the best hopes of GOSH that his NG-tube would only be needed for 2 or 3 months, Mike and I held the opinion that it would more realistically be in place for at least a year, if not longer, and we are rapidly moving closer to that 12-month mark. Of course, what none of us had anticipated was the struggle we would have in reintroducing foods back into M’s diet and over recent weeks, he has found the constant disappointment of failed food trials and the frustration of not being able to eat the same as everyone else almost unbearable to live with. With the agreement of our amazingly supportive dietician, we decided to take an extended break from the challenges, allowing M some much-needed time to come to terms with the realities of life right now.

shutterstock_190648280Having had that much-needed rest, M started to lose that haunted look that had been plaguing him for a few weeks and we finally seemed to have turned the corner and be back on track. We agreed on a new short list of foods to challenge in the run up to Christmas and had finally restarted where we had left off, more or less. However, last weekend, with another 3 unsuccessful attempts at reintroductions to chalk up to experience, tensions started to build and emotions threatened to overwhelm the tenuous calm that had just begun to settle. The final straw broke when G asked Mike and me to taste and review her cupcakes for her Food and Textiles homework. With hot, angry tears cascading down his cheeks, M crawled on to my lap to fitfully confide that it “just wasn’t fair” that everyone else could eat cakes when he couldn’t. Gently stroking his back, I offered to whip up a batch of one of the few sweet treat recipes I’ve managed to adapt for him in the last 12 months: Rice krispie treats? Cupcakes? Scones? Sugar cookies? Nothing seemed to quite hit the necessary mark, so I put my thinking cap on, did a little research and came up with the perfect pre-Christmas treat – Gingerbread!

Thanks to a few sneaky “mini” challenges, we have been able to add some extra flavourings to M’s diet and the most recent success was the addition of ginger to the humble pear crumble, so gingerbread seemed to be the logical next step. I started pulling the ingredients from the cupboards and, 20151121_162110as I weighed and measured out everything I needed, M’s interest was piqued and he pulled up the step-stool to stand by my side and help out. He rolled up his sleeves, washed and then floured his hands and, having selected an interesting array of cookie cutters, brandished my trusty rolling-pin to roll out the gingerbread dough on my pastry board. He chose to use the Christmas cutters as well as the odd one or two Mr Men ones, which have survived from my childhood and spent hours planning out to most effectively cut the shapes from the dough in front of him. We ended up with an impressive batch and I am heartily assured by my trustworthy taste-testers that they more than fit the brief and hit the mark!

Children In Need 2015

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Along with the rain, wind and grey skies, November also brings with it the star-studded evening of light entertainment that is BBC’s Children in Need. Last year they launched the theme of “Be a Hero” for the event and my pair decided to dress as their personal heroes of Princess Leia and M’s gastro consultant at GOSH. This year, the dressing up part was a little easier to achieve – G headed off to school in her own wardrobe selection and M wore his “Super Tubie” top as we really couldn’t think of any better superhero for him to represent. You might think that this meant I escaped lightly for this year’s celebrations, but for those of you who know me, or follow me on FB, you will be well aware that my youngest actually had very different ideas about how we should spend the night before the big day itself, and what a long night it turned out to be!

His school decided to hold a “Great Children-in-Need Bake-off” competition as part of their fundraising efforts and naturally M was keen to take part. His first step was to decide what he wanted his cake to look like and eventually settled on cupcakes rather than one big cake as they would be easier to sell as part of the school cake sale after the competition was judged. Instead of decorating a dozen individual cupcakes, 20151111_195743M wanted to use them to create Pudsey Bear’s face as best he could. Design done, Wednesday evening saw M whipping up the cake batter with a little supervision from me and the resulting 24 perfectly baked M-friendly cupcakes were left to cool overnight before he tackled the big job of the icing.

One evening to ice to perfection might sound like more than enough time, but when you take into consideration the after-school archery club requiring late pick-up, the long-awaited ‘flu vaccination appointment, the unavoidable homework and the much-needed dinner, you’ll begin to understand why we couldn’t get started until close to 6.30pm. Of course, having baked cakes that he could eat, M was keen to ice with safe icing too, so my first job was to help him make enough coconut oil icing, tinted a rather fetching Pudsey Bear yellow, to cover them all. 20151112_192831We had already made a simple cardboard frame in the shape of Pudsey’s head to hold the cupcakes securely and,having fitted 10 cupcakes neatly into place, M got started on the icing.

It was his first attempt with an icing bag and I have to say I was impressed. M handled the bag and nozzle like a pro and did what I’d consider to be a really good job for his very first go. Watching him I could see how much his motor skills have improved since he was first diagnosed with dyspraxia and he actually made a relatively fiddly task seem remarkably easy. Yellow icing piped, next came the task of rolling out and shaping the other colours to make Pudsey’s spotted bandage and facial features. He tweaked and adjusted until he was finally satisfied with the end result and I have to say it was a job well done. Whilst he couldn’t quite eat all of the cakes, he could eat those covered just with the yellow icing – the ears! – and for the first time in a long time, M knew he’d be able to buy a cake at the school cake sale!

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Now, for most people that would be a great place to stop; but oh no, not in our slightly mad household. Whilst we’d been browsing cookery books and the internet for ideas for his final cake design, M had spotted some Pudsey Bear cake pops and was keen to see if we could make some of those in a M-friendly version too. Cue some hurried reading on my part accompanied by much scratching of my head as I tried to work out a recipe that didn’t involve chocolate in some shape or form. I couldn’t find a single chocolate-free cake pop recipe, so did the next best thing and came up with my own.

20151112_204555I crumbled 8 cupcakes into a bowl and was delighted to see that the grated apple and pear in the cake mix gave enough moisture to form balls. M cut up some drinking straws as I carefully moulded our cake balls and stuck them to the sticks to create the lollipop shape. My full recipe is here, but let’s just say it took multiple moves between table and freezer as well as some much-needed help from all family members on hand to achieve the final look. The ones M decorated for school were not safe for him to try as we ended up using fondant icing, but we did try a few attempts with the coconut oil icing and I reckon with a few more tries, we might have those sussed.

20151113_082414It turned out to be a later night than planned, but M ended up with 2 entries to the school competition he could be proud of and was delighted that nearly all of his cakes sold at the fundraiser on Friday.

Fast food – home-made style!

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We are generally not a fast-food eating family, which, given the array of allergies we’ve had to deal with over the years, is probably a good thing. It’s not something we’ve noticed we’re missing out on and I doubt we’d ever be burger joint regulars even without the allergies, but all that being said, there are definitely times when being able to pick up a burger and chips or to grab fish and chips from the chippie would make feeding the family one less headache to deal with at the end of a busy day. I don’t think the children have ever really felt like they’re deprived in this area, especially as there were occasions before allergies became a big deal or we’d ever even heard of EGID that we would treat them whilst on holiday; GcsqwFsrRVGMfVc18IAf_imagebut there have been a couple of events recently where M has really struggled with not being able to eat on the go like so much of the rest of the world.

The first was back in July, he went to a friend’s paint-balling birthday party, which was followed by lunch and birthday cake at the local McDonald’s. M was brilliant. He was keen to join in and spend the time with all his friends and asked me to take along some safe food for his lunch. He sat with them whilst they enjoyed their Happy Meals and asked his friend’s Dad if he could have a small portion of fries to smell at the same time. This may sound strange and it’s most definitely heartbreaking to see, but is a coping mechanism he picked up from a couple of the amazing children we met during his GOSH stay last year. It is widely reported that if you lose one of your senses, the others become more acute to replace it and it is this theory that has been put into practice here. M may not be able to eat many of his favourite foods any more, but he can still garner great satisfaction from enjoying their distinctive smells instead. When you consider that your sense of taste is hugely influenced by your sense of smell, after all we all know how bland food can seem when we’re struggling with a heavy head cold, then I guess that it’s no wonder that M finds such enjoyment from smelling what he can’t eat.

With the party behind us, the issue of fast food didn’t raise its head again until just a few weeks ago following a family evening out at a local art exhibition. I had managed to feed G and M before we headed out the door, but Mike and I, no strangers to late night meals, decided that the timing was such that we could only grab something on our way back home. We stopped to quickly pick up burgers and almost instantly both children went into minor melt-downs. I knew that a lot of their complaints were the result of the late night and a desperate need to get to bed and sympathised with their frustrations at not being able to eat something, anything “normal” for a change. I put my thinking cap on and determined to create a meal that could somehow replace the humble burger in our household and give the children the taste sensation they were craving. 20150925_190329I remembered that a couple of summers ago, I had created a fantastically tasty lamb and mint burger recipe and I wondered if I could take that basic recipe and tweak it to meet M’s new dietary needs.

The great news is that I absolutely could. We buy our fresh meat, fruit and vegetables from a local co-operative and one of the ingredients I had spotted before was minced chicken. Adding a mix of seasonings and herbs as well as a generous helping of golden syrup, I prepared some great tasting chicken burgers. I whipped up a batch of rice flour pancakes to replace the bread roll for M, though we’ve decided that my flatbreads would work equally well. They were declared an almost instant success by both M and G, who have asked for them on more than one occasion since. Even better, I discovered that I could use the same recipe to create mini meatballs, which M enjoyed with rice pasta drizzled with a little rapeseed oil, some diced cucumber and a handful of additional herbs. So, one simple recipe led to 2 great new meals for my now slightly-less-moody children – a job well done!

Risotto – the M-friendly way!

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This could come as something of a surprise to some of you, especially when you consider that rice has been a staple ingredient for us since February, but until recently I really hadn’t thought of making a simple risotto for M. We love risotto in our house, which really makes this lack of regard inexcusable: the children have been eating my home-made version since they were tiny and yet I hadn’t ventured down this particular route in my meal creations for him. Keep-It-Simple-Design-SimplicityJust as with the gnocchi – although risotto is absolutely nothing like as complicated to make a those Italian masterpieces – I’ve been keeping to the mantra of “easy meals are best” for weekday evenings and somehow risotto had escaped my attention.

Our dinner out at Trewithen brought this meal back to the forefront of my consciousness, when I enjoyed the most mouth-wateringly delicate and delicious flavours of their prawn and smoked salmon risotto. The perfect balance of strong flavours and the creamy deliciousness of the dish reminded me of just why it has always been a firm favourite of mine and I determined then and there to see if I could create a M-friendly version that might make the grade.

Taking inspiration from the Trewithen marinade for the chicken, which won such huge acclaim from M that I ended up asking the chef for his recipe, I created my very own nod to a stock as M is obviously not able to eat any of the stock-cubes readily available on the market due to their long lists of ingredients. 20150909_173602I cooked off some sage, thyme and parsley with a little salt and pepper in some Cornish rapeseed oil until an aromatic smell arose from the pan and then added the arborio rice and chicken, before adding my final ingredient of rice milk and leaving it all to simmer in my usual “one pot” approach to risotto.

The end result smelt, well, good enough to eat and I was keen to see how my young gourmand rated my first attempt at a M-friendly risotto. He said little, but the resulting request for seconds really told me everything I needed to know and so another recipe has been added to the 7Y2D repertoire!

Gnocchi revisited

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Last year I wrote about my quest to create an all-time favourite of mine in a format that would not only meet all our then allergy needs, but that I also hoped both M and G would enjoy. I successfully tweaked some easy recipes to create an instant winner for dinner-time in our household: gluten-free gnocchi and their sweet potato counterpart. For very many reasons I haven’t ventured back to this delicious meal since M started his elemental diet at the end of last year, not least because it is really time-intensive and when cooking 3 different dishes for a single meal-time is the new norm, simple is often best.

One of the unexpected highlights of our holiday in Cornwall came right at the end of the week as I was browsing the farm shop at the Lost Gardens of Heligan before we headed home. I came across gnocchia packet of Bionita ready-made and gluten-free potato gnocchi and immediately snapped it up. I couldn’t wait for the perfect opportunity to try them out at home with G and that chance finally came last week, whilst M and I were both fighting off persistent heavy head colds, the peril of going back to school when you have a compromised autoimmune system. The prospect of slaving over a hot stove at the end of a long day really didn’t appeal and these gnocchi seemed to be the ideal option for a quick, easy and delicious meal.

20150909_173840Just as with the “normal” version, these gnocchi take just 2 minutes to cook in boiling water and I served them simply with a sage butter with sweetcorn and pine-nuts that was just as quick to prepare. Within 5 minutes, a steaming bowl of aromatic gnocchi was sitting in front of G and she loved every mouthful of this revisited classic. The packet is easily enough for 3 or 4 meals for G as gnocchi really are surprisingly filling and, as it states that they should be used up within 3 days of opening, I’ve popped the pack into the freezer until the next time. My fingers are now tightly crossed that they prove to be as good from frozen as the ones I made from scratch last year.

Inspired by #GBBO

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You might have noticed the extended radio silence over the last 10 days or so as we took a much-needed week away from it all down in Cornwall and the lack of wi-fi in our lodge meant that we almost had a technology-free week too. Despite my lack of blog posts, I did manage to keep up with a current TV favourite and I’m sure I’m not the only allergy-parent out there who looks forward to a weekly dose of the Great British Bake-Off (GBBO), which has recently re-started on our screens.  I spend that hour with Mike, M and G drooling over their masterpieces, cringing over their mistakes and pondering on whether I can adapt the recipes to create my own M-friendly #GBBO-inspired entries. Our household is especially excited about the upcoming episode airing on BBC1 tomorrow night (September 2nd) as the bakers will be tackling 3 different “free-from” challenges, though I’m not sure any are as difficult as baking to suit multiple food allergies! One person I’m sure will be watching with equally avid interest is fellow EGID Mum and FABED friend, Dr Berenice Golding, so whilst I’m beavering away to pull together a plethora of posts to tell you just how fantastic our Cornish trip was, I am delighted to be able to share with you this guest blog-post written by Berenice, in which she talks about her attempts at a #GBBO-inspired free-from Madeira cake.

BGIn our house we love everything Great British Bake Off despite the fact that on a daily basis we are dealing with multiple food exclusions. Diagnosed in 2012, at the age of 12, my son is allergic to wheat, gluten, tree nuts (not peanuts but we still avoid), soya, sesame and coconut. We have many other foods we are avoiding, or trialling in small quantities such as tomato, but the list is quite long… He has also, following total food exclusions last summer when he was fed an elemental diet via a NG-tube, been put on a diet that does not include dairy, eggs and fish. Nevertheless, despite the exclusions, #GBBO inspires us as we both like to bake. In fact, baking is a must in our house as it is the only way that safe cake, as a treat, can be made available.

We have trialled dairy re-introduction to no avail, so this summer, rather than re-trialling dairy due to an impending hospital admission, I opted to trial eggs. We have managed to re-introduce small amounts of fish, but egg was my next big adventure due to his rapidly approaching 16th birthday.

Why egg you may ask?

The answer is simple, I have struggled over recent weeks and months with the absence of eggs and trying to find egg replacements that not only work, but are also free from nuts – it has been a challenge. Then, while watching the bakers produce Madeira cake on #GBBO, I was suddenly drawn towards Lemon Madeira cake as a baked egg trial and began my search for an allergy-friendly recipe.

I have a number of allergy friendly cook books; my favourite, albeit American, is by Colette Martin. I have also recently invested in a book by Pippa Kendrick following a recommendation by one of the founders of Families Affected by Eosinophilic Disorders (FABED). I also had a recipe in my recipe folder – I started compiling this when I realised that baking was a necessity and not just for fun! – by Glutafin, but because the flour they produce contains milk powder, we haven’t been able to use their flour recently and so I consulted the internet and found a recipe by Dove’s Farm. Unfortunately, the recipe contained almonds which meant that I needed to modify recipes to make something safe for my son. This is where the fun began.

11900092_10153541906468739_7334883458966317310_oMy 1st attempt, whilst smelling okay, was somewhat disastrous as I had forgotten that I was using self-raising flour and had added baking powder as I was working with the Glutafin recipe. It did not taste that nice – the texture wasn’t right – and there was no discernible crack, Mary Berry would not have been impressed. The first cake made its way to the bin quite quickly. But I persevered and my 2nd attempt was exactly what I had been hoping for – well almost – the texture was a little dry (this time I opted to trial a combination of both recipes) but once topped with icing, prepared by Benjamin, it was actually quite delicious! I still need to work on further recipe conversions as I have yet to perfect this cake and I will share the recipe once I think it is worth sharing.

My thanks go to Berenice and Benjamin for this great post. Dr Berenice Golding is a Lecturer in Social Sciences at the University of Huddersfield. She has a personal and professional interest in the social, emotional and psychological aspects of food. Some of her other posts can be found here and here.

Not quite Mickey-shaped…!

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20140818_143459Around about the same time that I started fondly reminiscing about last year’s holiday to Florida, my FB timeline decided to prompt my recollections with this photo of what turned out to be just the tip of the iceberg when it came to the vast array of fantastic M- and G-friendly food in Disney. These Mickey waffles were a huge part of what made our trip so successful and are one of M’s favourite memories about his first visit to “the most magical place on earth“. In fact, they were so popular that they have gained the unenviable status of one of the top 10 foods M is desperate to enjoy once he has a few more foods back in his diet. With so many of the key ingredients for your traditional waffle firmly in the “unsafe” camp, I turned my mind to what the basic ingredients of a successful waffle were and whether I could replace them and produce a waffle that might satisfy M’s longing.

I found a great recipe for egg-free waffles and, confident that I could make a replacement that would at very least look good, even if the taste wasn’t quite all it should be, I insisted on a detour during a family day out to buy my very first waffle-maker. I had previously done some research on the various options out there and once we were in-store, 20150809_184330M helped me pick which one he thought would do the best job – a combined waffle-maker, sandwich-toaster and grill! Shopping done and the day’s activities completed, we headed home and I claimed the kitchen as a child-free zone until my experimenting was done.

The first recipe I adapted produced some amazing waffles and I just wish I had a photo that captured the pure delight on M’s face when he first caught sight of his plate full of M-friendly waffles. Needless to say, he was rendered speechless – something that rarely happens as those of you who know us well will know – and he flung his arms around me, squeezing tight as he whispered “Thank you Mummy, you’re the very best Mummy in the world“. Both children declared them an instant hit and the speed at which those first 4 waffles disappeared from their plates would confirm that to be the case. Mike and I shared a fifth one between us and agreed that as delicious as they were, the rice flour had created a granular taste to the waffles, a problem that I have experienced before when baking with this tricky ingredient. 20150809_185211I have found that making a wetter mix has been key in producing a less granular cake, but couldn’t quite see how to make this work with the thicker waffle batter and the limiting factor of only a handful of safe ingredients.

Not quite 100% satisfied with my first attempt and responding to the following day’s request for “..more waffles please!.” from M and G, this time I searched for a recipe for apple waffles and adapted it to suit our allergy needs. I used some apple purée to not only flavour the waffles, but also to replace the egg and add more liquid to the batter without diluting it too much. This batch cooked as well as the first and proved to be an equal success with my discerning duo. Mike also acted as a taste-tester and reported that the granular texture was considerably reduced with the addition of the apple, though it hasn’t disappeared completely. Whilst I will continue to strive for even better rice flour waffles, for now I’m more than happy to have found a way to replicate those Mickey waffles, even if they’re not quite Mickey-shaped!

Yet another chicken recipe!

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We might be nearly 9 months into life with a NG-tube and in theory should have long since said goodbye to its presence in our world, but the reality is very different. M hasn’t been able to progress beyond our 4 staple foods and it is becoming increasingly challenging to make rice, chicken, cucumber and apple into a tasty and interesting combination for 3 meals a day. 20150710_203444M’s steady consumption of new favourites tempura batter chicken nuggets and arancini di riso has resulted in the purchase of our first-ever deep fat fryer – a piece of kitchen equipment I never envisioned gracing my kitchen’s counter-tops – and I have been concerned about the amount of fried foods he’s now eating on a regular basis. Thanks to a recent post on The Recipe Resource’s Facebook forum, I converted the cornflake-covered chicken balls to a M-friendly version and found a healthier twist to chicken nuggets for him to enjoy.

They were really simple to prepare and it would be easy enough to adapt the recipe to suit your tastes and dietary needs. I’ve added both sage and thyme to the mix and both proved popular with M and G alike and I’m sure you could spice them up with chilli flakes for a more “grown-up” flavour.20150723_190656 The quantities would be easy to adapt too, so that you only make what you need for a meal-time, although M has enjoyed them cold for his packed lunches recently too. I also took the basic recipe and made some crispy fish balls for M’s white fish challenge, which I’m sure, with a little bit more time and effort, could be moulded into all sorts of interesting shapes. It ultimately turned out to be yet another food fail, but M definitely enjoyed the bite-size fish nuggets whilst he could.

Perfect pancakes

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During our recent GOSH appointment, the conversation naturally turned to the food I’m cooking for M these days and how we could continue to vary the options available to him with such limited ingredients. The subject had turned to our plans to introduce white fish and whether there were any M-friendly free-from fishfingers on the market, which there aren’t. I was just saying that I had perfected a rice-flour tempura batter, which would be ideal for making fish bites, when M, without looking up from the handheld computer device he was engrossed by, piped up to inform them that “…Mummy cooks me chicken nuggets and deep-fried rice-balls and flatbreads and pancakes…” before carrying on with his game. The conversation paused briefly as the dietician took note and then carried on from there, but it made me realise that I had never shared my rice-flour pancake recipe and I vowed to change that as soon as I could.

20141007_173343Pancakes are one of those recipes that I attempted very early on in our free-from journey and are still a family favourite 4 years on. I make the big, fluffy ones most associated with North America and use the batter as a basis for other savoury treats such as corn or courgette fritters. The basic recipe contains very few ingredients and proved easy to convert to the updated M-friendly version that you can find here. I flavour them with a variety of green herbs and they form a tasty accompaniment to any meal, enjoyed by the whole family, not just M and I even cooked them recently when he had a friend round for tea, where they proved to be a hit.

One of the best things about these pancakes, other than how quickly you can whip up a batch, is just how versatile they can be. With a few careful choices about flavours, they can be either savoury or sweet and both have proved popular with M. They will also form the perfect platform for our mini-challenges on spices and flavourings over the coming weeks, which I know M can’t wait to try.

A cake for every occasion

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We might have had Christmas, Easter and at least 2 birthdays since M first had his NG-tube, but they’ve all been celebrated without a morsel of cake passing his lips for 7 months.  He enjoyed Foxes Glacier mints for Christmas lunch, a “fake” cake for his birthday and a passable rice-flour biscuit for Easter; but we were all fully aware that none of them could possibly replace the role of cake in so many celebrations.  PV-2The harsh reality of so few ingredients has meant that even at my most inventive, a successful cake replacement has just not been achievable, but with the re-introduction of apple in the last couple of weeks, M’s dream of cake could, and has, finally been fulfilled.

It is all thanks to one of the lovely Mums that I have become friends with through FABED and whose son, under the care of the same consultant as us and who M met during his hospital stay last December, is a few weeks ahead of M with his food reintroductions after time on the elemental diet.  R and I have spent time chatting, texting and e-mailing about the boys and where we each are along our respective journeys, sharing stories and giving tips whenever possible.  Having gained the advantage of those few extra days, R has had some useful tips when it’s come to preparing food for M, the best one being this M-friendly cake recipe that I was able to try out at long last.20150626_144401

Apple purée is a popular egg-alternative, though not one I have previously used in my M-friendly baking as I have preferred to bake with ground flaxseed meal or mashed banana. With banana being a definite no for the time-being and flaxseed being low in our priorities of new foods to trial, it was finally time to put apple purée to the test. The first job was to prepare some apple purée before having to deal with the tough task of stopping M devouring it all at each and every opportunity that arose until I had a chance to actually try out the cakes. Despite his best efforts and enjoying lashings of purée with his rice pudding, there was just about enough leftover for these delicious apple and rice flour cakes.  The recipe is simple, easy to follow and perfect for anyone with such limited safe foods and, what’s more, I’m certain that it would be easy to replace any of the ingredients with an alternative that suits your particular dietary needs. The cakes are deliciously moist and have been a huge hit with M, who is asking for them morning, noon and night and are definitely a great addition to his school lunch-box.