Allergy-Free Wednesdays, May 2, 2012

Posted on May 2, 2012 by Cook

Welcome to Allergy-Free Wednesdays!

I’m so glad you’re here! AFW continues to go beyond our expectations with the wonderful and creative submissions. Each and every one of you is positively contributing to the food allergy community. Thank you!

Just a reminder: Don’t forget to link back to one of our sites. It helps spread the word about the food allergy community.

~Willing Cook Features~

Orange Pushup Smoothie from Sensitive and Centsible (I am so excited to share this kid-favorite treat with my dairy-free son.)

Almond Butter & Jelly Cookie Sandwiches from Sweet Healthy Living

Buttermilk Avocado Ranch Dressing from Cupcakes and Kale Chips (I’m going to try to make a dairy-free version.)

~Reader Favorites~

Peanut Butter Krispies Cookies from Sensitive and Centsible

Strawberry Cobbler from Organized Chaos

Chewy, Gooey Oatmeal Cookies from Dandelions on the Wall

Feel free to grab the Allergy-Free Wednesdays button below and share it on your blog. Be sure to check out the other blog hop hosts to see what recipes they chose as their featured favorites.

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Allergy-Free Wednesdays is a blog hop dedicated to allergy-free living and eating. You can share your allergy-free recipes, knowledge about allergy-related topics/issues, and connect with others within the allergy community. We hope you will glean much from your time spent here.

This blog hop is hosted by myself and four other allergy-friendly bloggers. When you link up your post below, it will automatically appear on all 5 blogs! Each of us will choose a favorite recipe/post to feature each week, so be sure to check in every Wednesday. Allergy-Free Wednesdays is hosted by…

Adrienne @ Whole New Mom

Amber @ The Tasty Alternative

Janelle @ Gluten Freely Frugal

Laura @ Gluten Free Pantry

Michelle @ The Willing Cook (that’s me!)

Nancy @ Real Food, Allergy Free

Tessa @ Tessa the Domestic Diva

Allergy-Free Wednesday Guidelines

Any linked recipes should be allergy-friendly in some way.
Provide a link directly to your post, not your homepage.
Please link back to this site. It’s good blogging etiquette. Feel free to grab the bottom below to display on your post. In order to be featured next week, you must link back.
Current and past recipes/posts are welcome.
It’s helpful if you provide a little description with your recipe (i.e., GF, DF, EF, Paleo, GAPS, etc.).
You can link-up as many as 2 posts weekly.
No giveaways, please!
Leave a comment telling us about your submission, and visit other bloggers submissions too! It makes us all feel loved.
Entries that do not comply with these guidelines will be kindly removed.

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Posted in Allergy-Free Wednesdays | 6 Comments

Life with Food Allergies: Understanding the Severity & Dangers

Posted on May 1, 2012 by Cook

What I wish I knew…

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How often have you heard, “Well, a little won’t hurt him.” Or, “Does butter count as milk?”

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I get so frustrated at people’s ignorance sometimes, but I have to be gracious and gentle in reminding them the life-threatening reaction my son WILL experience if having even a minute amount. It’s blind ignorance — people who don’t have to live with the daily grind of food allergies have no idea the ins and outs, the dangers lurking around every corner. It is our job as parents of allergy sufferers or allergy sufferers ourselves to do the educating. Don’t be your own worst advocate!

I like to break potential allergic reactions into 2 categories: severity and dangers.

There are two ways to understand the severity of your food allergies:

Talk to your allergist. {I highly recommend using a doctor that specializes in allergies. For a child, I encourage you to seek out a pediatric allergist, if possible. Doctors in allergy/asthma/immunology are up-to-date on the recent research. They attend conferences and see a variety of allergy patients daily. This is in contrast to a general doctor or pediatrician who deals with hundreds of illnesses and patients. They are not zeroed in on the latest findings in the allergy world.} Upon conducting allergy tests, whether blood, skin, or a clinical food challenge, doctors have the data to indicate the severity of your allergy. Now, I must caution you in that there is a chance for false results (either positive or negative) with blood and skin tests. Clinical evidence (actual consumption of the food) is the best measure of food allergy severity. However (and this is a BIG however), I do not recommend testing yourself or your child with foods that are thought to be an allergen. Only under the direction of a doctor do food challenges EVER take place.
Having stated in #1 that actual consumption of an allergic food is the only true measure of an allergy, this should only be done on purpose in a clinical setting. There are, unfortunately, accidental exposures to allergenic foods. If this happens, take careful notes on the type and amount of food consumed and specific details on the reaction. This information must be submitted and discussed with your allergist.

One final note about understanding the severity of a food allergy. Allergic reactions typically become more severe with each new exposure. This is not always the case. Anaphylactic reaction can occur with the first exposure to an allergy, but it is often a compounding effect.

Now that you understand the severity of your food allergy, let’s discuss the potential dangers of an allergic reaction. Simply, the dangers lurk everywhere. You always have to be on your toes, even if you don’t know the severity of your allergies.

Potential Dangers:

cross-contamination at your home, other’s homes, restaurants
allergens lurking in very strange places like, bike handle bars, swingsets, door handles, faucet handles, water fountains, and on and on
product labels: Do you heed to “may contain” or “shared equipment”?
allergens lurking in very strange products like, vitamins, hair products, cosmetics, etc.

How have you come to understand the severity & dangers in your life with food allergies?

So as not to overwhelm you, I have tried to be brief with the posts in this series. If you have any questions or any pertinent points to add, please do so.

Up next week on the Life with Food Allergies series: ”You mean I have to prepare 3 squares a day?”

Shared at Slightly Indulgent Tuesday.

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Posted in Life with Food Allergies | 4 Comments

Benefits of Cooking Dried Beans & Our Allergy Home Meal Plan

Posted on April 30, 2012 by Cook

You’ve all heard the benefits of adding beans to your diet. (If you haven’t, do a google search.) They contain a good amount of fiber, are easy to prepare, inexpensive, and a great meat substitute. Let me challenge you to start adding beans more to your menu and using beans from their dried state.

A good can of beans (with a bpa-free liner) will cost you over $2 a can on sale. That’s pretty pricey for the amount you get, less than 2 cups. You can buy a bag of dried beans, starting at $1.xx per pound (yields about 4+ cups cooked beans). The biggest deterent for people to use dried beans is the prep involved. Indeed, you have to plan ahead to eat beans from their dried state, but there are many benefits to doing so.

Here is the run-down of how I prepare dried beans and get more for my money and effort.

Rinse about 4 cups of dried beans and remove any stones. Put in crockpot with 8 cups of water, cook on low for about 2 hours. Pour beans into strainer and rinse. Put beans back into crockpot, cover with 8 cups of water, and cook for another 6-8 hours on low, or until tender.
From my crockpot full of cooked beans, I make several meals. Here is an example of how a crockpot of beans gets used in our house. Beans stay fresh for several days in the refrigerator, so it is easy to spread out the use of them throughout the week. I start the beans cooking in the morning (or even overnight). For dinner, we have something like tacos where I add 1-2 cups of beans to the 1/2 pound of taco meat (beef or chicken). Two nights later, we have a dish like beans & rice for dinner. With the beans that are left over, I make a bean hummus, like Whole New Mom’s Fast & Yummy Bean Dip (I add a touch of olive oil and a few shakes for hot sauce). Money Saving Mom recently did a freezer cooking session where she froze cooked beans. I have not had success freezing some bean varieties, but I did freeze the last two cups of black beans from last week’s batch. I’m looking forward to see how they turn out frozen.

And there is your mini budget & cooking lesson for this week about using dried beans.

Do you have ways that you benefit from, prepare or serve beans? Please share.

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Our Food Allergy Home Meal Plan for the week of April 29, 2012

Sunday: Baked Barbeque Chicken Thighs, Applesauce, Steamed Broccoli

Monday: Grilled Salmon, Carrot Fries, Brown Rice

Tuesday: Bbq Ribs, Sweet Potato Fries, Sauteed Balsamic Spinach

Wednesday: Salad Bar with (DF) Buttermilk Avocado Ranch Dressing

Thursday: Korean Beans in Sweet Sauce, Chicken (of some sort)

Friday: Baked Potato Bar, Fruit

Saturday: Kentucky Derby Party at friend’s house!

Dessert: Making Derby Pies for party (full allergy). Attempting an additional gf, df, sf, ef, cf version! We’ll see how that works out for me, but hopefully better than my pony picks

What’s on your menu this week?

Shared at….

Homestead Barn Hop, Real Food 101, Make Your Own Mondays, Menu Plan Mondays, Fat Tuesdays, Tasty Tuesday, Traditional Tuesdays, Hearth and Soul Blog Hop, Works for Me Wednesday, Thriving on Thursday

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Posted in Budget Tips, Cooking Tips, Meal Planning | 18 Comments

Happy Friday! And Reminders…

Posted on April 27, 2012 by Cook

Today is the last day to enter the giveaway for 1 gallon of Tropical Traditions Gold Label Virgin Coconut Oil! You have until midnight EST tonight to enter. To enter: Go back to the giveaway page and follow the directions.

Here are a few coupons that I felt were worth printing.

I think that about covers it for Friday. Have a great weekend! See you back here on Monday for another exciting week as we travel along our food allergy journeys.

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Recipe: Whole Wheat Blueberry Muffins

Posted on April 26, 2012 by Cook

I believe this has to be the best blueberry muffin recipe I’ve made to date. They got a little crispy around the edges and on the top. They were nice and moist, and puffed up to a good size too. It’s such a quick recipe that I whipped them up on a busy Saturday morning for our breakfast.

Muffin recipes are a great way to do a little freezer cooking without much extra work. Simply double this recipe and freeze half. I doubled the recipe, but our freezer batch never made it into the freezer

Enjoy this quick and tasty muffin as the blueberry season is quickly approaching!

Free of dairy, egg, soy, peanut/nuts

Whole Wheat Blueberry Muffins

Ingredients

2 bananas
2 EnerG egg replacer
3/4 cups brown sugar
1/2 cups grapeseed oil
1 teaspoons vanilla
2 cups whole-wheat flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoons cinnamon, ground
1/2 teaspoons salt
3/4 cups blueberries

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

1. Mix bananas (extra ripe work best) up on high speed in a mixer, until smooth. Make egg replacer (3 tsp powder + 4 Tbsp water; or 2 eggs). Add egg replacer, sugar, oil, and vanilla to the bananas; mix until well blended.

2. Add in flour, baking powder, cinnamon and salt (making sure to spread around a little as pouring in bowl). Mix until just blended. Stir in blueberries. Batter will be thick.

3. Pour batter into greased muffin cups. Bake for 22-25 minutes, or until toothpick comes out clean.

Remove from pan to cool. Makes 12 muffins.

Shared at Full Plate Thursday, B&B’s Tasty Tuesday, Tasty Tuesday, Slightly Indulgent Tuesday, and Thriving on Thursdays.

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Posted in Allergy Cooking, Recipes | 1 Comment

Allergy-Free Wednesdays: April 25, 2012

Posted on April 25, 2012 by Cook

Welcome to Allergy-Free Wednesdays!

We continue to grow here at AFW. We hit the highest submissions and clicks so far last week. Keep up the great work and spreading this important resource throughout the food allergy community!

I’m giving away 1 gallon of Tropical Traditions Gold Label Virgin Coconut Oil thru Friday, April 27. Head over to the giveaway post for details and to enter!

~Willing Cook Features~

Homemade Jello from Our Nourishing Journey

Sunbutter Chocolate Chip Baked Oatmeal from Jazzy Allergy Recipes

Italian Sausage Rice Bowl from Not Missing A Thing

~Reader Favorites~

Homemade Applesauce Fruit Snakes from Vegan Mommy Chef

Melt in Your Mouth Chicken from Sensitive and Centsible

Nacho Casserole from Gluten-Free for Jen
Feel free to grab the Allergy-Free Wednesdays button below and share it on your blog. Be sure to check out the other blog hop hosts to see what recipes they chose as their featured favorites.

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Adrienne @ Whole New Mom

Amber @ The Tasty Alternative

Janelle @ Gluten Freely Frugal

Laura @ Gluten Free Pantry

Michelle @ The Willing Cook (that’s me!)

Nancy @ Real Food, Allergy Free

Tessa @ Tessa the Domestic Diva

Allergy-Free Wednesday Guidelines

Any linked recipes should be allergy-friendly in some way.
Provide a link directly to your post, not your homepage.
Please link back to this site. It’s good blogging etiquette. Feel free to grab the bottom below to display on your post. In order to be featured next week, you must link back.
Current and past recipes/posts are welcome.
It’s helpful if you provide a little description with your recipe (i.e., GF, DF, EF, Paleo, GAPS, etc.).
You can link-up as many as 2 posts weekly.
No giveaways, please!
Leave a comment telling us about your submission, and visit other bloggers submissions too! It makes us all feel loved.
Entries that do not comply with these guidelines will be kindly removed.

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Posted in Allergy-Free Wednesdays | 7 Comments

Life with Food Allergies: Cooking

Posted on April 24, 2012 by Cook

We move on to stage 3 this week on cooking with food allergies. You’ve already done your cooking preparation by making a list of a few favorite dinners that you can easily make allergy-safe. Upon figuring out all the needed ingredients, you did your grocery shopping. Now you are back home and wandering where to begin. When it comes to allergy-safe cooking, you really have to be on your toes, particularly as you are new to this journey. You have to first consider all the ways in which cross-contamination can seep into your food.

Cooking utensils, pots, pans, cutting boards, etc. must all be clean and free of previously used on foods that are now forbidden (and even those presumed clean). This goes for your home as well as others. For example, we had lunch at a family members house recently where we were cooking and prepping all the food together. Even though I pulled clean dishes and cooking equipment out of the cabinet, I washed them again. I explained to my sister-in-law why I was being cautious. She did not take offense.
A word of caution regarding the first point, particularly if you wash items at someone’s house. If using a sponge or a washcloth, you have to make sure that there are not remnants of an allergen on that sponge. What’s the point of rewashing a knife with a sponge that was just used to wash the cheese grater? When in doubt, simply wash the item with your soapy hand. I have done that too.
Make sure all your ingredients, if previously opened, have not been cross-contaminated. Things like the peanut butter knife used in the jelly jar, or bread crumbs in the butter.

You are certain all areas of potential cross-contamination are now safe and you’re ready to cook. Go for it! Give yourself a little extra time to prepare things from scratch (you will be doing a lot, if not most, of your cooking from scratch). You can no longer expect to through a frozen pizza in the oven and eat 15 minutes later. The simpler your meals are though, the quicker you’ll be eating and out of the kitchen.

Let’s take, for example, our Sunday lunch. We try to have a nice lunch after church on Sundays. If I don’t prepare a little ahead of time, this always ends in “what are we going to eat”. This past Sunday, I remembered to thaw out the meat the night before and considered the side dishes that we would have. We enjoyed steak and baked homemade chicken tenders, pan-fried potatoes, and steamed vegetables. With all five of us working together, we were able to go from unloading the clean dishes from the dishwasher and reloading with the dirty breakfast dishes, to food prep, to cooking, to food on the table in less than 30 minutes. You can see all the simple, yet tasty, allergy-friendly dinners that I try to provide for my family on our weekly meal plan (many have recipe links).

Our Sunday Feast

Finally, some of you may live in a home where the food allergies are mixed, like my family. My husband is allergic to more foods than my son, but my son’s allergies are much more severe than my husband’s allergies. My two daughters and I have no food allergies. Cooking simple meals can be an asset in this environment in that you can add desired ingredients to the dish when serving. Some examples of this in our home are adding cheese and sour cream to tacos, chili, or baked potatoes, or topping a sausage biscuit with an egg. The more simple you start out, the more freedom you have…trust me!

{A word of caution: You are not going to make great meals night in and night out. You have to give yourself a little grace. I make blunders in the kitchen usually at least once a week. A recipe doesn’t turn out like I expected, or I was in a rush and threw things together. I like the meal but the kids hate it. That sort of thing. Learn from it and move along. This is a journey…maybe for life! Embrace it and work with it. But be encouraged, it becomes second nature after only a short time.}

Do you have any questions about cooking for food allergies? I want to make sure I cover all the bases for those starting out or struggling.

Next week, we’ll cover why it is so important that you (and others) have a clear understanding of the potential severity and danger of food allergies. It may just be a post that you need to pass along to others who don’t understand.

Shared at Slightly Indulgent Tuesday and We Are That Family.

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Posted in Allergy Cooking, Life with Food Allergies | 8 Comments

Our Allergy Home Meal Plan 4.22.12

Posted on April 23, 2012 by Cook

I’m trying out a new way to get my allergy-friendly meal plan out there to all of you. There are a number of websites that host meal plan link-ups, but they are always before I get around to posting it. Furthermore, our weekends are always packed with busyness that I’d like a little extra time to spend on my more in-depth posts, like the Life with Food Allergies series, that have always gone up on Mondays. So, I’m going to swap the Monday and Tuesday schedule for a few weeks to see if that works better for all. I’ll continue to give a little extra cooking, budget, or homemaking tip with the meal plan if there is something I want to share. We’ll see how that all goes in the weeks to come.

{Don’t forget to enter the giveaway to win 1 gallon of Tropical Traditions Gold Label Virgin Coconut Oil. Click on the highlighted name for the details.}

Our Sunday Feast

Our Food Allergy Meal Plan for the Week of April 22, 2012

Sunday: Grilled Steak, Baked Homemade Chicken Fingers (garlic, bbq, buffalo), Steamed Vegetables, Pan-Fried Potatoes

Monday: Jap Chae

Tuesday: Sweetened Clove Ham, Mashed Sweet Potatoes with Brown Butter Sauce

Wednesday: Italian Sausage Rice Bowl

Thursday: Potato Nachos

Friday: Black Bean Soup

Saturday: Refrigerator Round-up (leftovers)

New Recipe Experiment: Sunbutter Chocolate Chip Baked Oatmeal

What’s cooking in your kitchen this week?

Shared at Menu Plan Monday.

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Posted in Meal Planning, Recipes | Leave a comment

Giveaway Day: 1 Gallon of Coconut Oil!

Posted on April 20, 2012 by Cook

{Note: This giveaway is now closed!! Thank you for entering and come back soon.}

You guys were so awesome for entering the giveaway a couple of weeks ago for 1 quart of Tropical Traditions coconut oil! Because of your great participation, they are now offering to give away 1 gallon of their top-of-the-line Gold Label Virgin Coconut Oil to one reader! YAY!!!! That is so exciting!

Virgin Coconut Oil, Gold Label – 1 gallon

(Current Sale Price: $75)

And who knows where this may lead. If you guys share this giveaway and really get the word out there to all your friends and family, there may be more giveaways in the future. I love Tropical Traditions!

This giveaway is much like the last giveaway…read the details on how to enter at the bottom of the page. And please share, share, share via Facebook, twitter, email, etc.! Giveaway ends next Friday, April 27. In the meantime, here are the details of this great Tropical Traditions product…

You can watch a video about Tropical Traditions Gold Label Virgin Coconut Oil here:

Want to know about all the many uses for coconut oil? Read this link to over 100 uses for coconut oil!
Finally, check out Tropical Traditions YouTube page for recipe ideas, information, and more.

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How to Enter

There is a single requirement for entry in this giveaway. You must go to the Tropical Traditions website and subscribe to their email Sales Newsletter. (Just click on the underlined highlighted portion in the previous sentence.) I personally receive this newsletter about once a week. It informs you of current sales as well as provides other interesting articles on health issues.

You must come back here and leave a comment letting me know that you subscribed to the Tropical Traditions newsletter.

Do you already receive the TT newsletter? No problem. Just do one of the additional entries below and leave a comment letting me know that you already receive the newsletter. Be sure to leave a separate comment for each additional entry.

Additional Entries

Follow Tropical Traditions on twitter @troptraditions and @ttspecialdeals
“Like” Tropical Traditions on Facebook
Follow Tropical Traditions on pinterest

You must come back here and leave a comment letting me know that you did any of the above for additional entries. Please leave a comment for each additional entry.

This giveaway ends at midnight on Friday, April 27, 2012 at midnight (EST). So, let the entering begin….

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If you aren’t familiar with the company, here is a quick sample of the current sales at Tropical Traditions, click on the link below.

Tropical Traditions Weekly Sales

Disclaimer: If you order by clicking on the sales flyer link above and have never ordered from Tropical Traditions in the past, you will receive a free book on Virgin Coconut Oil, and I will receive a discount coupon for referring you.

Shared at Monday Mania, Make Your Own Monday, Real Food 101, Better Moms Monday, and Homestead Barn Hop.

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Posted in Reviews | 265 Comments

Recipe: Chocolate Chip Pecan Cookie Pie

Posted on April 19, 2012 by Cook

Do you want to know my secret to cooking? I like to….no, no. I can’t give out my secret.

I found this recipe for A Pie Named Blondie from A Taste of Wonderful a number of months back. It has been open in my browser waiting for me to make it. But with most recipes, I never make it exactly like the original recipe. Not that there is anything wrong with the original, I just may have different ingredients on hand or dietary restrictions.

The original recipe called for 1 1/2 cups of gluten-free flour (she used King Arthur). I rarely buy pre-packaged gluten-free flour blends, but make my own instead. Furthermore, with most chocolate recipes, I love the combination of bananas and chocolate. The original called for applesauce. There’s nothing wrong with applesauce and it’s a great addition to any recipe where you use an egg substitute. Bananas act similarly. Finally, I left out the coconut because I wasn’t in the mood for them and I used chopped pecans instead of walnuts.

Having said all the above, check out the original recipe because I made very few adjustments. Pick whichever recipe works best for you. (You can even follow the same recipe and use whole wheat flour and an egg, if you have no food allergies.) It is a delicious treat though, so you must make it! It was fantastic right out of the oven with ice cream. I even ate it for breakfast (hehe) warmed up and drizzled with maple syrup. Oh, I forgot to tell you about the awesome crunch around the edges and chewiness in the middle. Yummy!

Chocolate Chip Pecan Cookie Pie

Recipe adapted from http://tasteofwonderland.wordpress.com/2011/11/29/a-pie-named-blondie. This recipe can be made into bars by simply using an 8x8 pan.

Ingredients

1 EnerG egg replacer
1 bananas
1/2 cups grapeseed oil
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
3/4 cups brown sugar
1 cups rice flour
1/2 cups tapioca flour
1/4 cups Old-Fashioned Oats
1 teaspoons guar gum
1/4 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoons cream of tartar
1 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoons cinnamon, ground
1/2 + cups mini chocolate chips (like Enjoy Life)
1/4 + cups pecans

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

1. Whisk EnerG egg replacer (1 1/2 tsp powder + 2 Tbsp water; or 1 egg). Smash/puree 1 overly ripe banana until there are no lumps. Add banana, oil, and vanilla to the egg replacer and mix thoroughly. Add sugar and mix well.

2. Mix together dry ingredients. Add to wet ingredients and stir well by hand to combine. Add in chocolate chips and chopped pecans (you could use any other nut and/or shredded coconut); mix well.

3. Grease pie dish (you could also use an 8x8 pan) and spread batter into dish. Sprinkle additional chocolate chips and chopped pecans on the top.

4. Bake in oven 25-30 minutes, or until brown and cooked through.

Serve with allowed vanilla ice cream or whip cream. (Or eat it for breakfast like I did, warmed with maple syrup.) Yum!