Allergy families, need food ideas

[Chelley00]

After 2 years of being sick, I was finally diagnosed with multiple food allergies (egg, tomato, dairy, wheat, soy, potato, corn, chocolate, yeast and peanuts....yay for me!!!)

You've gotten a ton of great advice. Here's what I'll offer:

I'm finding that planning WAY ahead is the only way to make it. I do a lot of food packing: work, travel, relatives etc. It just keeps me safe and doesn't put the burden on anyone else to cook for me

There are GREAT websites out there with tons of recipes. The Sensitive Pantry is one of my favorites, as is Spunky Coconut (baked goods!)

Living Without is a magazine and well worth the subscription price

If you can find millet bread, it's egg free

We also use the soy free Earth Balance and I found Soy free egg free vegan-ese which is like mayo. I had to really look for the veganese but finally found it at a smaller health food store.

I use flaxseed meal and water for egg replacer. It's a little healthier than the egg replacer (and I can't use it because it's potato flour)

I second the sunbutter, and if he can still tolerate tree nuts, almond and cashew butters are great as well.

Try hummus. I never thought my kids would like it, but they love to dip veggies and crackers in it!

 

[happypooh]

My daughter has the same allergies plus more. Going to WDW and on DCL has been great as they are wonderful with food allergies. Where else can she get gluten free, dairy free, egg and soy free cookies to decorate? (Boma has become her all time favorite place to eat!)
We eat alot of rice - we're asian so it helps! But rice pasta from trader joes, plus homemade sauces work well. And we make a list from certain restaurants that we can eat - mcDs apple slices being one of them! We get alot of snacks from trader joes - their kettle corn popcorn and snappeas, and when she needs protein and we're out and about we take hormels natural choice ham or smoked salmon, maybe even prosciuitto. I make our own bread, cakes and even have a minidonut maker that is just hers so she gets donuts once in a while (rice flour, tapioca flour, baking powder, applesauce, corn oil, sugar and a little cinnamon...use variations of this with other flours like glutinous rice, sweet rice flour or cornmeal for cup cakes/ birthday cakes/waffles.) We also eat alot of fruit - berries especially. She is an expensive person to feed when we're on vacation! We rarely go to an italian restaurant as there is so little she can eat there. Mainly chinese or japanese restaurants - we always make sure to talk to the chef and the manager but sometimes it's still a little scary and we've had a few incidents so we know which places to avoid! Hope it all settles down for you. I know it may seem overwhelming but the resources that have been mentioned in other posts do really help...and also a trip to WDW where they are really really good about food allergies! Best resort so far for food allergies - Animal Kingdom Lodge as they have a chef especially for their baking! But we've also had great food at All Star Movies and Pop century. Worst place so far at WDW was at 50s Prime time - tried it twice and both times had reactions to food there where we're downing the benedryl before we even leave the restaurant! Probably wouldn't go back there again. Also not that crazy about Chef de France at Epcot. Otherwise, we'd go to most restaurants at WDW and have not had a problem (average of 4-5 trips per year for past 6 yrs).