someone more experienced than i....PLEASE HELP!
I have recently learned that my oldest son, sam, has some pretty serious/rare gastro disease called eosinophilic gastroenteritis. his gi recommended no dairy, no eggs and little or no meat. keep in mind that we are not vegetarians, let alone vegan! this is also somewhat allergy related and we had found out earlier that sam was showing reactions to peanuts, soy and watermelon. upon doing some research on e.g., i found that wheat also contributes to this. so here we are: no meat, no eggs, no dairy, no wheat, no peanuts, no soy. what can i feed my baby?!? thank god he does love his vegetables, but i am worried about iron and vitamin d. he eats enough beans and other things for the protein, so i am not so worried about that. he has been such a trooper. he actually likes rice milk (but not almond milk). my husband and i are making the same changes in our lifestyles. i can't imagine eating cheese in front of the boy! we have a pretty good health food store here, if you can't find it, they'll order it, you know? but i don't even know what i am looking for! here are my specific questions:
1) what is the best non-wheat flour for baking?
2) is there an egg substitute that does not contain soy?
3) is there a cheese sub that doesn't have soy?
4) what about a butter sub?
5) also, do you feel that you don't stay as full as long when you're eating this way? sam seems to be hungry all the time.
any and all help is greatly appreciated.
thanks,
sarah
Howdy
First of all, check out this website: http://www.foodyoucaneat.com/
It's a recipe website. when you sign up, you click off all the foods your son can't eat, and only recipes that fit your requirements will show up.
As for wheat/soy-free egg replacers, here are some ideas that are used for baking:
- "flax eggs" are made from ground flax seeds and water. I don't have an exact recipe for you but there are plenty of recipes on vegan websites (do a google search for vegan egg replacer)
- applesauce
- mashed banana (I like to use mashed banana in cookies)
If your son can eat oats, I often use oatmeal in cookie recipes with success.
Also, if he can eat brown rice, check your grocery store for brown rice pastas. You might be able to find spaghetti, rigatoni, macaroni, etc.
Here is a wheat/soy free recipe for grilled "cheese", and it's pretty tasty (and the cheeze can double as a nacho dip!), but it does contain oats. http://community.livejournal.com/vegancooking/1282278.html
thank you so much for the "foods you can eat" site! what a great site. it was so easy to use and i didn't have to sort through all kinds of things he can't eat (but i suppose that is the point!) and, while i am a little leary of "uncheese", the picture sure looked good, didn't it? i think we'll try it. thanks again.
Yeah, the uncheese didn't taste exactly like cheese, even though the appearance was similar. Think of this particular one as a melty roasted red pepper dip!
By the way, I just found a typo in my last post. I posted that I use oatmeal in cookies intead of wheat flour; what I MEANT to say is that I use oat flour. It's a flour made from ground oats.
Oh, another website you can check out is www.foodsubs.com . It's a food substitution website; you can pick almost any ingredient, and find it there to read about. The little blurb will also mention which foods can be substituted in a recipe for it. It's very helpful :)
Also check out Bob's Red Mill (bobsredmill.com). They have a whole line of gluten-free products, as well as recipes.
hi, i'm intollerant to wheat and gluten and for baking i use the following at these ratios to substitute for wheat flour:
for light cakes and light baked goods:
1 cup white rice flour (white is finer and softer than brown but less nutritious!)
1 cup tapioca flour
1 cup cornstarch
1 tablespoon potato flour
generally for non cake things like pancakes muffins, etc i premix and store:
8 cups rice flour (i mix brown and white 50/50)
2 2/3 cups potato STARCH (not flour)
1 1/3 cups tapicoa flour.
generally its worth remembering that different flours add different properties to cooking, for example:
cornstarch binds but makes things crumbly
tapioca flour is gluey (really really gluey and just sucks up liquid!)
potato and rice flours are starchy
you might also want to try buying some xanthan gum and experimenting with it- adding a quarter teaspoon to few cups of flour helps it stick together, but i've found it is a bit of a fine art mastering its use, get it wrong and things can come out chewy, lol. and don't spill it on the counter and get it wet as it is the most slippery thing you've ever seen, trust me, it's bizzarre.
you can adapt most regular receipes using these flour mixes, but you might have to add or subtract a little liquid from the origional, its a trial and error thing unfortunately, but i usually find after a few tries i can make something that tastes like its meant to, or at least close. bread... i haven't mastered yet. i make a lot of nice bread bricks though :-).
for gluten free pasta i'd recommend tinkyada brand rice pasta- the company site is: www.tinkyada.com
its the only one i've ever found that isn't slimy, rubbery, crumbly or just weird. i'm in canada so i don't know if you can get it where you are, but its worth searching for. at a push i'll use orgran products -see www.orgran.com they do have a pretty good packet bread mix too, now i come to think of it.
here in ontario you can buy gorgeous baked goods made by El Peto- www.elpeto.com these guys make products that seem to be pretty much free from everything and still taste heavenly, including frozen sweet pies and muffins- its worth finding out if you can get them where you are.
and the hungry thing... i've found i tend to snack more than most non vegans i've met- i think it's normal when you don't eat meat, and my dietition told me its actually better for your body to eat often, especially if you are eating things that your body breaks down more easily and efficiently, like fruit and vegetables. as long as your food is nutrient rich, its fine to be hungry more often than you would when eating meat, which is something which takes a really long time for your body to process.
I strongly urge you to buy this book. It is a fury of information, recipes etc....and its focus is vegetarians! Woo!
http://www.vegsource.com/jo/books/allergies.htm
-good luck!
gluten-free flour info:
http://www.csaceliacs.org/recipes/FlourFormulas.php
enjoy life (http://www.enjoylifefoods.com) makes bread products (bagels, bread) cereals (granola & a cheerios type cereal called perky-os, which come plain, frosted, or apple cinnamon), confectionary things like cookies/brownies/snack bars & chocolate chips that are free of all common allergens, meaning no: wheat/gluten, dairy/casein, peanuts, tree nuts, egg, soy, fish/shellfish/meat products/, corn, potato, sulfites or sesame. the company namaste foods (http://www.namastefoods.com) makes excellent bake mixes & lundberg family farms (http://www.lundberg.com/) make great rice products like rice milks, pilafs, rice cakes, & rice chips that are all gluten free & egg free. most of them are dairy free as well (i think the only things they make that aren't dairy free are some flavors of the instant rice dishes). also a lot of their products are organic. hope this helps a little.
I found this gingerbread cookie recipe today, and it reminded me of this thread. I haven't tried it though, but hey, it's wheat-free, gluten-free, and calls for oil instead of solid fat.
http://www.veganchef.com/gingerbread.htm
a good book is "food allergy survival guide" (living well without dairy, eggs, fish, gluten, peanuts, shellfish, soy, tree nuts, wheat, yeast and more)
check it out--may help