Cooking for kids with allergies

[AdoramusTeChriste]

I have a kid who can't have wheat, milk, eggs, or corn. Duck eggs are supposed to be OK, and today I finally found a farm that sells them. So we had our first pancakes in about 4 or 5 months. They turned out great! I used the Red Mill gluten-free, dairy-free baking flour and I mixed in some rice flour to give it a lighter quality, and I used light coconut milk- the flavor dissipates during cooking. Here's my recipe:

Together in a large bowl, whisk:

2 duck eggs
1 cup light coconut milk
3/4 cup water
2- 3 tablespoons coconut oil
2 tablespoons sugar

Together in a bowl or measuring cup combine:

1-1/2 cups Red Mill gluten-free dairy-free all purpose baking flour
1/2 cup rice flour
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 tablespoons baking powder

Stir the dry stuff into the wet stuff and start flipping flapjacks!

[Historian]

Thanks for posting this.  At my house it's no dairy, eggs, peanuts, or tree nuts.  I don't live near any duck eggs though, unless I want to start stealing them from wild ducks

[Historian]

I just signed up to cook some meals for the priests of my N.O. parish-- and after I had my day on the calendar, they told me that one of the priests has Celiac.  I would have probably signed up anyway, but this adds a level of complexity to the situation.

They gave me a chart of "Safe" and "Forbidden" foods.  Wow.  This will be a lot of stuff to keep track.

In beautiful Kansas City, barbeque is the fifth food group, but barbeque sauces are on the "forbidden" list.  I think I can make a decent bbq sauce while working around the gluten, but if anyone has a recipe, I'd appreciate it.  Additonally, is ketchup gluten safe?  I read mixed answers.  Any suggestions?

[DarkKnight]

Additonally, is ketchup gluten safe?  I read mixed answers.

They add wheat to ketchup in Kansas?

I'm thinking Ketchup, (vinegar or lemon juice), honey and spices??? I don't know what else has been blacklisted.

[Historian]

DK, that's what I thought too!  But things that you wouldn't expect have gluten in them (Miracle Whip? Teriyaki? Bleu Cheese?  Frosty Malts?).  Turns out that it's not just wheat gluten, but all glutens-- corn, barley and many others.  Strange.  Making bbq sauce from a ketchup base is imperfect, but it's a big step-saver.  I've made a few different sauces before with and without a ketchup base, and a little Heinz really stabilizes the sauce-- even if it leaves the sauce a little overly vinegary.

It's none of my business, but I'm curious about how he consumes the Blessed Sacrament at Mass.  I guess that it's one of the low-gluten hosts, but I've read that the host must be real bread and therefore must contain some measure of gluten.  Presumably he just has a very small piece of a low-gluten host, but truthfully I've never paid rapt attention (or thought to pay attention, since I didn't know he had Celiac) to him consuming the Body before.

[DarkKnight]

I've read of some just taking the Precious Blood (which has a crumb of the host in the bottom in any event).

[Historian]

http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCri...SN01401804
 
Expert sees peanut allergy solution within 5 years
Thu May 1, 2008 6:30pm EDT
By Will Dunham

WASHINGTON, May 1 (Reuters) - A form of immunotherapy that could get rid of a person's allergy to peanuts is likely within five years, even as the condition appears to grow more and more common, a U.S. expert said on Thursday.

Peanut allergy often appears in the first three years of life, with the allergic reaction to eating peanuts ranging from a minor irritation all the way to a life-threatening, whole-body allergic response called anaphylaxis.

Many children grow out of other food allergies such as milk or eggs, but only about 20 percent lose their peanut allergy.

Dr. Wesley Burks, a food allergy expert at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, North Carolina, wrote in the Lancet medical journal that a solution appears to be on the horizon.

"I think there's some type of immunotherapy that will be available in five years. And the reason I say that is that there are multiple types of studies that are ongoing now," Burks said in a telephone interview.

Ideally, such a therapy would change a person's immune response to peanuts from an allergic one to a nonallergic one, Burks said.

He said one possible approach is using engineered peanut proteins as immunotherapy. Other approaches are showing promise, he said, including the use of Chinese herbal medicine in animal research.

Genetic engineering may also produce an allergen-free peanut, Burks said.

But he said that because several peanut proteins are involved in the allergic response, the process of altering enough of the peanut allergens to make a modified peanut that is less likely to cause an allergic reaction would probably render the new peanut no longer a peanut.

"You could end up with a soybean," Burks said.

He said peanut allergy affects about 1 percent of children under age of 5, and that in the past 15 years more children have been diagnosed with the condition.

He cited research showing the condition becoming more common -- doubling among young children from 0.4 percent in 1997 to 0.8 percent in 2002 in one U.S. study

It is unclear why it is becoming more common, he said. One theory he cited was the "hygiene hypothesis," which holds that too little exposure to infectious agents in early childhood can raise one's susceptibility to allergic reactions.

Burks said other researchers have suggested that if a pregnant woman eat peanuts, her baby has a higher risk of becoming allergic.

Symptoms of peanut allergy includes skin reactions such as hives, itching around the mouth and throat, diarrhea, stomach cramps, nausea, vomiting, shortness of breath, wheezing and, in severe cases, anaphylaxis -- a medical emergency. (Editing by Maggie Fox and Xavier Briand)

[DarkKnight]

George Washington Carver died too soon. I bet he could have cracked peanut allergies (shelled them too with a little salt).

[AdoramusTeChriste]

I made a birthday cake today with spelt flour. My allergy guy turned 10 today. :) This is the first time I have used spelt. It came out really well! There are no eggs in it, and I think that one could substitute the butter with some other oil.

Lemon Spelt Cake
1/2 cup butter or margarine
Juice of 1 lemon or 3 tablespoons bottled lemon juice.
3/4 cup sugar
1 1/2 cups Spelt flour
1/2 tsp Baking soda
1/2 cup coconut milk

Melt butter and add lemon juice and sugar.
Pour the mixture and coconut milk over the dry ingredients.
Mix well and pour into a greased dish. (I used an 11 x 7)
Cook at 350F for 30 minutes.

[Historian]

What is spelt flour?