Nut free Christmas cake recipe

November 16, 2011 at 11:22 am | Posted in Allergy Related, Free from recipes | Leave a comment
Tags: , , ,

Looking for a nut free Christmas cake recipe? Try using this one – Rich Christmas Cake – on the Netmums site which says the almonds can easily be swapped out for extra dried fruit to make it nut free. It’s got good reviews and sounds delicious!!

They’ve also got a recipe for egg free mince pies. Happy baking!!

Have you got any great free-from Christmas recipes….let me know.

Father Christmas

 

Gluten free white bread

November 23, 2010 at 9:11 pm | Posted in Allergy Related | Leave a comment

After a recipe to make a great gluten free white bread?

I’ve been recommended Dan Lepard’s recipe – shown here. His recipe contains psyllium husk which mimics the gluten in wheat. I need to check out our local health food shops to see if I can get some and then I’ll definitely give it a go!!

Anyone else tried it?

Vague labelling makes life difficult

August 15, 2010 at 9:24 pm | Posted in Allergy Related, General: Day-to-day | Leave a comment
Tags: , ,

Just read this article on labelling – Vague labels harm food sufferers and think it’s so true.

I think I’ve got quite a good understanding of labels – for example I can spot sugar under all its guises (sucrose, fructose, corn syrup etc….) but sometimes labels do just seem very vague.

And my pet hate is with food nasties like additives & flavourings. Often foods will have it written on the front of the packet “no added artificial flavourings or colourings” and when you read the labels there’s a lot of vague stuff which sounds like it could be exactly that!!

And I imagine for people intolerant or allergic to things that don’t legally need to be mentioned then it makes life very difficult.

What do you think?

‘More guidance needed’ for allergies

August 13, 2010 at 4:38 pm | Posted in Allergy Related, In the news | Leave a comment

This news story was on Netmums….what do you think?

Food allergies in kids should be considered if they have skin conditions, gastrointestinal problems such as vomiting, or constipation and respiratory complaints, it has been suggested.

The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) has released draft guidance on the diagnose methods and assessment of food allergies in children in a bid to support health professionals.

If an allergy is suspected the doctor should then take a clinical history test, assessment of symptoms and a physical examination.

Associate director for the Centre for Clinical Practice at Nice Dr Judith Richardson said food allergies in youngsters are becoming more frequent.

“Many of the symptoms are common to other conditions, so it’s not always easy to identify and diagnose food allergy correctly,” she added.

Dr Richardson noted this will be the first evidence-based guideline on how food allergies should be diagnosed and assessed.

According to the NHS, between one and two in every 100 people in the UK suffers with a food allergy.

Allergy free chocolate – novelty & advent calendars

November 2, 2009 at 12:18 pm | Posted in Allergy Related | Leave a comment
Tags: , , , ,

Now that we are in November, it feels like Christmas is just around the corner.

So if you’ve already started to think about allergy free chocolate, the No Nuts Just Chocolate sells some really nice allergy free chocolate including:

  • dairy milk chocolate santa – nut-free, egg-free, £7.85
  • bag of 6 dark chocolate santas – dairy/lactose-free, nut-free, egg-free, £6.85
  • advent calendar – dairy/lactose-free, nut-free, egg-free, £8.85

Chocolate Santa

Dragon Egg-Free Birthday Cake

July 7, 2009 at 9:05 pm | Posted in Allergy Related, Eating In | Leave a comment
Tags: , , ,

Well, it was my son’s 4th birthday on Saturday so time for another homemade birthday cake!!

Several weeks ago, I stupidly asked him what type of cake he wanted – a dragon cake came the answer.

 Fine, I thought…then I started looking round and discovered that there are no dragons anywhere in any shops!! I thought I’d easily be able to get a dragon shaped cake tin or at least some sort of dragon decoration to put on a plain square cake. But no, nothing!

A couple of days before his birthday, a sense of panic set in before my sister came to the rescue. She casually mentioned on the phone one day that she in fact had a dragon shaped jelly mould. Hurrah, surely that could be of some use…?

 We had a couple of disasters along the way but in the end we cracked it. We went for a square chocolate sponge, with chocolate butter icing in the middle and on the top, with a green dragon poking out of his cave!

dragon_cake

dragon_cake

The green dragon was made using vegetarian geletine, condensed milk and green food dye.

The chocolate sponge was made using the usual birthday cake recipe (x2):

Ingredients:
110g/4oz dark 70% cocoa chocolate, broken into pieces
85g/3oz butter (or dairy free spread)
150ml/5fl oz golden syrup
110g/4oz self-raising flour
1 heaped tsp baking powder
50ml/2fl oz milk (or soya milk)
1/2 tsp salt

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees C or 350 degrees F and line a 20cm/8 inch baking tin.
2. Place the chocolate, dairy-free spread and golden syrup in a pan. Gently melt together, stirring continuously.
3. In a bowl, add the flour, baking powder and salt.
4. Pour the melted chocolate mixture and milk into the bowl with the dry ingredients. Mix together until the mixture is smooth.
5. Pour the mixture into the baking tin and place on the middle shelf for 10-15 mins or until the mixture is just set in the middle.
6. Allow to cool and then turn out the cake.

I then used the usual cheat’s decorating method, using bought icing, sprinkles and icing pens!

Kids Cookery Kits – Allergy Free

March 10, 2009 at 1:11 pm | Posted in Allergy Related, Eating In, Interesting Products | Leave a comment
Tags: , ,

Just come across this great site – http://www.craftychefs.co.uk/ – which has some fantastic cookery kits for kids which are dairy, egg and nut free.

You can also buy prebaked cakes and biscuits (egg, dairy & nut free) which are all ready for decorating at home.

Definitely a website worth checking out if your children like to help out in the kitchen!

Peanut Allergy Hope

February 23, 2009 at 1:06 pm | Posted in Allergy Related, In the news | Leave a comment

It was half term last week so it came as no surprise to me that I missed the latest news about peanut allergy. A couple of people mentioned it in passing and I thought I’d better look it up!

Here is a link to The Times article for anyone else that missed it! It may give hope to other parents of children with a peanut allergy.

Organic Fromage Frais – Lemon Free!

February 4, 2009 at 9:18 pm | Posted in Allergy Related, Eczema, Interesting Products | Leave a comment
Tags: ,

Plum Baby have recently launched baby organic fromage frais.

plum baby fromage frais

plum baby fromage frais

Now obviously these aren’t for those little ones on a diary-free diet but thought I’d mention here as

a) we’ve tried them and they were a big hit and

b) because, so far, they are the only organic baby dairy products we’ve found that don’t contain lemon juice.

All things citrus seem to make my daughters excema worse so we are avoiding it at the moment. But, as with lots of things, when you start looking at labels citrus seems to be in more products that you initially think! Yoghurt and fromage frais included!

I must add though that only two out of the three of the flavours are lemon-free (but that just means that I got to try them out too!!). And talking of flavours, they’ve got some quite unusual combos – Strawberry & Chamomile (lemon free), Raspberry & Rosehip (lemon free), and Peach & Sweet Fennel (not lemon free).

Green & Blacks 70% – No longer dairy free

January 29, 2009 at 9:51 pm | Posted in Allergy Related | Leave a comment
Tags: ,

I received my copy of Foods Matter magazine this morning and saw they had a snippet about Green & Blacks 70% dark chocolate no longer being dairy free.

So I quickly went onto the Green & Blacks website to have a look at their ingredients list and yes it does now list Organic Whole Milk Powder.

However, next to it there is an asterick directing you to their FAQ’s which state:

Q.  Why has the allergen warning changed:

A. The new communication will highlight milk as an ingredient in its previously labelled ‘vegan’ dark organic chocolate bars. As both the milk chocolate and dark chocolate bars are made using the same production line there is a risk of cross contact. A recent audit revealed that traces of milk residues can still be found on manufacturing equipment despite intensive cleaning.

Q. Has the recipe for dark chocolate change?

A. No, the recipe has remained the same since 1998.

This is obviously really disappointing news for allergy sufferers as they can’t take the risk of cross contamination. But at least it clears up the confusion over a change in the ingredients list.

Next Page »

Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com.
Entries and comments feeds.