Almond Milk Recipe

We have finally come up with a delicious almond milk recipe!!!!  My kids love it, and it bakes beautifully as well as tastes great.

Here it is:

1 c raw almonds
3 c water
2 T raw sugar
1 tsp. vanilla (optional)

Soak almonds for 6 hours or overnight.  Rinse off almonds and place them in a blender (I use a Vita Mix) with 3 c water, sugar, and vanilla.  Blend together for 3 minutes.  Pour milk through a sieve lined with cheese cloth.  Use a spatula, if needed, to help milk strain faster.  You can also squeeze any additional milk through the cheesecloth if desired.  Place milk in refrigerator and enjoy!

Note:  I have been saving the leftover almond paste/matter and have had great success in using it in cakes and muffins.  No waste, and very yummy!!!  I'll post another recipe soon!

Dairy-free Gingerbread Cookie Recipe

These spicy gingerbread cookies and nice and chewy. 
Be sure not to over bake! 
Enjoy:)

1/2 c dairy-free margarine (I use Fleischmann's Unsalted)
3/4 c light brown sugar
1/2 c molasses
1 egg yolk
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. ground cloves
1/2-1 tsp. ground ginger
1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg

In a large mixing bowl, cream together dairy-free margarine and brown sugar until smooth.  Add molasses and egg yolk and mix together.  In a separate bowl, combine together dry ingredients.  Add to wet ingredients and mix together until smooth.  Cover and chill for 1 hour in the fridge.  Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.  When dough is ready, on a lightly floured surface roll dough out to 1/4 inch thick.  Cut out desired shapes with cookie cutters.  Place cookies 2” apart on un-greased cookie sheets.  Bake for 8-10 minutes in preheated oven until firm.  Allow to cool a few minutes and then transfer to a cooling rack.  When cookies are cool, frost or decorate as desired using dairy-free frosting/icing and candies.

Dairy-free Vegetable Pasta Primavera Recipe

3 c broccoli, chopped
1 red bell pepper, chopped
3 medium carrots, peeled and sliced
3 T dairy-free margarine (I use Fleischmann’s Unsalted)
2 T flour
2 c chicken broth
2 c water
1 c rice milk (or milk substitute of choice)
1 - 13 oz. package Rotini pasta (I used whole wheat; you can substitute egg noodles or noodle of choice.)
1 garlic clove, pressed
2 T flour
Salt & pepper, to taste

Chop vegetables and set aside.  In a large pan, melt dairy-free margarine.  Add flour and whisk together.  Slowly add chicken broth, water, and rice milk and bring to a boil.  Stir in pasta.  Gently boil for 3-4 minutes.  Add broccoli, pepper, carrots, and garlic.  Return to a boil and cook until pasta is cooked according to desired consistency (around 4-5 minutes).  Add salt and pepper, to taste.  Allow to stand for a few minutes to thicken.  Serve warm.

For more free recipes visit:  www.milkallergycompanion.com

Allerbling Wrist Bands

My friend showed my this site.  What a cute way to keep your kids safe when they are out and about, especially in the younger grades.
http://www.allerbling.com/

Tolerance for Milk in Baked Goods?

This is a guest post by Walter A.  Thanks for the information!!!

Tolerance for Milk in Baked Goods?

Just a few years ago, researchers discovered that a significant portion of children with milk allergies
can tolerate baked goods containing milk. Dr. Hugh Sampson, from the Mount Sinai School of
Medicine in New York, led the study based on an intuition.

An allergy comes about because a person's immune system overreacts to something that person is
sensitive to. Most foods are actually complicated mixtures of lots of substances. Milk is a mixture of
proteins, fats, sugars, and other things, in water. Eggs are also complex, with many things assembled
together to form the entire egg. Most allergy sufferers are reactive only to a specific thing in the
mixture, called an allergen, and an allergen is often a type of protein.

Proteins are one of the basic building blocks of life - the cells in your body (and in plants and animals
we eat) are like little machines, and proteins are the parts. There are millions of types of protein, and
each has it's own special shape that helps it do particular things. Bacteria and viruses have their own
special proteins, and our immune systems have evolved to recognize these foreign proteins and attack
them. In allergic individuals, something goes wrong, and their immune systems over-react to proteins
that would normally be harmless, such as those found in milk.

Each protein is like a tiny (microscopic!) piece of chain which is twisted up to give it a particular
shape, like a coil, a tube, a dumbbell, or something else. When it gets heated up, the chain becomes
loose and untwists, changing the shape of the protein. This is one of the chemical changes that occurs
when you bake things, and the reason that egg whites become solid and white when they are cooked.
Not all proteins change shape when heated, but many of those in milk do.

Because Dr. Sampson knew this, his research group tested milk allergy sufferers with
milk-containing baked goods, including muffins and waffles. They found that 75% of milk allergy
sufferers were able to tolerate them without any allergic reaction. Even more interesting, after several
months of eating baked goods, many of these people lost some sensitivity to raw milk itself, suggesting
that the immune system of these people could be trained by exposure to milk in the cooked products.

The reasons not all people can tolerate milk in baked goods are twofold:

- Some allergic people's immune systems react to the protein whether it is in its original shape or not.
In this case, heating it does not help.

- Not everyone is allergic to the same milk allergen, and some of these milk allergens do not change
shape when they are heated.

However, many allergic people will tolerate baked goods, so this is very exciting news, and may lead
to research that helps other kinds of allergies. It is very important that you talk to your allergist before
attempting to expose an allergic person to baked products in this way. They can help with allergy tests,
and can ensure that the introduction is done in a safe way.

Guest Post by: Walter A.

Reference:

Nowak-Wegrzyn A, Bloom KA., Sicherer SH, Shreffler WG, Noone S, Wanich N, Sampson HA.
(2008) "Tolerance to extensively heated milk in children with cow's milk allergy", Journal of Allergy
and Clinical Immunology 122(2):342-347.

Dairy-free Quiche Recipe

I recently realized that my boys had NEVER tasted quiche.  With the high amounts of cream and cheese in most quiches, I wasn’t sure if it was worth adapting.  That said, we have recently created a DELICIOUS dairy-free quiche recipe that all my kids enjoy.  You don’t even miss the cheese!  It is completely adaptable and flexible and you can put whatever fillings in it that you want.  Here it is:

1 recipe pie crust (See below OR dairy-free store bought pie crust)
6 eggs
3/4 c plain rice milk (or milk alternative of choice)
1/2 tsp. salt
1/8 tsp. pepper
1 dash nutmeg (optional)
3 T all purpose flour
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 small onion, chopped
1 T dairy-free margarine (or olive oil)
Any of these other ingredients (pick and choose what you want):  tomatoes, green onions, chopped spinach, mushrooms, chopped green or red peppers, crumbled bacon, sausage, seafood, shredded zucchini, chopped asparagus, and/or shredded and cooked potatoes.  (NOTE:  The more additional ingredients you put in, the deeper the pie dish you’ll need to use.)

Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees F.  Follow pie crust recipe and pre-bake for 10 minutes.  While baking, whisk together eggs, rice milk, salt, pepper, nutmeg (optional), flour, and baking powder.  Set aside.  In a frying pan, sauté onions and other desired fillings (that need sautéing)  in 1 T dairy-free margarine OR olive oil.  When pie crust is ready, take out from oven and place sautéed vegetables and desired meats into pie dish.  Pour egg mixture on top, shaking lightly to allow mixture to settle in-between ingredients.  Place in oven and cook for 40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted  comes out clean.  Quiche will rise while baking, but should settle back down once you remove it from the oven.  You can add dairy-free cheese, if desired, to mixture, but we found that it was unnecessary.  My kids enjoyed eating it with salsa on the side.
Variation:  Add 1 - 4-oz can of diced green chilies, drained.  Serve with salsa.

Rich and Flaky Pie Crust:
(This is 1/2 of a recipe.  It makes 1 pie shell.)
1/2 c vegetable shortening
1/4-1/2 tsp. salt (scant)
1 c all purpose flour
3-4 T ice water

Combine salt and flour in a bowl.  Add shortening.  Cut shortening into salt and flour with a pastry cutter or fork.  Add water.  Stir with spoon until mixture clings together in a ball.  Dough may be slightly moist.  If dough is too dry or moist add additional water or flour as needed.  Don’t over mis.  You should see thin swirls of shortening throughout the dough.  Flour rolling surface and roll out as desired.  To transfer the crust from the rolling surface to the pie pan, fold the crust in half twice.  Lift and unfold crust over pie pan.

Chicken Gumbo Soup Recipe

With all of these COLD snow days, I wanted to share one of our favorite soup recipes.  My mother-in-law created this recipe.  It’s very forgiving.  You can use leftover chicken and vegetables, making it different every time.  Enjoy!
















3 T dairy-free margarine
1 onion, chopped
1 green pepper, chopped
4 c chicken broth (dairy-free)
1 - 16 oz. can italian-style diced tomatoes
1 - 12.5 oz. can chicken chunks
1 - 4 oz. package little smoked sausages (double check dairy-content)
1 c frozen corn
2 c veggie chunks (mixed veggies, celery, zucchini, okra, summer squash, etc.)
1 bay leaf
1/2 tsp. salt
1/8 tsp. pepper
1/4 tsp. oregano leaves
1/2 tsp. chili powder
1/4 tsp. cumin
1/2 tsp. Grillmates Montreal Steak Seasoning (or a dash of liquid smoke, pepper, garlic, and paprika)
3 c rice, cooked

Saute onion and green pepper in dairy-free margarine.  Set aside.  Cut up little sausages and cook until brown.  Combine all of the ingredients (except for the rice) into a large sauce pan and simmer until vegetables are tender (about 25-30 minutes).  Scoop 1/2 c rice into a soup bowl and ladle soup on top.  Enjoy!