Thursday 30 May 2013

Dairy free and egg free pain au chocolat (sort of)


Right ... seeing as I can't do anything about The Allergic One's allergies or the fact that he seemingly can no longer enjoy a Pain Au Chocolat treat all I can do is Google like mad and try to find ideas of how to make a suitable dairy free and egg free version of said treat and bake my own ... ta dah! ... here it is ... using a bread dough rather than a pastry: 





Although I am duty bound to inform you of the sting in the tale that The Allergic One does not like them much, he prefers the other ones ... the ones that merited a trip to A&E.  Great!  Not. Grrrr.  

I loved them, could have eaten the whole batch ... low-carb diet or no low-carb diet.  

PS:
Price comparison, Jusrol pack of six make-your-own Pain Au Chocolat are £2.10 or 35p each.  My version (using Tesco prices: ingredients 400g strong white flour @ 25p, 1 sachet easy yeast @ 9p, 50g sugar @ 5p, glug of olive oil @ 9p, 150g Tesco value chocolate @ 45p and a good shake of icing sugar @ 10p) cost £1.03 for 16 of the little beauties, that's 6.4p each.  Got to love that. 


Wednesday 29 May 2013

A Bank Holiday trip to A & E

On Bank Holiday Monday we had to take The Allergic One to A&E for the first time.  The culprit was a Jusrol Pain Au Chocolat which does not list eggs or dairy in the ingredients and he has eaten with relish many times before without reaction.  Our choice of breakfast was supposed to be a Bank Holiday breakfast treat.  

He had a few mouthfuls and began to scratch his face, he was rubbing his eyes and quite quickly, within a minute or two, his eyes began to puff up, his lips too and he was very upset telling us he couldn't talk properly.  We gave him anti-histamine but seeing as his reaction was so bad, the worst in several years, combined with the fact that he seemed to be having difficulty talking made us think we should take him to A&E to be checked out.  He was given the all-clear and was home a couple of hours later, thank you NHS.  

It is a worry, we avoid dairy and eggs strictly but had until this point been more relaxed about the 'may contain' warnings that food manufacturers use at the side of their ingredients lists.  If this is his reaction to small traces of the allergens then what would his reaction be if he ate larger amounts?  It's confusing as he has been eating these Pain Au Chocolat every few months or so for quite a while.  Has the recipe changed?  It's a great treat, he loves the taste and also enjoys making them.  Sad for me that he will now loose this treat and we have another item of food to add to the 'do not eat' list.  Plus, do we now need to avoid all foods that say 'may contain'?  




Monday 27 May 2013

Meal planning Monday

Ah, my much neglected blog, I've been away looking after a newborn but somehow he's now almost four months so I might just have a teeny tiny amount of time to start to record all things dairy free and egg free once more ... although with this week being Half Term, perhaps not ... 

Here's what we'll be eating this week: 

Bank Holiday Monday - BBQ lunch - sunshine is forecast ... shock horror ... so will big old steak burgers with salads and new potatoes.  Strawberries and Swedish Glace for pud.

Tuesday - Bacon and veggie pasta 

Wednesday - Bacon and veggie pizza 

Thursday - Salmon fishcakes, sweet potato wedges, sweetcorn 

Friday - Fish and chips 

Saturday - Roast chicken, jersey royals, steamed asparagus, carrots and peas 

Sunday - Leftover chicken with butternut and pea risotto 

A little bit summery this weekend: