Menu Ideas/Recipes

I've had a lot of my fellow A-List Moms ask me about dietary ideas to help them transition their kids to a clean diet.  First off, let me say, it was a lot easier in my case to just go ahead and clean out all of the cupboards and pantries and put the whole family on this diet. For one, I do not have to cook mulitple meals, and secondly, I don't have to worry about unnecessary temptation (especially since we've already had some food sneaking and hoarding issues to deal with)  Plus, the kids are all each other's cheerleaders and accountability partners when they're away from home.  It wasn't easy to get started. After I gutted everything (including the jars of seasoning mixes and blends!) I was left with home-canned veggies in the pantry, a roll of foil, and a jug of pure maple syrup in the cupboard. The fridge held eggs, produce,  and some Braggs liquid aminos I had bougth when my gf niece came to visit. I felt instantly overwhelmed and defeated. I did not know how I could ever do this!

I guess I should clarify that we are following the clean diet protocol listed on the NIDS website and explained further in Dr. Goldberg's book The Myth of Autism. Thankfully, the Paleo diet is really popular right now, and Dr. G's diet is a modified paleo. Paleos do not eat potatoes (we do), but they do eat citrus (we don't).  I have been thrilled to find all sorts of great ideas on some of these blogs as well as searching 'grain dairy free' on Pinterest.  I also went through my own recipe binders to see what recipes I already had on hand that were allergy-friendly or could be easily modified.  Personally, I like cooking with unsweetened, vanilla almond or coconut milk for sweet dishes and goat milk for savory (i.e. country gravy!) so I was able to just substitute those milks, some coconut oil for butter, and pecorino romano cheese for parmesan. Just those three items made many of my regular recipes doable.  Below, you'll see a list for some of the foods we've come to know and love. I hope it helps to give you a good start on this journey. As I run across new favorites, or if you have one to share, please let me know so I can add the link here. Happy Eating!

Oh, and PS-I did not rule out using almonds in my cooking, just all other nuts and peanuts. It is not as common an allergen as other nuts and so I'm taking my chances in order to have as much variety as possible. I know that Dr. G is concerned that they contain arginine which can feed herpes viruses, but at this point, all of N's tests came back negative for the herpes and strep viruses so we're going to keep the almonds for now. If we have issues later, we'll look into it...

Breakfast:
*Scrambled eggs

*Hashbrowns browned in EVOO

*Jimmy Dean natural pork sausage, applegate bacon

*Almond Butter Banana Smoothie  (sans yogurt and use almond butter) made with coconut or almond milk. I also like to throw in frozen cantaloupe or mango with it.

*Toasted paleo bread with earth balance butter and homemade jelly (Special treat since bread is expensive! Just be sure to use pectin that is 'clean' or use chia seeds to set your jelly.)

*Non-citrus fruit

*Breakfast Quinoa ( I make a big pot of quinoa at the beginning of the week and put it in the fridge. Then I put enough for one meal into a saucepan w/ some dried cranberries and/or raisins, cinnamon, vanilla almond milk and a little glug of maple syrup. If you want more of a 'Cream of Wheat' type consistency, use amaranth instead of quinoa.)

*Pumpkin Cinnamon rolls (I forego the icing and just use a powder sugar & vanilla almond milk glaze)

*Paleo Breakfast Bars

*Paleo Blueberry muffins

*Banana Bread

*Pumpkin Bread

*Apple Pancakes

*Apple Ring Pancakes

*Omelettes with preferred ingredients and a sprinkling of goat cheddar (It's sharp so a little goes a long way!).

Lunch:
 (Confession: Lunch is my hardest meal. I don't have my old standbys of sandwiches, ramen noodles, or quesadillas to turn to. sigh. )

*Butter or leaf lettuce wraps with gluten-free lunchmeat (we like the Kirkland sliced turkey from Costco), pickles, avocado, tomato,pickles,cucumbers,bacon,sliced goat cheddar or soft goat cheese, alfalfa sprouts,etc.

*For the child who won't eat a leaf of lettuce, just try wrapping a piece of lunchmeat around a dill pickle, piece of goat cheddar,cucumber, avocado slice, etc.

*Hardboiled eggs or egg salad in a lettuce wrap.   We also like tuna or chicken salad in a wrap or used as dip with plain potato chips.

*Ants or Fire Ants (dried cranberries) On A Log or Raft. Use traditional celery (log) or half an apple (raft) and stick on your critters using almond butter.

*Chicken Veg soup using boxed, organic chicken stock. Again, we found the Kirkland brand at Costco to be the cheapest here.

*Baked potato with Earth Balance spread

*Baked sweet potato w/ Earth Balance sread (or cut into fries, place on cookie sheet, drizzle w/ EVOO and bake at 400 for about 15 minutes until carmelized. Yum!

*Almond Butter and Jelly sandwiches (Again, the bread is a special treat!)

*Any of the breakfast ideas above

Dinner:
At this point, I really don't have the time to list out all of my dinner recipes. I hope to add some favorites soon. I will give you a few helpful tips that I have learned, though. 

*Hunts and Heinz both make a natural ketchup that is w/in the diet restrictions.

*Use boxed broth and potato starch (buy in the Asian aisle) to make gravies.

*Use Idaho Spud instant potato flakes to coat fried chicken or fish, or to use in lieu of bread crumbs in recipes.

*With the drought, meat prices are predicted to soar after the first of the year because of the early slaughter of so much cattle and chicken. Stock up now when there's a good sale and freeze some because you will be eating a lot of meat!

*Oven fries (potato pieces tossed in large ziploc w/ EVOO and salt and pepper, and then roasted at 400 for 20-25 min) and cauliflower rice make easy side dishes. The cauliflower rice is good served under stronger tasting dishes like stir fries and mexican dishes.

*I have found a lot of good recipes in the book Paleo Comfort Food. as well as on Pinterest.

*I found the cheapest way to buy/make almond flour and butter is to buy the 25lb bulk box of flour from nutsonline.com. It is a beautiful cream color and ground nice and fine. I put a couple of cups of it into my food processor with some EVOO and make my own almond butter for MUCH cheaper than buying a little jar!

*You really need a hand mixer (or an immersion blender) and a food processor to work with coconut and almond flour since they clump easily when mixing. Also the food processor is useful for making almond butter and banana ice cream.  Look at thrift stores for an inexpensive one or hit freecycle before shelling out for a new one. I'm still using my $5 La Machine that I purchased at a yard sale 13 yrs ago.  It's a lovely 70's yellow color but it can sure make wonderful almond butter :)

Snacks and Desserts:

*Plain Lays or Kettle potato chips and salsa
  
* Smoothies

*Stretch Island Fruit Leather

*Clif Kids Organic Twisted Fruit Rope

*Oberto Natural Plain beef jerky

*Pickles

*Phillipine brand dried coconut pieces

*We go through a LOT of apples and bananas

*Baby carrots 

*Dark chocolate covered almonds or semi-sweet chocolate chips that are labeled dairy free 

*Brownies-I add in 1/2c applesauce and some dairy-free semi-sweet chips. Really good and freeze well, too :)

*Coconut milk ice cream

*Frozen banana ice cream: Put a frozen banana in a food processor and just enough milk and a dash of vanilla extract to make it creamy. It makes a lovely vanilla type ice cream that I actually prefer to the expensive coconut ice cream!







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