FINALLY Clear Dietary Restrictions

It has been a challenging year and I've been a bit silent this month on my food blog. For that, I apologize. The good news is, I have had my food intollerance test, gluten, candida, caeisin and sugars tested. That and more actually.

I found out that I have a low thyroid problem, and am starting a new medicine for that tomorrow. I suspect that will help loads with my energy and weight loss. This could in large part explain why I can eat less than most people I know, but still gain weight. And why this last time I went on weight watchers it didn't work. I'm excited and hopeful.

I also was given foods to avoid. Eventually I will try a rotational diet which is meant to help avoid building intollerances to any foods I currently can eat.

The good news, I am NOT caesin or gluten intollerant! I now have 5 test results at 2 different times in my life saying I am not gluten intollerant in any way. I still make gluten free foods sometimes, so will post gluten free recipes along with the others...but if it doesn't say gluten free in the tags, don't assume it is please.

I will be trying both regular nonfat milk and lactaid to see which my body processes better. I did notice that when I was gluten free I was able to drink milk and eat cheese without a negative reaction. So I suppose it was some combination perhaps of carbs and milk that was upsetting my stomach.

My sugars were high, so I was told to cut out sugar, honey, and sodas. I'm still allowed to eat fruits (PHEW) and I believe I can still use small amounts of agave nectar or prickly pear. Which is a relief since both are in plentiful supply here in the Sonoran Desert, and I really love them both. But I will not be replacing all the sugar I drank and ate with other sweetners. I will be striving to have a balanced, low carb, low sugar, low fat way of eating. I will be not eating foods I am alergic to, and avoiding almost all foods I'm intolerant of. There were 3 lists of intollerance. Red, Orange, and Yellow. The red and orange are out. Finito. I was told I could eat the yellow. I will be eating them, but will strive not to eat too much of them, because I do not want to end up having them jump up higher on the scale of food intollerance.

Here's a list of the foods I can not eat at this time and for at least 3 possibly 6 more months:
Allergies: Crab (never again, Ige Allergy) Brocoli, Eggs, Squash, Watermellon, Red Zone: Carrots, Codfish (does this mean I need to avoid my fish oil pills and go back on meds for cholesterol?) Mushroom (yay!) Orange Zone: Asparagus, Black Tea, Green Tea, Oolong Tea, Chicken, Egg Yolk, Ginger, Grapefruit, Lamb, Lemon, Pecan, Plum, Sessame. And to avoid because of the candida, bakers yeast, brewer's yeast, Cane sugar, Fructose sugar, and honey.

I think there's a few other things I'm mildly allergic to that I am not remembering offhand, but the ones I listed are the ones I started avoiding this month. And no hives since avoiding them. I forgot about the watermellon at a BBQ, and 15 minutes later had hives. I forgot about eggs being the major ingredient in the quiche muffin I tried out one day, itchy itchy scratchy scratchy. Eating things my body is intollerant to or allergic to raising the inflamatory response, and that causes more fibro pain along with the hives I've experienced in the past. This means my Fibromyalgia Syndrom will likely be helped by this new way of eating.

Thankfully I haven't forgotten anything since. And as I learn to avoid foods that my body doesn't like, I am sure I will start feeling better. It is REALLY nice to not wake up covered in hives. I hope there's no summer heat rash in store this year either. We'll see, but I'm hopeful that if I'm not eating eggs and other things that I'm allergic to there will be no itchy hives to wake to in the middle of the summer nights this year. Wish me luck!

Home Cooked Italian YUM

I LOVE Italian food and Carlie makes some mouth watering pasta dishes. She has lived with Patch and I for the last 8 years and our stomachs are forever grateful. She comes from a family that is half Irish, and half Italian but she is one of those that looks 100% Italian, and from the way she cooks, you would believe it. After I read some of the recipes and comments in the "Gluten-free Italian" cookbook to her, she mentioned that if we could get the hang of cooking with gluten-free pastas we could make just about any of the meals she usually makes because there is no gluten in tomato, cauliflower, nor meat. 


True, although I have noticed the occasional use of wheat-flour in some strangely unexpected places, so we'll keep our eyes open for ways it might try to sneak into our diet. It will depend on how intolerant of gluten I am, but I have read that as little as a tablespoon a day can cause flare ups in some people and we may therefor have to be super vigilant about the ways gluten sneaks into our foods. I believe our new grocery store mantra will be, "When in doubt, leave it out!"


Other than being vigilant by reading the ingredients on pre made and packaged foods, she's right! Preparing Italian food should be pretty much the same as before. 


I found premade gluten-free lasagna noodles at Whole Foods and picked a box up. We are likely to end up making our own pasta some time soon, because frankly, home made is almost always better than pre-packaged, but it's a lot more work to make your own, and we don't have a pasta machine so we will be using prepackaged most of the time. Thankfully the Gluten-free Italian cookbook I bought on amazon does have a pasta recipe that looks like it will make great ravioli. Mmmmmm I can't wait to make interesting fillings for ravioli.

Tonight we made brown rice risotto with chicken. We LOVED IT! And want to make it again. Makes enough for 6-8 people depending on if you serve it as an entire meal as we did, or a hearty side dish.

Ingredients:
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 small yellow onion
1 small red onion
1 tsp garlic powder (0r 2 cloves of chopped garlic if you ahve them)
10 - 12 ounces skinless, boneless chicken breast cubed (1 inch cubes)
1/2 teaspoon oregano
1 teaspoon rosemary
4 tablespoons diced bacon (or prosciutto if you have it)
2 cups brown rice
2/3 cup cooking sherry
3 cups gluten-free chicken broth, heated (I use swansons 100% natural)
3 cups hot water
6 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
4 tablespoons grated parmigiano-reggiano
fine sea salt
black pepper 

in large skillet, on medium heat cook chicken with 1/2 herbs till no longer pink in 1 tablespoon olive oil
in large saucepan, on medium heat, warm 1 tablespoon olive oil and 2 tablespoons butter. Cook chopped onions and garlic until soft, but before browned. (about 5 minutes) add the rest of the herbs and the bacon or procsciutto. Season lightly with salt and pepper.

Add the rice and stir until well coated with oil. All the grains will appear shiny. Stir in the cooking sherry and bring to a boil. Stir and bring down to a strong simmer cooking until all the sherry is either soaked into the rice or evaporated, then stir in 2 cups of the hot broth. Simmer and stir often until the liquid is almost absorbed. Repeat with remaining broth a cup at a time. Repeat with 1/2 the hot water, and cook until rice is tender to the bite (about 35 minutes) adding the rest of the hot water as necessary until the rice is tender and the risotto is creamy with a slightly soupy consistancy. It should not be dry or sticky.

Turn off the stove, stir in the parsley and 2 tablespoons butter. Taste, and adjust seasoning as necessary. I added more pepper and garlic powder, but not more salt to mine. Seperate into bowls and sprinkle a tablespoon of the parmigiano-reggiano on top of each. Buy a good cheese, it makes all the difference in the world.

We put the leftovers in a sealed container into the fridge so we wouldn't eat it all up in one sitting. It was tempting, but portion control is part of losing weight while still being able to enjoy delicious food. When split into 6 servings, this ended up being 9 points on weight watchers.