An Executive Decision

I WILL NOW BE POSTING ALL ALLERGY POSTS ON MY MAIN MAMA BLOG ADVENTURES OF A SOMEWHAT CRUNCHY MAMA. FOLLOW ME OVER THERE!

I can hardly believe it's been 10 days since my last post here. It seems that my posts are becoming more sporadic. So I've made an executive decision. I'm going to combine this blog with my more active mama blog, Adventures of a Somewhat Crunchy Mama. I'm going to do the same thing with my travel blog. I had originally compartmentalized the topics due to the fact that I had no idea what I was doing and it felt more organized that way. Now that I've been blogging for almost a year, and have a better idea of what I'm doing, I think one main blog will be a lot easier to handle. Not to mention, our allergies and food are such an intricate part of our lives it makes more sense (to me) to include it in my main blog.

So, I will be moving my blogroll over to Adventures of a Somewhat Crunchy Mama. If you follow me here, I hope you will follow me there. I will be participating in my favorite memes like GF WHAT'S FOR DINNER WEDNESDAY and MEAL PLAN MONDAY via my mama blog. This will be my last post on The Garlic Press, all subsequent allergy posts will be on Adventures of a Somewhat Crunchy Mama. I will also re-post or copy many of The Garlic Press posts to my mama blog. Once the information has been transferred and traffic here has stalled I will delete this blog.

If I overlooked transferring your blog or link to my new blogroll DON'T HESITATE TO LET ME KNOW!! I want to make sure I don't lose anyone!!

What's for Dinner GF - Red Beans and Rice

Oh, I haven't participated in What's for Dinner Wednesday GF in so long! I love getting new GF ideas to serve when my mom, brother and GF step-father come to visit. It just so happens that we had a GF meal last night so I wanted to play along. We had one of Hubby's favorites-red beans and rice. I fix mine without meat-but I do cook with chicken broth rather than water. There are so many different recipes out there. I don't follow a single recipe, I usually just pull what looks good from several recipes and throw it all together. So rather than share a recipe I'll share the ingredients that ALWAYS go in our red beans and rice, no matter what else I put in or leave out:

Kidney Beans

Chicken Broth

Garlic (lots)

Onion --- The Cook's Trinity

Celery

Bay Leaf

Oregano

Cayenne

Thyme

Tabasco (just a touch)

Salt

Menu Plan Monday

This week I've listed some of the same things from last week. This is because last week's menu went belly up because we had some guests during the week So let's try this again shall we?

Monday- Red Beans and Rice with cornbread. I made the red beans yesterday, so I just need to reheat them and make cornbread. We ended up grilling yesterday because some family visited-we had a great time!

Tuesday- Roast pork loin with onions, and lots of them! We'll also have dairy-free smashed potatoes, crescent rolls and broccoli.

Wednesday- Fried chicken breasts with potato salad (left over from Sunday) and peas with carrots.

Thursday- Leftovers from the week.

Friday- Tomato soup and toasted sandwiches.

That's mt menu, what's yours? Visit Organizing Junkie to share yours!

Acne - Another Symptom

Boy it's amazing what you forget.  I keep remembering symptoms, such as sensitivity to smells, that I forgot to include in my allergy story post.  The last memory triggered was acne!  I had what many would call adult onset acne.  It was bad, very, VERY bad.  I was not happy about it.  Well intentioned family and friends would ask horrified "What's happened to your skin?"  A couple of my uncles and my brother had acne problems so I assumed it was hereditary.

As a teen I would get the normal occasional blemish, but nothing major.  It wasn't until I was in my mid 20s that my face exploded.  I believe part of this was hormonal and part heredity, but that the majority was caused by my undiagnosed allergy.  My WHOLE face began erupting around the time my gastrointestinal issues were peaking.  It was not pretty.  I tried a myriad of acne solutions including Proactive, nothing helped much.  Proactive helped the most so I stuck with that but I hated it because it is so, so harsh.

Well guess what?  Once I completely cut dairy out of my diet 97% of my acne disappeared.  Gone.  I was amazed.  And it hasn't come back.  I still have what I call acne-prone skin.  I'll get the occasional blemish due to hormones, stress or a Saturday night junk food fest but that's it.  I no longer have a face full of angry red pimples.  I don't even need Proactive anymore.  I still use the lotion sometimes when I get a blemish but, thankfully, I can now use "regular" washes and lotions.   

Menu Plan Monday

This is just what I need, being that I never went grocery shopping and there is no food in the house.  Now I can quasi-plan and have some idea of what to get at the store :) 

Monday- Hot Dogs (Yuck-I know.  I guess this is what happens when you don't grocery shop!) baked beans and peas

Tuesday- Red Beans and Rice with Cornbread

Wednesday- Breaded Baked Chicken Breasts with brussell sprouts and crescent rolls

Thursday- Pork Loin roast with mushrooms and onions, green beans and homemade dairy-free biscuits

Friday- Leftovers

Hemp Milk Smoothie

This is what I've had for breakfast the last 3 days.  Be warned, I'm a piggy in the mornings...I eat HUGE breakfasts usually.  So feel free to tailor this to your portion size and/or fruit preferences.

Hemp Milk Smoothie:

2 cups hemp milk

3-4 large strawberries

6-8 raspberries

1 medium ultra-ripe banana

1-2 tablespoons honey (depending on the tartness of the fruit)

Throw it all in a blender and blend until smooth.  Yummy!  You can also replace half the hemp milk with orange juice if you like.

FDA Says Coconut Is A Treenut

When I first started on our food allergy journey I was very active on allergy forums.  They were a wealth of information. It was wonderful to be able to chat to other allergy-newbies as well as allergy-veterans who knew all the tricks.  

One day I asked the innocent (I thought) question "Is coconut considered a treenut?"  This unleashed an epic debate.  It even got a little ugly so I bowed out of it.  In the end everyone agreed to disagree.

Well it looks like the FDA has spoken.  I picked up some of my favorite cookies, Arnold Jennie's Macaroons and noticed that their label has changed.  These macaroons are no longer labeled as treenut-free.  Under the ingredients they list coconut as a treenut as stipulated by FDA requirements.  When did this happen?  This is the first I've heard of it.

The funny thing is that Littlest, who reacted to almonds and other treenuts through breastmilk has no problem handling coconut in any form.  We use coconut, coconut milk, cream and oil-we love the stuff.

This is what makes allergies so tricky, we are all so diverse in our triggers and reactions.