Together at the Table: Allergic to the Holidays

by Meredith Blanks Paterson

Holidays are fraught with emotion for everyone, and those emotions can be particularly heightened around the subject of food. Holiday celebrations revolve around food, and the preparation and eating of the food is a ritual sacred to many households. 

When you or a family member has food sensitivities, food allergies, and special dietary needs, the weight of those traditions suddenly becomes more apparent, and you fear doing anything to disturb them. I play the zero-sum game with myself each time. Which is worse, getting sick or calling attention to myself with my special food? Typing that question makes me sad, but I consider it at each social meal.

Gluten-Free Easily is hosting an
extravaganza of allergy-friendly holiday recipes
to help create new traditions.

If you have a child with food allergies, the holidays mean well-meaning relatives offering spoons to lick and handfuls of treats at all hours of the day. You worry that hyper-vigilance won't be enough, and that maybe staying home is always the best option.

Several online resources have helped me handle both the emotional side of social eating-- the fear, the shame, the anxiety-- and the practical how-tos of what to bring when I go out to eat or to a friend or family member's house. These resources have also helped me realize that there are so many things that I can eat instead of focusing only on what I have had to remove from my diet. They make me feel excited about food again.

If you need a place to start, this post from Adventures of a Gluten-Free Mom really resonated with me and made me realize that making myself sick was not worth it.



Here are some resources that I have found helpful. Most cover multiple food allergies and sensitivities. Lots of great recipes and advice in each link.

Adventures of a Gluten-Free Mom
Elana's Pantry
M.A.G
The Whole Life Nutrition Kitchen
Gluten-Free Easily

What are your tips for handling the holidays on a special diet? Share with us any resources and recipes you have found.

Together at the Table: New Research on Eating Together

by Meredith Paterson

These Saturday Together at the Table blog posts are intended to start or sustain a family dialogue about food, cooking, and eating, and we'll be sharing recipes, food-related research, food events, and other fun food-related tidbits.

This week, I came across newly-published research about the benefits of eating together as a family. This research confirms that preparing and eating meals together nourishes us as people and families on so many levels. Mealtimes may be the only times carved out in our busy days where we actually get to focus on each other.

The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University found the following correlations between infrequent family dinners and alcohol, tobacco, and drug abuse among teenagers:

"Compared to teens who have frequent family dinners (five to seven per week), those who have infrequent family dinners (fewer than three per week) are almost four times likelier to use tobacco; more than twice as likely to use alcohol; two-and-a-half times likelier to use marijuana; and almost four times likelier to say they expect to try drugs in the future, according to The Importance of Family Dinners VII, a new report from The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University (CASA Columbia).

The CASA Columbia family dinners report revealed that teens who have infrequent family dinners are likelier to say they have ready access to alcohol, prescription drugs (without a prescription in order to get high) or marijuana. Compared to teens who have frequent family dinners, those who have infrequent family dinners are more likely to be able to get alcohol, prescription drugs or marijuana in an hour or less. In contrast, teens who have frequent family dinners are more likely to report having no access to such drugs.”

And the benefits of eating together go way beyond reduced substance abuse. Eating together can help improve vocabulary, it is a predictor of academic success, and it is a predictor of overall health and well-being.

The Mommy Dietitian has a wonderful list outlining the many many reasons we should take time to eat together along with some great mealtime tips and recipes.

I love this article and photo essay from the New York Times about family dinners and the art in each family's traditions and rituals. It's not about being fancy-- who has the time for fancy?-- it's just about being together.

How do you carve out time for meals together?

Together at the Table: Great Blogs for Cooking with Kids

by Meredith Paterson

©2011 Super Healthy Kids.
Amy Roskelley provides resources on feeding
your family healthy food.
Visit Super Healthy Kids for more ideas

I have recently found some OHMazing™ resources that I wanted to share with you. There are many days when I have no idea what to cook for dinner, and then the Google comes to my rescue. I enter the ingredients I have into the search box and 9 million recipes later, I am on to something. It's not entirely scientific, but it's always a fun experiment. Searching for a veggie lasagna recipe with zucchini the other day, I fell down a rabbit hole of blogs that cater to cooking and eating with children, and there are so many fun recipes and ideas that I can't wait to try. My hat is off to each of these bloggers for bringing families together for mindful meals.

 Here are some of the fun blogs I found with great kid-friendly recipes: 
http://blog.superhealthykids.com/ (see the flower tray crudité post connected to the adorable photo above)
http://www.raisehealthyeaters.com/
http://dinnertogether.blogspot.com/
http://whatscookingwithkids.com/

For those with food sensitivities and food allergies:
http://myaspergersgirl.blogspot.com/

Here is a kid-friendly, easy-to-prepare, healthy, veggie-full (Hallelujah!) lasagna recipe from Raise Healthy Eaters:

Slow Cooker Veggie Lasagna

Ingredients:
-8-ounce package shredded mozzarella cheese, divided
-15 ounces part-skim ricotta cheese
-2 large eggs
-¼ cup Parmesan cheese, grated
-1 teaspoon salt, divided
-1 cup carrots, shredded
-3 cups zucchini, shredded and firmly packed
-26-ounce jar roasted garlic marinara sauce
-8-10 regular lasagna noodles (not no-boil)

I made a version of the allergy-friendly lasagna
(mine had cheese but no meat, and I used brown rice,
no-boil noodles). Delicious!

 Recipe directions

For those with gluten, dairy, soy and/or corn sensitivities:
Lasagna (Gluten, Casein, Egg, Soy and Yeast Free)

What is your favorite dinner to make as a family? What resources do you use to find good recipes online?