Milk Allergy

A.,

My 34 year old husband is allergic to milk and has been since he was an infant. You don't mention what food/snacks your son likes, but we are able to find most everything (except for true dairy items like ice cream) for my husband.

Sorbets and Italian Ices are milk free (you still want to read the packaging but a true sorbet or italian ice is dairy free. Walgreens now carries Italian Ice freezer pops that we and my daughter enjoy. Sorbets also have great fruit flavor as compared to ice cream. There are also Soy ice creams out there. To me they aren't as good as the real thing and my husband doesn't even like some of them and he eats just about anything he can.

I do a lot of baking at home, banana muffins, cookies and cakes from scratch and can send you some recipes if there is something specific you are looking for. I have found that almost all spice cake recipes can be made dairy free and are a big hit just topped with a sprinkling of powdered sugar. Icings are tough without milk, water maked them too thin and the soy and rice milk haven't turned out well for me, very globby. Most of the time I substitute soy milk for milk, sometimes I substitute coconut milk if something needs more oomph. I have also substituted protein drinks for evaporated milk (pumpkin pie) or cream. For some recipes it works and for some it doesn't. Fleishman's Unsalted Margarine is dairy free and is our preferred butter substitute. One brand of cake mix (butter flavor) is now dairy free and everyone seems to like it a lot and one brand of frosting is dairy free and I can't remember what brand it is now. They switched on my about a year ago. One very strong word of advice when buying packaged stuff, always read the ingredients. They change often. Oreos are currently dairy free.

If you don't care to bake for yourself, check out vegan bakeries or Jewish bakeries (kosher foods are great because they either have milk or they don't and they are labeled very well). Also Whole Foods is a pretty good place to go. A warning though, their Rice Krispy bars have a very odd taste to them. They oftne have samples out and I would recommend trying them becuase some things just really don't taste very good, in my opinion. No one in our family would eat the Rice Krispy bar I bought there.
However my daughter loves the blueberry cereal bars that I buy for my husband at Whole Foods.

Finally, we buy a lot of Townhouse crackers. My daughter and husband both love them and we go through them like crazy. They are currently dairy free. We get the original and the wheat.

Good luck, feel free to send me an note if you need anything else.

D.

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Hi. My 10 year-old can't have dairy, wheat, gluten, MSG, Nitrates, and blue, red, and yellow dyes so I can relate. For recipes, try substituting soy milk which is sold in many stores now. You son can drink it too. Most are fortfied with calcium and come in chocalate and vanilla as well as regular In baked goods you probably won't notice the difference if you substitute. For scrambled eggs homemade mac and cheese and other use unsweetened soy milk. If soy milk doesn't work there is also rice milk or almond milk, but I've found it to be more expensive than the soy. I also buy the calcium enriched orange juice.
There are lots of regular foods you can buy, but you have to read every label. Look for CONTAINS MILK at the bottom of the ingredients list. Also look for words like casein, cream, butter and whey. Good luck.

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My son had a sensitivity to milk while I was breastfeeding him so I also had to avoid milk products. You will spend a lot of time reading the labels in the grocery store. There are crackers out there that are dairy free, usually the generic ones like ritz crackers and the saltines. I got mine at Pick n Save. I am a sweet person and I found dairy free chocolate chips at Walmart and I would bake all the time. Fleischmans unsalted margarine is dairy free so I would use that or crisco. There is stuff out there for him to eat but there just aren't as many choices. Search the internet for dairy free recipes and you should find some things that he should like. Check out www.foodallergy.org for ideas for substitutions and what to look for on the food labels.
Good Luck
B.

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My almost 2 year has a milk allergy too. At first I thought it was the end of the world. I was devisated. Whole foods and trader Joes are amazing they have a ton of cookies and snacks that are vegan and they don't taste to bad either Uncle Dan's cookies are terrfic. They also have soy icecream and so yogurt as well as vegan butter. We actually use the vegan butter in all our stuff now. In addition the dark chocolate chips ( whole food brand 346) have no dairy so I make whole made chocolate chip cookies and oatmeal reaisin cookies for my little guy. I have also signed up for food allergy alerts on line as well as a reminder service with EPIPEn so they tell me when my little guys epi pen is about to expire. The Company that makes the epi pen also has a great video as well as a carrying case and trainer pens that they sent me for free Just by calling their 800 number. We buy our soy milk now at Costco it is the cheapest we have found about 10$ for a case of 10 cartons. Let me know if I can provide you with more help. We have been living with this for over a year.

Good Luck

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I keep away from lactose becuase I'm a singer. You'd be surprised to find that your son will probably enjoy lactose-free ice cream and milkshakes. The only soy milk I like is silk soy milk -- vanilla flavored, and they come fortified too. they can make the most boring cereal taste sweet and sugary because of the vanilla! If he resists the milk because it IS really hard to get used to drinking soy milk at first, try adding chocolate to it. He can get protein from peanut butter and nuts... I hated beans at his age... cream of wheat is full of protein and iron and isn't too different from baby food and is really bland so he can try that. It's sooo boring-- add to it cinnamon, raisons, whatever makes him happy. Good luck!

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welcome to part of my world. Just use rice milk or soy milk in baking. we use rice only cuz my boy is allergic to soy and nuts (you can use almond milk but scarey w/nut allergies in little kids). graham crackers, ritz, teddy grahams, chereoos, some animals crackers (check label) some fig newtons (generic brand usually), fruit leathers, fruit and veggies, all bran crackers, salteens, ginger snap cookies, many breads, raisins, dates, craisons, pirate bootie puffs, kix, generic frosted mini wheats.... there's tons of options. just read the labels : ). i find more generics have less liklihood of having dairy/egg products.

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Hi A.,

While I can't add to the great advice on substitutes, I would like to add another perspective to complement the others.

Our society has socialized us to be most concerned about proteins and attached to our breads, desserts, etc.
I think we often forget that the foods that are most important for us are fruits and vegetables. Young kids love fresh or dried (some need soaking) fruits and my own kids have always liked most raw or lightly steamed veggies & others -- crunchy romaine leaves, steamed or raw carrots, little Chinese corns, jicama, avocado, olives, even sprouts. My daughter likes peanut butter on little slices of banana (she won't eat pb on anything else and calls these banana chairs).

I've read that we just don't need the large amount of protein that we eat and that many fruits and veggies provide adequate amounts.

I don't know if that helps at all, but it helps me when I try to make my family's food more complicated than I have the time for. You might want to check out vegan recipes to support whatever else you find.

Good luck!

Cheryl

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