Chicken Hash

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Years ago I found a recipe for something called “Chicken Hash” in a magazine.  I never actually made it, but I saved it because it looked really good.

With this dual-elimination-diet-thing going on in my house, I’m scrambling like mad to find edible meals to serve my family.  (Delicious is always the goal, but for now, edible is the lowered bar I’m aiming for!)

So I dug through my cookbooks and looked for any recipe I could find that might be altered to fit our culinary needs.

Chicken Hash looked like a possibility, but in the end I had to make so many tweaks to it that it served as inspiration only, and only two of the original ingredients are in my version!

However, this creation earned a gigantic thumbs up from the Geek (who ate it willingly two nights in a row) and Mr. Charm (who ate it for dinner and breakfast the next day)!  So I hope your family will enjoy it, too.

Here’s what I did:

Pre-FPIES, I was in the habit of regularly cooking up whole chickens, shredding the meat to freeze in 2 cup bags, and using the bones to make broth that I would freeze in 2 cup servings.

I stopped (and even gave away ALL my prepared chicken and broth!) this summer with our diagnosis.  Now, with Mr. Charm able to eat chicken again, I hit the grocery store and bought the last whole chicken they had and a package of quarters to cook up.

So, I had already cooked and shredded a whole mess of chicken, and had pitchers of chicken broth in the fridge ready to be portioned out and frozen.

If you’re a ‘bulk’ cooker like me, then go get 2 cups of shredded chicken from your freezer and thaw it.  Otherwise, cook up enough chicken to get 2 cups of shredded chicken meat!

Shredding the chicken into a bowl.

Toss the chicken in a bowl, and add 3 cups of potatos.  Mashed potatos was what I had on hand, but you could bake some potatos and dice them, or shred them…whatever floats your boat.  I just tend to make a big mess of mashed potatos to keep in the fridge for the week; makes dinner easier.  (I also leave the peels on my potatos.  One less step=less time in the kitchen! Plus, nutrients and all, but really, it’s about the time.)

Chicken and potatos.

Batter up!

Then I made up a batch of basically the same batter I used to batter-fry veggies.  I put 3/4 cup of quinoa flour in a bowl, added salt and pepper, and 3/4 cup of water.  Whisked it together, then poured it over the chicken and potatos.

The delicious trio.

I gave the whole mess a good stirring until it was all mixed together, and got some oil heating in the frying pan.

I used a 1/4 cup measuring scoop to scoop out portions of the Chicken Hash, dumped it into the hot oil, and used a spatula to flatten it into a thick pancake-type shape.

The patty on the left went weird on me. I think I only had half of it directly over the burner. But the other two look great!

Then, I let it brown.  When it was browned completely on one side, I flipped it and browned the other side.

When they were done, I laid them out on paper towels and dabbed up excess oil, then plated them up for dinner (or breakfast!)

Dinner is served!

This was a seriously successful dinner item!  The best part is that if you make too much, the cooked patties reheat very well the next day, and the uncooked ‘batter’ keeps in the fridge.  We used ours over a 3 day period, and it was just as good on the last day as it was the first day!

Excellent!

The second time I made it, I added one finely shredded zucchini and two big handfuls of chopped spinach leaves to the mix.  Because I was adding so much moisture via the zucchini, I made the mashed potatos thicker than I usually would, and it balanced out nicely.

The Geek reports there was no negative change in the taste, and Mr. Charm wolfed down two whole patties all by himself, exclaiming “MMM” after each bite!

LOVE watching my kiddo eat healthy!

So feel free to add veggies, as this recipe is another one that lends itself well to the addition of other things…zucchini, spinach, shredded carrot, chopped celery, onion and garlic, extra spices (thyme, basil, or even paprika!), but still tastes very good undoctored. 

I hope you like it!

Chicken Hash
 
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These yummy patties bring new life to dinner time, and are a great way to use up leftover chicken and veggies.
Author:
Recipe type: dinner
Serves: 1.5 dozen
Ingredients
  • 2 cups shredded cooked chicken
  • 3 cups mashed, diced or shredded potatos
  • ¾ cup quinoa flour
  • ¾ cup water
  • salt
  • pepper
  • additional veggies/spices as desired
  • safe oil (we're still using olive)
Instructions
  1. Cook and shred 2 cups of chicken. Put in a bowl.
  2. Cook 3 cups of potatos however you like: diced, shredded or mashed. Add to the chicken.
  3. In a separate bowl, mix quinoa flour, water, salt and pepper until you make a batter.
  4. Pour the batter on the chicken and potatos.
  5. If you're adding other veggies and spices, add them now.
  6. Mix all ingredients together. Meanwhile, start heating oil in a frying pan.
  7. Use a ¼ cup measuring cup to scoop out batter into the hot oil. Use a spatula to flatten the patties.
  8. Cook on medium heat until browned on one side.
  9. Flip. Brown the other side.
  10. Remove from pan and pat off excess oil.
  11. Plate up and enjoy! (Remember, leftovers will keep in the fridge very well.)

This post has been shared with Allergy Free Wednesdays, Whole Food Wednesdays, Frugal Days, Sustainable Ways, Real Food Wednesdays, and Gluten Free Fridays.

A Journey of a Thousand Foods Begins With a Single Bite

 
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OK, I wrote this post with the plan to post it today, but over the weekend some things popped up on our radar that complicates the issues. I didn’t have time to re-write it to include the new stuff, so, here’s the originally planned post, with the weekend revelations at the end.  Sorry for the length…
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Lately I’ve been writing a lot about Mr. Charm and his Fructose Malabsorption.  That’s simply because it is so new, so challenging, and I’m in the midst of learning as much as I can about it.

Meanwhile, Mr. Happy has been rolling along, happily nursing his way into “chunky monkey” status, and we’ve been relaxed and happy with his wonderful, safe, baseline.

But we know we can’t stay like this forever.

Now that there is a diagnosis for Mr. Charm and we have a game plan in place for discovering his safe foods, our attention is being drawn back to Mr. Happy and what we must do next for our FPIES baby.

The conventional wisdom of doctors is that children should receive their first solid foods between 4-6 months of age.  FPIES Mama’s, on the other hand, contend that you should put off solid foods for as long as you possibly can.

We’re starting to think that ‘as long as we possibly can’ is soon.  Like, maybe, now.

See, I’m a Flight Attendant.  When my maternity leave is over at the end of May, I will be back at work.  I may not (almost certainly will not) be awarded a jobshare at that time, which means I will be working somewhere between part and full-time.  That translates to at least 10, and maybe as high as 15 days of work per month.

Since I do not live in my domicile and must commute by plane to get to work, I often lose a day at home at the beginning or end of each work assignment (trip).  So come June, I will be gone from my family anywhere from 12-20 days a month.

A food trial for Mr. Happy will take anywhere from 2-4 weeks, and he must be carefully watched during that time.  Much as I love my Mom and much as I love the Geek, Grandma is not as familiar with my kiddos and may easily miss certain ‘early’ fail signs, and the Geek works an 8-5 job, so only gets about 2 or 3 hours a day with the kids.  Easy to miss things when you’re not with them 24/7.

So I will be doing my best to cram my work in to big chunks so I can be home and attentive during food trials for Mr. Happy next summer, but that means that we may only be able to trial a new food every 6-8 weeks.  That’s not counting any ‘gut rest’ time after fails.

So it would be in all of our best interests to get a tidy little menu built for Mr. Happy before I return to work, because after that time, his menu growth will seriously be slowed.

Also, and this is going to sound horrible, but the Geek and I must look at our family’s financial health as well as our family’s physical health.  For 2012, we have reached our maximum out of pocket expenses for medical costs.  Come January 1st, we’ll have to fork out the many thousands of dollars necessary to reach that out of pocket maximum again…which we truly cannot afford until after I’ve gone back to work and started receiving paychecks.

So IF we start trialing Mr. Happy on foods in the next two months and IF he reacts and we end up in the ER, it will only cost us $150.  If we wait until January or later, his first ER visit will cost upwards of 4K.

It’s a horrible position to be in; I want to first and foremost do what is best for my son.  Except, I’m not quite sure what that is!  I hate the idea of him being two years old and only having 7 safe foods, not because he can’t pass them, but because I can’t be there to observe him during trials.  It seems awful that not only will he be deprived of his Mama, but he’ll be deprived of food that he may have no FPIES reactions to, as well.

But I hate the thought of starting him on trials so early, when my FPIES Mama’s all say to wait as long as you can.  They’re right; kids with FPIES tend to have fewer reactions the older they get.  He’s more likely to fail foods now than he will be in 6 months.

I really don’t know what to do.

One thing we have decided, though, is how we will start trialing foods when the time comes.

Since Mr. Happy is a breastmilk reactor, we were originally planning to start him on foods that are already in my diet.  He can handle them through the milk, so they should be safe to eat, right?

Wrong.

Some kids will be fine with foods in their mothers’ milk, but they’ll react when said food is ingested directly.  Worse, though, is that after they react through direct ingestion, they often begin reacting to it through the breastmilk.

I’m down to only eating beef, potatos, carrots, salt, pepper, decaf tea, and stevia (the other foods on my diet were sacrificed to the fructose malabsorption altar!).  If he reacts to potatos, then there goes a MAJOR part of what is keeping me alive and producing safe breastmilk for him!  Not only that, but then ALL the milk (over 220 ounces currently) I have pumped for him would no longer be safe…and then what would we feed him?

So while I would prefer, in some ways, to trial him on foods through my breastmilk, I can’t take the chance that it may reduce foods in my already limited diet, and I can’t mess up my ‘safe’ milk by trialing a food he then fails because that pumped and saved milk will be most of what sustains him for those 10-20 days a month that I am away from home.

Besides, he went all the way to shock and hospitalization through my breastmilk; it’s not like I would be preventing another shock/hospitalization experience by trialing via breastmilk.

So instead, we’re looking at the spreadsheet of food reactions for FPIES kids and cross-referencing it with the low FODMAP’s diet foods to find the first foods we’re going to try Mr. Happy on when food trials begin.

We don’t know if he’ll have a problem with fructose malabsorption, but because his brother has MPI and FM, we’re going to be cautious and avoid high fructose foods at first in order to prevent confusing data from his food trials.  If he isn’t a FM kiddo, we’ll figure that out eventually.  No need to rush things on both fronts.

I really don’t want to rock this boat.  I wish I could just keep nursing Mr. Happy forever.  But I can’t.  Since I can’t do it forever, it makes sense to start his transition to solid foods in a way and in a time frame that means he may be able to avoid oral aversions and ‘issues’ with eating that can be commonplace if a child is not exposed to foods early enough.

I still don’t want to do it.  I still don’t know when we’ll do it.  But we’re talking about it, weighing our pros and cons, and trying to find the best solution for an impossible problem.
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OK, so this weekend we were talking about our kids current reactions. On Thursday, Mr. Charm managed to get two or three samples of chocolate at the grocery store before I could stop him.  I managed to dig one and a half pieces of chocolate out of his mouth, but I know he swallowed some first – at least half a piece.  Maybe more.  Sure enough, nasty diapers, bad attitude and sleep disturbances followed.

In two weeks that’s TWO instances of surreptitious fructose consumption by the little stinker.  Thank GOD this fructose malabsorption, while bad, won’t put him in the hospital!

Then I was commenting how Mr. Happy’s diaper rash (it was bad; it got to blisters and would NOT heal up) had finally cleared up almost overnight…and suddenly made a food connection.

I had been eating a lot of melon because it was about to be completely out of season, and realized that *I* may have a little fructose malabsorption going on.  The day after I would eat a lot of honeydew, I would wake up feeling fuzzy headed, with a headache, a bad nights sleep, and just feel lethargic and out of sorts all day.  Hmm.

With Mr. Happy’s diaper, it suddenly occurred to me that his diaper rash had come on just when I started eating a lot of melon, and would not clear up until about two days after I stopped eating melon.  (Took me a while to make the connection – did I mention I was fuzzy headed for a week?)

I don’t know if this is fructose malabsorption or FPIES (or something altogether new), but it’s clear that he has a problem with melon.  

Also, Mr. Happy is teething.  Has been for two weeks now!  This week, for three nights in a row, he was up every 1.5-2 hours ALL. NIGHT. LONG. and would lay there, wide awake, moaning at me!

I had gotten medications compounded for the boys, but was holding off on using them until I absolutely had to because of fear that they would react to them anyway.  Well, this seemed like an ‘absolutely had to’ situation, so I went looking for Mr. Happy’s acetaminophen.   

It has vanished.  I don’t know if we accidentally returned it to the pharmacy (they had to remake two of our medicines with different fillers and we exchanged the old for the new) or if Mr. Charm climbed up to the fridge and started playing with the bottle and left it somewhere strange or threw it away.  In any event, I can’t find it.

So on Friday, I called the pharmacy and asked them to make him a new batch at the appropriate dose for his new (heftier) weight.

Andrew commented to me that the ibuprofen they had made for Mr. Charm was of a strength and compound that would be safe for Mr. Happy, but to only give him 3 mL instead of 5 mL.

Yippee!  So, Friday night I gave him a dose at bedtime, and another dose at his midnight feeding, and for the first time in almost a week, we all slept well.  

Saturday, I gave him another dose around noon because he was moaning in pain again.

Later in the evening, we noticed that he had light eczema all over his body, and he had a nasty, gnarly poop that was very mucousy and stinky.

Breastfed babies don’t usually have stinky poop.

That got us debating on how long his poop has stunk; we both admit that his poop has had an odor to it for a while, but I think it’s a relatively recent thing (last 2-3 weeks) and the Geek thinks it has been stinky since he came off the formula.

This is important, because two weeks ago I let the doctor give him ONE vaccination.

So…is he reacting to the vaccination?  To the melon?  To the ibuprofen?  Or has he been slow-building to a reaction to my diet for the last two months?

Because my Mama’s on the message boards all seem to concur: the sour-smelling, stinky poop is a sign of a reaction.

So now what?  I can’t start food trials on him now, not with him reacting to something.  I’m even more scared to start food trials than I already was.

I wish to God that I could find competent, knowledgeable medical care for my kids! It would be SO GOOD to have someone to help me formulate a game plan for what we should do, instead of trying to figure it all out on my own and feeling rotten if it fails.

I really don’t know what to do…except, I’ve gotten recommendations from fellow FPIES Mama’s that there is a GI, an allergist, and nutritionist in Atlanta that all work together out of a single hospital as a team and are knowledgeable about FPIES.  So I need to try to get us an appointment there and fly the kiddos out to maybe, MAYBE get some good help.

I don’t know what to do in the meantime, though.

What would you do if you were in our shoes?

Nothin’s Too Good For My Boys’ Butts!

 
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If you’re a FAM, you likely have a kiddo that is a tad sensitive to irritants.  Disposable diapers are wonderful in a lot of ways, but when they turn your baby’s butt bright red (even if you change the diaper so frequently they aren’t even DONE yet when you’re trying to take it off!), well, they’re no longer a great idea.

So, if you’re like me, you turn to cloth diapering.

We went old-school, baby!  Flat fold diapers with a FLIP diaper cover.  And they are fantastic!

But still, the red bottom remained.

So we went with cloth wipes.

My first homemade cloth wipes were just a few old cotton t-shirts that I cut up, and they worked great.  Well, aside from the fact that they rolled into a little tube that was a pain in the heinie to unroll while holding a squirmy baby on a changing table!  Eventually, they just irritated me too much and I looked for another option.

Time to whip out the sewing machine, ladies!  But I promise – this takes NO SKILL and almost no time.

I did this before I was blogging, so I don’t have step-by-step pictures, but I did take pictures to show off to my family (who know that I’m brilliant with a crochet hook but abysmal with a sewing machine!).

This is so worth the time!  I made these wipes about 2 years ago and they’re still going strong, and now pulling double duty for two little boys!  Think about how much money you spend on disposable wipes in 2 years…yeah.  That’s what I thought.  HUGE money saver, too!

So here’s what you do:

Go buy about 4 yards of plain, soft white flannel at the cloth store.  Wash and dry, and then iron it.  Sounds silly, but it will make it a LOT easier to cut out!

Fold the flannel in half, and then decide how big you want your wipes to be.  We use a diaper warmer (no, not because we’re pampering parents, but because we were losing too much sleep from a suddenly shocked wide-awake baby from cold wipes and our sleep was worth it!) and 8 inch squares worked perfectly for it.  Just measure whatever container you’re going to use and double that number.  (If you’ll be folding them in half, that is.)

If you have a cutting mat and a rotary cutter, this will be easier.  But you can do it with just scissors if you have to.  Get a measuring tape or yardstick and a cloth marking pencil and dot out the size of your squares.  Then cut out a bunch of double squares!

Double layers of flannel ready to go. I staggered them when I stacked as they were cut out so they’d be easier to grab.

I went with double squares because I wanted them to be nice and soft and sturdy.  I suppose you could go single layer, but really, double is worth it.

Then get out your sewing machine and thread it with white thread.  You could use color, if you want, but I was going for all white so I could bleach them to death if necessary and they’d still look good!

Set your machine for a zig-zag stitch and zag those edges fairly tightly.

Zig-Zagging the edges of the double squares.

I started in the center of one side, and when I reached that spot again I just overlapped a bit, sewed backwards a bit, and then snipped the threads.  Easy!

Then just stack them up and you’re in business!

Heinie wipes all ready to do their duty!

I’m told that this would be so much easier with a serger, so if you have one, feel free!  Frankly, I’m not really a seamstress and anything beyond my oh-so-basic sewing machine sort of intimidates me.  So I’ll stick with zig-zagging the edges, thanks!

These really are wonderful.  I can wipe up the worst messes with a single wipe, as opposed to anywhere from 3-8 disposable wipes at a time.  If they start to look dingy, I wait for a sunny day, squirt some lemon juice on them and let them go get a suntan.  A few short hours later, they’re good as new!

So that’s how I made my kiddos diaper wipes.  Oh, and I just use plain old water in the warmer.  You can get fancy and put in essential oils and Castille soap and such, but plain water has always worked just fine for us.

I also just launder them with the diapers.  Makes it a simple process!

Have you made cloth wipes for your babies?  How’d you do it?

It’s For Your Own Good

 
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I HATED when my Mom would say that to me as a child.  H-A-T-E-D it.  Because I could never see what was “good” about whatever she was referring to!

Welcome to Motherhood, Mama!  I find myself saying it to Mr. Charm all the time  now.

I’m not starving him; he gets 3 squares a day, one big snack, and is allowed to snack any time he asks for food.

Driving through! Mr. Charm with a bag full of homemade potato strings and a hamburger patty on a fork! Love a toddlers sense of style!

But the poor child just WANTS to eat things that he’s no longer allowed to have; chocolate chips, raisins, dried cantaloupe, his cereal, and carrot chips.  I feel awful saying “No” to him, when what he’s asking to eat is something normally considered a healthy, I-can’t-believe-a-two-year-old-would-want-that food!

I have to, though.  I have to tell my son “No, it will make you sick.  This is for your own good.”

And I hate having to say it probably more than he hates having to hear it.

I’m already seeing improvements in his behavior and diapers on this fructose-free diet.  I can’t stand the idea of jeopardizing that with a lack of willpower on my part.

Plus, it would just teach Mr. Charm bad habits; “if I whine long and loud enough, I’ll get what I want.”  SO. NOT. the lesson I want him to learn!

As for improvements, his poop has finally turned dark brown, as opposed to a light brown/yellowish color (this is a sign that things are staying in his digestive tract for longer and therefore he is probably absorbing more nutrition from his food), he’s become a LOT more cooperative and obedient (in general – he still is 2, after all, and has his moments!), and he’s using more words in more ways than he ever has.

Just in case I could confuse myself by thinking this is a fluke, a few days ago, he snuck on the kitchen counters when I was nursing Mr. Happy and ate who-knows-how-many chocolate chips from the open bag tucked in the back on the top shelf (the top shelf being the place I’ve put food not his diet).  These are Enjoy Life Chocolate Chips, and they have pure cane sugar and brown rice syrup in them (plus other stuff I can’t remember now) and those two items are fructose no-no’s.

Three hours later he had a nasty poop with lots of undigested food in it, an hour later he had another one, and for the rest of the day he was uncooperative, mile-a-minute, and slept rotten at nap time.

So I REALLY can’t give in to his begging and pleading…I can see the change in him so clearly on this elimination diet!

Sigh…well, no one ever said motherhood was easy!  (But I hope we can pass some yummy treat-type foods quickly so he’ll stop making me feel like a jerk!)

How do you handle it when your kiddos beg for foods that are bad for them?

Happy Halloween!

 
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With all the food issues in our household, and with living so remotely, we’re going to skip trick-or-treating this year.  We still managed to make it to a Halloween party, though!

So I’m going to ‘phone it in’ on this post and simply share pictures of my boys in their costumes.

Happy Halloween!

Mr. Charm as Thomas! He thinks he has to close his eyes to smile for the camera!

Mr. Happy as a Ladybug…it was the best we could come up with on short notice! And he wouldn’t stop squirming long enough for his wings. Still, he’s a cute little bug!

Fellow Food Allergy Mama’s, please share your tips on celebrating Halloween safely!  How do you convince your kids not to eat candies and foods that are dangerous for them?

Spinach Pesto Pasta With Pollock

 
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I’m having to get creative here, folks.  Getting rid of dairy, egg, rice, chicken, and all the other major allergens was N-O-T-H-I-N-G compared to the challenge of cooking fructose-free!

I mean, how to you cook without tomatos, onion and garlic?!

So, looking for a dinner idea the other night, I came up with something that sounds bizarre and looked kind of weird, but got the ‘thumbs up’ from both the Geek and Mr. Charm!

Ready?  Here goes: spinach and zucchini pesto, pan-fried pollock, and rice noodles, with sauteed zucchini.

THERE’S a combination I never would have come up with if I didn’t have so many restrictions!

It’s really easy, though, so give it a shot – you might be pleasantly surprised!

Here’s what I did:

For the pesto, I tossed one zucchini, washed and chopped into large chunks and a few handfuls of spinach (enough to fill the bowl) in the food processor.  Then I added some salt and pepper, and drizzled a little olive oil on top and let ‘er rip!

Spinach and zucchini in the food processor bowl.

I had to add a bit more oil to get everything blended well.  Just keep an eye on it and scrape down the sides every so often.

Finished pesto!

This would be AWESOME with some fresh basil added, but that’s not yet on our diet so I didn’t.  Also, I imagine this could be made ahead of time and frozen.

The pollock was the frozen type.  I just thawed out two fillets, and pan-fried them in some olive oil with salt and pepper.

Probably would be better with butter, but still good in just oil.

After they were cooked, I flaked them up on a plate.

Flaked pollock.

The rice noodles are just like regular spaghetti noodles; I followed the instructions on the package, which said to cook for 5-7 minutes.  The Geek requested I cook them longer next time.  He said they were a little ‘tough’, though that could be a regular condition of rice noodles.  I’m sure you could use any kind of safe spaghetti-style noodle in your diet for this.

On a whim, I peeled another zucchini and sliced it fairly thin, then tossed it into the same pan the fish had cooked in and sauteed the slices.

To serve, I put some noodles on a plate, scooped a couple TBS of pesto on the noodles, added half the flaked fish and half the sauteed zucchini, and voila!  Dinner is served!

The finished product!

We had to microwave the plates before eating them; the pesto wasn’t hot, and the rice noodle package says to rinse the noodles in cold water after cooking, so the whole dish just wasn’t hot enough for my boys.  They requested a little warming, and 45 seconds in the microwave satisfied their desire for a ‘hot dinner’.

All in all, it came out pretty good.  It’s fairly versatile, too; you could substitute chicken for the fish, add basil to the pesto, and add any other veggies you would like to the saute pan.

Necessity is the mother of invention!  I’m glad it’s working out well for our dinner table (sometimes!).

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SPINACH PESTO PASTA WITH POLLOCK
(serves 2)

– 2 zucchini
– baby spinach leaves
– 2 pollock fillets
– safe spaghetti noodles
– salt
– pepper
– safe oil (still using olive oil here!)

  1. Wash and chop one zucchini into chunks.
  2. Add the zucchini and enough spinach to fill the bowl to a food processor.
  3. Toss in salt and pepper to taste, and drizzle a bit of olive oil into the bowl.  (Add fresh basil if it’s allowed in your diet.)
  4. Process, occasionally scraping the sides of the bowl, until pureed.  Add oil if necessary.
  5. Heat oil in a frying pan; salt and pepper the pollock and pan-fry until done.
  6. Flake the fish into bite sized pieces on a separate dish.
  7. Peel and slice the other zucchini, add to the same pan the fish was cooked in.  Saute until done.
  8. Cook the noodles as per the package instructions.
  9. To serve, put noodles on a plate, half the pesto, half the fish, and half the zucchini.  If needed, warm a bit in the microwave before serving.
  10. Enjoy a “St. Patrick’s Day Green” meal!

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Have you come up with an unusual but delicious dinner out of necessity? 

This post has been shared with Allergy Free Wednesdays, Whole Foods Wednesdays, Frugal Days, Sustainable Ways, and Real Food Wednesdays.

OK. I Give In. I Hate Doctors.

 
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photo courtesy of Stuart Miles at http://freedigitalphoto.net

I took Mr. Charm to the GI on Monday, Oct. 15th.  The doctor wouldn’t give us the hydrogen breath test, but did other tests to ‘rule things out’.

We were told we would be called with the results.  They didn’t call.

I finally called the doctor on Friday, the 26th to ask if the tests had returned.  After leaving a message, his nurse called back.

The phone call felt like an Abbott and Costello skit…except, this really wasn’t funny.

(begin scene)
(my thoughts are in parenthesis)

Nurse: “Oh, yes.  The tests have come back.  You were calling for the results?” (Duh.)

Me: (taking a deep breath and trying not to telepathically slap her) “Yes, please.”

Nurse: “OK, his CBC’s were normal.  (Good.)  The Celiac test was negative.  (Could have told you that.) The stool samples were negative for parasites.  (Duh.)  The chlorine sweat test came back negative, but “on the high side of negative”.”  (Already told you he couldn’t have cystic fibrosis, and what the h*ll does that mean, the ‘high side of negative’?)

Me: “What does THAT mean? The “high side of negative”?”

Nurse: “Oh, like if negative is 0-10, his levels were 0-8.”  (As if that explained anything.)

Me: “But what does that mean?”

Nurse: “It just means that we need to watch out for it.”

Me: “Watch out for what, exactly?!”

Nurse: “It’s just in his notes, you know, to watch out for it.”

Me: “…”  (I decided to let it go. Mr. Charm doesn’t have cystic fibrosis; cystic fibrosis, to my knowledge, is something you either have or don’t have, and I have enough things to worry about.)

Nurse: “OK, so, those are the results.”  (I could tell she was wrapping up the conversation, trying to get off the phone.)

So I interrupted her.

Me: “So what next?  We came in to have a hydrogen breath test, which the doctor would not give us, even though he insisted on all these other tests that I knew would be negative, so the question of whether my son has fructose malabsorption is still not answered!  What does the doctor want to do now?”

Nurse: “Oh, um, well, I can call the lab and see if they can fit him in for a test and give you a call back.”

Me: (seriously trying to not hurt my head with eye-rolling) “Yes, please, that would be nice.”

(end scene)

AAAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHHH!!!!!!

She did call back; they can test him at 7:00 a.m. in a couple weeks.  Then she ran through the ‘what to do’s’ before the test, which I already knew (plain foods – chicken, rice, potato, water, no food after midnight, etc.).  Then she sort of…threw out a comment about making sure to bring things to entertain my son because the test takes three hours to take.

Maybe I’m a little sensitive, but I detected a tone in the last comment that sort of irritated me.  I’ve outlined how the last two visits to this GI went; how Mr. Charm was going stir-crazy in those little exam rooms after TWO HOURS of being stuck in one.  It sounded to me like she was pointing out to the ‘bad mother’ to make sure to bring entertainment this time!

Well, excuse me, Little Miss “I Can Hardly Understand You When You Do Bother To Call Me Back”, but if I were TOLD that a normal appointment with this doctor would TAKE two or three hours, I WOULD have brought more to entertain my son.  I didn’t think I was MOVING IN, I thought I was coming for a short visit!

Hmpf.  OK.  Snark is over. (Maybe.)

Then I told her that I’d already implemented a fructose-free diet for Mr. Charm, and would that in any way affect the hydrogen breath test?  She didn’t know.  She’ll call me back.

Sure.  I’ll hold my breath.  (OK, still had a little snark left.)

So now to decide whether I want to drive the kids down the night before, get a hotel room, be up and at ’em at an ungodly early hour of the morning…or load the kids up in the car at 2:30 a.m. and drive straight through.

Which one only sucks badly, and which one sucks REALLY badly?

Of course, there is a third option: don’t get the test!

Sigh! Gasp! Seriously?  After all you’ve gone through to get it, you’re thinking of not getting it? (I can hear you all thinking that!)

Yes, seriously.

The hydrogen breath test can have false negatives; some people don’t create hydrogen in their lungs when exposed to fructose/lactose/etc., instead, they produce methane.  In fact, many hospitals are now doing a hydrogen/methane breath test to reduce the false negative results they get.  I have no idea if this hospital does the combo test or not, but if it does not, Mr. Charm could TEST negative and still BE positive.

The only way to know for sure is to go through a fructose elimination diet and then reintroduce foods to see the results.

Which I am already doing.

And other than giving us the diagnosis of FPIES, what exactly has ANY doctor on our medical “team” done to help us since being released from the hospital? (Because they were all awesome during our hospitalization!)

Let’s see…I’ve been told the WRONG FOODS to eliminate from my diet.  We’ve been instructed to go visit a nutritionist, who basically didn’t tell us anything I hadn’t already taught myself.  I’ve been told to ‘not be so paranoid’ by the man who then gave my son poison crayons.  I’ve been told that my son is probably allergic to my milk, and not something in my milk.  I’ve been told to give up nursing and try a different elemental formula, which my son then reacted to.

So HOW, exactly, are doctors worth another shiny red cent of our money, and HOW, exactly, are doctors worth another millisecond of my time?

I seem to be the only freaking person in the whole d**n world that can diagnose, treat, and care for my sons properly…and I’m a Flight Attendant that dropped out of college!  If *I* can go online, read, research, and figure this out…shouldn’t a “I Spent An Extra Ten Years In School” M.-freakin’-D. be able to do BETTER????

(OK, I lied.  Snark still lives here.)

I can’t think of a single good reason to spend another $100 in gas costs, plus the cost of a hotel, plus the wear and tear on my vehicle (not to mention the wear and tear on MAMA), and put my kids through such an upheaval in their routine to drive down for a test I requested and was ready to do two weeks ago!  Especially not with the fact that we’re already on a fructose elimination diet and I’m seeing MAJOR improvement in Mr. Charm!

So, I give in. I don’t know what to do next, but I do know this: I hate (our) doctors.

That is all.  (scratch)

(And if you get that last reference, we can totally be friends!)

Anyone else hate doctors? Please, share your horror stories!  You know, so I can have MORE reason to hate doctors!!

*For the record, I don’t really hate ALL doctors.  The Geek and I have a wonderful GP that we love, the GP my parents and I used for years literally saved my Daddy’s life and we were heartbroken when he left his practice, and the OB/GYN who delivered Mr. Happy is an absolute sweetheart and awesome at what she does.  It’s just the ‘team’ we have for our sons that is making me want to spit nails!

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UPDATE!!

After I posted this, I got a phone call from the actual GI hisself.

He was irritated.  “I don’t find that (the hydrogen breath test) to be a useful test.  I’ll give you names of some of my colleagues who administer the test, but I’ve never given one in the ten years I’ve been here.”

Well.  That’s NOT what you said at the appointment, Mr. Doctor!  You said – and I quote – “It’s hard to give that test to little ones.”  NOT that the test is bunk.

Anyway, I told him we were already on a fructose free diet, and he asked how it was going, and when I started to ask him questions about how to proceed from here he answered two of my questions and then said “OK, bye-bye.”

So, I didn’t get to ask the questions I still have, and this further makes me go “Doctor’s suck.”

Or maybe they don’t, and I just irritate Doctor’s and bring out the worst in them.

Whatever.  I’m still done with them.  For now, at least.

Quinoa Battered Veggies

 
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One of the ways I can almost ALWAYS get Mr. Charm to eat veggies is to fry them.  Yes, I know the arguments against frying.  To which I say: Get over it!  If my son is eating a vegetable, I don’t care how it’s prepared!

This became a problem when his egg and dairy problems were discovered; the only way I knew to fry chicken or veggies was to coat them in egg, then a flour/bread crumb mixture and then fry them.

Compounding the issue is this FPIES-friendly diet we are on, and now the fructose-free diet (which means gluten-free for now, as the two are closely intertwined).

How do you fry things with No Eggs, No Milk, No Flour?

Turns out, pretty easily!

Here’s what I did:

First I chopped up the veggies in question.  Squash is a major no-no for FPIES, but it is allowed for Mr. Charm’s FructMal diet, so I sliced up a yellow squash.

Then I took a half cup of quinoa flour and put it in a pie plate, to which I added some sea salt and pepper.

It’s not bugs – it’s pepper!

I added a half cup of water to the flour and whisked it together.  It was still a little thick, so I added about 2-3 tsp. more water until the batter was the right consistency.  (Somewhere between a cake mix batter and pancake batter was what I looked for.)

Whisked and ready for dredging!

I put about 1/4 inch of oil in a pan and started heating it.  When it was hot, I dredged the squash in the batter and placed them in the pan.  One thing I learned was that when you first put the battered veggie in the pan, you better like the position you put it in!  They won’t be movable until they’re mostly cooked on that side.  (I lost some batter off the veggies this way.  Oops!)

Squash coated in batter. Yum!

I basically just waited until the edges were looking a little ‘done’ and they were easy to nudge out of position, then I flipped them over to let them cook on the other side.

I should have used a bigger pan. I didn’t think Mr. Charm would eat so much!

Again, I just waited until they were easy to move, and then I took them out of the pan and sat them on some paper towels I’d laid out to let them drain.

Three little squash laying out to drain. Out of camera range is Mr. Charm, just waiting to grab them and shove them in his mouth!

I really should have only put down one paper towel…Mr. Charm pulled an ice chest off the porch, drug it next to the counter to stand on, and ate them as fast as they would cool!  The Geek had to actually distract Mr. Charm to grab the 7 pieces of squash he was able to get – beyond that, Mr. Charm ate all of it!

I think that’s a definite WIN for Mama!

Unfortunately, I can’t eat many of the new recipes I’ll be posting, so my decision on whether to post them or not is entirely dependent on the opinion and eagerness of The Geek and Mr. Charm.  This recipe passed muster – the Geek said it tasted great and Mr. Charm couldn’t get enough!  So if you’d like to find another way to fry your veggies while living on a restricted diet, I can’t recommend this enough.

If quinoa isn’t your ‘thing’, I imagine you could try some other alternative flour, though I don’t know how that would turn out.  If spices are allowed in your diet, feel free to add anything you like to the dry ingredients.  I always used to like a little paprika in mine.

So, enjoy watching your kids wolf down vegetables like they’re candy!  I sure did!

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QUINOA BATTERED VEGETABLES

– vegetable/meat of your choice, chopped or sliced into small pieces
– 1/2 cup quinoa flour
– 1/2 cup + 2-3 tsp. water
– salt
– pepper
– safe oil (we’re still using olive oil)

  1. Chop or slice your vegetables/meat into small pieces.
  2. Pour 1/4 inch of oil into a frying pan and start it heating.
  3. Put the quinoa flour, salt and pepper in a shallow pie plate.
  4. Add the water, starting with 1/2 cup and adding tsp. as needed to achieve the right consistency, whisking the ingredients together.
  5. Dredge the veggies/meat in the batter and place carefully in the frying pan.
  6. Wait until the edges look ‘done’, then flip to cook the other side.
  7. Cook for another 2-3 minutes, then remove and lay on paper towels to drain.
  8. Enjoy!

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Do any of you have a great batter recipe you use that is allergy/FPIES/FructMal friendly? 

This post has been shared with Allergy Free Wednesdays, Whole Foods Wednesdays, Frugal Days, Sustainable Ways, Real Food Wednesdays, and Gluten Free Fridays.

The Exciting World of Fructose Malabsorption

 
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Delicious Poison
photo courtesy of Maggie Smith at http://freedigitalphotos.net

It’s funny how things work out sometimes.

I thought MPI and an IgE Egg allergy were horrible.  Then I learned how to cook, what to avoid, and I mastered the challenge.

Then we got FPIES.

I thought I was going to lose my mind over that (and I may feel that way again) but we were blessed to quickly find a baseline for Mr. Happy and I’ve started to relax.

Then I realized there was something more wrong with Mr. Charm.  And my suspicions lead me to believe it is Fructose Malabsorption.

And I feel like I’m losing my mind again.

Why do my boys BOTH have to be stricken with conditions that so little is known about?   Huh?  Geez!

I did what I always do when faced with the unknown medical conditions of my kids: visit Dr. Google!  Quickly I found a great blog called “Life With Fructose Malapsorption”, and one paragraph really struck me: “Many people with FM are left undiagnosed for years before they finally stumble across FM, often after having tried many different medications,  diet changes, and evaluated what they are eating for quite some time.  Some people are fortunate enough to have a doctor who is aware of FM and will send them for the test, but many doctors are not aware of FM or that there is a test for it.  There are also many doctors who believe that there is no such things a FM (leaving patients extremely frustrated and “lost”).  There is slowly becoming more awareness of FM, but it is still widely unheard of.”

Take out the fact that there is a test for this condition, and substitute “FPIES” for “fructose malabsorption”, and you could be talking about FPIES!

Based on this lovely ladies wisdom, we’re starting a NEW elimination diet just for Mr. Charm.  For about two weeks, he will be eating only the following foods:

  • Beef
  • Pork
  • Chicken
  • Fish
  • Turkey
  • Seafood
  • White Potatos
  • Zucchini
  • Spinach
  • White Rice
  • White Rice Noodles
  • Oats
  • Quinoa
  • Millet
  • Tapioca Starch
  • Buckwheat
  • Salt
  • Pepper
  • Olive Oil

Then we’ll expand.  We should be able to trial new foods about every 4-5 days, so I’m hoping we’ll build his diet up fairly quickly.  Compared to the 4 week wait we’ll have to do for each new food for Mr. Happy, 4-5 days is nothing!

I did go through those lists of safe foods that I found online and my original diet for him was much larger than this, but, based on my experiences with FPIES I’ve learned it is best to start smaller than you’d like and work up from there.  No sense wasting time, and if you don’t go small enough you may have to start over from scratch.

So now I’m back to trying to learn new things to cook with a limited ingredient list.  Mr. Charm will be happy, though, to finally be able to eat bacon again!  (Well, if I can find any without any sweetener added!)

This is going to be a real challenge for me; I haven’t had any difficulty staying on my elimination diet for Mr. Happy whatsoever…but cooking bacon, my homemade sausage, and shrimp and crab is going to be TORTURE for me!  Not to mention convincing Mr. Charm that he won’t wither and die without his “Mo!” – Mr. Charm speak for “Orange Juice” (because he always asks for “More” – love toddler-speak!).

Also, my house is suddenly going to go on Red Alert for food sharing.  I won’t have an “FPIES Friendly” kitchen any more!

Plus, I attempted to ‘wing it’ on a lemon pepper chicken dish a few nights ago for Mr. Charm and he flat refused to eat it.  The Geek tried a few bites and made some hysterical faces – apparently I really stubbed my toe on the lemon juice!  It’s SO HARD to know if what you’re cooking is any good when you can’t taste as you go!

Well, I’ll get the hang of it.  I’m sure I’ll find and create some delicious recipes out of this challenge!

Most importantly, the next few weeks will tell us – testing or no testing – whether Mr. Charm actually DOES have Fructose Malabsorption.  Please cross your fingers and send some prayers that his diapers clean up their act (hah!) and he starts acting like a two year old…and not a two year old with a tummy ache!

Anyone else dealing with Fructose Malabsorption that has any brilliant advice to share?

Be Prepared: The Car Kit

 
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This is the last post in my Be Prepared for Winter (With Food Allergies) series.  Thanks for reading!

photo courtesy of Stuart Miles at http://freedigitalphoto.net

Where I live is very remote.  Many spots in our area have no cell phone coverage and houses are few and far between.  If I were to wreck or break down in one of those spots, I would either need to stay put and wait for a Good Samaritan to come help, or haul both kids on a fairly lengthy hike to find help.  I can only imagine how much fun that would be in bad weather!

So, I try to keep my car prepped with things that will make my life easier if things go wrong.  This can be the difference between panicking, or calmly handling an emergency!

Since Mama’s in general spend a lot of time in their cars, and no one can ever predict when a breakdown or accident will occur, it’s wise to be prepared for anything and any conditions.  This is especially important if you are a FAM.

Writing about the First Aid Kit, I discovered that there wasn’t much specific to a food-allergy child beyond special medications, so I listed off the needs of a basic first aid kit.  I’ve been trying to keep the focus of these posts on what a FAM needs to be prepared; but again, I find that with the Car Kit, there are only a handful of things needed beyond what you should carry at all times.

I found a terrific list of emergency car supplies at Consumer Reports.org, and recommend you check it out.

I’ll briefly highlight what they recommend, then return the focus to food allergy needs.

  • Travel first aid kit
  • Fire extinguisher
  • Flashlight
  • Flares
  • Jumper Cables
  • Tire changing equipment

For winter, add:

  • Windshield scraper
  • Small shovel
  • Tire chains and tow strap
  • Bag of cat litter
  • Blanket(s)
  • Gloves and hat (don’t forget spares for the kids!)

You may not need much more than that, but if you also live and drive in remote places, this is what I would add:

  • Tool kit
  • Brightly colored cloth
  • Bottled water
  • Emergency blankets (those thin silver ones)
  • Instant heat packs

If you are a FAM, you’ll have to keep in mind that your kids will get hungry if you are stranded.  Even if you live in a city and are stranded at a gas station in relative warmth and comfort, you’re not likely to find safe foods there!  So be prepared.

Try to find snack foods, either canned or pre-packaged, that are safe for your kids.  If you can’t find any that fit that bill, then make snack foods that are safe for your kids, store them in your car, and rotate them out every week or two so you’ll always have fresh, safe foods on hand in any situation.

Things I’m considering adding are beef jerky and potato chips (I found a manufacturer that makes chips using only safe ingredients for us!!).  I will probably add dried cantaloupe and carrot chips for me to eat, as those are safe for Mr. Happy’s FPIES but not for Mr. Charm’s FructMal.  I’m still trying to come up with other snacks I can provide for Mr. Charm, because that child can eat beef jerky and potato chips in astonishing quantities!

Also make sure that you ALWAYS have safe benadryl and your Epi-pens with you at all times!  These things cannot usually be stored outside of a certain temperature range, so they probably cannot be kept in your car.  Get in the habit of always putting them in your purse or diaper bag when you head out of the house! (Like you weren’t already!)

Make sure you have plenty of bottled water; if you use compounded medicines, they often have to be mixed with water to administer.  Even if you don’t use compounded medicines, keeping hydrated is important.

This isn’t food allergy specific, but if you’re going to be stranded with kids in a car, you’ll want to have distractions handy.  Think about making a small plastic tub of coloring books, books to read, small art projects, and anything else you can think of that doesn’t take electricity or batteries and can keep your kids entertained for a good long while to leave in your car.

If you do get stranded, keep calm and remember what you need to do.  Stay in the car if you can, unless you can make it to shelter easily.  Tie brightly colored material on your antenna.  Make one trip to the trunk to get anything you will need so you don’t let warmth escape the car too often.  Huddle for body heat.  Bundle up!  Wear your hats and gloves, and make sure blankets are tucked in as tightly as possible.  Stay awake.  Don’t run your motor for heat non-stop; you’ll run out of gas and risk carbon monoxide poisoning.  Just run the car for about 10 minutes per hour.

photo courtesy of Sura Nualpradid at http://freedigitalphoto.net

On that note, it’s a good idea to always fill your gas tank up when it gets to half full (or more!).  This is good for two reasons: one, you won’t be as likely to run out of gas if you have to spend an extended time in your car and two, you’ll be less likely to get condensation in your gas tank this winter.

If you read the Consumer Reports link, and think about what your food allergy child will need if stranded away from home, I am confident any car crisis you’re faced with will be nothing more than a mild irritation this winter!

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I hope you’ve gotten something beneficial out of this series; I know that writing it helped get my mind prepared for what I need to get done.

With luck, none of us will NEED any of the things I’ve written about.  I hope, though, that if you do, you will have planned ahead and you and your family will weather the storm in comfort and confidence.

Now that you’ve planned for winter, relax and enjoy the upcoming Holidays!

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Did you miss a post?  Read the whole series:
Part I – Be Prepared: Power Outage
Part II – Be Prepared: Food Provisions
Part III – Be Prepared: Food Preparation
Part IV – Be Prepared: The First Aid Kit 

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This post has been shared with Allergy Free Wednesdays and Frugal Days, Sustainable Ways.