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!
___________
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)
- Chop or slice your vegetables/meat into small pieces.
- Pour 1/4 inch of oil into a frying pan and start it heating.
- Put the quinoa flour, salt and pepper in a shallow pie plate.
- Add the water, starting with 1/2 cup and adding tsp. as needed to achieve the right consistency, whisking the ingredients together.
- Dredge the veggies/meat in the batter and place carefully in the frying pan.
- Wait until the edges look ‘done’, then flip to cook the other side.
- Cook for another 2-3 minutes, then remove and lay on paper towels to drain.
- Enjoy!
__________
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.
Love your creativity in the kitchen! Do you think this would work with millet flour? We failed squash last year but are trialing pumpkin this week (fingers/toes crossed). Haven’t done much frying, but i make fish sticks and breaded turkey cutlets a lot. Fructose malabsorption has really messed with my FPIES-friendly recipes — it helps to know someone else is working through similar issues….
Thanks, Amity!
Yes, I think this would probably work with just about any flour out there, as long as the consistency is right (not too thin, not too thick). Let me know how that goes for you!
I am right there with you on the FructMal messing with my FPIES cooking, and am also glad there’s someone else in this situation! 🙂
I’ll try a blend of potato and millet flours and let you know how it works. Do you have a safe milk to cook with? DOS is on Elecare Jr. but we can’t cook with it. We were on coconut milk but had to give it up because of fructans. Thinking of trying hemp milk… Love your blog, btw, totally mirrors my life at the moment. (:
I would love to know how potato and millet work out! As of now, we don’t have a safe milk to cook with because we’re still on the elimination stage of our FructMal diet. One of the first things I’m going to try is Almond milk, though, as that is what we preferred before. Rice milk would surely be safe, but with an FPIES kiddo in the house, I’m going to do my best to have as many ‘like’ foods as possible to reduce contamination risks!
I am in SERIOUS MOURNING over our coconut milk loss! I made all Mr. Charm’s popsicles with it, used it as the base for my much-trial-and-error vegan/soy-free pumpkin pie recipe, used it for whipped toppings, in smoothies, as a cream for soups…sniff! I have no idea what I can use in place of coconut for all the amazing things coconut did for our kitchen. Guess I’ll just have to get more creative!
Hemp milk is on our ‘to try’ list, too. Let me know what you think of it, if you try it before we do.
Thanks for the compliment, Amity! I’m glad you’re enjoying the blog. 🙂 (And sorry our lives mirror at the moment. This is stinky.)
Oh yes, I mourn coconut, carrot, apples, pears, stone fruit — FM knocked out half of my son’s safe foods (we currently have millet, potato, sorghum, corn (no HFCS), turkey, whitefish, celery, canola oil). But coconut in all its forms was key to cooking (still is in my elimination diet with boy 2). I tried hemp milk during my first elimination diet with boy 1 and hated the taste but it might be okay to cook with — our nutritionist considers it a power food and we definitely need those!
I’m sure you share my view that FM is a cruel trick to play on a boy with such a modest menu to begin with. Would love to take this conversation to email and share notes (compare FM symptoms, strategies for introducing solids to the wee ones, etc.).
E-mail sent! 🙂
Shoot, didn’t get your email (not in my trash either). Could you resend to westc100@yahoo.com?
Very cool and so creative! We love quinoa!! I’d love to have you link this up at our Gluten Free Fridays recipe link up over at vegetarianmamma.com It actually will go live tonight at 7:05 pm eastern! Hope that you can join us, I’d love for you to share some of your awesome goodies!!
Cindy
Thank you! I appreciate the invite – I linked it up! 🙂
Any way they will eat it! 🙂 yay! Got this tweeted and pinned!
Thanks!
Pingback: Back in the Kitchen – Salmon Patties! - Cradle Rocking Mama
can I make my own Quinoa flour out of the grain? If so do I need to wash it? What is the process?
Hi! That is actually my next project to try. 🙂
I’ve been told that home-ground flour tastes infinitely better than the store-bought quinoa flour, so yes, it can be done.
I plan to rinse the seeds first, because I find that even the pre-washed seeds still could use a good rinsing, and lay them on a cookie sheet to dry. Once they’re dry, then I planned to put them in the dry container for my Vitamix and grind them into flour.
If you don’t have a Vitamix, you can use a coffee grinder, though that will take a little bit longer.
And the rinsing thing is apparently a matter of taste and preference. My friend (the one who told me the home ground flour was so much better) was surprised when I told her rinsing the seeds made such a difference in taste to me; apparently, I’m fairly sensitive to bitter flavors. She didn’t notice a difference at all. So try it both ways and see! If you aren’t sensitive to bitter, that’s a whole lot less work for you! 🙂
Not only is the home ground flour supposed to taste better, my friend also assures me it’s far less expensive than buying it. I haven’t run the numbers on it yet (since I haven’t seen how much flour I can get out of a package of seeds, yet), but that would certainly be a nice perk!
Happy grinding! Let me know how it works out for you, okay?