What are your allergic children having for dinner? (recipe ideas thread)

[trixymalixy]

Just thought I'd start a thread to give those of us that are struggling with giving our allergic children a bit of variety some inspiration! I know I end up with the same meals rotated every week. I have included a bit of cooking technique as I know some on here are struggling with that.

I'll start with my children's favourite:

chicken pie

Heaped tablespoon of pure or similar spread
Heaped tablespoon of plain flour (dove's farm if need gluten free)
500ml chicken stock (knorr are gluten free)
2 tablespoons soy or Oatly cream (optional)
3 large carrots (chopped and cooked)
Tin sweet corn
Cooked chicken (I use approx half a cooked supermarket chicken,reserving drumsticks, wings and remaining meat for another meal)
Ready rolled Puff pastry (gluten free if necessary or could top with mashed potato, or just serve the sauce with rice)

Melt spread in pan and add flour. It should go into a ball. Cook for 2 minutes to cook out the taste of the flour. Add the stock a ladleful at a time and whisk well over a low heat until all the liquid is combined. The first couple of ladlefuls the mixture might go back into a ball, but with each subsequent ladleful the mixture will ease up and become a smooth paste, then a sauce.

Add carrots, sweet corn and chicken and put sauce in a pie dish. Top with puff pastry and bake for 25-30 mins at 190. I let the kids cut shapes with the excess pastry to go on top so we call it hello kitty pie in this house!

This feeds my kids for 2 meals or 3 if I serve with potatoes and other veg.

The veg can be swapped for peas, broccoli, leeks whatever you fancy.

The cream is optional but just adds a bit of richness.

I think most supermarkets sell frozen gluten free pastry or a pastry mix, but The sauce is also nice without the pie topping just with rice or potatoes.

I will ty out this recepie, thank you!

I'm going to try it too! Thank you! I'm just starting out in making more adventurous meals for my 13 mth old milk allergic ds so I don't really have any to contribute, but I will follow this thread with interest. Thanks again

Trixy, that sounds lovely. Thanks so much.

This has become a family favourite fruity chicken curry, the kids (3&2) have moved onto madras paste for it already! It looks like lots of ingredients, but it really isn't & they are very easy to eat hold of, unlike some curries.

There's actually a fair few of AKs recipes (especially in the family, kids1-4&4-10 sections) that are either ff, or can be made ff very simply. I know a lot of her weaning books are basically cheese & cream, but the more grown-up proper meals are a lot better.

Another firm favourite with the kids is chilli, the more beans the better!
I get (a few!) tins of the Heinz 5-beans whenever they are on special, as my two love them & they go great in chilli with green pepper & chopped up salad tomatoes (as well as a tin of chopped toms). A handful of red lentils will disappear into this too if hubby isn't looking my way while I'm cooking (certainly if its all dumped in the slow cooker!)

Spanish chicken (freefrom milk, wheat, gluten, egg & nuts PLUS syn free on Slimming World!)

(sorry for not giving accurate amounts but I just add as much as I want until it tastes right!)

1-2 large onions
2 cloves garlic
2 peppers
Cooked chicken (if using raw chicken, brown this in the pan first using Fry Light spray then remove and leave to one side while you cook the rest)
1-2 tins chopped tomatoes
approx. 1 pint chicken stock (we use Knorr stock cubes)
1 large tablespoon tomato puree
Splenda granulated sweetener (or sugar if you prefer)
Paprika
Italian seasoning (or oregano will do)
Passata (if necessary)
Dash of red wine (optional)

Fry the onions and fresh garlic in Fry Light spray. Add the chopped peppers and cook until soft.
Add 1-2 tins of chopped tomatoes, 1 pint of chicken stock, a large tablespoon of tomato puree, lots of paprika (mild or spicy, up to you), herbs, salt & pepper, sweetener/sugar and red wine (optional). Bring to the boil then reduce the heat, add the chicken and simmer for at least 30 mins to allow the sauce to reduce and bring out the flavours. I sometimes add a spoonful of Bovril to 'beef' up the taste a bit.
Serve with rice.

Thought I would add to this thread. DS is allergic to dairy & soy, I'm a coeliac and in need of ideas! Going to make the chicken pie next week.

Today we had polenta with roasted veg & chicken. You can use any veg for this.

Ingredients (feeds 3-4)
Packet of solid polenta
Peppers - sliced
Cherry tomatoes
Chicken breast (cut into strips) or legs/thighs
Oil
Smoked paprika

Method
Slice polenta into cubes or chip size strips. Add veg and chicken. Place in ceramic or glass oven dish. Sprinkle a teaspoon of smoked paprika over a shake until all ingredients is covered. Cook at 180 for 30-40 mins & serve.

You can use rosemary or thyme instead of paprika. Pop some garlic in or squeeze of lemon.

DS loves it

Trixy, this thread was such a brilliant idea!

I am gong to try all the recipes out, as they all seem like they would be okay for my DC as well as us too.

Thanks to everyone wh has posted recipes. They all sound yummy!

I was chuffed to bits to find this recipe soy-free soy sauce!
I freeze it in tablespoon & tea spoon portions and defrost what I need for either marinades, stir fries or for putting on 'rainbow rice' for the boys (all chopped-small coloured veg in boiled rice, nothing exciting really)

Often serve rainbow rice with meat, grilled chicken, salmon/fish fillet etc.
You may notice my kids like sauce, they'll eat veg (chunkier the better) if its in something. If I put carrots & peas on a plate, they won't touch it!

On the subject of sauces. Two that always live in the cupboard are both from M&S, free from pretty much everything (& bought when on special!) Sweet & Sour cooking sauce (uses rice wine vinegar so, soy & gluten free!) and Thai Green curry sauce (coconut milk based). Both lovely!
Amoy Straight to Wok Rice Noodles are also handy (& GF) to keep in the cupboard on a 'short of time' evening :)

I've thought of one!

My 13 mth old ds loves anything rice based but can't have dairy and only have egg well cooked and in very small amounts.

I cook a basic risotto and then add anything we have in the fridge!

Fry an onion in oil until soft, chuck in 300g of arborio rice and stir until coated in oily onion!

Make up 1.2L of veg stock, I use low salt oxo cubes but I'm not sure if they're gluten free.

Keep the rice on a summer and add the stock a ladle at a time. You might need to add a bit more if it starts to cook dry.

After about 20 mins the rice is cooked and you can add whatever u like! I've cooked things in a separate pan and added them at the last minute (bacon and mushroom, chicken, pea and sweet corn, salmon, mange tout and asparagus)

If allergies allow you can add a sprinkle of Parmesan cheese at the end and serve with a salad!

It's so quick and easy but very delicious.

We are wheat and mostly dairy-free

today i made GF spaghetti with a veg sauce (like ratatouille basically but blended with a chicken stock cube thrown in so that DD would eat it!)

Our basics are things like:
GF fish fingers with homemade potato wedges (best slightly boiled before baking)
Chicken drumsticks baked with smoked paprika served with onion-y rice stirred into the juices it makes
Stews
A lot of soups and sometimes with home-fried poppadums to dip in (they're made from gram or chickpea flour I think). The children like sweeter soups so I often include sweet potato or butternut squash and flavour like ginger/ cumin etc.
Spanish tortilla (slowly fry onion and finely chopped potato then stir in eggs to make an omelette)
Dahl with rice (they love Indian or Thai food)

I tried making a healthy dairy free ice cream by blending an avocado, banana and 200ml coconut milk with 3 tablespoons cocoa; I really love it but DD wasn't sure!

This went down a storm at lunchtime today, even with the cauliflower refusing DC.

Cauliflower soup
1 head cauliflower
1 leek
1 onion
Chicken or veg stock
Olive oil
Blue cheese(optional)

Chop onion and leek and sweat in olive oil until soft. Add chopped cauliflower, put enough stock in to cover the cauliflower and simmer until cauliflower is soft. Blend soup and serve.

The kids had the soup as above , but I had blue cheese at the table which the non dairy allergic adults crumbled on top of the soup.

You could also add some Creme fraiche or oatly cream to make it richer.