Suggestions for lactose free diet

[extremelychocolateymilkroll]

Dd has rotovirus and possible lactose intolerance. As I am breastfeeding her the gp has suggested we both eliminate dairy for a week and see if her funny tummy disappears. Bought Rice Dream today and Pure veg spread. The Rice Dream is lovely but the spread wasn't so good. I am used to having Yeo Valley spreadable with butter so the veg spread was a real disappointment. Any other spreads and other alternatives anyone can recommend? Thanks.

My DD was lactose intolerant till she was two and we used a lot of the lactosefree range.. The milk taste a lot like normal milk, DD loved the cheese and we still buy the yogurts now even though DD can have lactose as they are so yummy!! HTH

Thanks Manda. Will definitely check these out.

'Pure' margarine is quite good, the soya, sunflower oil and vegetable have slightly different textures and tastes.

Alpro products are generally nice and a bit creamier than other soya 'dairy' products. Their yogurts and milkshakes are nice.

Don't bother with non-dairy cheese, it's not good.

Vitalite dairy free is much more buttery tasting than pure, and makes great pastry or biscuits (soya spreads are rubbish for cakes though).
Alpro yogurts are nice enough, check labels though, as a lot of foods have lactose in as a sugar.

I find Pure ok for baking, thorugh probably use more hard veg fat for pastry. A lot of vegan cake recipes use oil.

Thanks inmysparetime and lottiegb. Have just tried the lactofree milk in coffee and it tastes very nice - though when you see that it's made from semi-skimmed milk it's somehow difficult to believe that it is lactose free! Am also eating some Kallo dark chocolate rice cake thins which are scrummy.

extremely I am permanently on a dairy free diet for my health and I use Olive oil instead of any 'spreads' 'cos they all have palm oil in them which i don't eat for environmental and health reasons (yr body sees it as saturated fat). I love it on rice crackers and toast with a bit of marmite etc. If you want more suggestions for yr diet i'd be happy to help! .

Thanks ppeatfruit. So you just pour some olive oil on bread do you? More suggestions very welcome.

Yes I use it in the same way I used to use butter or you can make a dip with a bit of garlic and lemon juice and 'dip' yr toast in it. I also make lovely brownies\cakes with olive oil or cooking oil; The secret is to use melted (plain) not milky chocolate and or syrups and mix it on the stove and soften the mixture with rice milk it's also naturally sweet; I use a normal all in one brownie or gingerbread recipe and replace melted butter with oil; it's easy.

For nice hot drinks I whisk up hot organic soya milk; don't boil though! check the soya content the more there is the richer\nicer it tastes (it froths really well 'cos no fat) and you can make cappucinos or hot choc. pure cocoa is dairy free.

Thanks ppeatfruit - great ideas. Would you mind posting the recipes you use? When you say you replace butter with oil if lets say the recipe needs 200g butter, how much oil would you use? Thanks again.

For cake and other dairy free (vegan) recipes, have a look here: www.theppk.com/ They have some good cookery books too.

You cutting out lactose won't have an effect on her - your milk is full of lactose. The lactose from cow's milk products doesn't pass from you into your milk: it's the proteins which do.

For secondary lactose intolerance (ie developed after a stomach bug), the best thing is to keep bf'ing and the gut will heal on its own. You can read about it on the Kellymom site here and here.

If you think that cow's milk protein intolerance may be an issue, you'll have to cut out all dairy including lactose free brands.

Unfortunately lots of GPs seem to be confused about this.

I prefer Pure sunflower / olive to Vitalite. You can also get calcium enriched oat milk (Oatly).

If you think she's got cow's milk protein intolerance, it's worth cutting out soya too as about 60% of children who are allergic to cow's milk are also allergic to soya.

I haven't forgotten your recipe it's just that MN goes off air when i try to post it. sorry! Marking my place for later

Like Angel says, there is no point in cutting out lactose if you are bf, since you are giving lactose that way. You don't need to cut out cheese in lactose free diets either.
Seriously, its a pointless exercise.

Cheese does have lactose in - relatively high levels of it (I know as I'm lactose intolerant and cheese makes me ill unless I take lactase tablets with it).

Yoghurt has low levels of lactose.

Hard cheeses have every low levels of lactose, many have practically none. The lactose is drained out with the whey and the fermentation takes out most of the rest. The harder the cheese, the less lactose.

Yoghurt, on the other hand, has almost as much lactose as milk. You have that entirely backwards.

Here is a basiclist that gives an idea:

Dairy product Serving size Lactose content
Milk, regular 250 ml 12 g
Milk, reduced fat 250 ml 13 g
Yogurt, plain, regular 200 g 9 g
Yogurt, plain, low-fat 200 g 12 g
Cheddar cheese 30 g 0.02 g
Cottage cheese 30 g 0.1 g
Butter 1 tsp 0.03 g
Ice cream 50 g 3 g

also human milk has twice as much lactose as cows milk. The amount of HCP's that advide BF women to cut out lactose in their diets is mind boggling.

Really? I can eat yoghurt without taking any lactase tablets at all, but I need 2 tablets in order to eat cheese, otherwise I get terrible diahorrea.

I'd read that the fermentation process in probiotic yoghurt broke down the lactose, and certainly I know people whose lactose-intolerant babies could eat yoghurt but not cheese or milk. Apparently milk products are often added to 'processed' yoghurts too.

Cheese which has been made using traditional processes ie aged for a couple of years is very low in lactose, but modern industrial methods don't remove the lactose.

It is still lower in lactose than milk, though.

Hard cheese, by any method, including mass produced, is very very low in lactose, because of the acidification and whey removal, as well as the fermentation and aging in traditionally made cheese. Yoghurt is relatively high though traditionally made yoghurt contains natural lactase in addition to high lactose levels, counteracting some effects, but modern mass produced yoghurt often has added milk solids or low naturally occuring lactase.

Very few babies are actually lactose intolerant, its rare since they are designed to consume high lactose breastmilk. It does happen but if diagnosed age under 2 its often a misdiagnosis, or a transient deficiency that is temporary.

Butter is 80% fat, the rest is water. So.....I would think that the conversion from butter to oil would be 80g oil for every 100g butter. I would use something with a more neutral taste like sunflower oil rather than olive oil in cakes/biscuits etc.

Ah, I think I probably only eat traditionally made yoghurt, which explains it.

I'm still mystified by the cheese thing though.

Yes, it's pretty rare for babies to be lactose intolerant - the ones I mentioned had secondary LI for a few weeks after a bad bout of gastroenteritis or similar.

Thanks so much for all your advice on recipes and alternatives and lactose content information.

Surely it's the protein in cow's milk that is very hard for some to digest that probably enters the BM. (I don't know if the lactose contains the protein I'm not a scientist, like Angel I go by my own experience) but human milk is for human babies which is obviously not the case with normal Formula.

Thinking of making this recipe this afternoon. Can I use rice milk instead of ordinary milk? Just thinking that rice milk is quite a bit thinner than normal milk.

Recipe 1 pot Vegan Brownies\Gingercake etc.

Contents:
100g flour (I use wheat free)
100g ground almonds
100g dark choc 70%
50g molasses
50g syrup (I use rice syrup)
50g cooking oil (I use olive oil you can't taste it!)
Rice milk to loosen the mixture
Baking pwder
Spices and or nuts to your taste

method- Using a large solid saucepan on v low heat; slowly without mixing melt choc., spices, oil, then syrups. Off the heat add almonds and flour and baking powder mixing gently add rice milk to make a 'dropping' consistency.
Oil a non stick quiche tin or whatever.

Put in oven @180c no fan for approx half an hour till the centre is still stickyish and the sides are coming away from tin. Cool in tin and cut when cool. This improves with keeping!