Food Allergies and America's Ultimate Food Fest: Thanksgiving Tips from The Nut-Free Mom

Thanksgiving is exactly a week away so I would like to offer some of my hard-won advice that I have posted previously on this blog. Here are several links that discuss many aspects of coping with Thanksgiving with food allergies, all in one place for your convenience!

Food Allergies Don't Take a Thanksgiving Holiday This post lists tips to follow to ensure a safe Thanksgiving meal with your extended family.

Food Allergies, Thanksgiving and Family Feuds Here I discuss how to cope with varying degrees of food allergy awareness and acceptance at this food-loving holiday.

A Safe Thanksgiving with the Non-Cooks What to do if your family does a catered meal, cooked outside the home.

Food Allergy Dining Out Tips Holiday travel to relatives usually involves a restaurant or two. Here are some tips for dining out with nut allergies.

Here's to the ultimate of all food holidays with food allergies: may you navigate successfully! And if you have any trouble, come on over here to vent.

Coming soon on The Nut-Free Mom...nut-free Thanksgiving recipes!

Peanut Allergy News: Thanksgiving Savings from Vermont Nut Free Chocolate!!

Vermont Nut Free Chocolate alerted me to their current Thanksgiving sale! As many of you already know, I'm a BIG fan of Vermont Nut Free Chocolate. In fact, I don't know what I would have done without them all these years. Here's what they had to say:

"From now through Thanksgiving Day Vermont Nut Free is offering 10% off all of our items on our Thanksgiving page. Just enter the promotion code Turkey at check-out to receive your discount. Offer applies only to items on the Thanksgiving page."

Click the link for your Vermont Nut Free Thanksgiving coupon.

I hope you will take advantage of the sale prices. Chocolate turkey pops (pictured above) and solid chocolate turkeys are wonderful little treats to place at the "kids table." They help to raise nut allergy awareness, provide a nut-free treat for the allergic kids AND they are melt-in-your-mouth delicious. On second thought, make sure you get enough for the "adults table" as well!

I'll be posting more holiday deals from Vermont Nut Free in coming weeks, so please keep checking back!

Family Feuds, Food Allergy and Thanksgiving

This classic Norman Rockwell painting certainly shows the ideal Thanksgiving meal--everyone anxiously anticipating the feast with a smile and a feeling of goodwill towards all at the table.

Obviously, many families don't meet the Rockwell ideal. They struggle with personality clashes, unresolved arguments and other emotional issues that seem to surface at the table along with the Thanksgiving meal. Even more complicated: What if you are the parent of a child with food allergies? Or you have them yourself? If your family is anything less than perfect (and truly, who has perfect relationships with everyone in their family) food allergies present a whole new way for relations to fight.

This is not a topic that is covered often and mainly because it is an awkward conversation to have. Too often the food-allergic (and their parents) are meant to feel as if they are taking away from the feast, the fun and the tradition if they ask for a certain food to be eliminated from the menu. This is especially difficult at Thanksgiving because the "traditional meal" is so iconic to everyone's idea about what Thanksgiving "should" be.

I've had so many people speak to me about in-laws, grandparents and other extended family members who just refuse to accept food allergies during the holidays. They're determined to serve that pecan pie or walnut-laden turkey stuffing despite the fact that their child, nephew or niece, grandson or granddaughter will be unable to partake of a large portion of the feast. Not only that, the presence of certain foods throughout the kitchen and the home may pose too much of a risk to a highly-allergic person. This is hard. What do you do?

First of all, try to remember the reason for Thanksgiving and the fact that you are in the driver's seat with your child's health and of course your own. If you are not getting reasonable accommodation--and by that I mean, a main course safe for your child or at least an effort to lessen food allergy reaction risks--then you may have to say "We can't make it this year."

Will this anger some family members? Probably, but that's really not your problem. Your problem is health. That's not to say that you close yourself off, shut down the communication and refuse to accept anything less than a full conformity to your rules. Compromise is key here.

One of the first things to consider is that the family members in question may not understand the very real danger of food allergies and that a severe reaction may cause death. When you live with this every day, it's hard to imagine someone won't get this but of course, many don't "get" it. Educate them. Show them this blog, the FAAN site and any information you doctor has given you. Share the details of your child's allergic reaction, if they've had one. Explain what can happen if an allergic person eats a certain food. Explain cross-contact. I talk more about how to do this here.

You won't be able to make inroads with everyone and in this way, you may also need to accept a less than "perfect" Thanksgiving. Family ties are important and so is health. You shouldn't have to choose between the two, but there are times that you will have to make that choice.

Even if you find yourself opting out of a feast this year or part of a feast, consider hosting your family in the future, where you will control the food. Try to keep family in the fold, because this is really what Thanksgiving is all about. Not pecan pie. Not pumpkin walnut bread pudding or pine nut bread stuffing.

Also, Allergic Living magazine will be featuring the topic of family feuds and food allergies at the holidays in their upcoming Winter issue. Stay tuned to their web site for details--today is the last day to subscribe in order to receive the Winter 2011 issue, so head over there! I'm a subscriber and it's a such a wonderful resource.

If you have Thanksgiving tales to share, good or bad, we'd love to hear them.

Food Allergies Don't Take a Thanksgiving Holiday

The days are getting crisper, the leaves are falling in Chicago and every magazine I flip through seems to feature recipes like these: pecan pie, pine nut turkey stuffing and pumpkin nut bread. That can only mean one thing: Thanksgiving is just around the corner. And so is a nut allergy minefield if you're not prepared.

Don't get me wrong, I love Thanksgiving--it revolves around feeling thankful, celebrating family and eating a ton of good food. What's not to love? However, we've all got to keep our guard up if we're caring for an allergic child. Something about the fall/winter holidays makes people crave tree nuts, so this is a particularly difficult time for this allergy. Peanut butter and its many related food items seem to be favorites year round, but tree nuts don't usually turn up in such massive quantities until now.

My family has been celebrating Thanksgiving with a nut allergy for nearly 7 years (!) now and I've seen a lot of nutty things happen in the kitchen (that's not even counting the behavior of me and my relatives) so I have a few tips to share that should make it easier for you to cope.

I've said some of these before but they bear repeating. And if you're new to nut allergies at the holidays, take heart. Once you've been through it once, you learn A LOT so you're much better prepared next time. You must not apologize for the allergy or worry about seeming "over the top." Believe me, that's better than winding up in the ER with your child.

The other thing to remember is that family recipes and traditions are different, but one thing is the same at Thanksgiving: the emotional ties to favorite foods. So don't be shocked if you meet resistance to a "nut-free" or altered Thanksgiving menu at first. Your family and friends will get the hang of it as time goes on. And if they don't, you may want to consider hosting the celebration.

Safe Thanksgiving Tips for Nut-Allergies:

1. Communicate about the allergy early and often. Whether you plan to attend a dinner outside of your home or you are the host family, you want to put the word out now about your nut allergy concerns. Things to discuss would be safe brands of bread for stuffing, gravy sauces or sauce enhancers or mixes, stuffing recipes in general (many contain pecans, pine nuts or other nuts), desserts and cross-contamination when cooking or baking. You want to give people plenty of notice about the food to help ensure safe choices. Many times people set their menus and decide what they plan to bring to a dinner early, so go on, make that call today!

2. Offer to provide safe alternatives to family favorites. Does someone always want to make pecan pie or peanut butter blossom cookies? See if you can make an alternative pie or offer to make the cookies using SunButter (sunflower seed butter) or soybutter. Or, introduce a new recipe that may become a nut-free family favorite.

3. Be careful at the buffet table. Buffet tables present cross-contact problems, since serving spoons may be used for more than one food. You may ask to serve your child first to prevent cross contact, or prepare a separate plate for your child in the kitchen.

4. Suggest an alternative to "mixed nuts in a bowl" and peanut-laden Chex mix-style snacks from the party. Yes, these are a big hit with many family members, but see if you can bring an alternative snack. These are particularly dangerous because younger allergic children may grab these items and eat them before you can stop them. Also, people spread the nut dust and residue around with these snacks.

5. You bring (or make) dessert. Desserts are one of the top foods to cause allergic reactions, so don't chance it. You do the dessert. It may seem like a lot of work but honing your dessert-making skills is a must if you're a nut allergy caregiver. Also, everyone loves desserts, so if you make a good one you'll be one of the "heroes" of the dinner! :) Another thing I plan to do this year is give each child a chocolate turkey from Vermont Nut-Free Chocolate. A way to promote awareness, yes, but also a way to include your child and impress their cousins with a delicious treat. If chocolate is out of reach for you due to other allergies, any little "extra," whether a safe candy or even Thanksgiving-themed pencils, helps your child feel like they brought something special to the party and helps them cope with having to avoid certain foods.

6. If you're really concerned, bring a safe meal for your child. Sometimes, despite your best efforts, you may not feel the meal is safe enough for your child to eat. That's OK--it happens. Just bring something extra for them and serve it to them without a lot of fanfare. If anyone asks, use the situation to increase awareness: "Alex can't eat the dinner because of her nut allergy." You never know--this simple statement could result in more cooperation from others for the next celebration.

This is just a start. I'll have more tips as we get closer to the holiday, including some nut-free recipes. If you have any tips that have worked for you or if you have any questions about managing this nutty holiday, let me know!

How to Have a Safe Thanksgiving with Nut Allergies

The days are getting crisper, the leaves are falling in Chicago and every magazine I flip through seem to feature recipes like these: pecan pie, pine nut turkey stuffing and pumpkin nut bread. That can only mean one thing: Thanksgiving is just around the corner. And so is a nut allergy minefield if you're not prepared.

Don't get me wrong, I love Thanksgiving--it revolves around feeling thankful, celebrating family and eating a ton of good food. What's not to love? However, we've all got to keep our guard up if we're caring for an allergic child. Something about the fall/winter holidays makes people crave tree nuts, so this is a particularly difficult time for this allergy. Peanut butter and its many related food items seem to be favorites year round, but tree nuts don't usually turn up in such massive quantities until now.

My family has been celebrating Thanksgiving with a nut allergy for nearly 6 years (!) now and I've seen a lot of nutty things happen in the kitchen (that's not even counting the behavior of me and my relatives) so I have a few tips to share that should make it easier for you to cope.

I've said some of these before but they bear repeating. And if you're new to nut allergies at the holidays, take heart. Once you've been through it once, you learn A LOT so you're much better prepared next time. You must not apologize for the allergy or worry about seeming "over the top." Believe me, that's better than winding up in the ER with your child.

The other thing to remember is that family recipes and traditions are different, but one thing is the same at Thanksgiving: the emotional ties to favorite foods. So don't be shocked if you meet resistance to a "nut-free" or altered Thanksgiving menu at first. Your family and friends will get the hang of it as time goes on. And if they don't, you may want to consider hosting the celebration.

Safe Thanksgiving Tips for Nut-Allergies:

1. Communicate about the allergy early and often. Whether you plan to attend a dinner outside of your home or you are the host family, you want to put the word out now about your nut allergy concerns. Things to discuss would be safe brands of bread for stuffing, gravy sauces or sauce enhancers or mixes, stuffing recipes in general (many contain pecans, pine nuts or other nuts), desserts and cross-contamination when cooking or baking. You want to give people plenty of notice about the food to help ensure safe choices. Many times people set their menus and decide what they plan to bring to a dinner early, so go on, make that call today!

2. Offer to provide safe alternatives to family favorites. Does someone always want to make pecan pie or peanut butter blossom cookies? See if you can make an alternative pie or offer to make the cookies using Sunbutter (sunflower seed butter) or soybutter. Or, introduce a new recipe that may become a nut-free family favorite.

3. Be careful at the buffet table. Buffet tables present cross-contact problems, since serving spoons may be used for more than one food. You may ask to serve your child first to prevent cross contact, or prepare a separate plate for your child in the kitchen.

4. Suggest an alternative to "mixed nuts in a bowl" and peanut-laden Chex mix-style snacks from the party. Yes, these are a big hit with many family members, but see if you can bring an alternative snack. These are particularly dangerous because younger allergic children may grab these items and eat them before you can stop them. Also, people spread the nut dust and residue around with these snacks.

5. You bring (or make) dessert. Desserts are one of the top foods to cause allergic reactions, so don't chance it. You do the dessert. It may seem like a lot of work but honing your dessert-making skills is a must if you're a nut allergy caregiver. Also, everyone loves desserts, so if you make a good one you'll be one of the "heroes" of the dinner! :) Another thing I plan to do this year is give each child a chocolate turkey from Vermont Nut-Free Chocolate. A way to promote awareness, yes, but also a way to include your child and impress their cousins with a delicious treat. If chocolate is out of reach for you due to other allergies, any little "extra," whether a safe candy or even Thanksgiving-themed pencils, helps your child feel like they brought something special to the party and helps them cope with having to avoid certain foods.

6. If you're really concerned, bring a safe meal for your child. Sometimes, despite your best efforts, you may not feel the meal is safe enough for your child to eat. That's OK--it happens. Just bring something extra for them and serve it to them without a lot of fanfare. If anyone asks, use the situation to increase awareness: "Alex can't eat the dinner because of her nut allergy." You never know--this simple statement could result in more cooperation from others for the next celebration.

This is just a start. I'll have more tips as we get closer to the holiday, but if you have any that have worked for you or if you have any questions about managing this nutty holiday, let me know!