It's Your Life December/January 2015 - 2016 | Page 27

December/January

27

Ultimate Allergy-Free Snack Cookbook
Ellen Sue Jacobson
Holiday time can be especially difficult if you or
your child has food allergies. Most snacks and
desserts served at holiday meals or at parties
are made with wheat, eggs, dairy, sugar, nuts
and more. These can cause major problems with
digestion and trigger other emotional and physical
reactions. Enter Judi and Shari Zucker, twins who
have been writing healthy cookbooks since their
teens and are now mothers. They have a new
cookbook from Square One Publishers entitled
THE ULTIMATE ALLERGY-FREE COOKBOOK.

As the Zucker twins note in their first chapter,
“Allergies on the Rise,” more than 15 million
people in the US have food allergies, and the
highest incidence is among children 18 years or
younger. In this chapter, they discuss this rise
in food allergies, discussing theories based on

research, such as the hygiene hypothesis, that is,
our tendency to live in a dirt-free world in which
germ-fighting is less, the burden that medications
and antibiotics add to the burden of our immune
systems, and too-early of an introduction to foods
that are known to be allergenic (a controversial
theory).
Discussing the difference between food allergy
and food intolerance, listing and explaining the
eight foods that trigger most allergic responses
(peanuts, tree nuts, cow’s milk and other
dairy, eggs, wheat soy, fish, and crustacean
shellfish), issues of cross-contamination because
manufacturers are not required to state whether or
not the food was processed in a plant with other
allergenic foods (although many companies do this
voluntarily), and food labeling that does require the
major allergens be listed.
On pages 10-17 is a terrific guide to avoiding
food allergens that is worth the price of the book
($15.95). The top allergens are listed with all
the places you can find them often camouflaged
under another term, such as hydrolyzed plant or
vegetable protein on a label may include peanut
protein; all the terms for cow’s milk such as whey,
rennet, or lactose; ditto for eggs, such as vitellin
and globulin; wheat terms such as seitan, emer,
and farina; soy terms and derivatives such as
lecithin, miso, okara, and yuba; and finally a list
of fish and shellfish including ingredients from
these foods found in sushi, roe, and some salad
dressings (ex. anchovies).
The chapter ends on a high note, stating that
avoiding an allergic food reaction by avoiding the
foods and their derivative “doesn’t mean a limited
diet of bland, unappealing meals and snacks¾and

2015

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