Managing Christmas
Depending on your family, your outlook, your desire to gorge on turkey or your tenancy to sit in a Victorian money-lenders snapping at your single employee, refusing to allow him enough coal to fend off a bitter Christmas Eve – you may look forward to Christmas with abandon or edge closer to it with caution……
Surprisingly Suitable – Christmas
The run up to Christmas can see a sudden increase in chocolates/cakes/pies and even liqueurs – all highly likely to contain milk, soya or both. A lot of stuff just obviously isn’t suitable but there are always a few surprises hidden away… Let’s play a game. Have a look at the photo below and see…
Best Thing Since Sliced Bread
I wanted to share an experience with you. Effectively a situation where I doubted some allergen information I was given but let Piglet eat the food anyway. In short, I got pretty much every bit wrong: I didn’t push for complete clarity on the ingredients, I let my son eat something against my better judgement…
Surprisingly Suitable – 16th Nov 2018
Custard. That famously thick, sweet, milk and cream based pudding. Obviously the most famous brand of custard powder would contain copious amounts of dairy. Right? Wrong! Welcome to my second list of everyday(ish) items that are, possibly surprisingly, suitable for those who need to avoid cow’s milk and soya from their diet. Bird’s Custard Powder…
Cote Brasserie – Westbourne Grove
Just a normal Wednesday evening: a pre-curling, French restaurant, work night out… I’m lucky that I work for a company that understands the benefits of team-bonding exercises as a boost to team morale. Not to the extent of ‘all expenses paid’ benders at ‘conferences’ in far flung corners of the world but occasional evenings out…
The Hive, Stow on the Wold
The need for coffee on a sore head was the driver of our trip to The Hive in Stow on the Wold last Sunday. The sore head a result of the wedding of my dear friend to his fiancee before he ups sticks and moves to live with her in Singapore. If there was an…
Hampton Court Palace
One of the perks of my wife being a teacher is that she sometimes gets free passes to visit the places that she’s going to take her girls to as a pre-trip investigation. A few years ago we had a jolly to Warwick Castle and most recently she got free tickets to go to Hampton…
Trip to Oxford-Pho
So… Following on from my wonderful lunch in Oxford last weekend; our day disappeared so quickly that we ended up eating out for dinner as well. Not the original plan but sign of the far and away improved eating out flexibility I was once so incapable of! We looked around for other places to eat…
Trip to Oxford-Mowgli
Phew! What a weekend! At least Piglet wasn’t poorly, it was nice and warm and we had a nice relaxing Sunday planned to make up for Saturday. Oh, wait… It’s been planned for a while but on Saturday we went back to Oxford for a bit of sightseeing, shopping and to visit family. In a…
Vegan Magnums
Shut. The. Front. Door! Magnum, as in ‘The ice-cream you used to have on holiday” Magnum, have started doing a vegan range. And what’s more – they don’t contain soya. I think I might need to sit down… I think it shows a real turning point in allergy/dietary acceptance when a big player launches…
What’s that smell? Episode 9
My little Piglet is growing up. Fast. We noticed the other day that a shelf he could recently only just reach up to is now head height. (Such observations are marked in time by both an affectionate comment between my wife and I but also the ceremonial ‘lifting of the valuables’ – basically finding a…
Coffee Culture in Guildford
So we found ourselves in Guildford at the weekend. A little bit out of our way but we’ve been having trouble getting Piglet’s hair cut. It’s been getting longer and longer to the point that it literally loops out and then straight back into his eyes. He’s even learnt the phrase “my hair’s in my…
Chocolate nut smoothie bowl
I’ve just stumbled on to this recipe and been so impressed I’ve had to write it up straight away! It’s a pretty indulgent chocolate nut smoothie which makes for a surprisingly good dairy and soya free pudding, if you’re lacking in that particular department (who isn’t…). It does require a fairly decent blender. We’ve recently…
What’s that smell? Episode 8
<- Episode 7 I dream of a day when I can walk into a restaurant with my son and wife, sit at the table and order anything I damn well want from the menu. My son with his vanilla milkshake, me with my baked Camembert and my wife with a Chicken Chow Mein. Actually, that’s…
The hunt continues…
It was a cold and blustery November evening. The moon shone brightly over Westminster Bridge, its reflection broken by the roughness of the water. A man looked out over the river, a cigarette smouldering away between his fingers, casting a perfect black silhouette against the lights of the Houses of Parliament. Welcome to the worst Sherlock…
What’s that smell? Episode 7
<- Episode 6 Right – quick recap: Piglet appears to be allergic to cow’s milk and soya. I’m allergic to cow’s milk. My wife (Piglet’s mummy) is breastfeeding him and therefore cannot herself consume any of Piglet’s allergens either. This presents a few, shall we say, challenges. We have to create a balanced diet for…
Sunday Morning Pancakes
It’s become a bit of a tradition in our house that, on weekends when we’re at home, Sunday mornings are pancake mornings. They’re the only thing that Piglet is prepared to wait for, compared to his urgent shouts for ‘bread’ or ‘cereal’ on other mornings. It helps that he gets to stand up on his…
I don’t know…
“How could you not know? How could you NOT know?” One of my favourite lines from the film ‘The Prestige’ (continuing my unnecessary series of links to Christopher Nolan films…), exclaimed by Hugh Jackman’s Robert Angier to his former colleague Christian Bale’s Alfred Borden; desperately trying to find out whether he used a dangerous knot…
What’s that smell? Episode 6
<-Episode 5 So here we are… into the heart (or should I say guts) of the diagnosis story; discovering that Piglet was having allergic reactions. However, before I dive straight in, you should know that it’s nowhere near as concrete as you might expect. I’ve spent a lot of time discussing this with my wife…
Booja-booja Chocolate Hazelnut Truffles
Prepare yourself. This post is unashamedly sycophantic in its praise of this product. I LOVE Booja-booja Chocolate Hazelnut Truffles. They. Are. Delicious! I first stumbled across Booja-booja as a maker of dairy free ice-cream by chance in the frozen aisle of Waitrose. They make a selection of cashew nut blended ice creams without milk or…