Ruddy Cheese

Poor you, granny23! I think the problem is this false notion that creme fraiche and yogurt are "healthier" than proper cream. Not for a person with your allergy, they're not! I don't believe they are for the rest of us either, but that's another issue. I think joan in OZ agrees with me but she hasn't been around for a bit. Hope she's OK.

granny23 sympathy! I have the same problems but with egg yolks. I find that many chefs slip them into sauces such as thermidor, wh
E none of my many recipe books even put it in as an option!

I'm sorry to hear that granny23. I'll certainly be more aware in future about this.

I'm intrigued by your comment bagitha, about yogurt and creme fraiche not being healthier. I'd be interested in hearing why you think that 'cause you seem to have a handle on this sort of thing. I am going to look into it.

However, on Christmas Day we had some mashed potatoes (don't ask why), and my son, who considers himself a bit 'cheffie' suggested we add creme fraiche instead of milk to the mash, and it was gorgeous! (yum emoticon)

I have met this problem so many times that I now do not eat out. There are many foods that give me a problem, so many more than when I was younger. The last occasion I tried I carefully told the waiter that I wanted plain mashed potato as I would be unwell if any of the usual ingredients were added. It arrived at the table yellow with butter. At least he agreed it was chef's mistake and did not charge for the meal.

I have the same difficulty with peppers...I am very allergic to peppers and am very careful when eating out. Yesterday we went to a garden centre where we've eaten before. The meal we chose came with Parmentier potatoes ( little cubes of fried potato) and when the meal arrived the potatoes had peppers in amongst them. Of course I then had to ask for another meal without potato!

There must be something in some Indian dishes that makes me sick. I thought it was a dodgy prawn that had me running fast to the ladies to return my meal, but I felt the same symptoms at an Indonesian restaurant in Amsterdam. That time I managed to keep it to myself. I don't know what the ingredient was, so have more or less avoided Eastern cuisine since then.

Well butty, I think the current "wisdom" is that there's less fat in them therefore they are healthier, or rather they come into the healthier food bracket. I just don't agree that less fat in food necessarily means healthier. It depends on the rest of your diet, for instance, where you live, and other things. Think of the usual ranges of the eskimo peoples and what's available to them and the fact that they love blubber, with good reason, and the fact that they survived in that unpromising environment because of their high fat diet, not in spite of it.

Also, the low fat stuff has been preached for quite a while now and yet the diseases a low fat diet is supposed to help don't seem to be going away. The death rate from heart disease is fallng, as I understand, but that's largely because of improved treatment rather than a fall in the rate of disease incidence. However, I do wonder if the fat content of the diets of people who avoid animal fats is really lower than, say, mine (I don't avoid animal fats) or if they've just replaced the animal fats with vegetable fats.

Do yogurt and creme fraiche often have sugar in them too? I don't eat much of either, though am happy to if they are put in front of me. Cream doesn't have sugar, as such, in it, though of course we do break down some of the fat into sugars. I don't eat much cream either, as it happens, but I don't avoid it and if I use some in a recipe and there's some left, then I use it up in my coffee or something else. Likewise with yogurt or creme fraiche, but if a recipe specifies cream, then I'll use cream and not a substitute.

Chilli, annobel? It can have that effect on me.

Yoghurt in coffee?

jeni

Thank you for that, bagitha.

Food for thought.

Thanks for all the info Bagitha. I have also learned today how to spell creme fraiche and Yogurt.

Annobel - I never eat Indian or Indonesian food because of yogurt in the sauces, marinades and even the nan bread. However I love chinese food (not sushi!) - no dairy at all, fresh or fraiche, to worry about.

stop talking of food i love indian,lol

so do I - but it doesn't like me very much. Nor do coffee, avocados or cream. I may have missed something!

If you look at the list of ingredients on low fat foods you will find more often than not that the fat has been replaced by corn syrup, a fructose (sugar) product that goes under a variety of names 'hydrolised maize product, maize syrup etc etc.

After hearing an item on the radio about this I have stopped buying DH low fat yoghourts (I loathe yoghourt so never eat it) because as he has diabetes that fat is probably less damaging for him than the sugar, regardless of calorie count. This week I scrutinised other low fat dairy products like low fat creme fraiche, all had the fat replaced with this sugar product. The one exception is low fat cheese. Low fat cheddar and low fat mozarella contain only milk.

It looks like being one of those products like trans fats that are developed by the food industry because they are cheaper/sweeter than natural ingredients, start to be used in every food on the market and then medical researchers discover that they may be good for the food industry but are not any good for the health of the consumers.

I once saw strawberry joghhurts being made. They use a mouldy fungus, let it grow and and then add a fake strawberry flavor to it and perhaps a drop of beetroot juice and put it into joghurts. Disgusting.
Give children plain joghurts and add a spoonful of jam.
As to créme fraiche I love it, it transforms soups and root vegetables

Eggs - I just can't digest them - they come straight back the minute I've eaten them. it is very annoying when the menu shows some sort of tart only to find it's a quiche when it arrives in front of me and has to be returned to the kitchen.

Strangely I can eat cake but I think the egg content is so small a part of the whole recipe I am probably only eating very little of the offending item. However anything predominately egg based - sauces etc have to be avoided and oddly I can't eat aubergines either - don't they call them EggPlant in America?

I have an intolerance to chilli and black pepper. I begin to feel ill within 30 minutes of having a meal that contains the pepper, sometimes I am not aware it is there until the sore tummy starts. My son reacts the same way when he has a curry so it may well be your problem too Annobel

silverf it's most likely that like me it's an allergy to the yolks, try just whites and see what happens.

Grans, is it another 'age thing'? I used to be able to eat almost anything but as I've got older I seem to have developed intolerences to an increasing number of foods starting with yeast extract and citrus fruits when I was in my late 30s. Since then chocolate, peppers and bananas have joined the list. Such a shame as I am a real foodie!

My problem is red wine. No, not that way. For years I wouldnt drink it because at times one glass would give me a two day migraine/hangover. Then I read an article in the New Scientist that said that young red wine contains volatiles that disappear with age and I discovered other people had my problem and solved it by not drinking red wine less than three years old.

Now I can drink red wine, which I really enjoy without worrying. The only problem is that when we are in restaurants we have to ask what year any red wine we would like to drink is, and back off if it is less than three years old, which at times makes us sound ever so precious and pretentious. Have you tried explaining this in fractured German when on holiday?

That made me smile, flickety! DH and I have the same problem with new wines, even whites.

Aaaaaaaaaah! Is that what it is? I only have the problem with whites tho' which tend to be young wines (the ones I can afford anyway). I also think lots of Chardonnays (SP) taste like liquid paraffin.YUK!

As I get older the number of foods I can not eat increase . It started with spicy foods which to be honest I have never liked.
I can't eat pickles (used to love pickled onions, I used to pickle them myself)
Nuts
Bananas
Lettuce
Pork
Oats
Wine gums
Can no longer put vinegar on chips ,but as I don't have them much thats not too bad.
I have an hiatus hernia which doesn't make things any easier