weaning children off dairy

[geegee]

my chidren have been lacto ovo for two years not but we just found out one of then have an alergy to dairy.He is very upset to think he might have to give it up.Im looking for ideas as Im not sure how to go about this.

[flowermama]

What are some the things he is most worried about giving up? There are some really good alternatives out there. Is it cheese he's worried about? The reason I ask is because that's the thing I miss the most. :O Is he allergic to casein in milk, too? My mom had some cheese the other day that she said was really good that was lactose-free, but it had casein in it. There are some pretty good vegan "cheeses," but they are expensive.

Oh, I just remembered... cheese was the last dairy product my kids gave up (for macaroni and cheese). To sort of take the place of that we eat noodles with a sauce that is made of tofu (like the one I made when I came to your house for dinner, but I am better at making it now ;)).

If he can have soy, there are a lot of great alternatives. Soy yogurt is really yummy, and you can make it at home fairly easily.

There's soy ice cream and also some made with rice. There is chocolate that is diary-free. :yum

Almond milk is yummy. We drink rice milk on our cereal.

Earth Balance is the best dairy-free "buttery" spread ever. :yum

Anyway, we've found there are pretty good alternatives out there to most everything that is dairy. :yes :tu

eta: Oh, I wanted to mention that we have an Allergies and Dietary Challenges (http://www.gentlechristianmothers.com/mb/index.php?board=157.0) forum that you might want to visit. You might find some good ideas there, too. :)

[Punkie]

I wanted to echo everything that Jeri said :grin

My son was a dairy addict before we discovered that he was allergic to it :P He is allergic to casein, so we have to be completely dairy-free, but its really not as hard as it seems.

We found a lot of great alternatives. He and his friends all LOVE chocolate almond breeze. It was very easy to transition them over to it. We all use Earth Balance - I think I actually like it better than butter now! Soy yogurt is a mainstay in our house. We make our own "milks" with either rice, almond, oat, or soy. I try to keep the soy to a minimum since they like other soy products (like the yogurt).

When giving up dairy, the hidden sources were a lot harder for us to eliminate than the obvious ones. We've only found one brand of bread in the stores that is dairy-free that the kids like (Iron Kids White - I know, I know, white bread is bad...). The same goes for breakfast foods, although Bisquick is dairy-free, you just need to use water or a fake milk instead of regular milk in the recipes. When we go out to eat, its very difficult to find a place that doesn't brush their meats with butter. Almost all battered foods have it in the batter. Cereals are tricky, although there's a better selection now than there used to be...

Its a steep learning curve at first, but once you get the hang of it, its really easy :grin Feel free to PM me if you have any questions. I feel like a guru when it comes to eating without milk :giggle

Ooh, and if you can shop at Whole Foods, they have a list on their site of everything in the store that is dairy-free :tu