Monday 4 April 2011

To be or not to be...

Lactose intolerant!! I know really, I’m pushing myself here!! I mean, who wants to read about crochet, knitting and cooking, when I can babble on about lactose intolerance?!

In all seriousness, there seems to be a high possibility I’ve developed this allergy over the last couple of years. Fantastic isn’t it? I felt like a right cripple asking two different coffee shops on Saturday whether they had soya milk. They looked at me like I was being a right difficult snob. Ouch. (And no, neither of them had soya milk). I didn’t really want to go into an explanation as to the effects cow’s milk has on my digestive system. Doesn’t quite come into the category of ‘small talk’.

Anyway, so here I am, trying to cut down on milk. And all things that may contain lactose, just to make sure you know. So last night I made the most of it before the start of my new found abstinence and indulged by having vegetarian lasagna, which had plenty of ricotta and cheddar in it. It was seriously yum.

Surely life’s not worth living without cheese/ cheesecake/ ice cream?!!!

11 comments:

Unknown said...

I could live without ice cream and cheesecake but definitely not without cheese!

Anonymous said...

That is bad news, but you know what? You'll get used to it, you'll find different things to enjoy. There are so many new ideas on the internet for you to research. Good luck.

PinkCatJo said...

Sorry to hear about your allergy. It must be hard. I can't imagine living without dairy products - good luck with cutting down. I hope you find some fun alternatives. x

Liz said...

Ouch! Quite apart from the fact that dairy is lovely, it's just in so much food. I'd suggest looking at vegan recipes for lactose-free alternatives. Thank goodness for the internet at least - there must be plenty of lactose intolerant bloggers out there with ideas.

Anonymous said...

Hi my stepfather is lactose intolerant so we've had various milk free alternatives for years. He can take goat and sheep milk (they contain some lactose but their chemical constituency, fat levels etc. can make it easier to digest). Also it's worth checking if it's lactose or casein you are intolerant to. If it's the latter then goat milk is fine) If you can manage sheep/goat milk there are a lot of products available (even up here in the back of beyond!)from milk to butter and yoghurt. My mother has perfected a variety of recipes using milk alternatives and she makes ice cream but I can't remember what with, I'll ask her.
All the best
gillie

Lucy in the Clouds said...

Oh no, I don't know what I'd do - does this include chocolate?! I'm shocked that the coffee shops didn't have soya milk though, I thought it was a pretty standard request these days. I'm sure you'll learn to manage it though and will come up with all sorts of alternatives to dairy in no time.

Ali said...

My eldest is Lactose intolerant - thankfully he can't stand cheese! It's not too bad actually, because he's okay with small amounts of cooked dairy (butter in cakes and so on) and tolerates Lactofree milk just fine. Hope you find your middle ground.

Louise said...

I don't know what I would do if I became intolerant to lactose! I'm a veggie so I eat quite a lot of cheese and I love desserts too much to give them up.

I feel for you! My man is wheat intolerant which is really hard because everything contains wheat - even things you really wouldn't expect to! We've even found chocolate with wheat in it! He is deprived of so many foods and it's almost impossible to eat out, but he feels much better having cut wheat out of his diet so it is worth it! I just need to master wheat free cakes etc - my attempts so far have all failed!

Good luck with it!

Louise

The Curious Cat said...

Make sure you don't miss out on the calcium - osteoporosis is not something you want believe me!!

I think we're all a bit lactose intolerant. Especially if you suffer from allergies like cats, dust, hayfever and have suffered from asthma and eczema. The doctor told me people who suffer from these sorts of things are atopic or something like that and so dairy can irritate and produce mucus etc...

I love soya milk on all bran - yum...so it is swings and roundabouts! xxx

The Curious Cat said...

PS Agree with the goats milk comment...

Anonymous said...

I don't seem to be able to post my mothers suggestions/recipes - I think it might be too long! Email me at gillian at smellie.com and I'll send them to you.