In the absence of a recipe, I decided to just go for it. I got a bag of yellow split peas and soaked it overnight. Then I took about half of them and ground them up in the food processor with some water, safflower oil, a little salt, and a little confectioner's sugar. I then stuck it in the microwave for about two minutes. The result was not at all bean-y but rather granular because they hadn't been boiled.

The second half I boiled until tender, drained, and mixed up in the food processor with salt and sugar. This came out like tahini, but because of the high liquid content, it wouldn't take any oil. It was also much MORE bean-y.

I think next time I will roast them, then boil them, then spread them out and let the water evaporate back out before grinding. This should let me get more oil into them.

In the meantime, I made cookies with the combined result of the two attempts, and while I won't say they taste like peanut butter cookies, considering that they are nut and gluten free, they're pretty palatable for a first attempt.

I was very intrigued by the NoNuts PeaButter someone posted about here. Unfortunately, my husband is allergic to some of the ingredients (canola oil...) in the ready made stuff. We plan on experimenting, but, before we reinvent the wheel, has anyone made their own?

So, I've just been invited by some classmates to eat at this healthy vegetarian place called Fresh (in Toronto). Looking at the menu, I am having trouble finding anything I can actually eat there without the worry of an allergic reaction. There are nuts and seeds in nearly everything, even the veggie burger. I'd be worried about cross-contamination even on the nut-free dishes. So for those of you who have a Fresh nearby, I would stay clear of that place. If any of you have been there, what is safe to order? And if you haven't been there, but have been in this situation where you go to a place with a ton of nuts on the menu, what do you do? Avoid it or talk to your server and hope it will be okay?? This is so frustrating. I may have to pass up on the invite.

Hi all!

I'm allergic to sesame, peanuts, and pretty much all tree nuts (not coconut).  These allergies developed in my mid-twenties (recently for me) and I'm still adjusting to not eating these things, especially as they appear in unexpected places.  Here are some things I've discovered. 
-Lots of bread, especially if labeled "whole wheat" or "multigrain," has sesame in it.
-Nuts can frequently be found in coffee and in herbal teas, including "Holiday Blend" coffee, and any kind of roasted flavor teas.
-Soap has nuts in it sometimes.  Dr. Bronner's has an almond flavored liquid soap, and there are other nut soaps as well.  Sometimes they appear unexpectedly in bathrooms in bottles that aren't labeled, or that are labeled as something else.  I don't really react to soap on my hands, but I try to avoid it anyway.

I feel lucky to have discovered each of these unexpected places.  Does anyone know of any others I should think about so that I can avoid them?

Does anyone know how hereditary allergies are?  How likely is it that if I have kids, they'll have the same food allergies that I do?

I'm wondering how likely it is that I'll develop allergies to coconut, and maybe to other seeds besides sesame.  If I don't eat much of them, will that make it less likely that I'll develop an allergy or that I'll develop the allergy later? 

Thanks!

Hey everyone, nice to see there's a nut allergy support group on LJ. I just wanted to inform you about a wonderful product I tried tonight called Peabutter. I did not react! It's completely nut-free, and safe for those who aren't allergic to peas. If you want more info check out their website: http://www.peabutter.com.

A little about me- I am severely allergic to most nuts, so severe that my allergist refuses to do the scratch test on me in favor of a blood test in the hospital only if I ever want to know exactly which nuts to avoid. I know for sure cashew, pine nuts and pistachios are like a bullet to the head with me. I've had multiple reactions to cashews and an anaphylactic reaction to pine nuts in Pesto sauce (which for some reason isn't labeled on menus as having nuts in it...) I'm also allergic to mango, stawberries and shell fish. It's always an adventure to eat outside of home being that I'm also a vegetarian and lactose intolerant on top of that!

My pet peeves regarding this allergy, other than eating out, are: people who are ignorant about the severity of food allergies and anaphylaxis, people who eat nuts near me where I can see and smell them (makes me sick thinking about it), cosmetic products that use nuts in their formulations, the ridiculous number of companies that state "may contain nuts" and especially the ones who don't warn, the minimal food choices I have if I want ice cream, chocolate, baked goods, and especially health food varieties, the stress I put on friends and family who want to cook for me, ethnic restaurants for obvious reasons, the fright of traveling to foreign countries and not being able to see the ingredients or know for sure what I'm eating or where the nearest hospital is!, the fright of holiday dinner mystery foods and birthday cakes and having to explain it over and over why I can't have it and it's not because I'm on a diet or being impolite, and the cost of buying an epi-pen every year! I'm sure there are more. Feel free to vent with me, it feels good! lol.

I have heard that there is a cure with something called Bioenergetic Intolerance Elimination (BIE) from the last health expo I went to from a holistic allergist booth. I'm very interested, but very sceptical considering if it was really true, then the media and allergists worldwide would already know about it and recommend it. I'll be looking further into it and will inform on what I find out. Here's the website about it: http://www.inht.ca/index.html and a list of practitioners in Canada and NY that do these treatments: http://www.inht.ca/practitioners.html. Here's another site about it: http://www.allergyelimination.biz/

By the way, if anyone has already tried BIE, please let me know how it worked for you!

x-posted to food_allergies

I impressed my mom with how civil I was with the Nestle representative I talked to because I was really cursing when I pulled the chocolate chips we always buy out of the grocery bag and noticed the allergen statement that they are now manufactured in a facility that uses nuts.  They are (according to the rep) made on separate equipment in separate rooms with a big wall in the middle, but the same place which puts the warning on the bag nonetheless. When I called a few years ago to check on this, they made the semi-sweet chips in a separate plant. I doubt they'll cause a reaction, but how can I be sure? Seriously, they do not understand how much it sucks for those of us with peanut allergies to not be able to eat much of anything chocolate and to have one of our favorite "safe" foods essentially taken away or rendered "eat at your own risk." 

I am really upset about this. Would anyone like to help generate complaints to Nestle to make them aware that their decision has negatively affected many people who will no longer buy their product?

DAMNIT I WANT MY CHOCOLATE!!!!

Just found this community and thought I'd introduce myself :) I'm 21, Swedish, though currently living in the UK. I'm allergic to a whooole bunch of stuff:

Anaphylactic allergies:
Peanuts

Severe allergies:
Soya
All tree nuts
Chick peas

Less severe allergies:
Almonds
Coconut
Basically all legumes, ie beans, peas, lentils

Suspected but unconfirmed:
Guar gum
Avocado
Tree pollen

My "normal" reaction is itching and swelling -- eyes, nose, throat, ears (!) itch, very attractive red blotches appear on my face and otherwise, nose starts running, eyes run; and in more severe cases, swelling of lips, tongue and throat, as well as dizziness/shakiness (most likely brought on by a sudden drop in blood pressure). Coconut and almonds make me throw up, as did Kellogg's Frosties (may contain traces of peanuts) the one time I ate them in the belief they were cornflakes. The past two times I've had a reaction -- first of which was the aforementioned Frosties hooplah, the second was to Junior Mints which has soy protein in it -- I've reacted by getting a fever. I had a doctor tell me this wasn't allergic as "allergies don't cause temperatures". I don't see how an allergen intake coinciding with suddent high fever which then disappears after intake of antihistamin can be called a coincidence. Especially not when it happened more than once! Silly doctor.

I've had my allergies for as long as I can remember. My parents are both allergic to pollen, and my dad also has a tree nut allergy, but no one else in my family is allergic to peanuts or legumes, and no one is as severely allergic as I am. My mother thinks what triggered my peanut allergy was milk -- when I was little, doctors in Sweden advised mothers to give their babies skim millk, which for some bizarre reason was "enhanced" with peanut oil back then. She can't remember ever giving me any peanuts or exposing me to them in any other way.

I was always allergic to peanuts and nuts (and probably soya as well -- in retrospect my mother can remember a pattern of me being sick after eating hot dogs as a child) but it was a lot milder until I accidentally ate peanuts when I was about 10. They were on top of a Danish, instead of almonds. Horrible reaction, puking all over the place and then sneezing ten times in a row, not pleasant. Shortly after I had a horrible reaction at school after eating ravioli in the canteen -- turns out they'd mixed the vegetarian ravioli in with the "normal" kind. That's how we found out I was allergic to soya, as well as how severe my allergies were. I was 11 when I had my last allergy test, and that's when I was given an EpiPen as well.

My peanut allergy is triggered from simply being in the same room as a bowl of peanuts, or talking to someone who has recently eaten some. Considering this I think it's pretty remarkable I've only ended up in the hospital once in the past ten years -- that was after eating one stick of Mikado. Reaction wasn't very severe (due to the tiny amount of peanut actually present), some itching and swelling, but I didn't have my EpiPen with me (stupid, stupid, stupid!) so we whizzed me off to casualty. Fantastic reception by medical staff, I was on a bed with an IV in my hand after two minutes, but yikes, I don't ever want to have to do that again.

Well, that was long and boring. Sorry about that!

First I'll briefly introduce myself: Hi! I am allergic to nuts! Walnuts and pecans mostly, but I like to avoid all of them. I get itchy mouth/throat/ears and big puffy lips when I accidentally eat them. Also my son (he's 2) is allergic to peanuts and some other nuts, or at least his skin and blood tests indicate that he is. He's never eaten a nut so we're not sure what will happen when he does.

Anyway, I just took a big ol' bite of this granola bar my husband bought. Then as I was chewing I glanced at the ingredients, where, to my horror, the word PECAN jumped out at me. So after lots of spitting and scraping the nasty substance off my tongue, I am now waiting for the Benedryl to kick in and put me to sleep right here at my desk.

Thing is, its a kind of granola bar I used to eat all the time, but there were never pecans before! Its this Nature Valley brand. I don't know when they switched their formula. It also contains peanuts, but I can't remember if it did before or not. I think not.

And that reminds me, another bar I used to loooove just changed too, Power Bar Harvest now has peanuts. I can eat peanuts but I live in a peanut-free house because of my son. It makes me SOOOOOO MAD when these companies suddenly and without warning ruin perfectly good food by adding *evil* things to their recipe! Grrrrrrr....

/rant

Has anyone here ever vacationed or studied in a foreign country, particularly where they don't speak English? How did you handle your nut allergy? Did you get a prescription for those special needles before you left, or were you just extremely carefui?

I'm thinking of applying for the JET program (studying or teaching English in Japan) but I'm terrified for my allergy, nevermind trying to communicate to people about it.

[x-posted to food_allergies]

yay i am glad there is a community for this! i have a tree nut allergy, but am ok to eat peanuts (but usually don't purely by association). here's my horror story:

a couple years ago i was at my aunt's house for passover dinner, and had just eaten a ton of food. my grandma always bring all the cousins 7 layer cake, which is amazing (she gets it from a bakery in brooklyn, ny...yummmm) and i never had a problem with eating the cake. unknown to me (and my grandma), i started having an allergic reaction after i ate the cake. it turns out they had replaced the flour (since you can't have flour and stuff like that on passover-- well kosher for passover food can't, i can never follow that tradition) with ALMOND PASTE. my nut reaction includes swollen lips and throat, fever and barfing... so after enjoying a whole passover dinner and dessert, it all ended up leaving my system. boo.

so that's my worst nut story. i am looking forward to talking to other people with nut allergies, since the only person i know with this allergy is my brother. (even though no one in our family has the allergy except us). yay!