Fish pasta sauce

 I promised to list all the recipes I've put together and then discovered I had never posted some of them.

So here is a simple and quick fish-based pasta sauce:

start cooking your pasta

• chop white cabbage and leek;
• stir fry in saucepan until white cabbage starts to brown;
•  add tin of fish - sardines or mackerel are best but tuna is manageable;
• add parsley;
  
• stir until it simmers;
• add milk, also yoghurt, cream or cheese if you wish;
• simmer and stir until pasta is ready.

Delicious!


RAS

Rhubarb

It may have been the rhubarb of course. We found ourselves in a National Trust cafe on Saturday and they were serving a delicious creamy cheese-cake with rhubarb in a side dish. I could not resist it - cheese cake is usually off limits.

Then I looked at the rhubarb and could not remember whether it was on any lists. So I reasoned that rhubarb is like a leafy vegetable and leafy vegetables are mostly all right - lettuce, cabbage, spinach, sprouts, cauliflower but not broccoli. Not sure about rocket, the subject of another recent post, although I generally eat it without harm. I think I need to find my lists...

So I took a spoonful of rhubarb thinking of all the rhubarb fools it would allow me to eat. I don't think it was all right - my tongue swelled briefly - and I did not finish it.

RAS

Easter abuse

After a weekend of self-abuse I've woken up with bright red spots and itching on my arm-pits and behind my knees and a very unhappy tummy. I've taken a montelukast and a vow of abstinence to try and calm things down.

It may have been the white wine or the Scotch whisky. I was  given a bar of dark chocolate for Easter. Not only have I vowed not to eat the stuff I've gone off it anyway - but it's hard to tell people that chocolate is now not really okay. Anyway as the day wore on I could not resist it and ate a square - along with a number of chocolate mini-eggs etc. I think the food has generally been okay - we've eaten in all weekend. There was a great fish pie on Friday night but after that it was red meat all the way. That doesn't help as it's rich in omega-6. Then for Easter Sunday I had a special trifle, made with bananas and whisky. Terrific! But Scotch whisky of course.  Ah well!

RAS

Does omega-3 work?

An disturbing report today suggests that taking omega-3 oils  - ie fish oil - is no good for treating allergy.Actually it does not say treating,  it says preventing.

That's a big difference. And I even tracked down the original article to try to make sense of it. Because my experience is that getting fish and other high omega-3 oils, eg rapeseed (or canola to Americans), into the diet makes all the difference.

It turns out the researchers  looked almost entirely at studies involving pregnant women, breast-feeding mothers and new-born babies. So it was very much about prevention. I'd still like to know whether these studies are looking for diagnosed allergies or only for symptoms such as eczema and asthma. It's a big difference because salicylate hypersensitivity is not a "proper" allergy and can't be diagnosed by a simple test (apart from the Imperial Leather test - not recommended for babies).

So that's all right.

RAS

Anaphylaxis, shock and the epipen

When I started out I was prescribed an epipen and faithfully carried it with me everywhere. I still have it, although I think it is expired, but I no longer carry it.

What I don't know - and cannot find out - is how serious the risk of anaphylaxis is. My thoughts are prompted by today's troubling news that hospital admissions and deaths from anaphylactic shock have doubled in Britain.

It's good to see that someone has taken the trouble to dig out the figures and also to do something about it. That apparently includes trying to find out what lies behind it. Now if you go to the Anaphylaxis Campaign it's pretty clear that the main problem is with peanut allergies. So is the problem that, in spite of all the warnings, peanuts are being tucked into all sorts of foods? The statistics suggest not for they show big increases in reactions across a number of categories.

Now the GP was quite right to give me an epipen at the outset. My mouth, tongue and throat were swelling and we didn't know what the allergy is. It also seems pretty clear now that salicylate hypersensitivity is not like peanut allergy - certainly not for me. But I may be wrong. As I've reported recently, a small dose of pepper can cause my throat to swell, my tongue to burn and my voice to go hoarse. Yet in general the problems seem to accumulate steadily. Some people call this anaphylaxis but not anaphylactic shock.

If I've got everything under control I don't go straight to a bad reaction - things just pile up over a couple of days. So it doesn't seem likely I will go into shock, which seems to be caused by very fast, extreme reactions. Perhaps if I inadvertently took aspirin it might happen.

Does anybody know? Is there any experience of shock caused by salicylate allergy? If so, I'd better get the epipen renewed.

RAS

Rocket allergies

 This headline caught my eye. It reminded me of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Sadly it got changed later:

Sneezing mice could reveal what has caused allergies to rocket
 
 RAS

Recipe ideas

I think it's time I pulled together some of the eating ideas I've developed over the last three years. Coming up...a list of salicylate free, healthy recipes!

RAS

Acupuncture and treacle pudding

 Here's an interesting idea - a treatment for hay fever based on acupuncture, in fact a wrist band that operates on acupressure points on the elbow. I have no idea if it works or not. I'm just wondering whether it would work with salicylate-caused hay fever, otherwise known as non-allergenic chronic rhinitis. The sellers claim it would relieve symptoms...I wonder. I also wonder what it would do to the skin symptoms on my elbow. I'm tempted to try.

Meanwhile I'm increasingly bothered by the wart that grew beneath my left eye last year. It itches - I wonder if it's a polyp. I really cannot face the thought of going back to the GP and trying to explain about Samter's Triad. Perhaps a High Street mole clinic? (that's a clinic for skin inspection, not small furry animals).

I took a montelukast yesterday as the weekend skin problems did not disappear. Indeed they may be linked to the irritation on my face. They're still around despite a fairly abstemious diet.

Ah, except I had a pub lunch today and could not face another treacle pudding and custard. So I opted for a chocolate pudding with vanilla ice-cream. It really seems as if my tolerance levels have decreased - when at Christmas they seemed very high. I wonder if it's related to late-winter stress?


RAS

Some rash moves

 Today there are red spider-mite rashes across my arms and my belly. It's not just the pepper in the bread on Friday.

I went out for a meal on Friday night, to a carvery where you can pick and choose. I even abstained from chocolate pudding and instead chose treacle pudding and custard, which is pure carbohydrate and was pretty unpalatable.

Then yesterday I was offered a slice of chocolate gateau, which I consumed with pleasure. Then to round off a lovely spring day I indulged in Scotch whisky in the evening. I keep kidding myself that because the diet sheet says whisky is okay, Scotch is okay. That's a rash move. Sadly the better the Scotch, the more time it has spent in oak caskets and the worse it is. And of course people give me nice whiskies for presents so I have a large stock of 5cl Scotch and Irish malt whisky bottles. Luckily somebody donated a large bottle of Jack Daniels later - but too late to save the weekend.

Just as worrying, my eyesight has gone downhill badly over the last few days. At one point today there was real pain behind the left eye and it is still quite sore. I can barely read with my glasses and am squinting to see some things in the distance. Is this temporary or do I need to see the optician?

RAS

Bread and pepper

 A week or two ago I mentioned a problem I had with a regular working lunch I go to where sandwiches are provided. The organisers have gone to great lengths to provide me with salicylate free sandwiches and yet they always seem to cause problems.

Today I think I tracked down  the problem.. They provided me a plate of sandwiches made of plain cheese and lettuce. I cheated a little as I borrowed a smoked salmon sandwich that was not meant to me. It did not seem to be a problem. Yet as I ate the cheese sandwiches it felt like they were laced with pepper. My mouth stang, my throat swelled and my eyes watered. Then I realised where the pepper was - in the bread.

It was granary bread and clearly it had more than grain in it. So I'll have to ask for white bread in future.

RAS