Elimination Treats

Chunky Monkey Granola

I recently read The Immune System Recovery Plan and am attempting the elimination diet: no dairy, soy, gluten or corn.  I'm about a week into it.  Some of it's been easy, the rest, not so much.  At a minimum, it's been an education.  The peanut butter I use for baking has soy.  The sausage I normally eat has corn syrup (really? I won't be buying that anymore).  I don't tend to buy a whole lot of prepackaged processed food, but I've found myself reading every label of anything I've purchased in the last two weeks.  It gives me a new appreciation for my friends that have various food allergies or restrictions.  I am hoping at the end of this experiment that any restrictions I put on my ingredients in the future is by choice, not by necessity.

Many of the meals I make already fit the profile or require only minor changes, so that's not too bad.  I've had to tweak my breakfast routine a bit.  But my snacks?  I needed to do some baking to replace my gluten- and dairy-filled treats.  I made some cookies and quick bread last week, adjusting the ingredients (although I botched one batch of peanut butter cookies which my sister is now enjoying).  I discovered that replacing the flour with almond meal in the coconut macaroons was a delicious substitution.  We'll be keeping that change regardless of the outcome of this trial run.

I made some granola this weekend, based on a recipe I've been meaning to try for nearly a year.  I found some dairy-free, soy-free chocolate chips and swapped the butter for coconut oil.  It's delicious, although it's a bit sticky.  I like my granola a bit drier.  But it satisfies my sweet tooth, so I am happy.  I agree with the gal from Very Culinary - it's going to be hard not to polish off the whole batch in a day or two!