Classes

Seattle Nourished Festival

Seattle Nourished Festival

For years I have scrolled through social media to see gluten free and allergy friendly trade shows all over the country, except for my hometown. It has been sad and frustrating that there hasn’t been a show here. Seattle isn’t a small town in the middle of nowhere, it’s a major metropolitan city! Two years ago, my husband and I traveled down to Portland, OR. to attend and host a booth at the GFFAFEST. It still wasn’t close enough to home for me, I wanted one in my own city. Last spring, I heard that we were FINALLY getting a gluten free and allergy friendly trade show in my home town: Nourished Festival. YAY!! This is something I have looked forward to for a long time and am thrilled to not only attend as a blogger sponsor, but also as a speaker. I’m honored and really excited to be at this event and I’d love to have you join me there. You can purchase tickets for 30% off through September 20th by using the code: EARLYBIRD Please let me know if you decide to go, I would love the chance to meet you.

When my daughters and I go to Costco on sample day, it’s like a game for us to see who can actually eat any of the samples offered. For those of us with multiple food allergies, intolerances, and celiac disease, eating Costco samples is nearly impossible. Going to the Nourished Festival will be like the Disneyland samples of gluten free, allergy friendly, vegan, paleo, keto, and plant based food. My girls cannot wait to attend the event and be able to eat their way through the event. They have never experienced a place that they will be able to eat so many foods. If you are anything like them, you don’t want to miss this event!

I love attending gluten free and allergy friendly trade shows to find all the new amazing companies and products on the market. There are so many amazing brands out there, but it can be heard to sift through so many. An event like this is the best place to find what is new, ask questions, and of course sample their products. It’s also fun to see our most favorite gluten free and allergy friendly brands that we have loved for many years like Enjoy Life Foods, Made Good, Hilary’s Eat Well, and many others. At the festival this year, I love that they have added a paleo, vegan, keto, and plant based areas. So many of people’s food needs cross over into one or more of these areas as well. I think this festival is fit for anyone and if you don’t think so, I bet it fits for someone you know. As a way to love them, come join us and invite them too! 🙂

Please follow along with me on September 21 & 22 as I will be posting in my Instagram Stories all about the event while I am there. I can’t wait to tell you all about the new brands I find, the information I learn through the classes I will attend, and what the favorite brands we’ve had for many years are up to these days. I’ll be sure to tell you everything once the festival is over in one blog post as well. You won’t want to miss it, it’s going to be great.

I mentioned that there will be classes at the Nourished Festival as well. There are a few classes each day that you’ll want to be sure to attend. I have been given the opportunity to speak on Sunday September 22 from 12-1pm on Baking and Cooking free from the top 8 allergens and gluten. It would be wonderful if you would attend my class! I am happy to answer any questions you may have during my class so come prepared with any you may have. Thanks for supporting me in this way, I can’t wait to see you all at the event! Again, be sure to buy your tickets ahead of time for 30% off by using the code: EARLYBIRD As always, let me know if you have any questions.

*There are affiliate links above for your convenience and helps support my blog 🙂

Teaching on Food Allergies

Teaching on Food Allergies

I had the absolute privilege of teaching in two classes this morning on food allergies. This all came about because there is a little girl in my daughters first grade class that puts her cheesy chip fingers in the faces of the food allergic kids to tease them at lunch. I figured this was my opportunity to teach and train on this important topic instead of get angry. This little girl is 6 or 7 and I can’t expect that she knows or understands the risk that she is putting her food allergic classmates in. I kindly emailed the teacher to let her know my concern and told her that I would be more than happy to come teach in her class. She had the best response any of us food allergy moms could hope for. The next day she talked to the whole class and then requested that I come in the following week to teach her students as well. When my oldest daughter, in 4th grade heard this, she begged that I come into her class as well. I know her teacher pretty well so I also asked her if I could come in. She too said she would be happy to have me come in.

I planned and prepared with my two food allergy kids what would be important for me to teach about. While there are a myriad of things I could teach on, we picked the few that seemed the most important. We decided to talk about how to treat our food allergic friends with kindness and understanding, the dangers and severity of some people’s allergic reactions, and how we all can keep our food allergy kids safe. I took the book “Show and Tell Scout” written by Disney and Mylan which talks about a boy named Scout with a severe milk and peanut allergy, what it is like to go to school for him, and what it means to have a severe food allergy. This book is long, but covers so many of the topics we need our non-food allergy friends to know. Then I did a little hands on activity, which I love to do when I teach, to show what cross contamination means and how it can affect our food allergy friends.

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The kids in both classes had amazing responses to what I was able to teach them. In both classes, they all learned new things they didn’t know before, they asked great questions to help understand their food allergic friends better, and seemed to really appreciate what they learned. It was such a joy for me to be back in the classroom teaching about a subject that I believe it so important and doesn’t get taught about.

The reaction that I wasn’t prepared for was the reaction of the teachers. In the 4th grade class I was in, a teacher from next door came in to use the printer. He leaned over to me and said that two of his boys have a severe peanut allergy and requested that I speak to his class as well. On my way out of the school, I ran into this teacher again and he encouraged me to go cause a raucous in the office about food allergies because it’s about time someone did. 😉 My daughters 4th grade teacher said she learned things she didn’t know and said I need to talk to the PTA and staff. She said she would talk to the Principal about having me come to train the staff and talk seriously about why the school serves peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in the cafeteria. I’m not sure if anything will come of this, but the one thing I do know is that these teachers went away knowing more deeply the dangers our kids with food allergies face when they go to school. More than that though, is they care so much about our kids that they want everyone to hear what they heard today. That is victory in my book!!

Bulk Baking

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I have been asked several times how I keep my family fed when I have to make the vast majority of what we eat. The answer is simple, but making it happen takes time. Bulk baking is the only way that I can realistically keep bread on the table, literally. Early on, we invested in a large freestanding freezer that sits in our garage, which holds meat, sauces, fruit, and a few other random items. In our freezer that attaches to our refrigerator which feels small, I put desserts, breakfast items, bread items, and frozen veggies. Without all of the freezer space we have, I wouldn’t be able to bulk bake the way I like to.

Typically, about twice a week, I spend several hours baking. Since I still have two daughters at home during the day, they bake with me or I bake while they nap. The items that I typically make in bulk are, muffins for breakfast, sandwich bread, egg cups for breakfast, buns, tortillas, and any dessert. I choose to bake all of these in bulk because they aren’t items that can be baked quickly, they disappear quickly, and/or we don’t eat them daily so they aren’t on the top of my head to make when I really need them.

Ziplocks and permanent markers have become two of my best baking friends. I freeze all of my baked goods in Ziplock freezer bags and then label the item with what it is and who can/can’t eat it. Since our family has a very long list of allergies and intolerances between us, labeling is really important for us. I want to be sure that anyone (babysitter, grandparents, friends, etc) who opens my freezer to pull an item out knows who can eat the contents in the bag.

A few weeks ago, I had one of my dear friends over that lives in another state. We ate dinner and then I asked if she wanted dessert. She asked what I had so I went over to my trusty freezer to tell her. To my surprise, I listed at least 10 different dessert choices. Clearly I have a sweet spot for making desserts even though I can’t eat any of them myself. I find myself seeing amazing desserts online in so many places, tell myself that I can surely make that yummy dessert for my family, and enjoy the smell of baked goods. Since this time, I have put myself on a no baking new desserts restriction. ☺ When the dessert stockpile begins to dwindle, I have some amazing recipes to fill my freezer back up. HA!

I would love to work with you to help learn to bulk bake, or just to begin the journey of allergy friendly baking. Contact me to find out how I can help you.

*Note- This picture was taken the day I brought home 1/2 of a grass fed cow. My freezer isn’t normally that full. I just snapped this with my phone to show my husband that I did in fact get all of the meat in the freezer, barely.