Eggplant Salad

     Eggplant salad is a classic Mediterranean dish that contains no major allergens (or corn, yeast, or sesame): this is one recipe I haven't had to tamper with. Any wax containing corn, soy, or dairy products on the outside of the eggplants or peppers is peeled off.

     2 medium eggplants 

     2 Anaheim peppers (You can easily substitute other peppers, but Anaheims 

          have plenty of pepper flavor without much heat and are especially easy 

          to peel.) (See Produce in the Glossary)

     juice from 1/2 lemon (See Juice in the Glossary)
     3 Tb. olive oil (See Oil in the Glossary)
     2-3 green onions, sliced
     4 cloves of garlic, pressed
     small handful of flat-leaf parsley, chopped roughly (See Produce in 

          the Glossary)

     salt to taste (See Salt in the Glossary)

For this recipe you need around 2 cups of cooked eggplant,
or about this much raw eggplant. The index card on the right is 4" x 6". 

     You can cook the eggplants and peppers on a grill or about 6 inches under a broiler, turning as needed to cook them thoroughly on all sides. The eggplants should be well charred on the outside (this gives a distinctive smoky flavor) and very soft on the inside. The peppers should be softened up, and their peels should be brown and bubbling up. The eggplants will need more time than the peppers. Cover the eggplants and peppers with a lid and let them sit for a few minutes. Besides letting the vegetables cool off a bit, this allows steam from inside them to loosen the peels.

This is what the peppers and eggplants should look like
when you take them off the grill or out from under the broiler.

     Peel and chop the eggplants. Peel and chop the peppers. Stir in all remaining ingredients.  (Do not delay adding the lemon juice, or the eggplant will turn a yucky brown.)

Raspberry Lemonade

     Most commercial lemonade is made with corn syrup. Like other bottled fruit juices, it can also contain yeast and/or mold.  Fortunately, lemonade is very easy to make at home. If you happen to have some raspberries and aren't allergic to them, you can easily add a distinct raspberry flavor to your lemonade and turn it a pretty pink.

     2 c. sugar (See Sugar in the Glossary)

     3/4 c. freshly squeezed lemon juice (See Juice in the Glossary)

     8 c. water
     1/4-1/3 c. raspberry juice*

     Stir all the ingredients together. Chill.

*The easiest way to make raspberry juice is to put raspberries through a juicer.  Alternatively, you can break down some raspberries by heating them briefly on the stove, let them cool, pour them into a bowl through a strainer lined with cloth, and wring the rest of the raspberry juice through the cloth. This method wastes less raspberry juice than the juicer.

Corn-Free Vanilla Extract

This vanilla extract has steeped for several months.
You can see that the vanilla beans have turned
 the vodka quite dark.

     Vanilla extract, like extracts generally, is about a third alcohol. This is because alcohol is an excellent solvent for leeching tasty molecules out of plants. Because of the subsidy on corn in this country, the alcohol in an extract is likely to have been made from corn. Fortunately, it is very simple to make your own corn-free vanilla extract using vodka.  

     Not all vodka is made from potatotes.  A lot of it is “grain alcohol,” and there’s no way to be sure what grain they’re using. Look for potato vodka. 

     Even if you’re allergic to alcohol, you can flavor desserts with vanilla. Keeping a vanilla bean in your sugar canister works surprisingly well, but you will probably need to keep two sugar canisters: you probably don’t always want vanilla sugar in your green tea or your BBQ sauce. Alternatively, you can simply slit a vanilla bean open and scoop a small bit of the soft interior into pudding base or cake batter in place of vanilla extract. Stir it in thoroughly.

     8 vanilla beans, split lengthwise and cut into 1/2" chunks
     750-mL bottle of potato vodka

     Drop the cut vanilla beans into the bottle of vodka.  Let the mixture steep for at least a couple of months, giving it a shake once in a while.

Tomato-Rice Soup

      This soup is an example of a recipe that could be salvaged and made nonallergenic with only minor substitutions.  The original recipe called for 2 Tb. of butter to be melted in 2 Tb. of olive oil.  To make it dairy-free I simply replace the butter with extra olive oil. This doesn't hurt the flavor of the soup a bit.  To make it corn-free, I use fresh, peeled tomatoes. Canned tomatoes and tomato products usually contain citric acid made from corn and/or soy. Grocery-store tomatoes are generally coated with wax, which may contain corn, soy, or dairy products. Peeled, fresh tomatoes are the best thing to make tomato soup out of in any case. Just dunk the tomatoes in boiling water for 15 seconds, then get them into a large bowlful of cold water.  The skins will pull off easily. If you need to avoid produce treated with ethylene gas (made from corn), the tomatoes need to be "vine-ripened."

     1/4 c. olive oil (See Oil in the Glossary)

     2 large celery stalks, sliced

     2 large carrots, sliced

     1 medium onion, chopped

     7-8 c. peeled, chopped, vine-ripened tomatoes (See Produce in the 

          Glossary)

     1-1/2 tsp. basil (See Spices in the Glossary)

     salt (See Salt in the Glossary)

     4 c. water

     1/2 c. rice (See Rice  in the Glossary) 

     Gently saute the celery, carrots and onion in the olive oil with a good sprinkle of salt until the onion is translucent.  Add the tomatoes, basil, salt and water and bring to a boil.  Add the rice and simmer until the rice is done. Salt to taste.

Hypoallergenic Broccoli Salad

     Most broccoli salad relies heavily on mayonnaise, which generally contains multiple allergens (corn, soy, eggs). I think the dressing I describe here is tastier, as well as containing fewer allergens. The maple syrup complements the bacon, and the mustard adds depth to the broccoli, to which it is related.

     It is important to pay attention to the sources of your ingredients. Bacon, for example, can contain corn syrup and/or soy additives, but doesn't always; Applegate Sunday Bacon, for example, consists entirely of pork, water, salt, cane sugar and celery powder and so is a good choice at my house.  Use real maple syrup, not maple-flavored corn syrup; besides being corn-free, it tastes a whole lot better. Don't skip the step about peeling the tomatoes: one goal of peeling them is to get rid of their wax coating, which may contain corn, soy, or dairy ingredients. If you need to avoid white vinegar (corn, yeast), mix up your own mustard (click on the link provided: mustard is surprisingly easy to prepare yourself).

     4-6 slices bacon (See Bacon in the Glossary)
     4 c. broccoli cut into small florets
     2 medium vine-ripened tomatoes (See Produce in the Glossary)
     3 green onions, trimmed and sliced
     (optional) 1-2 Tb. chopped dill leaves (See Produce in the Glossary)
     dressing (recipe follows)

     Fry the bacon and cut it into chunks; set aside. Prepare a large bowlful of very cold water. Fill a medium pot with salted water and bring it to a boil. Add the broccoli to the boiling water, bring it back to a boil, and cook for one minute. Dredge the broccoli out of the boiling water and immediately get it into the bowl of cold water. Leave it there until thoroughly chilled; drain it thoroughly and set it aside.  Get a fresh bowlful of cold water ready. Dunk the tomatoes into the boiling water. Scoop them out after about 15 seconds and get them into the bowl of cold water.  Leave them there for a couple of minutes. Take out, peel, seed, cut into chunks and set aside.

     Just before serving, combine the bacon, broccoli, tomatoes, green onions, dill and dressing. Adjust salt to taste.


The dressing:
     3 Tb. freshly squeezed lime juice (See Juice in the Glossary)
     3 Tb. olive or other oil (See Oil in the Glossary)
     2 Tb. prepared mustard
     2 Tb. maple syrup
     1/2 tsp. salt (See Salt in the Glossary)

     Mix.

Minty Lemonade

     It can be surprisingly difficult to find something to drink (besides plain water) that doesn't contain any corn, yeast or other allergens.  Lemonade, of course, can easily be made at home with beet or cane sugar (rather than corn syrup and dodgy additives).  I think it is particularly good infused with a bit of mint.

     1/2 c. fresh mint leaves, washed and chopped (See Produce in 

          the Glossary)

     2 c. sugar (See Sugar in the Glossary)

     3/4 c. freshly squeezed lemon juice (See Juice in the Glossary)

     water

     Combine the mint leaves and sugar in 2 cups of water. Bring to a boil, making sure all the sugar dissolves.  Set aside to to steep for one hour; strain into  a pitcher.  Stir in the lemon juice and 6 more cups of water and chill.

Leeks with Olive Oil (zeytinyağlı pirasa)

     Turkish cuisine has a whole category of dishes in which vegetables cooked with olive oil and lemon juice are served cold. (Another is favas with olive oil.) Leeks cooked this way, besides being a delicious, classic hot-weather food, contain none of the common allergens. If you pay attention to how you source your rice, sugar and salt, they can easily be corn-free as well.

     1 onion, chopped

     2 carrots, sliced

     1/3 c. olive oil (See Oil in the Glossary)

     salt (See Salt in the Glossary)

     the white parts of 3 large leeks, cut into 1-inch chunks

     1 large potato, cut as if for french fries

     1/3 c. rice (See Rice in the Glossary)

     1 tsp. sugar (See Sugar in the Glossary)        

     2 lemons (See Juice in the Glossary)

     Gently saute the onion and carrots with a good sprinkle of salt and half of the olive oil just until the onions are softened and translucent.  Do not brown; set aside. In a large pot, gently saute the leeks in the remaining olive oil with another good sprinkle of salt until they have softened considerably. Do not brown.  Add the onions and carrots to the pot with the leeks; also add the potato, rice, sugar, juice from one lemon and 2-1/2 cups of water. Bring to a boil; stir in the rice and bring back to a boil. Cover, and simmer until the leeks are soft and the rice is cooked, 20-30 minutes. Adjust salt and lemon to taste; chill. Remove from the fridge a few minutes before serving to allow the olive oil to reliquefy.