What they’re saying

What people are saying about The Food Allergy Mama and her
Baking Book:

Since one of my granddaughters is allergic to peanuts and tree nuts, I have first-hand knowledge of the concerns associated with food allergies. Rudnicki’s book is a welcome addition to my culinary library, and I’m looking forward to using it on a regular basis.

Cookbook Reviews by Barbara Revsine, Edible Chicago, Spring 2010

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Cool cookbook!

A new study found that the number of kids with a food allergy has increased by 18 percent—meaning 1 in 25 are susceptible to reactions to everyday ingredients. One of the first foods to go for many? Baked treats (cookies, cakes, and muffins), which are usually made with one or more of the most common allergenic foods, such as nuts, dairy, and eggs. That’s why we love Kelly Rudnicki’s new cookbook, The Food Allergy Mama’s Baking Book ($19.95; Agate Surrey), with its dozens of delicious dairy-, egg-, and nut-free recipes. Turns out, those ingredients aren’t as critical to moist, delicious oatmeal–chocolate chip cookies as we thought. Below, some of the dairy, egg, and nut substitutes Rudnicki uses:

  • PLAIN SOY MILK: 1 cup for every cup of dairy milk
  • TOFUTTI’S DAIRY-FREE SOUR CREAM AND CHEESE CAKE: for recipes that call for either of the dairy versions
  • UNSWEETENED APPLESAUCE OR MASHED BANANA: ¼ cup for every egg
  • WATER: ! tablespoon for every egg
  • SOY NUT BUTTER: use instead of peanut butter and nuts, to taste

– Parenting Magazine, March 2010 (PDF version here)

New Healthy Cookbooks We Love!
Bake Sweets Everyone Can Eat

Chances are, someone in your office or your kid’s class is vegan, lactose-intolerant, or allergic to half the ingredients in your famous snickerdoodles. Learn to whip up all your favorites without eggs, dairy or nuts—and in most cases, with less fat.

– Shape Magazine, October 2009

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As a physician who has treated children with life threatening allergies for the past 18 years, I often see the challenges that parents face in everyday living. Many children with food allergies cannot experience the day-to-day joys of going to birthday parties and having a birthday cake. Eating a cake may be one of life’s simple pleasures, but not easy when you have severe life threatening food allergies.

Children are often teased that they cannot have sweets, cannot have a normal diet, they have to sit at designated food allergy areas at schools. Parents try to normalize their kids’ lives and diets but find it very hard to do so with the processed foods and labels that now have every disclaimer that is possible. This stress often leads to social and behavioral complications associated with food allergies. As sad as it may seem, bullying in schools is now commonplace for a child with severe food allergies. Everything that can normalize a child’s life should be looked at and explored by parents and physicians.

Looking further through this book and reading some of the recipes really took me back to my childhood days when my mom would bake at home, the smell of fresh chocolate chip cookies, cinnamon bread, and of course the classic yellow birthday cake. Wouldn’t every parent want to capture that first birthday cake smeared all over their child ‘s face and them loving every bit of it?

The Food Allergy Mama’s Baking Book would be a wonderful addition to my teaching materials and information that I pass on to parents and patients in my allergy practice. This book will help physicians and parents start to help “normalize” children as they grow up in a world that doesn’t fully understand severe life threatening food allergies.

- Dr. Sai R. Nimmagadda, M.D.

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WEB SITE WE LOVE:

Even if your child doesn’t have a food allergy, chances are that one of her classmates does, which can make bringing snacks to school events challenging. Enter Kelly Rudnicki, a food allergy-awareness advocate and mother of four from Wilmette, Illinois.

Rudnicki’s Web site, foodallergymama.com, is loaded with useful recipes and tips for handling food allergies at home and in school. “When my son turned one, the only recipe I could find for a dairy- and egg-free cake that he could eat was terrible,” says Kelly. “So I set out to make treats that would taste as good as the real deal.”

To try her recipes (such as the banana chocolate chip muffins shown here), check out her blog or her book due out in October: The Food Allergy Mama’s Baking Book: Great Dairy-, Egg-, and Nut-Free Treats for the Whole Family (Agate Surrey, $20).

– Disney FamilyFun, September 2009

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“I salivate as I read this cookbook…I especially appreciate that Kelly
included specific brands of ingredients and very detailed lists of
substitutions. The reader will find this information both helpful and
inspiring.”

– Denise Bunning, Co-Founder, Food Allergy Project and Mothers of Children Having Allergies (MOCHA)

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Press clippings