Since our last visit to the dietician we have been introducing Oscar to high salicylate foods. The process is to pick a starting level (we’re supposed to start off at 25g every 3 days) and maintain it for 2 weeks. If there are no reactions you increase the level (i.e. 25g every 2 days) for another 2 weeks and repeat, if there are reactions you drop back to the base diet until the reactions disappear then start again at a lower rate. It sounds pretty straight forward, but unfortunately someone forgot to tell toddlers about this process! Getting Oscar to eat a prescribed amount of a new food is extremely difficult. New foods are a problem to start with (unless they are lollies or cakes!) so I usually try to hide them or find them in processed foods that are similar to something he already eats. But even doing this he manages to thwart my best efforts – muffins made with carefully calculated amounts of apricot only get nibbled on or he decides he doesn’t want dinner or even dessert that night – a typical toddler.
So what do we do? We do the best we can and keep a diary of when he has high salicylate foods, but not how much, and any reactions that occur, as well as other factors that might be causing issues, such as illness. We have also put Oscar onto a few meals at day care (6 out of 16 over a 4 week cycle). All the meals contain high and very high (100 times more) salicylate foods and most have some additives, but we have tried to pick the meals where these foods occur later in the ingredients list, so (in theory) should be in smaller amounts. I’ve include our shopping list of high salicylate foods at the bottom of this post. Many of the high salicylate foods are also high in amines (A), which are not a problem for us, and glutamates (G), which are. The list has been put together based on the RPAH handbook and my own laborious reading of ingredients lables.
So far we seem to be doing OK as far as reactions go, we still do have a few, and will continue to do so as we try and increase the amount of these foods. It would be nice just to stick to a moderate salicylate diet and have no reactions, but it is much better for Oscar if we can increase his tolerance and open up his diet. He’s only 2 and half, but he already understands and talks about his “food list” and that he can only eat foods on his list because other foods make him “sick”. It amazes me how accepting he is of this, especially when he is constantly around other children who are eating different foods, however, we haven’t started the birthday party cycle yet, so this may change. I hope that one day he doesn’t have to worry about food lists at all, or at least that his list of allowed foods is bigger than the not allowed list.
Shopping List of High Salicylate Foods
Biscuits
- Corn Thins (S, G)
- Rice cakes containing corn, sesame, sunflower (S, A, G)
Bread
- Corn bread (S, G)
Cereal
- Cereals containing corn (S, A, G)
Cooking Aids
- Brewer’s Yeast (S, A, G)
- Coconut milk, cream (S, A)
- Food colours, natural (S, A, G)
- Hopper natural colours
Drinks
- Camomile tea
- Coffee – instant or ground
- Decaffeinated tea
- Elderberry Cordial
- Pear juice – commercial
- Santa Vittoria Fruit Nectars Pear
Fats and Oils
- Coconut Oil (S, A)
- Spiral Organic Coconut oil
- Soland Banana chips
- Copha (S, A)
- Olive Oil (S, A)
- Peanut oil (S, A)
Fruit
- Apple – peeled – Bonza, Fuji, Gala, Granny Smith, Jonathan, Pink Lady, Sundowner
- Apricot
- Avocado – just ripe
- Berries – ripe and sweet – blueberry, mulberry
- Custard Apple (S, A)
- Dragon Frut
- Durian
- Feijoa – Guvasteen (S, A)
- Fig – Fresh (S, A)
- Grape – peeled (S, A, G)
- Guava
- Jackfruit (S, A)
- Longan
- Luchee
- Mango (S, A)
- Tropical Pavlova Roll, Mango Ricotta Pie
- Barambah Organics Real Mango Yoghurt
- Nectarine – peeled
- Peach – peeled
- Persimmon – peeled
- Pomegranate
- Rambutan
- Rhubarb (??)
- Banana and Rhubarb bread and butter pudding (add a small amount of stewed rhubarb to each of the banana layers)
- Rockmelon
- Starfruit
- Tamarillo
- Watermelon
Grains
- Corn (S, G)
- Cornmeal (S, G)
- Maize flour (S, G)
- Polenta (S, G)
Nuts and Seeds
- Almond – raw or lightly roasted (S, A)
- Almond meal
- Brazil Nut – raw or lightly roasted (S, A)
- Chestnut – raw or lightly roasted (S, A)
- Melrose Almond, Brazil and Cashew Nut spread
- Hazelnut – raw or lightly roasted (S, A)
- Nutella
- Linseed (S, A)
- Vita-Weat Grain Snacks
- Macadamia – raw or lightly roasted (S, A)
- Peanut – raw or lightly roasted (S, A)
- Pecan – raw or lightly roasted (S, A)
- Pine nut – raw or lightly roasted (S, A)
- Pistachio – raw or lightly roasted (S, A)
- Pumpkin seeds, pepitas (S, A)
- Sesame seeds (S, A)
- Sunflower seeds (S, A)
- Walnut – raw or lightly roasted (S, A)
Pasta and Noodles
- Corn pasta (S, G)
- Maize pasta (S, G)
Spreads
- Apple Jelly
Sugars and Sweeteners
- Molasses
- Raw Sugar
- Treacle
Vegetables
- Artichoke
- Broccoli, broccolini (S, A, G)
- Cauliflower (S, A)
- Chinese Broccoli (Gai Lan) (S, A, G)
- Corn (S, G)
- Corn on the cob, tinned corn kernels
- Cucumber – unpeeled
- Endive
- Fennel
- Parsley
- Pumpkin – grey, kent, JAP
- Radicchio (S, A)
- Rocket (S, A)
- Snow pea sprouts
- Spring onion
- Tomato – fresh, peeled, sliced (S, A, G)
- Water chestnut
- Watercress
- Zuchini – unpeeled
Miscellaneous
- Hopper hip hop Fruit and Cereal Bar – choc fruit brownie
