Since starting on food re-introduction (salicylates and glutamtes) with Oscar 2 years ago we have progressed to him being able to eat anything from the Moderate column of the RPAH Elimination Diet handbook in unlimited quantities, plus anything with amines only (he passed that challenge). Around the middle of last year we started experimenting with re-introducing some foods from the “High” and “Very High” column with Oscar. I started with the meals he has made for him at the child care centres, allowing the following ingredients to be used, keeping in mind that not every meal or snack will contain all of these:
- Broccoli (High SAG)
- Cauliflower (High SA)
- Pumpkin – any variety (High S)
- Corn (High SG)
- Apples – any variety (High S)
- Cinnamon (VH S)
- Vinegar (VH SA)
The reason for including these foods at child care was to get more variety into those meals and snacks, and make them less “different” to what everyone else is having. We kept a diary and monitored for any reactions, there was nothing significant, so we are moving on a bit more.
Oscar is desperate to start eating strawberries, grapes and other berries. I would prefer him to eat more vegetables and nuts, plus the skin around his mouth turned bright red when he ate strawberries years ago, so I’m not keen to go there just yet. As an interim we are focusing on foods that are in the High and Very High columns that contain salicylates and amines only, starting with the ones that appear to be low to moderate in salicylates in the “Salicylates in Foods” publication by Anne R. Swain, Stephen P. Dutton and A. Stewart Truswell on the RPAH website.
I say “appear to be” because this list is from 1985 and it just gives the amount of salicylates in mg/100 gm. I used sweet potato (moderate salicylates) as my cut off point (0.5 mg/100 gm) and identified all foods containing amines and salicylates where the salicyaltes were <= 0.5 mg/100 gm. I also know that these lists have been revised, and some foods have been moved from moderate to high as more testing is done. The list I came up with included the following foods from the High and Very High columns of the RPAH handbook:
- Custard Apple
- Fresh Figs
- Kiwifruit
- Lemon
- Mango
- Passion fruit
- Cauliflower
- Eggplant, peeled
- Fresh coriander
- Brazil Nuts
- Hazel Nuts
- Pecan Nuts
- Sesame Seeds
- Sunflower Seeds
- Walnuts
As corn has been successfully reintroduced (salicylates and glutamates) we are also going to starting trying corn based flours (cornflour, cornmeal, maize flour, polenta) and pastas. I will keep you updated as we progress. You will start to see some recipes incorporating these foods, but as we will be going slowly there will still be lots of low and moderate recipes.
I have also updated my shopping list, making it a bit easier to find foods on the low chemical / FAILSAFE list and those that can be used for challenges or food re-introduction.
Please Note: All the foods listed above are in the High and Very High columns of the RPAH Elimination Diet Handbook, and this is my list of foods that we are going to re-introduce next, they are NOT suitable for the FAILSAFE or ELIMINATION diets.
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