Food Ideas...i'm Stuck!

[missybean]

Hello.... I was hoping people could give me some ideas of different thing I could eat for breakfast foods. Here is my current issue....I have gestational diabetes so I have to watch my blood sugar especially in the morning and right before I go to bed. My morning readings are usually a little high. I need to eat some protein. Last pregnancy I ate eggs and bacon for breakfast and that worked fine but now I seem to have developed a issue with eggs and everytime I eat them I get hives and itch like crazy and it's the same thing with dairy. I have been lactose intolerant for a while but could always tolerate cheese and yogurt. Now when I eat even a piece of cheese I get problems with congestion and sinus problems and I get a rash. I'm also suspecting soy as in issue. I recently just started gluten free about two months ago and it helped a lot. But with all these other issues its become really hard to find stuff to eat. I'm awaiting some food allergy results...but regardless of the results I know I'm having issues with eggs and dairy and must stay away. I hope this is just a pregnancy induced thing. So I need help finding breakfast food that has a least 7 grams of protein in it and is below 20 grams of carbs for breakfast. I also need a snack before bedtime that is protein with little or no carbs to stable blood sugar through the night or if I don't have a protein snack my blood sugar is high in the morning. Please help. This is getting really hard..... I'm current 23 weeks and gestational diabetes just starting coming on...thought I was going to be able to avoid it this time. I was wrong!

[Maggie Mermaid]

Hello.... I was hoping people could give me some ideas of different thing I could eat for breakfast foods. Here is my current issue....I have gestational diabetes so I have to watch my blood sugar especially in the morning and right before I go to bed. My morning readings are usually a little high. I need to eat some protein. Last pregnancy I ate eggs and bacon for breakfast and that worked fine but now I seem to have developed a issue with eggs and everytime I eat them I get hives and itch like crazy and it's the same thing with dairy. I have been lactose intolerant for a while but could always tolerate cheese and yogurt. Now when I eat even a piece of cheese I get problems with congestion and sinus problems and I get a rash. I'm also suspecting soy as in issue. I recently just started gluten free about two months ago and it helped a lot. But with all these other issues its become really hard to find stuff to eat. I'm awaiting some food allergy results...but regardless of the results I know I'm having issues with eggs and dairy and must stay away. I hope this is just a pregnancy induced thing. So I need help finding breakfast food that has a least 7 grams of protein in it and is below 20 grams of carbs for breakfast. I also need a snack before bedtime that is protein with little or no carbs to stable blood sugar through the night or if I don't have a protein snack my blood sugar is high in the morning. Please help. This is getting really hard..... I'm current 23 weeks and gestational diabetes just starting coming on...thought I was going to be able to avoid it this time. I was wrong!

Have you looked into quinoa? It's supposed to be a grain that has a complete protein content. Not sure what the carb situtation is though. It's available at Trader Joe's in a box; the health food store either packaged or in bulk bins; and Costco in 4 lb. bags. Cooks up in about 20 minutes. Can be cooked with plain water (so you can use it for breakfast cereal) or broth (for savory lunch/dinner). It's also in health food stores in the cereal section as quinoa flakes and pasta (although they might blend it with corn).

As for eggs, during my research I discovered that the protein in egg whites is different than the protein in egg yolks. My husband can tolerate egg whites but not egg yolks. Crazy but true.

Could you be reacting to the casein in the dairy milk cheese? There's goat's milk cheeses that come in small quantities, that might work. Don't know of any non-dairy, non-soy cheeses out there but maybe one exists?

[missy'smom]

I do very low-carb, no dairy, no eggs. I have fewer grams carb in the a.m. so you could take my suggestions and adjust. I eat only non-starchy, low glycemic veg. and nuts for carbs. Pro. is usually 20 some grams or 3-4 oz. by weight.

Here are my breakfasts:

bacon, ham-with 0 g. sugars and carb per serving., canned pumpkin warmed up in the microwave-add one or more of the following: unsweetened almond milk, Earthbalance spread, cinnamon. nutmeg, coconut milk etc. to taste

broiled fish-usually tilapia or salmon, seasoned with a variety of seasoning blends I have on hand and olive oil and/or Earthbalance, sauteed zucchini/onion/yellow squash-plain or using a seasoning blend, or steamed broccoli or califlower. I saute the veggies the night before or save aside and extra portion from dinner and just warm up in the a.m.

nuts are a good low carb addition to a meal or snack, if you count the carbs and measure them. You can make a "granola" with a combo of nuts and seeds and coconut and sprinkle it on the pumpkin.

I bake a whole spaghetti squash or two ahead of time and measure it out into a measuring cup according to how many carbs and what size serving I can have and plop and drop onto a lined baking sheet and freeze and plop into ziplocks. Then in the a.m. I can just plop one in a bowl and microwave to warm up. You can sprinkle on spices and/ or mix in some Earthbalance. I prep the canned pumpkin the same way.

I prep bacon by oven baking it a pound at a time and storing it in a container in the fridge.

I snack on bacon, nuts, salami.

Turkey is also a good breakfast food. Serve as a sandwich wrapped in a lettuce leaf with bacon, a slice of tomato, mayo, avacado, whatever fillings you like, or just as is with the spaghetti squash, steamed broccoli etc.

Leftover roasted chicken breast meat is another good protein for the a.m.

If you really want a "cheese" Vegan Gourmet is gluten-free/CF, it does have soy though.

For a snack, spread chicken, tuna or salmon salad in lettuce leaves. Instead of the mayo, I sometimes use just a bit of olive oil, red or white wine vinegar, dijon or brown mustard and herb like thyme and/or parsely, salt and pepper etc.

If you are avoiding soy, Earthbalance original has soy but the came out with a soy-free version recently.

[missybean]

I do very low-carb, no dairy, no eggs. I have fewer grams carb in the a.m. so you could take my suggestions and adjust. I eat only non-starchy, low glycemic veg. and nuts for carbs. Pro. is usually 20 some grams or 3-4 oz. by weight.

Here are my breakfasts:

bacon, ham-with 0 g. sugars and carb per serving., canned pumpkin warmed up in the microwave-add one or more of the following: unsweetened almond milk, Earthbalance spread, cinnamon. nutmeg, coconut milk etc. to taste

broiled fish-usually tilapia or salmon, seasoned with a variety of seasoning blends I have on hand and olive oil and/or Earthbalance, sauteed zucchini/onion/yellow squash-plain or using a seasoning blend, or steamed broccoli or califlower. I saute the veggies the night before or save aside and extra portion from dinner and just warm up in the a.m.

nuts are a good low carb addition to a meal or snack, if you count the carbs and measure them. You can make a "granola" with a combo of nuts and seeds and coconut and sprinkle it on the pumpkin.

I bake a whole spaghetti squash or two ahead of time and measure it out into a measuring cup according to how many carbs and what size serving I can have and plop and drop onto a lined baking sheet and freeze and plop into ziplocks. Then in the a.m. I can just plop one in a bowl and microwave to warm up. You can sprinkle on spices and/ or mix in some Earthbalance. I prep the canned pumpkin the same way.

I prep bacon by oven baking it a pound at a time and storing it in a container in the fridge.

I snack on bacon, nuts, salami.

Turkey is also a good breakfast food. Serve as a sandwich wrapped in a lettuce leaf with bacon, a slice of tomato, mayo, avacado, whatever fillings you like, or just as is with the spaghetti squash, steamed broccoli etc.

Leftover roasted chicken breast meat is another good protein for the a.m.

If you really want a "cheese" Vegan Gourmet is gluten-free/CF, it does have soy though.

For a snack, spread chicken, tuna or salmon salad in lettuce leaves. Instead of the mayo, I sometimes use just a bit of olive oil, red or white wine vinegar, dijon or brown mustard and herb like thyme and/or parsely, salt and pepper etc.

If you are avoiding soy, Earthbalance original has soy but the came out with a soy-free version recently.

Thanks for all the great suggestions. The canned pumpkin thin sounds intersting. I will have to try that. I guess I will have to accept that I won't be eating normal breakfast foods. I bought some ham and today I will try and find some gluten free breakfast sausage. I have had the IgE rast food allergy testing and it came back negative for everything but I had scratch testing for some enviromental allergens and I was allergic to like 70% of them. I'm awaiting allergy testing results for a IgG test. I'm really anxious to see what they say. I saw you have had some allergy testing done. What did you have done to determine your food allergies?

[missybean]

Have you looked into quinoa? It's supposed to be a grain that has a complete protein content. Not sure what the carb situtation is though. It's available at Trader Joe's in a box; the health food store either packaged or in bulk bins; and Costco in 4 lb. bags. Cooks up in about 20 minutes. Can be cooked with plain water (so you can use it for breakfast cereal) or broth (for savory lunch/dinner). It's also in health food stores in the cereal section as quinoa flakes and pasta (although they might blend it with corn).

As for eggs, during my research I discovered that the protein in egg whites is different than the protein in egg yolks. My husband can tolerate egg whites but not egg yolks. Crazy but true.

Could you be reacting to the casein in the dairy milk cheese? There's goat's milk cheeses that come in small quantities, that might work. Don't know of any non-dairy, non-soy cheeses out there but maybe one exists?

I do like quinoa but I believe it only has 4 grams of protein per serving and 46 grams of carbs. So I could do half serving for dinner probably but for breakfast it has to many carbs. The goats milk cheese sound good...I will definetly look into that. Yum. Thanks for all the great suggestions. In a couple of weeks if I see a reduction in my hives I will try just egg whites and see what happens.

[missy'smom]

I saw you have had some allergy testing done. What did you have done to determine your food allergies?

I used to make dairy-free low-carb muffins with almond flour. They contain a high ratio of eggs though. I tried cutting down the number of eggs and using flax as an egg replacer and that was successful but was only able to get it down to two eggs out of four per 1 dozen muffins and I've lost my desire for them because I feel better without the eggs. If you didn't have a reaction to eggs I would have shared the recipes. Something to keep in mind though if you can have eggs again.

My son is the one who reacted to everything they tested him for. I am not happy with our allergist though and want to get re-tested myself with someone else, using different test. I know I have problems with dairy, although all tests have come back neg. I haven't done the IGg?(if I remember right-the ELISA) testing though, just the egg, milk subfraction blood test and run of the mill skin testing. The egg/milk subfraction separates the egg and milk into it's various components and tests for each one. My reaction with eggs is more subtle so I have yet to prove it-maybe more of an intolerance than an allergy. I've done some experiments with both eggs and dairy since the diabetes DX and I have stumbled across a possible immune reaction to the dairy and eggs that shows up in my BG readings. I get that nasal stuffiness with dairy. Didn't notice it until I eliminated it and I could breathe so much better! I've always had GI trouble. Eggs I just have such a strong aversion and can't get them down. Could stand one in a recipe but start to increase it and my aversion kicks in I've suspected something up with that for a long time, even before I became more aware of food intolerances and allergies.

I had gestational diabetes too. Good for you for keeping an eye on your carbs and making some sacrifices with your diet. It's worth it! I'd encourage you to keep an eye on your BG after delivery too.