How to eliminate dairy??

[motherearth23]

Hey guys,
I'm a huge dairy fan. Cereal with milk every morning, cottage cheese with lunch, cheese cheese cheese on everything, ice cream for dessert kind of girl. I just had my son 2 weeks ago, and I've noticed that he spits up a lot when I eat a dairy-heavy meal, and less when I've had no dairy that day.

Although it's not officially diagnosed, I think he might be sensitive to the dairy products I'm consuming. I am going to try cutting out milk products for a few weeks and see if that helps him... also hoping it helps me lose some of this excess weight (I gained 60 lbs in pregnancy).

My question is... where do I start?? I base so many meals off of dairy I am at a loss. I've already bought some almond milk and rice milk to use for my cereal and for recipes that require milk. But cheese? Can anyone suggest some good meals that I can easily (MUST BE EASY as I'm home alone all day clusterfeeding) make?

 

[confused87com]

i eat a lot of meat and veg meals, or spag bowl, chilli....homemade chicken curry. i use coconut milk as i find its consistancy is thicker than rice milk, i like the milk to 'stick' more to my cereal. its hard to begin with and you are constantly reading labels but there are so many other things to eat. i am quite enjoying the alternatives. i cut out soya as well and then trialled it. turns out she cant have that either!

 

[JenX]

It is even more difficult for me as I have to be gluten free for my own health, so dairy was a large part of my diet. What we do is make some big pots of things on the weekend while my husband is home. Things like quinoa and beans (you could use rice instead of quinoa), gluten-free pasta (made from quinoa and rice flour) with sausage and tomato sauce, chili, etc. Then we divide it up into small containers so all I have to do is heat it up during the week for lunch.

My husband generally grills some steaks or fish for us for dinner, and we'll have that with some steamed veggies or some potatoes- we cut them up, coat with olive or macadamia oil, season them and bake.

Hope this helps!

 

[MommyJogger]

This was me, as well. I will say that it takes the dairy protein (casein) several weeks to actually leave your system. So if you've been a heavy dairy eater and lo seems to be responding to specific meals, I'd like to gently suggest that you look into the possibility that it's either something else in your diet or that it's just natural variation in spitting up times and it's not actually coinciding with anything in your diet. Spitting up really isn't indicative of a dairy intolerance. Casein intolerances are usually more indicated by what's in the diaper-- my son had blood in his stool, big splats of it. Very mucousy diapers are also a common symptom and I've seen lots of women say that their babies would vomit up their meals, which is quite different from spitting up.
If you would still like to look into eliminating dairy from your diet, what helped me was making bulk dairy-free meals and putting them in individual servings so that I was never faced with having to make a dairy-free meal on the fly. Chilis, curries, stews, broth-based soups, veg/meat and rice are all nice dairy-free meals that can be changed up for variety. If you google "Oh She Glows", you'll find a blog of the same name with a huge collection of recipes for all kinds of elimination diets. It was essential to my success at going dairy-free (and other stuff-free). I also embraced coconut everything (milk, yogurt, ice cream, chocolate); it's all delicious and has the fat your body needs and that you'll be getting a lot less of by eliminating dairy. Good luck, mama! It's difficult and I really hope your lo doesn't have it, but if he does, you'll settle into a routine that works without dairy and it will get a billion times easier once you identify "safe" go-to foods and make them easily available to yourself.

 

[dan-o]

I was also a huge dairy fan.. I just stopped! Cold turkey! I craved for a few days and now no longer miss it!

I use hemp, oat and coconut milk for cooking, drinking and tea/coffee, dairy free marg for cooking and that's about it. I just make most things from scratch and substitute the ingredients. It's been quite easy and I feel great in myself. Baby Vin is a lot happier and has stopped his all night writhing plus I'm confident that my milks not aggrivating my older sons eczema.

 

[Srrme]

I had to cut out all dairy (and soy) for a while when my oldest was younger because he was sensitive to it. I drank almond milk instead of cows milk (it is so yummy!) and I found a lot of other products (including sweets!) that didn't contain any dairy. It's difficult at first, but if you look for the right ingredients you'll find a whole dish of foods to make up for the ones you can't have!

 

[CupcakeBaby]

I was the same - cheese with everything.

I've switched to Oat Milk as its the least sweet and strange tasting to me.

And we have a lot more meat and two veg sort of meals.

So far I've dropped dairy and soy (for about 9 weeks now - it gets easier)

DD is much better but still not right so I'm thinking it could be egg. She's also bad if I have lots of tomato or onion.

 

[CatherineK]

I've been dairy and soy free for this baby since birth, as both my other two were intolerant and I wasn't going to risk it. You get used to it. Just look out for hidden dairy! It's in so many things.

 

[summer rain]

In the US there are quite a few very good dairy and soy free cheese alternatives, Daiya is one xx

 

[CatherineK]

My favorite treat - So Delicious brand coconut milk ice cream sandwiches - soy and dairy free. They also make a 'yogurt' out of coconut milk that is soy and dairy free. Heavenly!

 

[morri]

cereal are also good with juice or with vegan milk :soy, rice oat etc. You cab get calcium fortified veg milk too , and soy cream etc.