Food Allergies -- Eggless Marshmallows

Actually, these marshmallows are not only egg-free, but they also contain no cane sugar. They are made with maple syrup, but you could use agave or corn syrup according to your needs. They should stay refrigerated, and they are slightly gooey-er than the typical marshmallows, but the recipe I used said they work well for rice-crispy treats, which I plan to make with them soon.

The best part? They are super-duper easy!!

Egg-free (and sugar "free") Marshmallows

6T cold water

2 envelopes unflavored gelatin

1 cup Agave, maple, or corn syrup

1t. vanilla

1/4 t. salt

flour or corn starch

Add gelatin to water and microwave 30 seconds. Pour into mixer. Add syrup, vanilla, and salt. Beat with electric mixer for 12 minutes until the marshmallows are very thick and tripled in size. Pour into a 9x12 baking dish coated with cooking spray and dusted with flour or corn starch (I lined my dish with parchment paper and put a little corn starch on top). Let them cool in the fridge at least three hours or overnight. Cut marshmallows with a wet knife into squares.

When I first put the ingredients in the mixer I thought, "These are gonna be brown!" But they fluffed to a nice color fairly quickly.

The mixture globbed down into the dish, and I spread it with a rubber spatula. I didn't worry about trying to make them too "pretty" as I am just planning on using them in a recipe. I would be good to note that this would make a great marshmallow cream to add to a recipe without any other steps.

And this is the finished product -- not beautiful, but very tasty. My 6-year old allergic child was thrilled when I gave him a bowl-full!! I may make some Christmas shapes the next batch using the old metal cookie cutters.

Alternatives

As I have mentioned in previous posts, I regularly try new foods with Noah to see how well he tolerates them. Sometimes we have great results, and as I have recently posted, sometime we have not so great results. But we have to keep trying, and I am very hopeful that the cream of buckwheat that we tried yesterday will be a success story.

I really like this creamy buckwheat product, and it makes a great hot cereal for anyone with gluten allergies/intolerances. It is one of my favorites! And when I tried it yesterday for Noah, he really seemed to enjoy it too! I saw no ill effects on his tummy, so I feel pretty confident trying it again in a couple days.

So far Noah has not tolerated sunflower seeds, and he couldn't use this product anyway because it does contain some sugar. However, I was looking for something that I could make for Eli for lunch tomorrow that doesn't need to contain a cold pack because he is going on a field trip. We cannot use peanut butter (or any peanut products) because Noah is very allergic to them. We don't keep any kind of peanut products in the house.

I remembered that some friends of mine use this product, and if your child goes to a peanut free school, you might like to give this product a try as well. It is a really great replacement for peanut butter in taste and texture. It is lightly sweet, and after you stir it the first time, keep it in the fridge so it won't separate again.