Allergy free brownie

When first told of my intolerances, my biggest preoccupation was that of dessert (and of a butterless life). Swearing off rice and wheat etc. is all in a day's work but dessert, biscuits, pastry, and all things sweet are the French on one's toast, the salt on all chips, the coco before the pop.

It is my very nature to obsess with finding replacements and I started with something easy (and not too dear to my heart for fear of total and utter failure): brownies. This recipe I "converted" from la barefoot and call it beginners luck at that time but it worked rather well. Note however that this recipe falls strictly into the cakey-brownie camp, for fear of over promising on gooeyness and chewiness...

Melt 450gm allergy free dark chocolate in a Bain Marie over low heat. Off the heat stir in170gm trex (vegetable shortening). In a separate bowl, mix 45gm potato flour with 150ml water and add in 3 tbsp of instant coffee granules, 2 tbsp vanilla extract and 150gm sugar. Add the melted chocolate to this mixture and let cool completely. Combine 150gm allergy-free flour with 1tbsp baking powder and some salt. When cooled, lightly mix the two and if desired, toss about 30gm of allergy free choc chips in AF flour and add that in too. Bake in a 12x18inch pan in oven preheated to 180degrees for 25 minutes. 

Food intolerances - Allergy Freetarian and proudly so

I was having a lovely chat with a dear friend recently and she asked me a question which got me terribly excited and concerned. It was a rather simple question - what is the term for people like you? My immediate answer was: "friends", bearing in mind that I just had 9 over for lunch of which 4 had special dietary requirements. I also postured "intolerant people" (rather apt for me) and "the troublesome ones" (referring to myself again of course...). But, what is the globally accepted term? Surely, we are not awaiting for the term to be coined - or are we?

Whilst the phenomenon which is food intolerance has been around for decades now, it is still a relatively new and "trendy" area and is now occasionally, but surely unacceptably, referred to as a "white whine". Rather personally, I object (surprise surprise) to the gentrification of the issue (yes you, gwyn) - for most of us, food intolerances are neither choice nor want and much as we would like to trivialise it (and I speak from personal experience with coeliacs (who have gluten intolerance) and the other types), we are bound up like chickens in purgatory, by the very ropes which are our health and sanity. No longer are we only intolerant to gluten or dairy but more commonly a combination of things, with different permutations for every individual. No longer are we vegetarian, vegan, fruitarian, but we are, and proudly so, "allergy free-tarians" - we are not only gluten free, dairy free, egg free, but we are also yeast free, rice free, soya free, fill-in-space free.

So, there! To ease myself into allergy freetarianism and to help me embrace rather than trivialise my intolerances, I'm taking up my other half's suggestion that I carry a freetarian card. And it's scented...Eat my heart out - something I'm not intolerant to, for a change.