Why I Bake Egg-less

I learned that my son (on the left in Kauai) has a severe egg allergy when he was 10 months old and I fed him his first scrambled egg; he loved it. Then he turned red, swollen with hives, and started crying. His eyes swelled shut, and his eyebrows became huge—picture Oscar on Sesame Street. He had to be rushed to the pediatrician and given a shot of Epinephrine and oral Benadryl. He was fine; he just CAN’T eat eggs or anything with eggs.

Because of that event, I gave up eating anything with eggs. Until I realized birthday cakes and cookies are a necessity for children. This revelation came about one year after the no-egg diet. I use Egg Replacer by Energy for baking. It does not taste very good at first. But now after at least 5 years of using egg replacer, I can make baking taste as good as it should. Also, the back of the Egg Replacer box has many ideas for using the replacer. I have successfully made the quiche, pancakes, and more.

However, my son also is allergic to wheat. He is only mildly allergic to the wheat, so it is not life-threatening like the egg allergy. I use Pamela’s Products for most of my baking because it is an easy to use mix without any wheat or egg included. You can buy the mix at local health food stores. I can make the most delicious chocolate chip cookies from the recipe on the bag (with the egg replacer substituting the two eggs), and kids love them. It takes a while to learn how to get the consistency for the egg replacer in the recipe perfect, or the cookies come out flat and lifeless—not very appealing to a real chocolate chip cookie lover. So, I am going to use this blog to share recipes that work for me using the egg replacer and as close to wheat-fee baking as I can get. I do use spelt flour often, and some people cannot tolerate spelt as a wheat substitute. I enjoy baking, and can’t wait to share my recipes for those of you who are interested.