Learning to Bake Allergen-Free: A Crash Course for Busy Parents on Baking without Wheat, Gluten, Dairy, Eggs, Soy or Nuts [Paperback]

Colette Martin (Author), Stephen Wangen (Foreword)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 19, 2012

Has your child been diagnosed with food allergies? If so, help is here! Colette Martin has been there too: When her son Patrick was diagnosed with multiple food allergies in 2001, she had to learn all-new ways to feed him—and especially to make baked goods that he both could and would eat.

Learning to Bake Allergen-Free is the book Colette Martin wishes she had back then. She ingeniously presents a dozen manageable lessons that will arm parents to prepare allergen-free baked goods the entire family can enjoy together. The book features:
• More than 70 recipes (including variations) sure to become family staples—for muffins, rolls, breads, cookies, bars, scones, cakes, tarts, pizza, and pies— starting with the easiest techniques and adding new skills along the way
• Clear explanations of the most common allergens and gluten, with all the details you need on which substitutions work, and why
• Hundreds of simple tips for adapting recipes and troubleshooting as you go
• Detailed guidelines and more than 15 recipes for making allergen-free treats from packaged gluten-free baking mixes
• Special crash courses focused on key ingredients and techniques, including sweetening options, decorating a cake simply but superbly, kicking everyday recipes up a notch, and much more!

Whether you already love to bake or are a kitchen novice, Learning to Bake Allergen-Free will give you the knowledge, skills, recipes, and confidence to make food that your family can safely eat—and that they’ll love!

Editorial Reviews

Review

“Parents of children with food allergies will appreciate this practical book.”
—Library Journal

“This might just be the most comprehensive allergen-free baking guide we've ever seen.”
—VegNews 

“You will learn a mountain from [Colette] Martin’s lessons and recipes, whether you’re a novice or more experienced baker. She gives brilliant guidance on egg replacers, explains mysteries such as why more baking powder is used when there are no wheat or eggs, and even helps you figure out when your gluten-free baking is done. . . . There are more than 70 allergy-friendly recipes and page after page of invaluable baking advice. This book is a must-have.”
—Allergic Living

 “This book will give you the depth of knowledge you need to be a successful allergen-free baker.”
—Chef Ming Tsai, chef and owner of Blue Ginger and national spokesperson for the Food Allergy &Anaphylaxis Network

“This amazing collection of lessons and recipes will fast-forward the learning curve for anyone new to cooking with food allergies. Speaking with the voice of experience, Colette Martin offers in-depth but approachable chapters on replacing key ingredients, even seemingly integral baking ingredients like eggs. Her ‘Crash Course’ subchapters cover everything from using baking soda and baking powder, to proofing yeast breads, to how to tell when the darn thing is done! Learning to Bake Allergen-Free will be a companion you will want to keep close by in your kitchen for frequent reference.”
—Jules Shepard, author of Free For All Cooking and The First Year: Celiac Disease and Living Gluten Free

“Colette Martin’s book will be a great resource for the home baker hesitant to venture ‘out of the box.’ Her use of a variety of name-brand gluten-free flours and mixes makes for easy adaptation.”
—Chef Richard J. Coppedge, Jr., CMB, professor of baking and pastry arts

“A fabulous education in a cookbook! Learning to Bake Allergen-Free will move you right to the head of the baking class thanks to Colette Martin’s thorough and easy-to-understand lessons about allergens, ingredients, and substitutions. Colette’s recipes are poised to become staples in your repertoire, so happy baking, and enjoy your new discoveries!”
—Lori Sandler, founder of Divvies and author of The Divvies Bakery Cookbook—No Nuts, No Eggs, No Dairy—Just Delicious!

“Learning to Bake Allergen-Free is the guide that I sought for years, and a positively beautiful book. Colette Martin presents all of her secrets, from the most reliable egg substitutes to the best gluten-free baking mixes, and her masterful recipe collection is the icing on the cake!”
—Alisa Fleming, author of Go Dairy Free: The Guide and Cookbook and founder of GoDairyFree.org

“As a practicing allergy and asthma specialist, I see patients every day who have multiple food allergies, but the diagnosis is just the first step. These families need to modify their diets to avoid wheat, milk, eggs, peanuts, nuts, soy, and other common food allergens. Learning to Bake Allergen-Free is exactly the book these families need when they leave my office. It’s jam-packed with practical advice, simple baking techniques, and easy recipes that the whole family can enjoy! It will, for sure, bring smiles to many, for years to come.”
—Dr. Atul N. Shah, Medical Director, Center4AsthmaAllergy.com, and author of the AmazingAllergist’s Awesome Series for Children, AmazingAllergist.com

“Colette Martin shares her favorite, creative recipes and her love of baking with you so you will come to love gluten-free, dairy-free, egg-free, nut-free baking, too.”
—Lynda Mitchell, President, Kids With Food Allergies Foundation

“Colette Martin’s Learning to Bake Allergen-Free is a welcome addition to the world of allergen-free cooking. Martin’s approach to the challenge is masterful and complete. This is more than a cookbook; this is a resource book for families struggling to feed a family member with multiple food allergies. She guides the way, teaching us how to adapt recipes for results that the whole family will enjoy. Kudos to Colette Martin for tackling this challenge head-on and providing families with a much-needed resource.”
—Wendy Book, President, American Partnership for Eosinophilic Disorders

About the Author

Colette Martin is a food allergy mom and an expert on how to bake allergen-free. Having first learned to bake in her grandmother’s kitchen with wheat, butter, milk, and eggs, she understands firsthand what it means to transform a kitchen to accommodate multiple food allergies. She is an advocate for food-allergic families, Vice-Chairperson on the Board of Directors for the Kids with Food Allergies Foundation, and a member of the Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Network and of the American Partnership for Eosinophilic Disorders.

Stephen Wangen, ND, is a licensed and board certified gluten intolerant physician who lectures nationally on the subject of gluten intolerance. He is co-founder and Medical Director of the Irritable Bowel Syndrome Treatment Center, and is on the Board of Trustees of the Gluten Intolerant Group of North America. He continues to investigate the relationship between food allergies and health as the research director of the Innate Health Foundation. He is the author of two books, Healthier Without Wheat and The Irritable Bowel Syndrome Solution.

Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: The Experiment (June 19, 2012)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1615190538
• ISBN-13: 978-1615190539
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 0.7 x 10 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #33,520 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Colette Martin is a food allergy mom and an expert on how to bake allergen-free. When her son was diagnosed with eosinophilic esophagitis in 2001, triggered by allergies to wheat, milk, eggs, soy and peanuts, she had to reinvent how her family ate. Having first learned to bake in her grandmother's kitchen with wheat, butter, milk, and eggs, Colette understands first-hand what it means to transform her kitchen to accommodate multiple food allergies. As she modified her recipes to eliminate the top eight food allergens and gluten, she discovered her own intolerances to wheat and soy. She believes that everyone should be able to eat birthday cake, and that breakfast is better if it includes chocolate!

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars a MUST-have cookbook for those with food allergies! June 12, 2012

By J. sprague

Format:Paperback

I have 2 boys with Multiple food allergies [8 foods, and over 20 foods!], I also run a blog~ multiplefoodallergyhelp.com~ So I need a lot from a cookbook!~ This one delivers! I LOVE this cookbook! It really is a tutorial~ teaching you not only about the alternatives you can use in baking, but how and why they work! This is EXACTLY the type of book I WISH I had when my boys were first diagnosed! Colette does a great job explaining what products you can use, even offering alternatives if you need to further adapt your diet from `normal' substitutions, like avoiding xanthan gum, [corn allergy] or flax seed. It is like having someone hold your hand and show you what you need to do to make this new allergen-free lifestyle work for you! Remember your old college or high school textbooks, with the window boxes of important facts, information, and chapter summaries? They're in here too, and great for refreshing your knowledge, or fact-finding when newly diagnosed! Her baking tips are useful whether you've baked for years, or you're a man! Seriously though, this is a very well explained, practical, well laid out handbook to guide you!

I love that she experimented with a lot of the readily available shelf mixes for breads, cakes, cookies etc. Colette explains the differences between the brands, and which taste and work better. She also includes recipes using them with yummy alterations to enhance them! There are so many wonderful little tidbits of information here! Truly, whether you have been at this for a while, or have just been diagnosed, I highly recommend this cookbook!~ In a perfect world, when the allergist gives you a diagnosis of food allergies, he should be handing you this book too! To see full review: [...]

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars AmazingAllergist's team recommends this book. June 19, 2012

By UrFan

Format:Paperback

As a practicing allergy and asthma specialist, I see patients everyday who have multiple food allergies, but the diagnosis is just the first step. These families need to modify their diets to avoid wheat, milk, eggs, peanuts, nuts, soy and other common food allergens. Learning to Bake Allergen-Free is exactly the book these families need when they leave my office. It's jam-packed with practical advice, simple baking techniques, and easy recipes that the whole family can enjoy! It will, for sure, bring smiles to many, for years to come.
- Dr. Atul N. Shah, Medical Director, Center4AsthmaAllergy.con, Bestselling Author of Allergies, and Awesome You, and Founder, AmazingAllergist.com

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A Wonderful Starting Point for Anyone with Food Allergies August 7, 2012

By Andi

Format:Paperback

I've been cooking for food allergies for over 30 years for myself and my family. When I found Colette Martin's "Learning to Bake Allergen-Free," I almost passed it by since I rarely eat sugar or bake. When I scanned the book, I was surprised and thought, "It's about time someone wrote a book like this. " This is much more than a baking book, but a comprehensive reference for understanding what the various food ingredients are, why they are in our foods, and how to make wise substitutions when dealing with any of the 8 most common food allergies. Martin gives several crash courses in various aspects of baking, then goes on to give recipes which give optional ingredient substitutions. She also goes on to evaluate several commercially available baking mix products, with instructions for alternative ingredients if allergic.
The cinnamon rolls are delicious, and I look forward to tasting the gluten-free coffee cake next. Even if you're specific allergy isn't covered in depth, still the book is a valuable starting point for understanding and coping with the change necessary to live well with food allergies.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Great book especially for newbies June 16, 2013

By vbmichelle

Format:Paperback

I had the pleasure of attending a cooking class with Colette and working through some of the recipes with her. The book is comprehensive, easy to follow and gives so many tips that I never would have known if I started allergen-free baking on my own. The recipes are easy to follow and the photos are very appealing. Thanks, Colette for providing newbies with a great foundation to begin allergen-free baking!

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Best of it's kind May 21, 2013

By Susan Weissman

Format:Paperback

I'm the mother of a child with multiple anaphylactic food allergies. I've been baking for my son for over nine years and until this book came along, there was none that I could rely that was both instructive and specific and did not rely on esoteric ingredients or techniques. Food allergy bakers are dealing with a new medium when we try to fiddle our way to batch of breakfast muffins or a decadent chocolate mousse. And that's why I love Colette Martin's book. She doesn't simply share the fruits of her labor - the stellar and versatile recipes she developed over the years of baking for her son. In her book, Colette Martin teaches her readers concepts and methodologies of allergen-free baking and empowers us should we want to adapt or create new baked goods, based on different food restrictions. The author and baker understands that feeding our families is a long term proposition. The old adage comes to mind: "Give a man a fish and you feed him for aday. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime."

-Susan Weissman, author of Feeding Eden: The Trials and Triumphs of a Food Allergy Family

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Fabulous! April 8, 2013

By Jenn

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

This is really a great allergy free cooking reference! I search high and low for great allergy free recipies that are like the ones I'm used to cooking. cinnamon rolls..All the things I enjoy making and what my kids love eating!! I love this practical book! The author also explains why she uses the ingredients she picks. Ifyou are starting out on square one she explains everything. I already tweak recipies to make them allergy free as best I can. So, to have this book is really a rare and great find. Thank you!!!!!