LID Tips

This section does not contain detailed recipes, because I think it is easiest to use the recipes you are used to, and just adjust them to fit the low-iodine diet. This way, you should find that many of your usual foods can be eaten with only slight variation, and that the whole family can still eat together. I think it is important to try and keep as normal as possibly throughout this, for your own sanity, apart from anything else.

What this section does include are tips on preparing some of the meals suggested in the menus above. I went out and bought some coloured stickers before I went on the LID. I then spend an afternoon going through my store cupboard with the list in my hand, and stuck a coloured marker onto all the foods I could eat. If you do this, it makes it is easier when cooking, both for yourself and your family, to see which ingredients you are allowed.

Main Meals and Salads

Shepherd’s Pie	Use LID butter and milk in the potato. Don’t use a commercial stock cube.
Casseroles and Stews	Use home-made stock, and fresh meat. Check with the butcher that it is not injected with any flavour improvers.
Pasta Salad	No mayonnaise
Chicken Salad	Serve with fresh salsa and chips fried in sunflower oil or skinless new potatoes
French Dressing	Make your own from sunflower oil and vinegar

Light Lunches

Vegetable Soup	There are only a few vegetables on the excluded list. Don’t use a commercial stock cube, though. Make your own stock. Add tiny pasta for extra body.
Chicken Soup	Use only fresh chicken from a reputable butcher, and LID vegetables. Make your own chicken stock.
Salsa Dip	Make your own with fresh vegetables. Eat with vegetable sticks, homemade crisps or matzo crackers.
Hot Beef Sandwich	Check the label of the horseradish sauce or mustard if you use it.
Pasta Salad	Pasta tossed with lightly blanched vegetables and French dressing. Don’t use mayonnaise.
Mushroom Toast	Use home-made bread and sunflower spread.

Sweets and Snacks

Peppermint Creams	Don’t be tempted to dip them in chocolate
Coconut Ice	No red food colouring – try another colour!
Home-made crisps	Peel potatoes very thinly and deep fry.
Popcorn Quick, easy fix of carbohydrate for those missing bread!	Add sugar or table salt – no butter.
Toffee Apples	Use sunflower spread instead of butter.

Biscuits and Cakes

Macaroons	Sugar, almonds, rice flour and egg whites – ideal!
Anzac Biscuits	Use sunflower spread, not butter
Scones	Use unbleached plain flour and sunflower spread. Add raisins but not cheese.
Muffins	Lots of replacements in this one: almond milk, sunflower oil, no egg yolk, unbleached plain flour.
Brandy Snaps	Use LID spread instead of butter. Try them with vanilla essence instead of ginger.
Lardy Cake	Use Flora white fat

Puddings

Rice Pudding	Use almond milk. Try soaking the rice overnight for a really rich taste.
Apple Snow	Omit the egg yolks
Jam Tart	Make your pastry with pure vegetable fat and unbleached flour
Syrup Tart	As above
Lemon Sorbet	Once you have the technique mastered, you can try lots of different fruit sorbets.
Baked Apples with Dates	Substitute any dried fruit for the dates, and add sugar to taste.
Plum Crumble	Use sunflower spread
Banana Fritters	Fry in pure sunflower oil. Use egg white only in the batter.
Scots Porridge Apples	8oz each of sunflower spread and oats mixed with 6oz brown sugar. Layer apple slices on top, pour over 5fl oz water, and bake at 180° for an hour.
Melon with Sherry	Marinade melon cubes in equal quantities of sherry, honey and lemon juice. Serve with roasted almonds.
Calvados Apples	Simmer apples in sugar syrup. Remove apples, and add 3 tablespoons to the syrup while you reduce it. Pour over apples.
Apricot Jelly	Dried apricots soaked and cooked with honey, made firm with the addition of gelatine.

Other tips I have picked up along the way include

Ø Coffee: make real coffee with milk substitute from the list. Add as much sugar as you like.

Ø Tea: herbal, green or black tea is best, because substitute milk doesn’t taste right in ordinary tea. Add lemon, sugar, honey – or all three!

Ø Cold drinks: 7-Up, lemonade, Sprite, soda water with a twist of lemon, fruit juice, wine/beer

Ø Cereal: Shredded Wheat, Puffed Wheat, Jordan’s Muesli from list

Ø Toast - use Pure Sunflower spread and marmalade or jam

Ø Snacks: popcorn with salt, fruit, vegetable sticks

Ø Biscuits: buy from the list, or make your own

Ø Porridge: make with milk substitute, and sugar or salt to taste.

Ø Bread: make your own bread using unbleached flour. Try not to have too much in one day e.g. don’t have toast for breakfast and sandwich for lunch on the same day.

Ø Fruit: interchange the fruit as you like, choosing fresh or dried (if using dried, choose unsulphured)

Ø Puddings: there are a huge number of sorbets you can made, using fruit, egg

Ø Egg replacement: use the whites of two eggs to replace one whole egg, OR 1 tablespoon white sauce, OR half a banana, mashed

Ø Watch out for ‘vegetable oil’ as this is often a blend containing soya oil.