A Rotation Diet for Food Allergies: Why and How

The Basics

The idea behind a rotation diet is to take the strain off your immune system. As it turns out, eating the same foods, day in and day out, are a challenge for our immune systems. In a rotation diet, you'll be eating foods no more often than every four days. This, along with removing environmental immune stressors and adding supplements to help heal your body, can help preserve and even increase your tolerance for various foods.

Believe me, as someone who developed an intolerance for potatoes, rice, and winter squash by eating them all the time (when my other options seemed limited), I can tell you, you will want to be on a rotation diet. What on earth are you going to eat? You'd be surprised what's available.

First, get out a piece of paper. List four or five each of grains, proteins, oils or fats, veggies, and fruits that you know you can tolerate. This is just to start you off. Your lists might look something like this:

Grains or Starches: rice, millet, oats, buckwheat, potatoes

Proteins: turkey, venison, rabbit, salmon, lentils

Oils or fats: olive oil, grapeseed oil, palm kernel oil, safflower oil, apricot kernel oil

Vegetables: cruciferous (broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage), root (carrot, beet, turnip), squashes (zucchini, butternut, acorn), peas and beans (snap peas, string beans), other (asparagus)

Fruits: apples/pears, bananas, citrus, berries, kiwi

So, let's say you're on a 5-day rotation. Day 1, you might eat brown rice grits for breakfast, along with some applesauce. For lunch, you could have some spicy lentils with a side of steamed asparagus. For dinner, you could have turkey cutlets with rice, along with broccoli, drizzled with olive oil. The next day, you could have millet puffs (a cold cereal) with hemp milk, along with a banana. Lunch would be leftovers from dinner the night before (on a rotation diet, eating leftovers for lunch will make your life MUCH EASIER), and dinner might be meatloaf out of ground venison, along with a side of cooked millet and steamed carrots.

See? You can do this. It's not convenience food, but it's simple and can taste very good. Plus, you'll know the diet is helping your body to heal and, within a short time, you may begin to feel stronger and have more energy.

Click here for my full 4-day rotation diet menu.

Books

There are a couple of great books I've found helpful in learning to use a rotation diet. One is Nicolette Dumke's The Ultimate Food Allergy Survival Guide. In it, she assigns every food a day (Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, or Day 4), and her recipes are keyed to the days. This makes meal planning a lot easier.

The second book I like is The Allergy Self-Help Cookbook by Marjorie Hurt-Jones. Ms. Jones, an RN, suggests listing 12 basic foods to which you know you are not allergic, and shows you how to rotate them. Her book is filled with tasty and useful recipes as well--and the ingredients can be substituted, too. For example, she'll often list 2 or 3 different flours you might use in a particular recipe, and I've found that I can often substitute other flours not listed, as well.

After awhile, you'll get to be a pro at rotation diets. You may discover new foods that you weren't aware of before. And once you get into the habit of meal planning (especially if you haven't done that before), life will seem a lot less stressful overall.

Finding Rare Food Sources for Your Rotation Diet

Finding some of the items to include in your new rotation diet can take some doing, especially with the meats. If you're not aware of food allergies or intolerances to meats, just go with beef, chicken, pork, and turkey, organic if at all possible. But do remember that beef, chicken and pork are the top three allergenic meats in the U.S.--because we eat them most often, of course. If you aren't sure, and haven't done so already, try a blood test (preferably ELISA), or an elimination diet (or both) to find out.

If your rotation diet requires some rarer meats, go to a local butcher. This is where I've been able to buy lamb, duck, rabbit, and buffalo. If he doesn't carry these meats regularly, he may know where to find them.Try middle-eastern grocers for goat, lamb, and tropical fruits at lower prices.If you live in or near a rural area, keep your eyes open as you drive past farms. Don't hesitate to knock on doors and politely request information. Recently I noticed that a local farmer had begun keeping buffalo (American bison). I knocked on the door, introduced myself, and asked if he planned on butchering any time soon. In the end, I received his business card, and an invitation to phone him in the spring--he was going to have too much meat to know what to do with. Let friends and relatives who hunt know that you are on a rare-foods rotation diet, and are interested in sharing their game. I have received venison and pheasant this way.

Another good source for unusual foods, other than your local health food store, is a natural foods co-op or buying club. You'll buy (often) larger quantities of foods and products for reduced prices. I am part of a United Natural Foods buying club, where I can buy things as exotic as sheep and buffalo yogurt.

Soon, you'll get into the routine of your meals and your food buying sources, and things won't seem overwhelming at all!

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