Welcome to Belly Healthy – a site for gourmet dairy-free recipes!
I was lactose intolerant for years before I discovered that gourmet food doesn’t have to be full of butter or cheese.
I started learning the basics of cooking while at university (inspired by a Le Creuset casserole dish my housemate had), and nearly a decade later, I’ve just about got the hang of preparing delicious, homecooked, lactose free meals that fool all of my friends and family into thinking I cheated and used butter and other “normal” ingredients.
Lactose intolerance is a condition that seems largely misunderstood. It’s not an allergy, so people assume it won’t be life threatening. I get the intolerance towards the intolerance: Once upon a time, everyone ate dairy and drank milk straight from the cow and never had a complaint. My own family made it very difficult to have a meal with them without feeling seriously ill afterwards: even store bought sliced bread tends to have unnecessary lactose preservatives in them, or whey. They figured since they weren’t affected, why should I be?
It’s taken years for them to realize it has affected them, too. Over time, consuming overly-processed and enriched foods that food companies piled into our supermarkets to make a quick buck (when they should have been concentrating on quality and freshness), we simply wore our stomach enzymes out. But without taking things to extremes, a lactose-free diet (whether or not you are intolerant to digesting lactose) can keep you enjoying the good things in life — like FOOD!
So after years of recipe-searching online with limited success in finding a sufficient number of tasty dairy-free recipes (i.e. ones that didn’t rely completely on tofu and bland soy milk), I decided to start my own resource. My goal is to keep it simple and post recipes that I have found to be a great hit with my own friends and family, and to expand my own repertoire by testing out seasonal recipes inspired by my local Farmers Market.
Another thing about my cooking style: I never add salt unless I absolutely have to. So you’ll notice that most of my recipes read, “salt (to taste)”. What I tend to do is put salt on the table when I’m serving and let people know I’m not offended if they want to go to town on it. My dad discovered he had a serious heart condition when I was about 12, and that set the tone for my eating habits for good.
So if you’ve found yourself here and you’d like to contribute your feedback, thoughts, or share a recipe for posting, let me know!
