Challenging the Egg

It amazes me how much my kids can be alike, yet so very different.  When it comes to food, the similarities and differences are glaringly obvious.

Scout LOVES to eat.  She will eat and eat until her belly looks like she swallowed a antelope.  She loves vegetables and fruits.  Kale, on the other hand, will only eat a small variety of things.  He despises all vegetables and most fruits.

Milk has challenged both my kids.  Kale had a very hard transition to milk, as it upset his tummy.  He had a tolerance problem with milk.  Scout doesn't tolerate milk either, but her reaction is a pure allergic reaction that causes her to sneeze, itch, and be blotchy.  This was verified by the allergist.  Do you know how many products contain milk or its derivatives?  Ugh.

Eggs challenged my kids as well.  At 16 months, after a lunch containing every major allergen (he had already been exposed with no previous reactions), Kale freaked us out by sneezing nonstop, becoming itchy, and turning red across his face.  Boom, he is allergic to eggs.  Fast forward to the testing for Scout to verify the egg allergy.  A week before the test, Ep asked if he could give her a bite of his eggs.  I asked if he wanted to spend the day at the emergency room and reminded him we would be paying later in the week to find out the safe way if she could eat eggs.  Sure enough, she is allergic to eggs (to which she reacted more strongly than the milk).  At the same time, over the last few months we have noticed no indications from Kale  that he was still reacting to eggs.  At one point, he was so sensitive that he would react after eating things made on the same machinery that processed another product with egg.  So, despite eliminating all egg products from his diet, he would still sometimes have a minor reaction.

Kale was again recently tested for egg allergy, and got no reaction.  To verify, the allergist wants to do an egg challenge which would require Kale to start with a very minute portion of eggs and eat more and more to see if he reacted...all at the doctor's office and for three hours.  Just getting Kale to try eating egg would be a challenge in itself--we knew that and so does the doctor and his nurse.

So, Ep and I have somewhat done our own egg challenge.  A few weeks ago, Kale was with his daddy and ate cookies that had egg as an ingredient.  No reaction.  So, this morning, I reintroduced Kale to pancakes--not the egg free kind that are similar to pancakes but just not quite the same--real pancakes made from batter that contains eggs.  The kid who never cleans his plate managed to quickly clean his plate and ask for seconds.  I looked him over--no splotches, no sneezing.  He finished that second pancake too.  He just walked back in to the kitchen asking if we had more pancakes...anybody know the best way to hide vegetables in pancakes?