Been away for awhile: Question about food?

Hi everyone,

I can't remember the last time I was on here, but glad I found you all again! I've been going through some health issues this year with really bad asthma after Hurricane Sandy in the northeast, and am currently out of work for the week due to the really bad asthma.

My migraines have been...well my migraines. I have the complicated/confusional variety. I had tried to get off the gabapentin, as it makes me hungry all the time, by switching to atacand. Well the atacand didn't work too well, and the gabapentin keeps me from being confused. So in general, had some bad pain in the last several months, and ongoing hand numbness for a while...mostly due to the stress of the hurricane/asthma attack I think. Being on different doses of prednisone certainly doesn't help.

Anyways, since I am home from the week and have a little bit of time, I've been looking into ways to set myself up better to cook more to be healthier. I used to cook more, but it is really difficult with low energy and long work days.

Generally I am supposed to keep a low salt, anti-reflux diet, which I'm pretty good at, but I find I sort of hit a wall when I realize there are many foods I don't eat because of the migraines! I'm not strictly avoiding everything on a migraine diet list, but if I eat "too many things on that list" I have trouble.

Truth be told if I really think about it my migraines are triggered by citrus, bananas, red wine/balsamic vinegar, MSG of course, and freshly risen dough. Generally I can eat pasta with tomato sauce (as long as there is no red wine/strong vinegars involved), but if I eat pizza forget about it!

Which leads me to my question. LOL! I was just looking over my mother's soup recipes, and she has a great recipe for barbaque beans, with kidney beans and lima. Is there some sort of substitute I can use for barbaque sauce in the recipe? The only thing I can think of is white vinegar and tomato sauce? I could maybe get away with some apple cider vinegar??

Also, I was looking for a low salt/no MSG version of taco seasoning. Does anyone know what usually goes in taco seasoning?

And I guess third. LOL. My mother used to make some great ribs. If I don't use barbaque sauce (which I haven't cooked with in YEARS), what would you season them with?

Oh, and it seems a lot of low salt suggestions say to use citrus as a flavor (or balsamic vinegar), what do you use to season instead for salad dressing or to marinate something?

Thanks a bunch!

Angel

You don't need taco seasoning. Just use chili powder. I also add salt or onion salt, but if salt is a problem for you skip it or use a salt substitute and onion powder. A little Cumin is good too

In place of BBQ sauce, you can make a rub with brown sugar, paprika, pepper and salt. That is excellent on ribs.

Here are a couple of taco spice recipes:
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/taco-potion-19-recipe/index.html

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/taco-seasoning-i/

Obviously you would omit or reduce the salt, but it would get the correct mix of flavors that are in the pouches

Thanks guys. That was really helpful! I wrote them down on the back of my taco soup recipe and will try them for next time. This time I used a McCormick's spice mix "lower" sodium and no MSG, but it was missing something. I much rather experiment with my own mix of spices until I don't care that it's low sodium!

Angel

You can make some taco seasoning. I found a recipe online for you. Of course adjust the ingredients to your specific circumstances. It has chili, garlic, onion, red pepper, oregano, paprika, cumin, sea salt, and black pepper. Here is the link: http://www.the-girl-who-ate-everything.com/2012/09/homemade-taco-seasoning.html

You can also make your own BBQ sauce up. If the recipe calls for red wine vinegar (you mentioned you can't eat that), substitute it for white vinegar. I substitute recipes using plain white vinegar all the time where I work because that is all we have and I still make lots of tasty dishes. Here is a link to a homemade BBQ sauce, but remember to substitute out the foods you can't have with something you can. In the recipe it calls for liquid smoke. I would leave that evil stuff out!
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Big-Als-KC-Bar-B-Q-Sauce/Detail.aspx

Thanks Jilly! I just wrote down the barbaque sauce and will print out the other blog page. That blog looks really fun. It's nice to be around other migraine suffers who get the food thing. LOL. I just adjust and don't try to explain to anyone anymore!

Angel