lactose intolerant guest?

Raisin

Thu, May 21 2009, 8:24 am

DiznyIma wrote:

So, just as I am ready to plan my Shavuos menus a really good friends who I have not seen in a long time asks if she can come for Shavuos.

I know for a fact that she is very lactose intolerant!!! What do I do?? No dairy meals?

just make a couple of options for her that contain no milk. eg milk less quiches, lasagna with tofu instead of cheese. Or make a piece of fish for her. you can make a cheesecake with tofutti cream cheese.

yOungM0mmy

Thu, May 21 2009, 8:34 am

not everything has to have cheese. We usually serve fish first - no cheese. Then a vegetable soup - no cheese. then main course can be blintzes with cheese or potato, creamy pasta bake without cheese, salad without cheese, as well as lasagna with cheese or something else if you want. Or you could have optional dressing and feta cheese as toppings for your salad.
for dessert you can do cheesecake and parev icecream or sorbet, so she can have just the ice cream.

ruthla

Sun, May 24 2009, 12:34 pm

Is she lactose intolerant or allergic to dairy? You need to call her and find out specifically what she can and can't eat before you plan your menu.

If it's a simple matter of lactose intolerance, she can take a lactase pill (lactase is the enzyme that breaks down lactose) and eat dairy products- possibly needing more than one pill if she consumes a large amount. Many people who are lactose intolerant can handle some kinds of dairy but not others (say, yogurt but not milk) and most can handle a certain amount of dairy with no problems, but too much causes issues (which can be fixed with lactase pills.)

If she's allergic or intolerant to milk fat, she may be able to handle skim milk products. If she's allergic or intolerant to milk PROTEINS (like I am), then there's really no way to consume dairy products without getting sick. I personally can handle butter but no other dairy; others are more sensitive and react even to the trace amounts of milk protein found in butter.

If she truly can't consume any dairy products, then you should make sure to have plenty of pareve items on the table, rather than putting cheese in every single dish. Make a fish dish at each dairy meal, have at least one pareve vegetable and a pareve starch (or skip the pareve starch if you've got plenty of challah!) There's no need to skip your favorite dairy dishes. If you make blintzes, make some potato, some fruit, and some cheese (keeping the cheese ones separate) and serve sour cream and applesauce on the side.

Go ahead and serve cheesecake, but also make another dessert alongside. Personally, I wouldn't make a pareve cheesecake to serve next to a dairy one since the parve one will pale in comparison- I'd make something like an apple pie, or a chocolate cake, etc.

With Shavous coming over Shabbos this year, you can either go with "typical Shavuous meals" OR "typical Shabbos meals" for the 2nd day.