So I made a decision to just go ahead and post recipes with my instagram shots – it just means I’ll get more recipes up here but you’ll have to deal with it while I figure out the tripod and iphone framing issues sorted!
Today’s post-yoga lunch was one of my absolute favourite new dishes: gluten free zucchini pasta with a creamy vegan sauce made from white beans. You can go ahead and sub the beans with coconut cream, my creamy artichoke pasta recipe or by using some steamed cauliflower. It’s all good believe me.
The zucchini pasta is my go to for pretty much everything since finally taking the plunge into 100% grain free territory. Ok, I guess more like 99% realistically as when I’m in a jam while traveling I’ll relax my kung fu grip on diet. Just get yourself a vegetable slicer – this is the one I use: Paderno World Cuisine A4982799 Tri-Blade Plastic Spiral Vegetable Slicer. My favourite veggetti is made from zucchini, butternut squash or kholrabi (Have some new ideas for me? Post them in the comments below please!).
You’ll find recipes full of foods with antihistamine and anti-inflammatory properties my books Anti-Recipes and The Anti-Cookbook
CLICK HERE FOR A FOUR WEEK HISTAMINE RESET WITH MEAL PLANNERS, STRESS RELIEF STRATEGIES & MORE
Some with histamine intolerance or mast cell activation may react to bell pepper which is a nightshade. You can go ahead and omit that, especially if you’re using red onion. It’s mostly for the colour and for extra nutrients and anti-inflammatory benefits. You could sub with a little boiled beet, or beet juice, or a couple of carrots.
If you decide to go bean free (I know everyone’s afraid of the big bad lectins!) consider that they’ve been shown to possess antihistamine and anti-cancer properties as I talk about in this post.
Nutritional benefits:
Please remember studies on these foods are often conducted in test tubes or animals, not on people, and that antihistamine foods can still cause reactions. All the foods I post are absolutely tolerated by me, but not in the first few months on the diet. As your inflammation bucket empties you should be able to tolerate more and more foods. You can search my site for the studies I have linked to that show the properties of these foods, I’m no longer including them in every single post as I keep repeating myself! You’ll also find a six-page list of high nutrient antihistamine and anti-inflammatory foods and the studies in the Anti-Cookbook.
Antihistamine: red onion, garlic, basil, turmeric, beans.
Anti-inflammatory: red onion, garlic, basil, turmeric, beans, olive oil, paprika, cayenne, bell pepper.
Gluten Free Zucchini Pasta with Creamy Vegan Sauce
Servings: 2 | Difficulty: Easy
Ingredients:
2 large zucchini
1 cup white/cannellini beans
1 red onion, finely chopped
1/2 red bell pepper
1-2 cloves garlic
lemon, squeeze of
olive oil
handful basil, half of it finely chopped
1/2 tsp grated turmeric
optional
2 tbsp coconut sugar
1/2 tsp paprika
pinch cayenne pepper
Directions:
Drizzle a little oil into a large pan and begin sautéing half the onions. I like to add a cup of cancer-fighting Portobello mushrooms at this point but they appear on some lists as high histamine (Dr. Furhman says they’re fine for HIT). Meanwhile toss the beans, other half of the onion, bell pepper, garlic, turmeric, a plash of olive oil and half the basil. Blend, adding a dash of water if needed. Add in the coconut sugar, paprika and cayenne if using. Pour the bean mixture into the pan and mix it all up over low heat.
Now grab the spiraliser and get cracking! It should take you about 60 seconds to pasta-fy those zukes, but take as long as you need. Once done, add them to the creamy sauce. The zuke pasta will release some water as cooked which will thin out your creamy sauce, but don’t overcook it. I just cover it and let it cook for about five minutes in total.
Kid tip: peel your zukes before spiralising. They won’t know they’re not pasta – I’ve tried this out on little ones…
You’ll find recipes full of foods with antihistamine and anti-inflammatory properties my books Anti-Recipes and The Anti-Cookbook
CLICK HERE FOR A FOUR WEEK HISTAMINE RESET WITH MEAL PLANNERS, STRESS RELIEF STRATEGIES & MORE
Please remember, even antihistamine and anti-inflammatory foods can hurt us, please always exercise caution and consult a medical practitioner before adding new foods.