CRAVING FOR CHOCOLATE Easter has been and gone. Spring is fast heading into summer, but as I write this, there are still chocolate eggs seemingly everywhere! I find them hard to resist. Chocolate in general is hard to resist, but what if your dietary requirements mean you can’t eat it?
Louise Robertson Specialist Dietitian
The milk content in milk chocolate vegetarian menus and supermarkets is a problem for some, including for promoting vegan ranges. New foods people with milk allergies, or for those have arrived on the supermarket who have galactosaemia and can’t shelves, such as Jackfruit which can be metabolism galactose (found in lactose). made into a type of pulled-pork dish, Children and some adults with PKU vegan cheese made from coconut oil, (requiring a very low-protein coconut yoghurts and plant-based diet) can’t have chocolate milks including nut, rice and either, as it contains too coconut milk. What have all the much protein for them. Milk-free chocolate foods got in common? Those who follow a vegan diet will be Well, if you look at the is also often lower in avoiding milk chocolate, nutritional labels you protein so could be but some businesses, will see that they are all incorporated into the having cottoned on to fairly low in protein. As a metabolic the rise of veganism, diets of adults with are starting to provide dietitian who looks PKU and counted into more suitable products after people who have their protein allowance to have low-protein and foods. There over holiday times, has certainly been an diets to manage increase in the amount their conditions, this particularly is exciting to see, as of vegan and free-from during Easter. it offers these patients chocolate available on supermarket shelves. This more food choices directly is good news for children and from the supermarket. But for adults with milk protein allergy, those who have recently chosen to people with lactose intolerance and people become vegan, they need to be educated with galactosaemia. Milk-free chocolate about trendy low-protein vegan foods, as is also often lower in protein so could such foods need to be balanced out with be incorporated into the diets of adults protein sources such as beans, lentils and with PKU and counted into their protein chickpeas. allowance over holiday times, particularly The good news is, Easter time during Easter. needn’t be a chocolate-free zone from Veganism is obviously becoming now on. And before we know it, all more popular. I have seen well-known the Christmas chocolates will be back pub chains advertising their vegan and on the supermarket shelves!
Louise is an experienced NHS dietitian who has been specialising in the fascinating area of Inherited Metabolic Disorders in adults for the last 10 years. In her spare time she enjoys running her blog Dietitian's Life with her colleague and good friend Sarah Howe, playing the cello and keeping up with her two little girls! www. dietitianslife.com
www.NHDmag.com May 2019 - Issue 144
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Coming in the June/July issue: • Cow’s milk allergy
• Ileostomy & colostomy management • IBS/IBD
• Dementia: healthty eating to reduce the risk • The flexitarian diet • ONS prescribing
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