Insights from the Editor

Two summers ago, we found out our toddler was allergic to peanuts, corn, soy, eggs, chicken and wheat. The news was relatively devastating at the time. It took six months for us to learn to cook without those ingredients and to do entirely without processed foods, which are rich sources of soy, corn and wheat proteins.

But we've learned to look back on the diagnosis as a blessing. Our son is thriving, and the whole family eats a healthier diet as a result. Here are three things we've learned:  

Reading nutrition labels helps you make healthier food choices.
Nutrition labels are opaque, requiring a decoder and a  chemical engineering degree to decipher. But that's the first clue that picking processed foods over whole foods might not be the best idea. Looking for allergens has led us to startling discoveries, such as: 

• High-fructose corn syrup is often used to sweeten ham and hot dogs.
• Huge amounts of sodium and sugar hide in unexpected places.
• Wheat and gluten turn up in surprising places from beer to oat meal to prepackaged broth.

This is to say nothing of unrealistic serving sizes that are designed to minimize calorie and fat counts on the labels. Of course, nutritionists have drawn the public's attention to these issues for years, but seeing the proof ourselves made it more believable. 

We still buy processed foods, but we look for foods with labels that we understand and that have short ingredient lists. 

It's not hard to give your kids good food habits
For parents trying to feed picky eaters and manage busy lives, frozen chicken fingers, hot dogs and other "convenience" foods often become nightly fare for their young kids. But when your child is allergic to so many ingredients common to processed food, the term "convenience" takes on new meaning. In our house, convenience is an apple or a banana, a celery stick or a carrot.

And our 3-year-old eats them up. Really, he doesn't have much of an option. And neither do we. Something simple like mac and cheese, which we make from rice noodles, whole milk and shredded cheese, takes 15 minutes to prepare.

Looking back now, I almost wish our first child had been diagnosed with food allergies as well. Then maybe she'd beg for a banana for breakfast instead of reaching for a Pop Tart.

If you're excited about food, your children can be, too
Several years ago we began raising some of our own food. Our oldest child helps us and she gets excited over the vegetables we produce. And she gets excited about the food we make from those veggies. (Children, it turns out, eat more fruits and vegetables if they're homegrown.)

She's invested in the process--a process towards healthier food choices we wouldn't have started if our youngest hadn't developed food allergies.

That's something we can be grateful for.

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What do food allergy labels really mean? Find out.