We regularly have extended family dinners. Lately, I’ve been hosting the dinners. My niece has noticed that her eczema flairs up when she eats tomatoes or tomatoey food. One of our favourite dishes is Quick Chilli Beef but this is a very tomatoey dish. Thus, we’re trying to find alternatives and other tomato free family dinner options that everyone can enjoy. So they need to be tomato free, gluten free and preferably dairy free.
Why Tomato can exacerbate eczema & other issues
Tomatoes contain salicylates, amines and natural MSG which can exacerbate issues such as eczema, headaches and other things. They are also part of the nightshade family. The nightshade family is fruit and vegetables that contain the alkaloid solanine. These include tomatoes, eggplant, white potatoes & capsicum (peppers). For these reasons tomatoes are often on the lists of foods to avoid to help treat eczema.
Interestingly tomatoes seem to be one of the causes of my headaches or migraines and my son needs to avoid white potato. These are both part of the nightshade food family, so I wonder if it’s the nightshades that’s causing us problems? Often the same foods or food from the same food family can cause different issues in members of the same family. For example, caffeine affects both my mother and I but in different ways.
Tomato Free Family Dinner Ideas
It’s important to remember that it’s not just about avoiding tomatoes but sauces or other ingredients such as taco spice mix which are tomato based or contain tomatoes.
Meat & …
The obvious first choices are meat and vegetables or meat and salad, without tomato. However, when feeding more than just a household, dishes that can be made in bulk are much easier.
Some regulars in our household include:
- Baja Steak – tomato is one of the options to serve it with but don’t need to have it
- BBQ
- Homemade Chicken Nuggets
- Chicken Schnitzel – from Family Food
- Donar Kebabs – again don’t have to have tomato
- Roast meat & vegetables
- Pulled Beef Wraps
- KFC (Krispy Fried Chicken)
- Tasty Steak – 4 Ingredients 2
- Oriental Chicken
- Mogul Chicken
Simple Healing Food
I’ve recently purchased Simple Healing Food by Jo Whitton and many of the dishes in here are tomato free or can be made nightshade free. So from this book, at family dinners we’ve tried Paprika Chicken with Creamy Paprika Sauce, as well as Savoury Mince on Toast. Both of these dishes were tomato free.
Other Tomato Free Family Dinner Options from Simple Healing Food:
- Nomato Sauce
- Beef & Vegetable Stir-Fry
- Pulled Pork
- Chicken with 40 Cloves of Garlic
- Nightshade-Free Osso Bucco
- Hearty Beef Stew (using Nomato Sauce)
- Stovetop ‘Roast’ Lamb with Veggies
- Oven-Bake Lamb Stew (using Nomato Sauce)
Other dishes on our current household menu that are tomato free:
- Asian Chicken Stew – based on Asian Chicken Soup from 4 Ingredient Kids
- Chicken Risotto
- Fried Rice
- Potato or Sweet Potato Sausage Pie
- Salmon & Corn Cakes – 4 Ingredient Kids
- Chicken Dorothea
Tweaking Meals to be Tomato Free:
For any dish that contains tomato paste or sauce you could use Nomato Sauce instead. Nomato Sauce is a sauce made from vegetables and spices but has no tomatoes in it. Often based on beets or pumpkin and other vegetables instead. There are a number of nomato sauce recipes around from this Basic Nomato Sauce Recipe to this Classic AIP Nomato Sauce Recipe.
This Nomato sauce could then be used instead of pizza sauce on pizza or instead of tomato paste or puree in rissoles, lasagna and other tomato based recipes. Not sure if all my family would appreciate this sauce but I might try it to make a tomato free Quick Chilli Beef.
Make your own taco seasoning mix (my shop bought one contains tomato powder) could try this Mexican seasoning recipe. The mexican seasoning could then be used to make Mexican Meatballs and other dishes that contain taco seasoning.
Other Ideas:
Other tomato free recipes that I have bookmarked or are in my recipe books include:
- Apple, Carrot & Pork Burgers – 4 Ingredients Kids
- Slow Cooker Chicken and Gravy
- Chicken Pot Pie The Sequel
- Easy Mongolian Beef
This list of tomato free family dinner options should keep us going for a while.
What tomato free family dinner options would you suggest?
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