Back from the Darkness

Unless food allergy legislation is involved, I make a point of staying away from politics on this blog.  I want my little home on the internet to be a place where everyone dealing with food allergies feels welcome, regardless of political philosophy or personal beliefs.

The news about the pending SOPA/PIPA legislation worried me enough that I considered taking my blog down today as part of a planned massive online protest.  The idea of taking my blog offline was so painful, that I knew I had to do it, since I believe these bills present a very real risk of actually censoring sites like mine at the behest of corporate interests.  So I did.

To be clear, I do not support theft of copyrighted content, especially since I have had my own recipes and photos stolen and posted on other sites.  I began photographing and blogging my recipes because I want to share them, and do so under a Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial License.  You are free to copy and adapt my work here as long as you give me credit and don't attempt to profit from it.  I was furious the first time I saw my cookies submitted as someone else's original creation to a recipe site, along with my photo with my watermark carefully cropped off.  I really do understand the need to protect intellectual property.

SOPA and PIPA go far beyond that, though.  They give copyright holders the right to block the I.P. address of a website that they deem to have infringed upon them.  (By the way, the method is the same one China uses to block political dissent online.)  Even more scarily, this includes content uploaded by a site's users and comments left by visitors, not just content offered by the owner of the website.

How could this potentially effect a little blogger like me?  If a publisher decided, with or without justification, that one of my recipes was was stolen from their authors' copyrighted works, I could be shut down.  This is not an unrealistic concern.  For example, the Associated Press is already notorious for threatening legal action against bloggers who merely quote AP articles, even when the blogger scrupulously follows fair use guidelines.

These bills threaten free speech and the exchange of all information online.  If you value the information you've found and the communities you've joined, the support you've discovered and the friends you've made, contact your congressional representatives and tell them to vote NO on SOPA and PIPA.

Stop SOPA/Stop PIPA image courtesy of Bloggers Alchemy.

Chicken Paella

Chicken Paella, a very yellow chicken and rice dish.

I had some really lovely saffron left over from the Marx Food dessert challenge I took part in last month, so I decided to make an allergy friendly version of paella which is a traditional rice dish from Valencia, a coastal region of Spain.  The original version is something between a gumbo and a risotto which is cooked in a special pan over an open flame and is stuffed with up to a dozen different kinds of highly allergenic seafood.

Since I don't own a paellera and prefer to avoid flames in my kitchen, I adapted Mark Bittman's technique for starting paella on the stove and finishing it in the oven from his book, How to Cook Everything.  The resulting recipe was surprisingly easy to make.

Yellow chicken...

Despite paella's traditional roots and heavenly spices, it is really just a basic rice dish which can be thrown together on a weeknight with any meats or vegetables you have on hand.  The oven finish has the bonus of giving you enough time to throw a salad together and yell at direct the kid to set the table.

...coordinating yellow "tablescape".

Chicken Paella

(Click here for printable version.)

1 qt chicken stock (homemade, if possible)
healthy pinch of saffron threads
2-4 Tbs olive oil, divided
2 lbs chicken, chopped into bite size pieces
2 tsp ground paprika
kosher salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
1 large onion, chopped (I like 'em sweet)
1 large red bell pepper, sliced
2-3 cloves garlic, crushed
2 C short grain rice
1 C frozen peas
1/4 C dry white wine (optional)

Heat oven to 450°F.  Warm the stock and saffron threads in a saucepan over low heat until ready to use.

Use a large, ovenproof 12 to 14 inch skillet.  (Cast iron is perfect.)  Heat 2 Tbs olive oil over medium high heat.  Combine chicken with paprika, salt and pepper, stirring to coat, then brown in hot skillet.  Remove from pan after all sides are just browned. and set aside.

If needed, add additional tablespoon of olive oil.  Cook the onion and bell pepper in hot skillet.  Sprinkle with salt and pepper.  Stir occasionally while cooking until the onion is translucent, then stir in crushed garlic.

Check again to see if additional olive oil is needed.  If so, add last tablespoon and heat.  Add rice to pan and stir until all grains are shiny.  Carefully pour stock mixture into pan, then stir in chicken, peas and wine.  Adjust seasonings as desired.  (If you are using a commercial stock, additional salt will probably be unnecessary.  If using homemade, add salt and/or pepper as desired.)

Make sure that mixture is spread evenly in the pan, and all of it is below the level of the stock.  Transfer the skillet into the oven and allow to bake undisturbed for 15 minutes.  At this point carefully evaluate the rice.  If all the stock has been absorbed and the rice has cooked to tenderness, return it to the oven, turn off the heat and allow it to sit undisturbed for another 15 minutes.  If the rice is dry but too hard, add a small amount of water or stock (about a quarter or third of a cup) and allow to cook for another 5 minutes.  Reevaluate the rice after 5 minutes, adjust liquid and cook time again if needed, then turn off oven and allow to sit for 15 minutes before serving.

Support the Emergency Access to Epinephrine in Schools Act

Please sign this petition on Change.org in support of the Emergency Access to Epinephrine in Schools Act.

In honor of Sabrina Shannon, Megan Ayotte Lefort, Katelyn Carlson, and Ammaria Johnson who died of their allergies, children in schools should be given access to life saving epi-pen injectors in the event of an allergy whether there is an action plan in place or not.
Children with food allergies are at risk for anaphylaxis, a serious life threatening reaction that can rapidly close the airways of a child, causing death.  Nearly 6 million American children have potentially life threatening allergies.  Many families do not know that their child has a life threatening allergy until the first reaction, which can be deadly if not treated quickly.
This is why it is important to be certain that life saving Epi-pens can be made available at school to all children in the case of an allergic reaction.  The lives of the above listed children, and many other children, might have been saved if an Epi-pen was available to them.

I couldn't have said it better.

Their Hour of Need

No mother should have to bury her child.  Laura Pendleton is faced with this horror, only to find the funeral expenses to lay her beloved Amarria to rest are greater than the family can bear.  According to WWBT News, an account to accept donations has been set up at Wells Fargo under the name "Amarria Johnson Fund".

I found out today that the information was not entirely accurate, and the bank will not be able to look up the account without her mother's name.  If you'd like to help the family, here's what you need to do:

• Go to any Wells Fargo branch and fill out a counter deposit slip for Laura Pendleton, Chesterfield, VA, and whatever amount you would like to donate.
• From this information the teller will be able to look her up on the computer.  Let the teller know, either verbally or by writing on the deposit slip, that the account it should go into is the "Amarria Johnson Fund".
• The teller WILL NOT be able to give you the account number, but will fill it in on the deposit slip and give you a receipt.

Wells Fargo does have free online banking and transaction imaging.  I have no idea whether Laura Pendleton will ever pull up the online images of the deposits made into the account, but in case she does, I wrote a little note on the front of the deposit slip.

We can't bring Amarria back, but we can make sure Laura Pendleton knows she is not alone, and that the food allergy community grieves with her.  Let's give her all the love and support we can.

Many thanks to Tiffany Glass Ferreira of Food Allergy Fun who lives in the Richmond, Virginia, area and has kept me up to date on this tragedy.


Update:  More thanks to Thanita Glancey of the Loudoun Allergy Network of Virginia for sharing this link to Amarria's obituary and online guestbook, where messages can be left for the family.

No More Dead Children

Photo of victim from NBC 12.

Last year was a tough one for the food allergy community.  A fifteen year old died in Georgia. Within a week a twenty year old also died in the Atlanta area.  A six year old died in Montreal.

Instead of a better educated and more compassionate public, one girl faced parents at an elementary school, who actually made picket signs and protested her food allergy accommodations.  An airline refused to keep another boy safe by refraining from spreading airborne tree nut allergens.

I had cautious hopes that this year would be better.  Then I saw the news yesterday about seven year old Amarria Johnson who died Monday from an allergic reaction on her first day back at school in Chesterfield, Virginia.

This unnecessary death is so horrific, I can't begin to describe it.  Here's the story from WTVR of exactly how an allergic reaction should NOT be managed.

CHESTERFIELD COUNTY, VA (WTVR) - Ammaria Johnson, a seven-year-old elementary school student in Chesterfield County, Virginia, died after suffering an allergic reaction at school.
According to Chesterfield police, the initial investigation revealed that the Hopkins Elementary School student, a first grader, died after she suffered an allergic reaction.
Johnson's family said it was a reaction to a peanut product.
Emergency crews were called to Hopkins Elementary Monday afternoon around 2:30 p.m.  When the EMS crew arrived, the child was in cardiac arrest, according to a Chesterfield Fire Department spokesman.
The child was pronounced dead a short time later at CJW Medical Center.
The child's mother, Laura Pendleton was distraught and she has many questions.
"She has an allergy plan at the school," said Pendleton, which authorizes the school to give her Benadryl during a reaction.  "They didn't do that," she said.
At the beginning of the school year, the mother said she tried to give the clinical aid an Epipen for emergencies, but she was declined and told to keep it at home.
Pendleton also wants to know how her daughter got access to the peanut.
She is also upset on how she says the school handled the situation.  "At 2:30 they called my wife and said somebody needed to pick Ammaria up because her tongue was swelling.  My wife told them to call 911."

Failure to give Benadryl, no Epi-pen on hand and the outrageous decision to call a parent instead of 911 when a child's airway is closing?  I don't even have words for this school's heinous behavior.  What part of "life threatening medical condition" did they not understand?  These people shouldn't be entrusted with the care of a gerbil, let alone a child's life.

And what kind of self-serving, we're-not-responsible-for-the-death-of-the-child-in-our-care, preparing-for-a-lawsuit garbage was the school district trying to serve up with its statement that this girl died of a "pre-existing medical condition"?  Here's the county's own guidelines for managing food allergies which the school failed to follow.  (Thanks to @IknowTiffany for the link.)

If I were a parent in that school district, nothing would outrage me more than the knowledge that the school was aware of the "pre-existing medical condition", had an action plan in place and still did not keep her safe.

Let me tell you what I want from 2012:  NO MORE DEAD CHILDREN.

Food allergy deaths are preventable.  The steps are simple, but require compassion and common sense which, clearly, are in short supply:

• Label all food, beauty and medical products accurately and completely.
• Ban airlines from serving peanuts and tree nuts, so that food allergic travelers are not denied safe access to public transportation because of their invisible disability.
• Train restaurant staff to safely prepare meals and avoid cross-contamination for food allergic customers.
• Have a licensed nurse on site in every school.
• Create an appropriate food allergy plan for school children, and follow it to the letter.
• Keep food in the cafeteria and out of the classroom.
• Pass the School Access to Emergency Epinephrine Act.  Do it now before more children die.

I'm fresh out of tact and diplomacy.  I really don't give a damn about your child's "right to eat peanut butter" or some corporation's "proprietary information".  I just want to keep my son alive.

Please, that's all I want from 2012.  Don't kill my child.

My deepest, most heartfelt condolences go out to Amarria's family.  You are living my worst nightmare, and my heart bleeds for you.

Post updated to correct the spelling of Amarria's name which was misspelled Ammaria in the original news reports.