Baked Brie with Cranberry Chutney

This past Saturday I was at a women's pampering event held at my mother-in-laws church and there was this really good brie cheese there! They had recipe hand outs that I could take so I of course had to grab one! I am a huge Brie cheese lover especially when it is warm with nuts and berries!! If I make this at home though it will be nut free, as our daughter has a peanut & tree nut allergy!

Ingredients:
2/3 c. water
2/3 c. sugar
1 1/3 c. cranberries
4 tsp. cider vinegar
1/3 c. dark raisins
1/4 c. chopped pecans
2 tsp. brown sugar
Scant 1/4 tsp. ginger
1/2 tsp. chopped garlic
2 1/4 lb. wheel of Brie cheese

1 loaf French bread cut in thin slices or party loaf pumpernickel bread- or crackers of choice

Directions:
To make chutney: In a heavy saucepan combine water and sugar. Stir and bring to a boil. Add cranberries, vinegar, nuts, sugar, ginger and garlic. Boil slowly, stirring until thick, 5-10 minutes. Cool and refrigerate. It will keep in refrigerator up to 1 week or it can be frozen.

To Serve:
Place Brie in an ovenproof shallow dish. Spread chutney over top of cheese. Bake at 350 degrees 5-10 minutes watching carefully so as not to melt brie, just to soften it. Serve with slices of bread or crackers.

This is NOT the picture from the recipe above, but it looks very similar, except this wheel of Brie looks smaller! 

Recipe from the kitchen of Cindy VanArtsdalen (family friend).

Food Allergies & The Holidays

 For those of you who don't know, our 4 year old daughter has a severe life threatening peanut allergy. As the holidays are here we have to have extra precaution at all times, or that one time we turn our back she might intake a peanut butter snack/dessert and will go into Anaphylactic Shock. "The reaction may be fatal if emergency treatment, including epinephrine injections, is not given immediately". Our daughter is only 4 years old and does not fully grasp her allergy, so we have to keep a very close eye on her.

When we have family gatherings, there is no peanut anything around, which we are so thankful that family and friends understand her allergy and that it is air born. Proof of that at a baseball game last year. People behind us were eating peanuts and throwing the shell's on the ground. Halie was breathing in the peanut dust or whatever you want to call it and started getting woozy and falling over. :/ Needless to say, we left right away and she started feeling much better within a matter of minutes.

Our biggest thing is keeping an eye at her at church. We have only been going there for a little over a month now and not a lot of people are aware of allergy, however her Sunday School teacher is very much aware. We keep a snack at church in her classroom for Halie to eat at snack time, and the kids do wash their hands after they eat their snack.  Thankfully the teach doesn't bring peanut/nut products in but some items are still made in the same factory as peanuts/nuts.

Halie does wear a peanut allergy alert bracelet and knows to always ask me or daddy to have something if someone wants to give her food. AND we do practice with her to say that she has a peanut allergy and to ask mom and dad if she can have that snack. Thankfully the only reaction she has ever had was when we first learned of her severe allergy when she was around age 1.

 

Does your child or someone you know have a food allergy? What precautions do you take? What advice can you give us? Thanks!

My Song, My Strength