Hello!  My name is Leslie and welcome to Cooking for Amaya!  I started this website to share allergy-friendly, plant-based recipes I develop.  My goal is to cook gluten-free, soy-free, dairy-free, and vegan food that is satisfying for everyone, not just people with food allergies.  

 

I have been a vegetarian for over 20 years and developed a gluten intolerance about three years ago.  As someone who loves food, the gluten intolerance was hard to accept at first.  I found there were limited gluten-free recipes that didn't make me feel like I was missing out.  

 

This year, my husband and I welcomed our beautiful baby girl, Amaya.  We quickly realized that she had stomach issues, which turned out to be food intolerances.  Since I am breastfeeding Amaya, her food intolerances have become further restrictions to my diet.  I became very hungry very quickly and learned that there are extremely limited options, both in terms of prepared food and recipes, that I enjoyed eating or that I felt good about cooking for anyone else.  I'm someone who thinks about food hours or days in advance and I consider reading menus to be my hobby.  I became very discouraged on this incredibly limited diet and eating became a chore rather than a source of joy.  I decided it was time to get creative.

   

I have been cooking daily since I was a kid, have taken numerous amateur cooking classes covering many types of cuisine, and spent 6 months last year at Le Cordon Bleu in London in their professional training program.  I believe that food can be allergy-friendly, plant-based, and delicious; it just takes some experimenting and patience to overcome ingredient limitations. I believe this so strongly that I think allergy-friendly recipes should be good enough to serve to carnivorous omnivores (such as my husband!) and have them wanting more!  Through this website, I am sharing my best recipes for allergy friendly food that doesn't taste allergy friendly.