My approach to Martin’s food continues to evolve.

In the earliest days, I would say, Martin’s diet was one of restriction. No grains, dairy, soy, corn, refined sugar, starchy vegetables, or fruits other than pear and avocado. No colors or sweeteners, no packaged or prepared foods, nothing from a restaurant. My mindset was mired in what he could not eat, and I concocted elaborate replacements for “usual” foods. This was a time of homemade zucchini seed “French fries,” sunflour patties, and duck nuggets; as long as the dish didn’t have any no’s, and seemed vaguely like a familiar food, it was a yes.

As I learned more about Martin’s particular needs, we ventured into specialty diets: GAPS with its endless broths, the Specific Carbohydrate Diet, low-salicylate, which brought us more potatoes and less coconut oil.

At some point, food became easier when I focused on simplicity: fewer replacements and complicated recipes, more limited-ingredient masterpieces.

This summer in Nicaragua, I was able to confirm that fruit doesn’t have to be our enemy anymore—after fruit had been relegated to that role for years by Martin’s tendency to yeast overgrowth. Also, through trial and error, I brought back in some of the higher-salicylate items formerly removed.

Now, back in the States with access to an embarrassing range of organic options, my motto has become: “Every meal, a chance to heal.” Martin is still gluten-, dairy-, soy-, and refined-sugar free, and his food is mostly homemade and organic. But I’m focused less on how to replace what Martin can’t eat and more on how I can pack fat, protein, and nutrients onto his plate while still keeping the meals delicious.

For exemplar purposes, I photographed this morning’s breakfast preparations. These were the ingredients, as I prepared them—

Fritter mixture (sweet potato, onion, garlic, carrot tops), pineapple, strawberries, orange, avocado, egg.

You see orange slices, strawberries, 1/4 avocado, one egg, and a bowl with shredded sweet potatoes and minced onion, garlic, and carrot greens. That’s a lot of vitamin content, plus the healthy fat of avocado and protein of egg. Tell me that you’re asking yourself what kind of lunatic arranges the prepared ingredients in a pattern on her cutting board? Only when I’m operating “for exemplar purposes.” Keep up. Next I whisked the egg in a glass with Himalayan pink salt and stirred it into the sweet potato bowl.

Fritter mixture, now with egg. Ready to fry!

Then I juiced those orange slices in preparation for Martin’s smoothie. Because it so fibrous, orange is one of the few fruits I won’t add whole to a smoothie. I usually use coconut water as the base of Martin’s breakfast smoothie; this morning, I had oranges to use up and so substituted orange juice. I put the orange juice in the Vitamix with the avocado and strawberries. I add avocado to every smoothie, healthy fat that Martin doesn’t taste. (I’m also finding new ways to disguise spinach and kale.)

Getting the pulp out of the oranges.

Finally I formed patties from the shredded-sweet-potato mixture and fried them in olive oil. Breakfast looked like this:

Voilà! Crunchy sweet potato fritters with fruit smoothie. Breakfast is served.

That’s a common weekday breakfast. Here are some other examples:

Berry smoothie with “egg muffin” (diced vegetables, spices, and egg baked in ramekin) and salted roast potatoes.

Tropical smoothie with “egg muffin” (diced peppers, parsley, and spices with egg, baked in ramekin) and potatoes with carrot greens.

Tropical smoothie and squash fritters, made with onions and red palm oil for rich color.

I still tend to put Martin’s meat serving—if he has one, on a given day—into his school lunch. Today, lunch was turkey meatballs, filled with peppers and leeks. For dessert, homemade meringues (egg whites, vanilla, arrowroot, maple sugar). For snack, a Lärabar.

Tonight was a slow-cooker dinner. Late morning, I diced whatever “autumn” vegetables were in my fridge, and added late-season tomatoes and herbs from my garden. That mixture went into the Instant Pot, together with red lentils, spices, and vegetable broth.

The dinner ingredients. I had such fun laying out the breakfast ingredients for display that I figured I would continue the trend.

Dinner into the Instant Pot to slow cook.

Of course, not every meal is a vegetable powerhouse. Convenience can play its role. Some mornings, breakfast is a smoothie plus “pizza,” i.e., peanut butter spread between Siete grain-free tortillas and fried in macadamia nut oil.

Finally! A green smoothie. This one has spinach, cashew milk, coconut yogurt, peanut butter, and frozen banana.

Some evenings, dinner is brown-rice fusilli with “cheese” sauce, in this case served alongside Indian-spiced chickpea fries.

This is like the ASD-recovery version of mac-‘n’-cheese with chicken fingers, I guess.

Adrian, who refuses to eat breakfast except on weekends, continues to get two Bento boxes of mostly raw food, and one container of lentils, to take to the office for lunch.

A sample bento box for Adrian. In this one I packed salted avocado, grapes, peanuts, raw-milk cheddar, apple, hummus, and Mary’s Gone Crackers Thins.

Every meal is a chance to heal.

Now, if a child’s system is damaged and not properly absorbing nutrients, all the raw vegetables in the world won’t necessarily get the healing done; the trick is to find the proper food combinations. We are awaiting new test results to learn more about Martin’s gut today and whether we need to tweak his diet yet again.

And we press onward.