Can I reintroduce in this way?

[Jezzie]

Hello everybody! I am currently on day 21 of my first Whole30 and I have a few questions about reintroduction. To start off, I know that once I am done with the official part of the program, the rest is in my own hands. But I wanted some opinions/advice from people more experienced at this than I am.

I work at a grocery store that contains a popular bakery, a Chinese restaurant, a comfort food restaurant (fried chicken, pulled pork, baked macaroni, etc.), a Starbucks, and a pizza bar. Being around these types of things so frequently in addition to regular groceries has made it very easy for me to notice changes in my attitudes toward food. On day 3, I picked up an extra shift on "demo day", a day when we set up sample stands all over the store. I was in charge of handing out angel food cake. I had never done sampling before so I was hoping at the end of my shift, I would get to take home the leftovers. I was so annoyed when I remembered I couldn't eat that. When I got home that night, I spend a lot of time thinking about the reintroduction phase. Googling my favorite chips, trying to see what I could get away with eating when I reintroduce non-gluten grains, downloading the nutrition info from my favorite burger places so I could figure out what to eat when I reintroduce wheat. But over last weekend, one of my managers was giving out free packs of cookies from our bakery because they had reached their "best by" date, and it was so easy for me to turn them down! Yesterday afternoon was my last major shopping trip before I'm finished with this challenge so I've been thinking about reintroduction again. Maybe I'm being overly optimistic,  or maybe I really have that Tiger Blood, but as the days pass, I really don't have a genuine desire for a lot of the things I used to eat. I feel like everything  I'm considering eating as I reintroduce each food group, I'm only considering for the sake of completing the reintroduction phase.

As someone who used to snack constantly, the main food group I am really eager to reintroduce is dairy. I am honestly missing my omelettes with cheese more than Spicy Nacho Doritos. Now, I'm certain I will eventually go back to eating legumes and grains, but again, I really don't desire those other food groups right now and I don't think I will when I begin reintroduction next week. I know it is discouraged to mix food groups when reintroducing. But say I only reintroduce dairy and keep the rest of my diet Whole30. If it becomes clear I have no problems with dairy, do y'all think I would be able to properly evaluate grains if I have oatmeal made with milk and oats several weeks later? Could I have something with dairy as breakfast one day and then for dinner, swap out coconut aminos in a compliant recipe for soy sauce to evaluate soy? Or when I'm thinking about reintroducing one of the other food groups, should I totally stop consuming dairy for some time and then evaluate each group individually? I am aware of the "slow roll" option. That track, like the fast track, also says to not reintroduce two things at the same time. And I know that for a typical reintroduction, you still should not mix something you've already evaluated with something you're reintroducing. But do these concepts apply if I evaluate dairy and don't introduce another food group until some indefinite point in the future?

Thanks for any advice you all may have!

[ladyshanny]

You have such a clean slate at the end of your whole30, it's the perfect time to test anything you might one day want to eat so that when that day comes, you know how it'll affect you. I would not do as you suggest above because even if dairy seems fine, if you have some reaction to oats and dairy day, how will you k ow if it's the oats, the dairy or the combination. Some people do ok if they have an item like dairy alone but as soon as they combine it, its overload on their system. You wont know that without testing each thing individually.