Lactose

Learn how to articulate your problem in French and Dutch and also figure out how to ask that you are willing to take any substitutions. Our experiences in traveling in Japan was that it was very difficult to articulate that you are willing to try anything as long as they can accommodate your needs. France and the Netherlands will likely be a different story because they are more Western, but I would definitely get a friend who can speak French and/or Dutch to write out a card with all the details you need (hopefully you know someone). Don't just have it say 'I am lactose intolerant' otherwise you probably won't get much help from the locals and you will end up either eating nothing or spending your time in the bathroom. :-)

Do the enzyme tablets work for you? My daughter uses just the generic dietary enzyme tablets that we get at Target (I think the name brand is Lactaid). I would assume that you already know what foods to stay away from at home, so it won't be any different abroad. Fortunately, lactose intolerance isn't as big a problem as a food allergy, where something might be made with an ingredient that could cause real harm for you. Something made with a small amount of milk, for example, probably won't bother you. An enzyme tablet before eating would probably take care of any problem.

Greetings

You may find that you have less of a problem in Europe because many of the traditional methods of producing cheese/yogurt remove all or most of the lactose. The longer something is heated, fermented (during which the bateria break down the lactose) or aged, the less lactose - and mass production methods tend to emphasize speed.

Pure butter has no lactose, and the harder the cheese the less the lactose. So hard cheese should be fine

(This info comes from Barbara Kingsolver's great new book 'Animal, Vegetable, Mineral' - she's lactose intolerant but has learned how to get around it by making her own cheeses and knowing what processes will remove lactose, thus which items are low lactose)

Have fun!
Kate

Make that "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle"

FYI, there are statistically, as likely to be as many lactose intolerant French and Dutch people as Americans (of European descent), so it's not something unknown there.

Kate

Joe, I am lactose intolerant, and I found out that when I was in Italy, Germany, and France I had no problem. However, in London, they must pasturize the same way we do here in the States, because my stomach did not like the milk there.

So for Paris, if you order your cafe creme, there should be no problem. Not sure in Amsterdam though... but you may want to bring some lactaid pills.