Not just what, by how and where too

In addition to eating biology based, alive foods…it’s location, location, location.

Somehow meals in American have become a second thought instead of a celebration and self-nurturing part of our day. One habit I changed after my first trip to France was where I allow myself to eat. No more meals in the car, at the counter, at my desk or in front of the computer. I came across the realization how I was missing the taste bud party of my meals after reading the book French Women Don’t Get Fat by Mirielle Guiliano.  Dr. Clower states some of the same ideas in his book. Here is a completion to remind myself to how to bring more pleasure to my food and in the process reduce my appetite. I’ve also added a few of my own tips.

• Plan on going back for seconds when you place the food on your plate or order your meal. It will be there when you return or you can try something else just as good.
• Plan on dessert or something as a treat to end the meal. Other choices could be cheese, nuts (unsalted and not candied), or a special flavored tea or coffee. Keep it real and
• Set a place of honor for your food. Use a placemat, a nice smaller plate, and utensils.
• Don’t drink more that 6 ounces of water with your meal. You may add another 6 ounces of a drink you like to your meal (choose from tea, coffee, wine, juice, or a regular not-diet soda). Only sip both beverages, no straws and no gulping
• Slow down. 
• Say a prayer or meditate in thanks.
• Take a few deep breaths.
• Focus on the food.  A game I played with my children was to come up with a new adjective to describe each bite we tasted.
• Create an eating rhythm by taking a bite size of food and putting the fork or food (if your eating by hand) back down on the plate, completely finish what is in your mouth before taking another bite
• Engage in conversation or read a light piece (something for pure enjoyment and not work related)

Winter Vegetable Soup

This soup is like a warm blanket on a chilly winter's day. It's creamy consistency is from the potatoes and other root vegetables, it has a mild flavor which can easily be pepped up with other spices.

**Beware - when pureeing this soup, only fill your blender 1/3 full with the hot soup (about 2 1/2 cups for me). Otherwise the steam will shoot the top off the blender and send it sailing across the counter. This is dangerous and if you want to experience it (I homeschooled so this would be considered part of physics) I suggest you wear long sleeves, rubber gloves and safety glasses. Also get a volunteer to clean up.

Ingredients

3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
4 carrots
2 parsnips
2 celery stalks
4 medium potatoes
2 zucchini
1 small red pepper
2 cups cauliflower florets
2 tomatoes
1 medium head savoy cabbage
8 cups chicken stock (may need to add a little water to cover all veggies)
1/2 teaspoon thyme
2 tablespoons parsley
splash of Braggs Liquid Aminos
salt and pepper to taste

Chop all the ingredients into medium pieces.
In a large kettle (mine was 6 quarts), over medium-high, heat oil with vegetables (no cabbage) for about 5 minutes.
Stir in stock, add cabbage and spices. Simmer until all the ingredients are soft.
Let cool on stove for 20 mins.  Place in blender and puree.

From Faux to Fabulous

The past few weeks have been interwoven with eliminating faux foods (ok, really reducing faux foods, I haven’t found a replacement for ketchup yet) and cooking from scratch with fabulous, fresh, 100% biology foods. I am feeling lighter in my body and no longer feeling dazed in the middle of the afternoon. I’ve been spending more time reading labels, in the produce section, and in front of a cutting board. Not only am I rearranging my cupboards, but my Daytimer is getting an overhaul too.  I’m remembering that I like cooking. Years of creating a menu for a family of diverse appetites narrowed my options and I guess I fell into a menu rut.  

I am surprised how excited I am about making soup! I made my first homemade chicken stock and the delicious difference has me excited to make a roasted vegetable stock.  

 I spent an hour making the chicken stock (from prep to clean up) and a couple hours making Winter Soup (sooo good, recipe to follow with important tips on pureeing hot foods). I have decided that one day a weekend, preferably Sunday, will once again be my Sabbath and, now also, my hearth day.

Adding zest to my life includes creating more creative moments. I have fallen away from several nurturing activities and, as I plant my garden of herbs this spring, I will also plant a garden of nurturing activities to spice up my days. My meals are becoming creative moments. Martha Stewart and Oprah would be proud.

Chicken Stock Recipe

Time to the table: at least 3 hours    Makes 2 quarts

You’ll need:

Bones from 1 baked chicken

3 quarts water

4 stalks celery, chopped

1 cup chopped carrots

2 cups chopped onions

2 teaspoons salt

3 bay leaves

4 cloves garlic, smashed

5 sage leaves or 2 teaspoons rubbed sage

Several turns of the pepper grinder, to taste

Directions

Pick majority of meat off the chicken and cut the bones into 2 inch pieces.

In a 4-quart stockpot

                Add chicken bones with the water and bring to a boil. Once foam comes to the top, skim it away and add all the other ingredients. Let it simmer away uncovered for half the day ( about 4 hours), until it cooks down by about a third.

                Strain the stock, let it cook and store in a tight lidded container in the refrigerator for up a week. Otherwise freeze it for up to 3 months.

Stepping Toward Organic

Shakespeare would have been thrown. Today I was shopping for biology winning food and came across a display of beautiful roses. Out of reflex I walked over to the roses, stuck my nose in the blossoms and deeply inhaled. I paused waiting for a scent and wondered if I had been duped and mistaken plastic flowers for real.
They were "real" roses though they proved Shakespeare wrong. "That which we call a rose, by any other name would smell as sweet." Nope.

I've always thought organic food is great, just not that big of a difference for the price. I wondering now if organic food is the real cost of growing real food and the other stuffed needs to be called by another name. After returning from France, I notice a difference in the flavor of my typical diet and how I felt afterward. Dr. Clower, in his book The French Don't Diet Plan, states 'unless the sign says "locally grown" chances are that the fruit was picked green, shipped in from somewhere far away and gassed with ethylene. Ethylene is a gas produced by the combustion of kerosene, and by ripening fruit. The fruit is gassed right before it is placed in the store to de-green it. I didn't realize that. Why isn't that considered part of the information we need to know, like ingredients. I work with people who have food allergies and sensitivities, I had never thought that the 'ripening' chemicals might play a part.

When I get curious I like to create experiments. I think experiments are more fun then pure research and make a clearer point. So, I'm going to make two recipes; one with regular grocery produce and one with organic. I'm choosing to make a veggie stir fry.

Here are the ingredients: carrots, green beans, zucchini, red pepper, asparagus, mushrooms, celery, pea pods, and broccoli, garlic and herb infused extra-virgin olive oil (homemade with herbs from our garden).

Hands down the organic stir fry tasted better. The veggies cooked up more consistently and had more water in the bottom of the pan. It also cost about twice as much.

I'm sorry I didn't take pictures of the completed dish. I will with future experiments.

So, the lesson here is: locally grown and organic tastes like the food it is meant to be.

Garlic-Poppy Seed Salad Dressing

This is our favorite dressing and we make it with a strong garlic flavor.

Enjoy!

1 to 3 large cloves garlic minced (1 clove for mild flavor, 3 cloves for "WHOO-WEE now that's garlic!")
1 cup Italian extra-virgin olive oil (chemicals and high heat are not allowed in the processing of virgin olive oils)
1/2 cup apple cider vinegar
3/4 cup  sugar
1/2 to 1 Tablespoon poppy seed
1/2 to 1 Tablespoon sesame seed

Place ingredients together in a blender and hit the button.

This salad dressing is great on spinach salad with strawberries or a leaf lettuce salad with walnuts, cranberries, carrot and broccoli pieces. 

Real Sweets for the Sweet

Mireille and I are in the groove of removing foods that have more chemistry than biology. Dr. Clowder suggests the typical  ‘start clean’ approach of clearing your kitchen of any food product culprits. We decided to take it a bit slower and eliminate the foods we come across. I blame the Michigan-winter-hibernation feeling for our laid back approach. When spring arrives we will have the bounce back in our step, and, if necessary, attack the ignored corners of the pantry and freezer. 

While sorting out our food, I realize that we have been reading food labels all wrong. I have been looking at calories, amount of fat, and serving sizes. Now we look for food versus food products; biology versus chemistry. The last couple days our radar swipes have been calibrated to products with additive sugars, especially corn based sugars, namely high fructose corn syrup (HFCS).

What HFCS does to our bodies, is just is not worth the moment of flavor. Our metabolism interprets HFCS as a toxin and our liver has to work to break it down and out of our body.  Now I’m not sure how much you know about the liver, but it is numero uno for clearing out our blood. What the body can’t use or could be harmed by, that lovely organ nabs and forces out. Our liver just doesn’t work out the food we eat, it also breaks down hormones and other natural body chemicals. From my perspective, teenagers and mid-life adults going through the emotional roller coaster ride really need a relaxed liver. Could this be something else I can blame…I mean another reason for my occasional state of irritation, a weary liver?  

Along with HFCS roughing up the liver, in the process of clearing it, the liver creates fat and triglycerides. What? A sugar substitute that makes my body create fat and raises my cholesterol….ah no thanks.

 So here’s what we are watching for:

• -    High fructose corn syrup
• -     Corn syrup solids (that just sounds awful)
• -     Polysorbate 80 ( wasn’t that a rock group?)
• -    And off course any chemical sweeteners: aspartame, stevia, splenda, saccharine, acesulfame K,  cyclamate (isn’t that a drug name?), and sorbitol

**Note at 87°F aspartame degrades into formaldehyde, methanol and formic acid all toxic to humans.

So this week we said good bye to our store bought ketchup, syrup, some sauces and salad dressings. We have begun eating a lot of salads with our own homemade dressings (recipes to follow) and I’m wondering why we ever left them. Though we both agree it’s time to dive into the cook books find more biology recipes.

Saute of Baby Spinach - first French recipe and it's a keeper

Our first recipe!
Biology has all the points on this recipe.
It's easy and delicious.

Mireille and I are adding recipes to the blog as an electronic recipe holder. Back in the day, I would have written this one down on a 3x5 card and made another card for Mireille. How nice all we have to do now is add a label to our post and Voila!  Enjoy!

 

Recipe
1 Tablespoon butter
2 Tablespoon olive oil (extra virgin)
2 cloves of garlic, minced
6 cups baby spinach leaves
juice of one lemon (I squeezed half a lemon over the dish)

In a large skillet over medium heat, melt the butter with the olive oil. When they begin to foam, add the garlic and spinach leaves. Cover and cook for about one minute. Uncover, stir the spinach a bit and cover again. Cook until the spinach has barely wilted, but is still bright green, another 30 secs to 1 minute.
Remove from heat, stir in the lemon juice and serve immediately.

Served 4 (French serving size, not American)

Faux food

Already I like this book: The French Don’t Diet Plan. Dr. Clower, the author, is a neurophysiologist who studied in France. Two of my favorite things, neuro-science and France, are brought together.   Dr. Clower’s whole family also delighted in French cuisine and became healthier. I have stumbled upon the perfect guidebook to begin my journey.

So we’re starting off this adventure by following Dr. Clower’s lead.
His book is divided into three steps:

1.       What we eat

2.       How we eat

3.       Changing what we eat and how we eat for our entire life.

1.       What we eat

Habit : Eat real food
Idea: Some foods are natural; some are inventions.

Mireille, my daughter and climbing partner, is in her Junior year at K college majoring in biology. I teach high school chemistry. When we looked at foods in our cupboard they fit more into my classes than hers. As I read aloud the ingredients in a loaf of whole wheat bread, I felt like I was preparing for a class lab. Mirielle and I decided to make a game of it and take sides, biology verses chemistry, and see who would have the most ingredients in the foods we could have for breakfast and lunch. Here’s how it played out:

Food                                                              Biology                 Chemistry

Quaker Oatmeal w/apple                                   3                               0
        brown sugar

Apple Cinnamon instant oatmeal                        5                              11          

Crunchy nut cereal                                             9                              15

Vanilla Greek Yogurht                                       5                                2

Whole wheat bread                                           9                               10          

Jennie-o smoked turkey                                     4                               10          

Lettuce                                                             1                                 0

Meijer Mustard                                                 6                                 0

Real Mayonnaise                                               7                                 1                             

Progresso chkn noodle soup                            17                                11

Trader Joe’s swt potato soup                            9                                 0

                                                                           

I learned that sometimes we eat real food and other times we eat food products. Looking over the values for bread and Progresso soup, Mireille and I decided that it wasn’t just enough that biology would win the match; the goal is for Chemistry to be at zero. Early on in my children’s lives I told them to eat foods that were “grown in the sun”, funny how what goes around comes around.

To Life!

“A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step” Lao Tzu

On New Year’s Day, 1/1/11, I returned from a glorious two week vacation in France. While in Paris and Strasbourg, I guiltlessly indulged in any French culinary delight I desired. Every morning we shopped open markets choosing from fresh fruit and vegetables. After filling our baskets with brightly colored tangerines, apples, bananas, beans, and carrots, we strolled through meat markets and patisseries adding baguettes, almond croissants, and cheeses to our bulging cloth bags. Our delicious dinners ended with banana-Nutella crepes, fruit tarts, or an assortment of French chocolates. I did not count calories or carbs, and never saw a “low fat” or “light” food the entire trip, after all I was on my dream vacation.  

I boarded the plane in Paris re-energized and happy to face whatever number my bathroom scale rudely choose to announce. After a couple days of reacclimating to life at home, I gathered up the courage to check my weight. I held my breath and my amazement found that I had lost several pounds. I then realized that my clothes were fit better and I didn’t have the nagging muscle kink in my lower back. I had all the benefits of dieting and working out without the even trying. 

I have vacationed in France twice (my first time in 1999) and both times I returned a healthier, happier hedonist. This trip I reached a goal that had eluded me for five years without the pain and sacrifice I had grown to believe was necessary. This I liked.

With mid-life vengeance, I am now devoted to recreating this “joie de vivre” experience in my everyday life. Until I am able to move to France, I will create a simpler, healthier life here, where I am, with calmer days, better tasting food, more movement and less stuff.

 

I am approaching my new life style as an adventure, a trial-and-error, try-something-new journey. I may not have a map, but I do have an idea, a climbing partner, and several guide books to lead the way. I am using this electronic journal for motivation as I record my excursions and track my progress. 

First, I’ll be reviewing the advice in self-improvement books, comparing and contrasting recommendations from American and Mediterranean perspectives, trying new recipes, eliminating foods, changing habits, and reveling in the time spent doing what I enjoy. 

I am beginning with the guide book “The French Don’t Diet Plan” by Dr. Will Clower.