Wednesday, February 26, 2014
This Week's Meals
I've just gotten home from the grocery store. There is only one thing that sends me to the store at 3:30 on a weekday afternoon. Coffee! I'm cutting back and maybe forgoing it for Lent. Hey, it's my only addiction, so at 31 I think I'm doing pretty well.
The mess in my kitchen does not look like progress or planning, but it is both. Between food and artwork, the counters are covered. I have chicken stock in the crock pot. It's been on low for going on 24 hours. The next step is to remove the chicken, de-bone (and talk Frank into cracking said bones open before tossing them back in the pot), put the bones back in and let it hang out until tomorrow morning. Bone broth--even better than plain old broth. Whole organic chickens were my splurge at the grocery store this week. I got two. Somehow it makes me feel better about eating meat if it was humanely raised and slaughtered. That's another post--Kate the would-be ethical vegan. I'll make broth, freeze it in ice-cube trays to use for other recipes, and save the picked meat for other things. Three cheers for me--I found some big girl panties and put that baggie of organ meats into the crock pot, too. We should all eat more organ meat, but I just cannot bring myself to do it.
Also on the counter is some flour soaking in buttermilk for breakfast tomorrow morning. Pancakes are always a hit, and these from Nourishing Traditions are chewier and thicker. Dense but flavorful and filling. For breakfast, we often have soaked oats, preferably steel cut, or these pancakes topped with cultured butter and local honey. My favorite breakfast is Fage Total topped with my soaked oat granola and a superfood breakfast mix--cacao nibs, goji berries, and chia seeds. I get all three of those bulk for much better prices from that Frontier co-op I love. Of course, there is always fruit and/or eggs to round out the most important meal of the day.
This week has been a blur between a run to the Commissary on Monday, contractors working on sealing up a couple of doors in the house, and keeping up with the kids. We've also had another big weather change that had them looking run down yesterday. I've been giving them my elderberry glycerite (again, bulk elderberries from Frontier), 10 drops of echinacea/goldenseal tincture, and local honey mixed with warm water 3x daily. Doubled up on our usual 1/2 teaspoon of Nordic Naturals fish oil, too. Fingers crossed some good herbs and whole foods keep them healthy!
I meant to share our meal plans for the week on Monday or Tuesday. In fact, the description of my kitchen and grocery run above is from late yesterday afternoon. Here's my plan that developed Saturday or Sunday in my head and has just now made it out into print:
Stir fry--head of cabbage, veggies that needed to get used up, and organice grass-fed steak chopped into little pieces, and some seasoning. Easy. No recipe. Lots of garlic and ginger. Some coconut amnios and rice wine vinegar. Turned out delicious.
Baked black beans with guacamole and fried plantains. Turned out delicious except the plantains were a little under ripe. The produce guy told me that they used to stock them brown and ripe, but nobody bought them. I have to buy them yellow and wait....
Sweet potato veggie cakes (again, from Nourishing Traditions.). The veggies are shredded not pureed. Some sort of salad with the romaine I got on sale.
Paleo chicken tenders, steamed broccoli, and baked fries (with large amounts of ketchup for all but Frank) or pot roast with the same veggies. It depends on what I pull out of the freezer. I got organic chicken breasts and chuck roasts on special a few weeks ago.
What's on your menu?
Thursday, February 20, 2014
Cultured Kids
As in probiotics, active cultures, microorganisms that are beneficial to our guts not art museums, violin lessons, and cotillion. I am not a scientist or a nutritionist, but I get the whole gut flora thing. I don't always do things 100% right to keep ours healthy, but I understand why it's important. If the little bugs that live inside you and keep things inside happy are not happy, that's no good.
There also exists a school of thought which says that generations of damaged/improperly balanced guts leaves us with an inheritance of weakened immune systems, allergies, infertility, and overall less health and well-being than those who ate optimally and did not have the environmental toxins we are daily exposed to no matter how "clean" we try and live. The Weston A. Price Foundation has plenty of information about this. Suffice it to say that if you know better about your gut, you should aim to do better. Science is showing is that a healthy gut is more important that we might assume.
My first experience using a probiotic powder was when Isabelle was about nine months old. She had a urinary tract infection. It was asymptomatic until it was really bad. With an infant who nurses on demand, eats some "real" food, and sips a little water from a cup, normal grumpiness from teething is hard to distinguish from other discomforts. She had to have a very strong antibiotic, so I ventured into Whole Foods for the first time utterly lost and purchased an infant probiotic powder. Even though the pediatrician didn't have anything very positive to say about probiotics other than, "It can't hurt," I needed to try it and know that I was doing everything (that I knew at the time) to help her get better. It made sense to me she needed help rebuilding her good gut flora since antibiotics are broad-spectrum and kill the harmful and beneficial things in your system. We used it. It was fine. It was not mind-blowing.
Fast forward one year almost to the day. Again, we are at Whole Foods. I am about 35 weeks pregnant and in search of the items on my list to kill Group B strep. Isabelle's birth was completely hijacked by GBS and the antibiotics I thought I needed. That's a whole other story. I guess I'll share it soon, too, since Will's birth story has been floating around for a while now.
I had the same list of supplements/homeopathic remedies when I was pregnant with her, but I didn't have the scoop on GBS. What you don't know can a) hurt you and b) dramatically affect your birth plan c) wipe out your baby's gut flora in utero if you have as much intravenous antibiotics in labor as I did. I got everything on my list, took it twice daily until he was born, swabbed myself for GBS (my awesome midwives offered but said that given the choice, most women your rather do it themselves)at 38 weeks, and tested negative. I'm beginning to be a little amazed.
Between then and now, we have used several different brands--some capsules, some powder, some even for the animals. I think eating Activia is a complete joke. When I buy a probiotic supplement, I want to know how many billion (yes, BILLION) active cells it contains. Between all of the sugar and over-pasteurized nutritionally devoid dairy, yogurt doesn't offer much. I'm not saying it doesn't taste good, but I'd rather have ice cream for the sugar (or aspartame which is far, far worse). Sidenote--when you eat yogurt, please, please eat real whole-fat yogurt and put fruit and honey into it. It's part of the "eat real food" plan.
I do think that probiotic powders have their place and are great for boosting your immune system when sick, traveling, run down, for infants and children, etc.... Not very long ago, I had a lightbulb moment. Stupid, really, but if the obviously lab-created powders are good for you, wouldn't foods that naturally contain various strains of live cultures be even better? Just like how you can take a whole-foods based multi-vitamin but ideally we all get the needed nutrients from food and ditch the vitamins?
Part of the reason I'm willing to try incorporate more cultured foods into our everyday eating is that my kids have opposite problems with the same end--one goes too much and too loose, one goes too seldom and it just doesn't smell right. Yuck, I know. Once you have kids, you'll be amazed how much you end up talking about poop. It doesn't gross me out anymore--exploding diapers, catbox, doula work, whatever. It's just poop. With my kids, I honestly think of it as an indicator of how well I'm doing for them nutritionally. There is actually a right and wrong look and smell for elimination.
Maybe I inherited crappy gut flora and passed it on, but I have that knowledge and some tools to help remedy the issue. So, I started giving them kombucha, a nutritionally loaded fermented drink. They also get plenty of that whole-fat plain greek yogurt. I picked up some creme fraiche, cultured butter, and naturally lacto-fermented pickles. I didn't set my cap on them eating the sauerkraut I struggle to choke down--"It's good for me. It's good for me. It's good for me," is my mantra as it goes down.
It helps. Noticeably so. I am impressed. I like what what I'm seeing says. One goes more often and it doesn't smell like stale airplane bathroom. The other doesn't run from the table to the potty to have pine cone squiggle (you know the little brown things full of pollen that fall from the trees?) upset stomach. Hallelujah! I could easily digress into a Gargantua and Pantagruel style scatalogical moment, but I'll refrain.
Now, I'm not yet hardcore enough to try fermenting my own veggies or brewing kombucha yet. I've looked into a SCOBY and read up on how to maintain a "mother." The part about the mushroom blooming in Nourishing Traditions did me in. I'm afraid I'll be added to a wierdo granola watchlist if I google "mother mushroom bloom where to buy." I might be on one already. I'm a bit seditious. My grocery budget cannot sustain me buying it in quite the quantities I'd like, so maybe I'll get up some nerve and ask around for an extra SCOBY...and pretend I don't know that it's a 'shroom.
Fermented foods and foods with live cultures are important to maintaining wellness. Not preventing illness or getting healthy. Maintaining wellness or health and curing or avoiding disease are two very different paradigms. Compared to even our grandparents (for my generation), our immune systems have to work even harder to keep us healthy. We of course have wider access to medical care when it's appropriate, and that does provide some counterbalance. Honestly, though, so many of us are so dependent on medicine to patch us through, and I think that's our bodies crying for help. Maybe just nutrition.
Most of us do not eat locally enough, grow/raise enough or our own food, or consume raw dairy products. That's part confession on my part. We could do better in those areas. We don't "put up" vegetables as relishes or pickles to ferment. A large percentage of what we eat does not come from near enough to our everyday paths to be considered part of our microbiome--ie their microorganisms are part of our body's flora. It's really interesting to think that with the technological advances that came from people moving from their family farms into the city and suburbs we lost a lot of nutritional wisdom. That loss is really catching up with us.
I'm glad to know about these building blocks of health if you will, these supplements that make up for our lacking diets, lacking knowledge, and GMO foods whose purported nutrients are not really bioavailable. I'm glad to know that I can run to the store and buy a probiotic, some good fish oil or D3 when the days shorten, and beef that I didn't have to do in myself. I'm also glad to be learning more about how to get what we need from incorporating more cultured and fermented foods into our daily routine.
I've been thinking about this for a while, and amidst my culture increasing this little gem appeared in my inbox. I subscribe to her blog and am always drawn into her writing. I've read several other places about gut flora related to birth, breastfeeding, babies going long periods without a bowel movement. It's all fascinating and admittedly over my head.
We mothers have the power to reverse if not prevent this in our children. How empowering and terrifying. The Nourishing Traditions Book of Baby and Child Care puts it into layman's terms and even lays out an ideal way of eating preconception and prenatally to put vitamin and mineral stores and gut flora into their best working order. I do feel overwhelmed by this. On the other hand, looking at the sicknesses that hopefully will pass them over and the vastly improved cognitive function healthier guts can give them, how can I not try and do better for them?
There also exists a school of thought which says that generations of damaged/improperly balanced guts leaves us with an inheritance of weakened immune systems, allergies, infertility, and overall less health and well-being than those who ate optimally and did not have the environmental toxins we are daily exposed to no matter how "clean" we try and live. The Weston A. Price Foundation has plenty of information about this. Suffice it to say that if you know better about your gut, you should aim to do better. Science is showing is that a healthy gut is more important that we might assume.
My first experience using a probiotic powder was when Isabelle was about nine months old. She had a urinary tract infection. It was asymptomatic until it was really bad. With an infant who nurses on demand, eats some "real" food, and sips a little water from a cup, normal grumpiness from teething is hard to distinguish from other discomforts. She had to have a very strong antibiotic, so I ventured into Whole Foods for the first time utterly lost and purchased an infant probiotic powder. Even though the pediatrician didn't have anything very positive to say about probiotics other than, "It can't hurt," I needed to try it and know that I was doing everything (that I knew at the time) to help her get better. It made sense to me she needed help rebuilding her good gut flora since antibiotics are broad-spectrum and kill the harmful and beneficial things in your system. We used it. It was fine. It was not mind-blowing.
Fast forward one year almost to the day. Again, we are at Whole Foods. I am about 35 weeks pregnant and in search of the items on my list to kill Group B strep. Isabelle's birth was completely hijacked by GBS and the antibiotics I thought I needed. That's a whole other story. I guess I'll share it soon, too, since Will's birth story has been floating around for a while now.
I had the same list of supplements/homeopathic remedies when I was pregnant with her, but I didn't have the scoop on GBS. What you don't know can a) hurt you and b) dramatically affect your birth plan c) wipe out your baby's gut flora in utero if you have as much intravenous antibiotics in labor as I did. I got everything on my list, took it twice daily until he was born, swabbed myself for GBS (my awesome midwives offered but said that given the choice, most women your rather do it themselves)at 38 weeks, and tested negative. I'm beginning to be a little amazed.
Between then and now, we have used several different brands--some capsules, some powder, some even for the animals. I think eating Activia is a complete joke. When I buy a probiotic supplement, I want to know how many billion (yes, BILLION) active cells it contains. Between all of the sugar and over-pasteurized nutritionally devoid dairy, yogurt doesn't offer much. I'm not saying it doesn't taste good, but I'd rather have ice cream for the sugar (or aspartame which is far, far worse). Sidenote--when you eat yogurt, please, please eat real whole-fat yogurt and put fruit and honey into it. It's part of the "eat real food" plan.
I do think that probiotic powders have their place and are great for boosting your immune system when sick, traveling, run down, for infants and children, etc.... Not very long ago, I had a lightbulb moment. Stupid, really, but if the obviously lab-created powders are good for you, wouldn't foods that naturally contain various strains of live cultures be even better? Just like how you can take a whole-foods based multi-vitamin but ideally we all get the needed nutrients from food and ditch the vitamins?
 | |
| All of the "cultured" things in my fridge at the moment. The cultures and fats in the butter and creme are delicate, so we use them as toppers since heat damages them. Same for buttermilk and yogurt--I don't kid myself that cooking with them is the same as having them straight from the fridge. |
Maybe I inherited crappy gut flora and passed it on, but I have that knowledge and some tools to help remedy the issue. So, I started giving them kombucha, a nutritionally loaded fermented drink. They also get plenty of that whole-fat plain greek yogurt. I picked up some creme fraiche, cultured butter, and naturally lacto-fermented pickles. I didn't set my cap on them eating the sauerkraut I struggle to choke down--"It's good for me. It's good for me. It's good for me," is my mantra as it goes down.
It helps. Noticeably so. I am impressed. I like what what I'm seeing says. One goes more often and it doesn't smell like stale airplane bathroom. The other doesn't run from the table to the potty to have pine cone squiggle (you know the little brown things full of pollen that fall from the trees?) upset stomach. Hallelujah! I could easily digress into a Gargantua and Pantagruel style scatalogical moment, but I'll refrain.
Now, I'm not yet hardcore enough to try fermenting my own veggies or brewing kombucha yet. I've looked into a SCOBY and read up on how to maintain a "mother." The part about the mushroom blooming in Nourishing Traditions did me in. I'm afraid I'll be added to a wierdo granola watchlist if I google "mother mushroom bloom where to buy." I might be on one already. I'm a bit seditious. My grocery budget cannot sustain me buying it in quite the quantities I'd like, so maybe I'll get up some nerve and ask around for an extra SCOBY...and pretend I don't know that it's a 'shroom.
Fermented foods and foods with live cultures are important to maintaining wellness. Not preventing illness or getting healthy. Maintaining wellness or health and curing or avoiding disease are two very different paradigms. Compared to even our grandparents (for my generation), our immune systems have to work even harder to keep us healthy. We of course have wider access to medical care when it's appropriate, and that does provide some counterbalance. Honestly, though, so many of us are so dependent on medicine to patch us through, and I think that's our bodies crying for help. Maybe just nutrition.
Most of us do not eat locally enough, grow/raise enough or our own food, or consume raw dairy products. That's part confession on my part. We could do better in those areas. We don't "put up" vegetables as relishes or pickles to ferment. A large percentage of what we eat does not come from near enough to our everyday paths to be considered part of our microbiome--ie their microorganisms are part of our body's flora. It's really interesting to think that with the technological advances that came from people moving from their family farms into the city and suburbs we lost a lot of nutritional wisdom. That loss is really catching up with us.
I'm glad to know about these building blocks of health if you will, these supplements that make up for our lacking diets, lacking knowledge, and GMO foods whose purported nutrients are not really bioavailable. I'm glad to know that I can run to the store and buy a probiotic, some good fish oil or D3 when the days shorten, and beef that I didn't have to do in myself. I'm also glad to be learning more about how to get what we need from incorporating more cultured and fermented foods into our daily routine.
I've been thinking about this for a while, and amidst my culture increasing this little gem appeared in my inbox. I subscribe to her blog and am always drawn into her writing. I've read several other places about gut flora related to birth, breastfeeding, babies going long periods without a bowel movement. It's all fascinating and admittedly over my head.
We mothers have the power to reverse if not prevent this in our children. How empowering and terrifying. The Nourishing Traditions Book of Baby and Child Care puts it into layman's terms and even lays out an ideal way of eating preconception and prenatally to put vitamin and mineral stores and gut flora into their best working order. I do feel overwhelmed by this. On the other hand, looking at the sicknesses that hopefully will pass them over and the vastly improved cognitive function healthier guts can give them, how can I not try and do better for them?
Tuesday, February 18, 2014
Monday, Monday
Ba-da, ba-da-da-da.... How about just another manic Monday? There are lots of song lyrics about Mondays. We all know why. Yesterday was a very Monday Monday. Despite that, I finished up several things and have a precious float almost ready for tomorrow's Mini Gras parade. Such a Monday was it that I here I sit on Tuesday typing what I wanted to post yesterday.
One of my goals for the week was to be better prepared. For me that means planning ahead for school days, having laundry done and put away, having a semi-clean and neat house, and having a list of several meals to put on the table for dinner.
Meal planning is not my favorite thing nor is scrambling at 4 when we are all hungry and tired. Previously, I'd make my list of meals, check the pantry, make a grocery list to make up for lacking ingredients, then go shopping. It often involved multiple stores in Mississippi to find the things I needed and wanted. Here in Mobile, I can go in Publix and get everything, even natural-minded medicinal items and teas. I also track the weekly and monthly sales fliers at Fresh Market. They really have some good deals several times a month if you watch.
For shopping, I make a simple list of everyday needs then go see what produce and/or meat is on sale. I get the ingredients then make my meal list. It ends up being about the same cost if not less expensive and works because we keep it simple. I just don't have time for 12 ingredient stir fry sauces. Not that more complicated cooking isn't delicious, but I don't enjoy the prepwork and subsequent cleanup on a typical weekday. For example, this week I only bought one package of chicken thighs and plan on using things from the freezer for other meals.
When I say simple, I mean it. Veggies are roasted, steamed, and maybe topped with cultured butter or coconut oil and sea salt. Meats are baked, braised, sauteed, or slow-cooked in a dutch oven. I've gotten better with the actual slow-cooker, but I still find the taste better and the meat more tender when cooked in the enameled cast iron dutch ovens. Every 1-3 weeks, I make hummus from soaked garbanzo beans, granola from soaked oats, a big jar of balsamic dressing, Frank makes bread, and I cook up a big pot of quinoa. I make huge batches of kidney, black, and garbanzo beans and freeze what we won't use immediately. I have a very simple repertoire of recipes. I don't get terribly creative or obsess over it anymore.
We are not 100% grain free anymore. What grains and beans we do are usually (ideally) soaked before eating. Nuts, too. To keep costs down since I am more and more committed to buying organic and/or verified non-GMO when possible, I buy grains and beans bulk at Publix. It's SO much less expensive than cans of beans and boxes of oatmeal and quinoa. I'd even wager that the pricing is on par with the Commissary (military base grocery store) pricing. Organic nuts are not in my budget, so I get big bags at Sam's club. You can't beat the price, and I do feel like the soaking and oven-drying process helps get some of the ick out. I would rather eat well and not take vacations than save for a vacation by eating junk. Studies like this one just published by Harvard are constant reminders that what we put inside ourselves, more importantly our children, is of critical importance.
Some other things I try and keep on hand ready to eat are avocados, apples, carrots, celery, oranges, bananas, boiled eggs, pickles, cherry tomatoes, cucumber, whole-fat plain greek yogurt, kombucha, organic somewhat local milk, coconut or almond milk, nitrite/nitrate-free bacon (I buy extra when it's on sale), and Applegate sandwich meat (again I buy up when there is a sale and freeze it for Will). In the freezer for back-up is organic ground meat, Applegate nuggets (come on, every now and then), grass-fed hotdogs, Rudi's tortillas, a couple of Amy's pizzas, and any cuts of meat I find on special. My pantry staples are a variety of organic canned tomatoes, canned organic green beans, canned pumpkin, a variety of flours, oats both rolled and steel cut, balsamic vinegar, honey, coconut oil, a box of O's just in case, some arrowroot cookies or ginger snaps, and a variety of "crispy" (soaked and baked dry on low heat) nuts. We don't use up every single thing ever in a month, and the produce is part of my weekly grocery trip.
There's an old saying (and a book) about eating to live not living to eat. Simple semantics, right? Well, eating to live can easily turn into living to eat when you are doing your very best to learn about, find, go get, and prepare nutritious meals for your family. I keep a running list of the biggies we need from the Commissary and Sam's. I make weekly lists of perishables and everyday items. All of the planning, getting, and making gets obsessive very easily. It is important to me, but so are other things in life. I don't want to be as consumed with food as Pinterest gets me. Keeping a well-stocked pantry and some things in the freezer helps me not live to eat. So do simple menus based on what I can find and what my kids will eat like this:
Sunday--Garam masala meatballs, quinoa, and roasted veggies (Maybe recipe coming later for this one. It is really easy and fast)
Monday--Beet pancakes and fresh berries
Tuesday--Braised pork (based on this with only salt and pepper to season then topped with a jar of chutney in the last hour of cooking), steamed green beans (they were on special last week), and baby sweet potatoes.
Wednesday--leftovers
Thursday--Slow cooker chicken curry with veggies and quinoa
Friday--pizza or leftovers
That's it! Nothing fancy. Not a million pots, pans, and prep bowls dirty and priorities somewhat well aligned.
One of my goals for the week was to be better prepared. For me that means planning ahead for school days, having laundry done and put away, having a semi-clean and neat house, and having a list of several meals to put on the table for dinner.
Meal planning is not my favorite thing nor is scrambling at 4 when we are all hungry and tired. Previously, I'd make my list of meals, check the pantry, make a grocery list to make up for lacking ingredients, then go shopping. It often involved multiple stores in Mississippi to find the things I needed and wanted. Here in Mobile, I can go in Publix and get everything, even natural-minded medicinal items and teas. I also track the weekly and monthly sales fliers at Fresh Market. They really have some good deals several times a month if you watch.
For shopping, I make a simple list of everyday needs then go see what produce and/or meat is on sale. I get the ingredients then make my meal list. It ends up being about the same cost if not less expensive and works because we keep it simple. I just don't have time for 12 ingredient stir fry sauces. Not that more complicated cooking isn't delicious, but I don't enjoy the prepwork and subsequent cleanup on a typical weekday. For example, this week I only bought one package of chicken thighs and plan on using things from the freezer for other meals.
When I say simple, I mean it. Veggies are roasted, steamed, and maybe topped with cultured butter or coconut oil and sea salt. Meats are baked, braised, sauteed, or slow-cooked in a dutch oven. I've gotten better with the actual slow-cooker, but I still find the taste better and the meat more tender when cooked in the enameled cast iron dutch ovens. Every 1-3 weeks, I make hummus from soaked garbanzo beans, granola from soaked oats, a big jar of balsamic dressing, Frank makes bread, and I cook up a big pot of quinoa. I make huge batches of kidney, black, and garbanzo beans and freeze what we won't use immediately. I have a very simple repertoire of recipes. I don't get terribly creative or obsess over it anymore.
We are not 100% grain free anymore. What grains and beans we do are usually (ideally) soaked before eating. Nuts, too. To keep costs down since I am more and more committed to buying organic and/or verified non-GMO when possible, I buy grains and beans bulk at Publix. It's SO much less expensive than cans of beans and boxes of oatmeal and quinoa. I'd even wager that the pricing is on par with the Commissary (military base grocery store) pricing. Organic nuts are not in my budget, so I get big bags at Sam's club. You can't beat the price, and I do feel like the soaking and oven-drying process helps get some of the ick out. I would rather eat well and not take vacations than save for a vacation by eating junk. Studies like this one just published by Harvard are constant reminders that what we put inside ourselves, more importantly our children, is of critical importance.
Some other things I try and keep on hand ready to eat are avocados, apples, carrots, celery, oranges, bananas, boiled eggs, pickles, cherry tomatoes, cucumber, whole-fat plain greek yogurt, kombucha, organic somewhat local milk, coconut or almond milk, nitrite/nitrate-free bacon (I buy extra when it's on sale), and Applegate sandwich meat (again I buy up when there is a sale and freeze it for Will). In the freezer for back-up is organic ground meat, Applegate nuggets (come on, every now and then), grass-fed hotdogs, Rudi's tortillas, a couple of Amy's pizzas, and any cuts of meat I find on special. My pantry staples are a variety of organic canned tomatoes, canned organic green beans, canned pumpkin, a variety of flours, oats both rolled and steel cut, balsamic vinegar, honey, coconut oil, a box of O's just in case, some arrowroot cookies or ginger snaps, and a variety of "crispy" (soaked and baked dry on low heat) nuts. We don't use up every single thing ever in a month, and the produce is part of my weekly grocery trip.
There's an old saying (and a book) about eating to live not living to eat. Simple semantics, right? Well, eating to live can easily turn into living to eat when you are doing your very best to learn about, find, go get, and prepare nutritious meals for your family. I keep a running list of the biggies we need from the Commissary and Sam's. I make weekly lists of perishables and everyday items. All of the planning, getting, and making gets obsessive very easily. It is important to me, but so are other things in life. I don't want to be as consumed with food as Pinterest gets me. Keeping a well-stocked pantry and some things in the freezer helps me not live to eat. So do simple menus based on what I can find and what my kids will eat like this:
Sunday--Garam masala meatballs, quinoa, and roasted veggies (Maybe recipe coming later for this one. It is really easy and fast)
Monday--Beet pancakes and fresh berries
Tuesday--Braised pork (based on this with only salt and pepper to season then topped with a jar of chutney in the last hour of cooking), steamed green beans (they were on special last week), and baby sweet potatoes.
Wednesday--leftovers
Thursday--Slow cooker chicken curry with veggies and quinoa
Friday--pizza or leftovers
That's it! Nothing fancy. Not a million pots, pans, and prep bowls dirty and priorities somewhat well aligned.
Wednesday, February 5, 2014
Banana Oatmeal
This is short and sweet. So much so that it's almost embarrassing to write down as an actual recipe. Truth be told, it's a go-to for me. Both kids LOVE it, like yell, "Yay! Oatmeal!" after asking, "What's for dinner?" It's just this kind of no-brainer meal that is sanity-saving for me after a long day when I have not planned well and have two exhausted children who need to be in bed asap. This filling oatmeal is definitely on the wear them out, fill the up, and put them down plan.
We love steel cut oats. They are slightly chewy and almost nutty in flavor. They are also closer to the actual plant than rolled oats, so they are less processed. Maybe it's my Scottish heritage that makes them a comfort food not the good-for-me factor.
Soaking them makes them more easily digested and their nutrients more bioavailable. If you are new to soaking (I've not yet graduated to sprouting), here is a quick primer: The whole idea of soaking grains (and nuts, seeds, and beans) is to trick the plant. The plant is naturally coats its seed with a substance meant to keep it germinating until an animal has eaten it, digested it, and deposited it elsewhere. It's a very easy and smart way for a plant to spread itself as widely as possible before sprouting a new generation. Dandelions rely on wind to carry their seeds far and near. Other plants rely on roaming animals pooping far away.
On that note, here's the recipe if you still feel like eating:
1 1/2 cup steel cut oats
1 ripe banana
Sea salt
Cultured butter
Cinnamon
Soak the oats perferably overnight or at least 6 hours. Mine were only soaked for about an hour and did take longer to cook, about 20 minutes. After soaking, place in a fine strainer and rinse. Put into a large pot and barley cover with water, about 1/4 above the oats if you barely soaked like me, less if you soaked.
Cook over high heat until boiling, stirring frequently. Once you get a good rolling boil, reduce heat to low to medium low. Stir constantly, and cook until thick. When you scrape your spoon across the bottom of the pan, it should make a line that the oatmeal slowly slides back into.
Turn the heat off and let cool slightly in the pot.
Chop your banana and divide between two bowls. Mash with a fork.
Add oatmeal, stir, and top with cultured butter, a few dashed of cinnamon, and maybe some honey. Honey will make oatmeal soupy, so go easy on it.
Let it sit a few more minutes to cool, let the kids eat, and hope your bowls look like this in a few minutes.
We love steel cut oats. They are slightly chewy and almost nutty in flavor. They are also closer to the actual plant than rolled oats, so they are less processed. Maybe it's my Scottish heritage that makes them a comfort food not the good-for-me factor.
Soaking them makes them more easily digested and their nutrients more bioavailable. If you are new to soaking (I've not yet graduated to sprouting), here is a quick primer: The whole idea of soaking grains (and nuts, seeds, and beans) is to trick the plant. The plant is naturally coats its seed with a substance meant to keep it germinating until an animal has eaten it, digested it, and deposited it elsewhere. It's a very easy and smart way for a plant to spread itself as widely as possible before sprouting a new generation. Dandelions rely on wind to carry their seeds far and near. Other plants rely on roaming animals pooping far away.
On that note, here's the recipe if you still feel like eating:
1 1/2 cup steel cut oats
1 ripe banana
Sea salt
Cultured butter
Cinnamon
Soak the oats perferably overnight or at least 6 hours. Mine were only soaked for about an hour and did take longer to cook, about 20 minutes. After soaking, place in a fine strainer and rinse. Put into a large pot and barley cover with water, about 1/4 above the oats if you barely soaked like me, less if you soaked.
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| Soaking oats |
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| My very scientific way of measuring |
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| A rolling boil |
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| Consistency check |
Chop your banana and divide between two bowls. Mash with a fork.
Add oatmeal, stir, and top with cultured butter, a few dashed of cinnamon, and maybe some honey. Honey will make oatmeal soupy, so go easy on it.
Let it sit a few more minutes to cool, let the kids eat, and hope your bowls look like this in a few minutes.
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| The dinner table was all but silent tonight |
Simple Tomato Sauce
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| Oops! Forgot to put the garlic in the shot. |
Maybe you do, but I don't usually have prosciutto, heavy cream, or the time and energy to spend on the food processor. If your family (or picky kid) prefers smoother sauce, feel free to use the food processor. Have fun washing it afterwards. This adaptation is an easy everyday meal. My pickier kid slurps it up with the chunks of veggies. He is actually why I started making it instead of falling back on a jar of premade here and there. He will not touch jarred sauce, even organic and/or reduced sodium, not even for the fun of noodles. There are some other things he refuses to eat that are extremely processed, kind of like the canary in a mine. Of course, he'll knock you down for goldfish, marshmallows, and dye-loaded frosting.
It's also dinner for tomorrow. We have a busy day that will last well into the afternoon. I'm not usually one to plan ahead that well, but I had the time and ingredients today. It also gets better as it sits. Just leave it in the pot, let it cool, refrigerate, and pull out to reheat in the original pot.
Are you noticing a theme here? Minimizing dish washing!
4 carrots peeled and finely chopped
3 stalks celery finely chopped
1 large or 2 regular onions finely chopped
5-8 garlic cloves (We go through a lot of garlic) smashed then minced or peeled and grated on a microplane.
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| Lots of veggies, but they cook down well. |
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| Smashed, skins still on. |
1 lb. ground meat--turkey, beef, venison, chicken, some blend of any of these with sausage shucked from casings)
1-28 oz can crushed tomatoes (I have not gone so far as to put up my own tomatoes, but a food mill is on my ultimate kitchen tools list)
1 14.5 oz can diced tomatoes (we love fire-roasted)
1 6 oz can tomato paste (just in case your sauce doesn't thicken and you like a more stew-like sauce)
Italian seasoning
Nutmeg
Salt & pepper
Olive oil (or bacon grease, ghee, or tallow if you are all into the paleo thing and worried about rancid oils from heat)
Butter
In a large pot (perferably an enameled cast iron dutch oven) heat 2 Tbsp olive oil and 2 Tbsp butter over medium high heat. Once the foam on the butter subsides, add the carrots, celery, onion, and ground meat. Cook, stirring frequently until veggies are tender and meat is almost cooked through. This is easiest to tell with beef or venison. Toss garlic with salt & pepper plus 3-4 dashes of nutmeg on top and give it a quick turn around the pot, maybe 1 minute of constant stirring as garlic burns easily.
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| Like that hunk 'o turkey? |
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| Excuse my poor exposure here. Still getting to know the new camera and took these in a hurry. |
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| It was seriously purple when I first poured in the wine! |
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| Again, operator error with the camera. You get the idea. |
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| Thick with all the flavors well "married" and ready to eat. |
Monday, February 3, 2014
Soaked Bean Chili
It's that time of day when I'm either prepping what I can of the pre-planned dinner or scrambling to thaw what I've decided to throw together. This means I have to have a fairly decent stock of basic items. Tonight we are having Paleo Almond Chicken Tenders (if my chicken breasts thaw in time), baked sweet potatoes, and something green that has yet to be decided. They are delicious, require a few ingredients, and both kids like them. This is somewhat miraculous.
Spaghetti is my other last-minute fallback. Will eats spaghetti like he has not eaten for days. He is my pickier kid. He eats lots of things, but not lots of dinner-type things if that makes sense. Soup and casseroles are two of the biggies on his "no" list. This makes dinner challenging. Isabelle will wolf down just about anything.
I couple of weeks ago, I decided to try chili on top of spaghetti noodles. I'm not the first to make Mexican spaghetti. He always loves to help cook, so we made it together, and he ate it! I think he may have even enjoyed it!
The basic ingredients and cooking techniques for chili are just like that of spaghetti--one big pot, meat, onion, bell pepper, tomato--the spices and add-ins are where it gets different. Onion, bell pepper, various canned tomatoes, frozen veggies, and frozen meat are all basics for me. I can find all organic, the cans are BPA-free, and I can send Frank on a big trip to the commissary monthly to keep my pantry and freezer stocked without opening a vein at Publix. I can also order any organic spice that I need from the awesome Frontier co-op that a friend runs. Avoiding GMOs, eating organic foods, and eating fresh foods when and where you can and can afford does truly make a difference in your overall health.
Add the garlic, ingredients 11-13, and give a quick stir. Garlic burns easily, so have your tomatoes open and ready to pour in as soon as you give the garlic and spices a turn around the pot.
Add ingredients 5-7 to the pot ans stir until well combined. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low so that bubbles still break occasionally. This is a simmer.
Add ingredients 8-10 and stir gently. This is why you needed to use a big pot. Cover and forget about it for about 30 minutes to let the flavors meld. You may stir occasionally, but leave it alone for the most part.
After about 30 minutes, uncover and taste-test. Adjust seasonings to your liking and add a splash or water or stock if you like a soupier chili. Let it simmer and cook down for at least 30 more minutes, stirring occasionally. It will get darker red and the sweet potato will get tender.
Enjoy, and top with avocado, sour cream, creme fraiche (I'm all about those cultures!), whatever you like. If you don't want or need to put it on top of noodles, serve it with cornbread of course. Does that even need saying? We like the Pioneer Woman's Skillet Cornbread, though I make a few tweaks, including using bacon grease instead of shortening. Get a copy of Nourishing Traditions. It'll change your mind about animal fats and health.
Spaghetti is my other last-minute fallback. Will eats spaghetti like he has not eaten for days. He is my pickier kid. He eats lots of things, but not lots of dinner-type things if that makes sense. Soup and casseroles are two of the biggies on his "no" list. This makes dinner challenging. Isabelle will wolf down just about anything.
I couple of weeks ago, I decided to try chili on top of spaghetti noodles. I'm not the first to make Mexican spaghetti. He always loves to help cook, so we made it together, and he ate it! I think he may have even enjoyed it! The basic ingredients and cooking techniques for chili are just like that of spaghetti--one big pot, meat, onion, bell pepper, tomato--the spices and add-ins are where it gets different. Onion, bell pepper, various canned tomatoes, frozen veggies, and frozen meat are all basics for me. I can find all organic, the cans are BPA-free, and I can send Frank on a big trip to the commissary monthly to keep my pantry and freezer stocked without opening a vein at Publix. I can also order any organic spice that I need from the awesome Frontier co-op that a friend runs. Avoiding GMOs, eating organic foods, and eating fresh foods when and where you can and can afford does truly make a difference in your overall health. |
| One thumbs up |
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| Another thumbs up |
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| I hope your kid's plate will look like this |
- 1 pound grass-fed ground beef (optional: 1-1/2 pound of your favorite sausage, casings removed. I had chorizo from Fresh Market.)
- 1 green bell pepper, finely chopped
- 1 large onion, finely chopped
- 3-5 (or more for me!) cloves of garlic, grated on a microplane or smashed then minced
- 1 can of crushed tomatoes
- 1 can of tomato sauce
- 1 can tomato paste
- 1 large sweet potato, peeled and cut into about 1 inch chunks
- 2 cups soaked, precooked kidney beans (soak for 12-24 hours and cook. This makes the beans no big deal on your tummy and increases nutrient absorption)
- 1 10-oz package frozen corn (one can drained or 1 1/2c fresh may be substituted)
- 1 tsp salt
- 2 tsp cumin
- 2 tsp chili powder
Add the garlic, ingredients 11-13, and give a quick stir. Garlic burns easily, so have your tomatoes open and ready to pour in as soon as you give the garlic and spices a turn around the pot.
Add ingredients 5-7 to the pot ans stir until well combined. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low so that bubbles still break occasionally. This is a simmer.
Add ingredients 8-10 and stir gently. This is why you needed to use a big pot. Cover and forget about it for about 30 minutes to let the flavors meld. You may stir occasionally, but leave it alone for the most part.
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| Just after removing the lid |
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| See how much darker red and chunkier it gets? |
Enjoy, and top with avocado, sour cream, creme fraiche (I'm all about those cultures!), whatever you like. If you don't want or need to put it on top of noodles, serve it with cornbread of course. Does that even need saying? We like the Pioneer Woman's Skillet Cornbread, though I make a few tweaks, including using bacon grease instead of shortening. Get a copy of Nourishing Traditions. It'll change your mind about animal fats and health.
Sunday, February 2, 2014
EDD: Egg Deposit Deadline
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| First egg ever |
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| 6 egg day |
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23 September 2013
One of our six chickens has just begun laying. Her first egg appeared two weeks ago today. The first few were small, the last few have been about the size of a store bought large egg. They are all delicious.
She's been giving us one a day, usually mid-morning, so I've gotten in the habit of expecting one in the morning. I walk to the coop confident that I'll find another pretty, blue egg waiting in the egg box. I sweet talk her, pet her, and tell her what a good chickie she is. If the box is empty, I just come back later.
The past couple of days, though, I've really been almost peeved that she's not laying on a schedule. I've been giving her an EDD, a deadline based on my convenience
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| About when it all started |
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| Bitsey, the boss, mean muggin' |
She isn't on my clock. Gosh, somebody slap me. Hi, my name is Kate. You know, the birth activist who really thinks due dates are a complete myth? What is the deal here. I've gotta back off and let these feathered ladies do their thing. They really do remind me of ladies of decades past with ruffled petticoats peeking out from under long skirts.
So anyway, due dates...estimated dates of confinement, expiration dates. Yeah, they are all crap if you are healthy and your baby is, too. I just read the most amazing birth story of a first time mother who gestated happily for 43 weeks and birthed a 10 pound baby boy with her patient, supportive doctor cheering her on. Wow. Where is he? Can he teach seminars around the country?
Many of us, myself included, do have a last minute panic and feel like yes, I am going down in history as the first woman who was pregnant for forever. We put so much pressure on ourselves sometimes, and so do the people around us. It bubbles over as a meltdown most often or the kind of grumpiness that puts you in a funk. I don't want anybody to spend those last days of pregnancy down and/or anxious.
It's just so hard for me to hear about an intelligent, informed mother going back and forth with her provider about an arbitrary date and being pressured, scared, or convinced to accept intervention when both she and baby are still thriving. Even worse is hearing the woman who says things like, "I never could go into labor on my own." Your dates were wrong, my dear, not your body's clock or hormones.
Yes, there are women who carry babies ten full months, over 42 weeks no matter how you add up the dates, but I honestly think that is rare. Far more commonly do we miscalculate whether from lack of knowledge of how it actually all works, business, or just forgetting to track a month or two. It's easy to do. "Wait, did I ovulate last week or the one before?" That one week makes a huge difference depending on your provider who will likely rely on a date from an early ultrasound (which you do NOT have to have). Even fundal height can easily be off depending on who measures and how they do it.
We didn't all start menstruating on our 12th or 13th birthdays did we? Do we all ovulate on day 14 and have 28 day cycles. Do we all experience labor the exact same way? Do we all have our morning (or afternoon or evening) constitution at the same time? Do we all like to be intimate at the same time of day? Nope. Why on earth would we all fit into the very narrow window of acceptable dates for giving birth? Great apes have something like a 60 day window. Why is ours 28 days at best in most situations, since 37-40 is what's okay for women by the standards of many care providers? Bravo for the evidence-based practitioner who understands that 41 and even 42 weeks are nothing to fear. Sure, it's a period of watching and waiting, but not one inherently fraught with danger and fetal demises.
There are multiple ways of calculating your dates, at least 5. Mine with Isabelle were spot on, just a few days apart. With Will, they were all over the calendar, some falling in July, most early to mid August. He was born August 22nd. I was 41+4 calculating the most generous way, which I hear most midwives find to be the closest date to go by. On "The Wheel" I would have been 45 weeks pregnant with him. I very much was NOT 45 weeks pregnant. He had vernix still, languno, and was quite plump. That should give you pause and consider how many "full term" babies you've had or met who really were 36, 37, 38 weeks instead of 40, 41, or 42. Contrary to popular belief, overdue babies do not get too big to be born vaginally. They do the opposite. A clinically post-term baby is shrunken since he or she has used up the mother's body's resources and is no longer thriving. In fact, the only way to know if you were "overdue" is a thorough newborn exam and examining the placenta.
So, as a chicken owner, I've decided to give them the same respect that I do to the human mothers around me. Back the f&*# off. Leave them alone. The more I go out, the more the neighbor's dogs bark, and the longer it takes her to lay that one egg. A watched pot, even feathered, does not boil. If chickens didn't know when, where, and how to lay eggs, the culinary arts would be far different. I've only had chickens since April. People have been cultivating these charming, comical, and practically brainless birds for a looooooong time. I bet mine will know what to do when the time comes, whenever that may be, and I bet each will do it on her own terms.
2 February 2014
That was written in a hurry a few months ago. I literally started laughing at myself as I shut the laying box. After Bitsey "went" (just as we birthy peeps say of "our" mamas), the other 5 followed spaced out by about a week. There were some pheromones flying--the week before somebody else "went," the other who were already laying bullied her. The laying ones got all exclusive. It became a layer's only club. Coco, the last one to "go" is still the odd man, well hen, out. They just do not like her.
For the time being, we get 4-6 eggs a day rain, shine, or ice here lately. All of my ridiculous frustration was forgotten until today when I realized that I've sworn to publish something daily and saw this 85% complete. That's another bad habit of mine--jumping into a project and almost finishing, like so close it's absolutely ridiculous. Out with the old, in with the new.
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| Chickens no likey ice |
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| Sweet Coco with a pecked up comb |
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| The two reds as days old chicks |
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| Add caption |
Saturday, February 1, 2014
Hearing Truth
Today is my thirty-first birthday. Tonight, actually, marks my unexpectedly early arrival and the beginning of me, my story that has become inextricably interwoven with the people and places around me. Reading Under the Tuscan Sun years ago, a single sentence about the essence of being Southern sticks with me--how I define myself is deeply rooted in place. She means location, but for me I think defining myself began with the place I took in my family beginning that night. I am the first grandchild on both sides, the oldest cousin, an only child who was lucky to live through a premature and infection stressed start. That place has shifted as dearly loved grandparents pass away and my own family grows. Well, it has and hasn't--if I'd never been those things, I'd be a very different person now.
I've been thinking a lot lately about who I am. I know where I am and how pleased I am with the current location situation, but who is harder to pin down. The ways we think of ourselves are too often subjective, adverbs and adjectives that describe what we like, what we do, what we have. The trap of dualities once fallen into is hard to escape-I am not one thing, so I must be the opposite. I like nouns. In the order that they happened, I am:
A daughter
A granddaughter
A niece
A cousin
A friend
A student
A writer
A lover
A wife
A mother
A teacher
A doula
It's a much shorter list than I expected when I first started pecking out letters. These are things that I am independent of judgement, my own or that of others. There are probably a few more that could be added, but I think there is more truth in a free-write sketch.
A literal translation of one of my favorite phrases, sat nam, is, "I am truth," or literally translated, "true name." Don't get all into the multi-layered philosophy of it. Again, it complicates things. There are the words, and there is the most simple definition. If you listen just right, the lung filling, catch at the peak inhale is, "Sat," the exhale's deflating hiss, "Nam."
The above list is me--my true name, my truth, the things that make up what I consider to be me at my very core.
I don't mean truth as in perfection or the opposite of a lie, though certainly it would be a lie to say that I am not any of the nouns on that list. They are not arguable or open for discussion. They are truth. Had I said, "I am a good or bad <noun>," there would be room for falsehood. So truth as in veracity of self-definition is the idea I'm after.
How freeing is it to think that you are your own truth? Truth is not static though comprised of very concrete words. It is expansive. It begins as a tiny person free of any concept of "me," unfolds slowly as that child navigates familial roles and growing friendships, and explodes as their experiences and passions further solidify their true name. Breathing is necessarily a process of opposites--without the in you cannot have the out. Listen closely and remember two words. You will hear, "I am truth."
I've been thinking a lot lately about who I am. I know where I am and how pleased I am with the current location situation, but who is harder to pin down. The ways we think of ourselves are too often subjective, adverbs and adjectives that describe what we like, what we do, what we have. The trap of dualities once fallen into is hard to escape-I am not one thing, so I must be the opposite. I like nouns. In the order that they happened, I am:
A daughter
A granddaughter
A niece
A cousin
A friend
A student
A writer
A lover
A wife
A mother
A teacher
A doula
It's a much shorter list than I expected when I first started pecking out letters. These are things that I am independent of judgement, my own or that of others. There are probably a few more that could be added, but I think there is more truth in a free-write sketch.
A literal translation of one of my favorite phrases, sat nam, is, "I am truth," or literally translated, "true name." Don't get all into the multi-layered philosophy of it. Again, it complicates things. There are the words, and there is the most simple definition. If you listen just right, the lung filling, catch at the peak inhale is, "Sat," the exhale's deflating hiss, "Nam."
The above list is me--my true name, my truth, the things that make up what I consider to be me at my very core.
I don't mean truth as in perfection or the opposite of a lie, though certainly it would be a lie to say that I am not any of the nouns on that list. They are not arguable or open for discussion. They are truth. Had I said, "I am a good or bad <noun>," there would be room for falsehood. So truth as in veracity of self-definition is the idea I'm after.
How freeing is it to think that you are your own truth? Truth is not static though comprised of very concrete words. It is expansive. It begins as a tiny person free of any concept of "me," unfolds slowly as that child navigates familial roles and growing friendships, and explodes as their experiences and passions further solidify their true name. Breathing is necessarily a process of opposites--without the in you cannot have the out. Listen closely and remember two words. You will hear, "I am truth."
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