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This post is part of Fight Back Fridays, hosted by Food Renegade and the Bare Cupboard blog carnival.
iTunes is playing “Gonna Fly Now” on my computer as I write this post. You know that song. It’s the one from “Rocky” where Rocky Balboa is beating up sides of beef and jogging up the Philadelphia Art Museum’s steps and holding his hands up in victory at the top. It’s the theme song of determined underdogs everywhere.
photo by radiospike photography on Flickr
My victory once again focuses on a great meal review from my hard-to-please son, John. Earlier this month, I wrote a Fight Back Fridays post about two wonderful in-season foods: strawberries and kale. Michelle commented, “Haha I thought this was going to be a recipe made with strawberries and kale! That would have been a new one.” I took this as a personal challenge and served Strawberry Green Smoothies for breakfast this morning:
Strawberry Green Smoothies
Toss a handful of washed, stemmed, organic strawberries in the blender. Add a raw (pastured only, from chickens you know and farmers you trust, please) egg yollk, a splash of milk, a few drops of flax oil, a drizzle of whey and a few pieces of frozen banana. Turn the blender on. Add a washed, destemmed organic kale leaf and let it blend for a while until all the pieces are invisible and the smoothie is nice and green.
I never expected John to like it. I wasn’t even going to pour him a cup, but he insisted. And he liked it. He said if he was drinking it in the dark he would have never known it was green. And the kale I used was thick, meaty, red Russian kale, too.
It’s amazing and wonderful how quickly our tastebuds adapt to healthy foods if we give them the chance. My mother-in-law is visiting again this week and I learned last time to not allow that to be an excuse to eat poorly. This time, tempted with eating out, grabbing a Starbucks and ordering in, I was able to easily say no. I just have no interest in eating that stuff anymore. I’m spoiled. I’m also educated. The thought of what is in those non-foods kills my appetite as surely as the idea of drinking gasoline.
It’s Friday, I’m fighting back, and I’m gonna fly now!
This post is part of Real Food Wednesdays, hosted by Kelly the Kitchen Kop.
At the farmer’s market this weekend, hidden behind the boxes and boxes of strawberries was a small box of miniature cherries. I asked the farmer what variety they were, but she didn’t know. This cherry tree had been growing in her yard for more years than she had lived there. They were not quite as sour as a Montmorency, but not sweet like a Bing, either. The whole eating experience was fun: kind of like someone put a regular cherry in a shrinking machine. The pits were smaller and the stems shorter, too. For size comparison, this photo was taken with my youngest girl holding the bowl – those are 9 year old arms.
In our CSA box, we received a big head of romaine. The cavies loved the tough outer leaves, and we enjoyed the tender inner leaves in several salads. We had the collard greens with bacon and onion one night with dinner. The big old quart-box of strawberries didn’t even make it home, but were slurped up in the car (we have a big sheet and damp towels in the car for easy cleanup on CSA pick-up days.) Half the kale was made into chips for a snack and the other half I added to a big pot of Minestrone. We had the chicken roasted and I used the leftovers to make a little stock. I made two pounds of ground beef into a meatloaf. There’s loads of meat in the freezer, but I need to find something to do with hot ground pork because we usually don’t like spicy food. We’ve been using the pint of honey for all the sweetening we’ve done all week, and the quart of cream I got went half for creme fraiche and half for the ice cream we will have after dinner tonight.
I love not only how fresh everything is, but how long it lasts. The romaine lettuce has a couple remaining leaves that are almost a week old and still crisp as can be. When I pulled off the outer leaves to give to the guinea pigs, my husband caught sight of a fat caterpillar happily munching and FREAKED. I reminded him that it’s probably better for us to eat food that would support such a delicate creature than to eat the kind that’s been sprayed with poisons. I like my produce bug-approved, even if it means occasionally picking a bug off!
One of the happy romaine-fed cavies.
I’ve mentioned Harvest Moon: Tree of Tranquility before. A few days ago, one of the characters said:
You don’t often get wisdom like that from a video game.
This post is part of the Natural Cures Blog Carnival hosted by Hartkeisonline.
We don’t have health insurance. It can be a scary place to live, knowing that we are one broken leg away from financial ruin, but we are getting used to it. Hubby has maintained his insurance to help defray the cost of his dozen prescriptions, and we kept the dental insurance because of the kids’ tooth problems. But I am completely uninsured, and the kids have no medical insurance at all. I looked into the state insurance for low incomes, but the premium for all of us is more than we make!
So, we are making do with natural remedies as best we can. I feel confident that most of what we encounter we can heal from with some supporting nutrition and herbs and lots of prayer. There are a few things I wouldn’t do at home. I would not set a broken bone, for example, or leave symptoms of meningitis to a “wait and see” attitude. I am comfortable within my limits.
Our health care protocol starts with sunshine, fresh air, exercise, clean water, real food, prayer and sleep. If someone exhibits the symptoms of illness, we take action right away, knowing that the sooner a condition is treated, the greater the liklihood that a gentle treatment will suffice.
Our favorite natural remedies:
For twisted ankles, wrists, etc.: Cold packs 20 minutes on and 40 minutes off for the first 24 hours, followed by warm packs in the same manner. Resting the injured joint if it is swollen or too painful to move or bear weight. A homemade infused oil (we call it Ahh Oil) of St. John’s Wort and Arnica, infused into coconut oil and applied when the cold or warm pack is removed. Fresh pineapple in the diet to take down swelling.
For sore throats, colds, etc.: Sixteen ounces of filtered water taken immediately when that sore feeling begins usually stops the illness before it “blooms.” If we miss it, we gargle with a vinegar infused with raspberry and sage once an hour. Stuffy noses are treated to a steam tent for five minutes each hour made of a bath towel over a bowl of hot water in which thyme has been steeped. A salad of wolfberries and parsley to give an unbeatable vitamin C boost.
For cough: Mullein to the rescue! We add garlic to the diet to warm the lungs and prevent secondary infections as well.
For itches: Bug bites (as long as the bite has not been scratched open) are treated to a q-tip dunked in ammonia once every several hours. Smells awful, but stops the itch like nothing else we’ve found. We also keep zinc oxide and calamine lotion available for poison oak and ivy rashes, but not for the longer term rashes of eczema and dishydrosis we battle. A booster of Omega 3s and zinc in the diet help skin repair.
For burns: When a burn happens (stove, oven, ironing board etc.) the injured body part is immediately soaked in water for five minutes. If the least bit of redness remains after soaking, I slice off a tiny piece of aloe leaf from a plant we keep in the kitchen and expose the inside where a soothing liquid waits to provide relief. The liquid goes onto the burn every time the heat comes back for the first 24 hours. We don’t cover the burn, but allow it to “cool” in open air. Sunburns are treated to a vinegar rinse after a cool shower. Since we’ve been using vinegar on sunburns, we haven’t had one that peeled. Here too, Omega 3s and zinc seem to speed repair.
For eye problems: We had a baby whose tear ducts didn’t open until she was 2. I did not want the doctor doing surgery on her to open them, but she got frequent eye infections. If I caught them early enough, placing freshly grated potato or apple on her closed eye (while she slept) would stop the infection before naptime was over. I must admit, I have NO idea why or how this works, but it did.
For cuts and scrapes: We love keeping witch hazel around for minor cuts and scrapes. We use it to clean wounds well before applying a tea made of echinacea, yarrow and calendula. Echinacea encourages new tissue growth, yarrow closes wounds and calendula is very soothing.
Headache: A cup of chamomile, peppermint or lemon balm tea usually does the trick here. Of course, a moment of quiet contemplation while sipping the tea enhances its effect.
Diarrhea: A few tablespoons of dried blueberries steeped in hot water and drunk like tea usually stops it.
Gas: Laying on the floor and rolling very slowly like a log can release trapped gas.
Nausea: We chew on papaya enzyme tablets if it is so severe that a spoonful of lacto-fermented vegetable or a cup of raw milk doesn’t do the trick. But more often than not, the food remedies work fine.
This post is part of the No GMO Challenge Blog carnival.
In an article posted on Science Daily this month, Daniel Voytas, lead author and director of the University of Minnesota Center for Genome Engineering describes a new type of genetic modification being researched for our food.
In the protocol, genes were removed from a tobacco plant, modified and cultured to produce mature plants with chosen characteristics. While this might seem a step forward from splicing DNA across species, the motives for the modification are still suspect. The original modification was to allow the plants to survive exposure to herbicides. This does nothing to reduce the herbicide load in our bodies, our water supply and our soil, instead merely allowing plants to survive greater and greater exposure to the poisons that are killing the rest of the planet.
His next step is to alter rice, a critical food crop of underdeveloped and impoverished nations. When this untested GMO rice enters the world’s food supply, billions of lives will be at stake as people who have no choice in the marketplace are used as experimental animals.
Another frightening aspect, straight from the scientist’s mouth:
“This is the first real advance in technology to genetically modify plants since foreign DNA was introduced into plant chromosomes in the early 1980s,” Voytas said. “It could become a revolutionary tool for manipulating plant, animal and human genomes.”
And there you have it, ladies and gentlemen, what I believe to be the true motive of genetic modification: manipulating the human genome.
I was wondering what was taking Dr. Mercola so long after being put on the WAPF Advisory Board to post about Weston A. Price’s extraordinary contributions to the field of nutrition. At last the article has appeared on his website so those who read his entries can access these important findings. He called his post
“The Greatest Nutrition Researcher of the 20th Century“
The article includes a link where Nutrition and Physical Degeneration can be read online for free! That was news to me, so I’ll post it here as well:
Recently, a reader asked me to share my soap-based tooth cleaning stuff recipe. I hope you all aren’t disappointed, it’s almost too simple to bother writing out!
Christy, my next-to-youngest daughter started breaking out with mouth sores several times a month when she was about 6. The dentist had no idea what might be causing it or what to do about it. I did my regular research and found that they can be caused by so many possible triggers that the only sure-fire way to get rid of them was to start trying different things to see if they were made better or worse. Over the next year, we tested (by eliminating then returning to her diet) acid foods, citrus, grains, mushrooms, eggs and chocolate. There didn’t seem to be a dietary trigger. I kept records of the seasons, but there didn’t seem to be an environmental trigger. The sores weren’t brought on by visits to the dentist, either. My records were extensive, but inconclusive. I was at the end of everything I knew to do.
One day while browsing at the health food store, I saw some toothpaste labled “No SLS” and asked about it. What is SLS and why does this toothpaste not have it? The first words out of the salesperson’s mouth were golden: “Some people get sores in their mouths from SLS.” Could it be I’d found something new to test?
SLS is Sodium Lauryl Sulfate, an ingredient that helps break up oily stains. SLS can also stand for Sodium Laureth Sulfate, which is used in soaps because it makes a nice, foamy lather.
I did some more reserach, this time on other options. What do people use if they want to avoid SLS? I’ve heard of people who use baking soda and salt, but it was unlikely I could get a finicky nine-year-old to go for that. There were also some warnings that this formula could be abrasive, something a young one didn’t need just starting out. I also found some resources on something called “oil pulling,” which involves swishing coconut oil around your mouth for 20 minutes a day. Interesting, but also unlikely. I finally found a relatively good recipe and modified it a little for our use. What I finally came up with was:
Melt 1/2 cup coconut oil over very low heat, allow to cool to barely warm but still liquid. Add 2 tablespoons of liquid castile soap and a few drops of flavoring extract or essential oil. Stir well, pour into a pump dispenser (like you’d use for liquid hand soap) and you’re done! My “usual” formulation includes peppermint castile soap and peppermint extract, but I’ve also made it with cinnamon, orange, lemon and vanilla. The coconut oil firms a little in our bathroom, but flows well through the pump. If you keep your house very cold, giving the pump bottle a quick dunk in warm water loosens it right up. We follow the brushing with our homemade tooth rinse at night.
Since we have started using this formula, Christy hasn’t had any mouth sores. We also haven’t spent any money on toothpastes, not even $5 tubes of SLS-free toothpaste. Our teeth aren’t getting cavities at a faster rate, if anything we are getting fewer than before, but credit our improved diet for that.
The Week has a real foodie in John Sherffius.
This post is part of Fight Back Fridays, hosted by Food Renegade.
My mom was bemoaning how she couldn’t eat chicken gizzards anymore the other day, what with their high cholesterol and all. After a brief discussion about organ meats and the role of cholesterol in the body, I decided I should take the plunge as well and try those gizzards! The farmer who supplies my organic, grassfed meats just happened to have some, so I ordered a package. I found a recipe with possibilities on Allrecipes dot com, messed with it a little and came up with:
Gizzled Portobello Rice
4 ounces uncooked wild rice
1 quart homemade chicken stock, divided
1 pound chicken gizzards
1 tablespoon extra virgin organic coconut oil
1/2 medium organic red onion, chopped
3 large organic portobello mushroom caps, chopped
1 clove garlic, chopped
1/4 cup sun-dried tomatoes, cut into slivers
1 cup grated Parmesan cheese
Place rice and 2 1/2 cups stock in a pot, bring to a boil, reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer 45 minutes. Place gizzards in a pot with remaining stock and enough water to cover, and bring to a boil, cook 15 minutes, drain, and dice. Heat coconut oil in a skillet, and cook the onion, and mushrooms until tender. Mix in the cooked gizzards, garlic, and sun-dried tomatoes and cook until lightly browned. Stir in the rice. Serve topped with Parmesan cheese.
The sun-dried tomatoes added a very welcome zing, and the onion and garlic were just enough aromatic. The meaty portobellos blended well with the earthy flavor of the wild rice. My family raised their eyebrows at the chewy gizzards, but the flavor was enough to overcome their objections. My problem is this:
Even after the cheese is grated on top, it’s sure an ugly color! Unappetizing to say the least! So, can you help me lighten it up a little? I was thinking maybe some brown rice instead of all wild rice, perhaps some colorful bell peppers? Maybe a white onion instead of red? Help!
This post is part of the Natural Cures Blog carnival, hosted by Hartke is online, The Bare Cupboard blog carnival and Make it From Scratch blog carnival.
Since I started making breakfast for John every morning before school, he and I have come to a truce. I can’t make him coconut flour muffins. He won’t eat his eggs any way but scrambled. No leftovers, no potatoes, nothing spicy, no fruit, nothing cold.
That leaves scrambled eggs sprinkled with raw cheese, uncured bacon and toasted homemade bread, which he has three days a week; and pancakes, which he has the other two. I wanted him to eat soaked grains but couldn’t find a good recipe for pancakes. I was near giving up on the pancakes and just making regular old whole-wheat pancakes when I found a link to the best pancakes I’ve ever had: soaked or otherwise!
Even though they contain whole wheat and oats (or buckwheat, barley or any other grain you choose) you don’t need a grain grinder because your blender will do the work. They soak overnight in buttermilk which both neutralizes the phytic acid in the grain and makes them light and fluffy. Even better for me, once they are put together the night before, it’s a quick 5 minute blend with leaven and an egg in the morning so I’m not having to do a lot of measuring and thinking at 5:30 AM.
Here’s the link. Don’t be discouraged by the length of the instructions, Sue Gregg, the author, really went to great lengths to explain and photograph the process. I have the bare bones written on a 3×5 card that hangs on the fridge for twice weekly reference.
One of the farmers whose produce graces our local farmer’s markets has been featured on Local Table, a website for finding local produce in our area. The YouTube video is just charming! What really struck me, though, is how this young farmer learned at his father’s knee and is carrying on a family tradition. He loves his work, something we should all be able to say. I hope you enjoy:
The Dark Side of Fat Loss
