Cell - A - Brating Spring Foraging

                                               Clockwise from top:                                                   Dandelion greens, Wild Violet, White Pine, Wild Leek shoots.

It is April 23rd (Happy Earth Day yesterday!) and I am patiently awaiting Dandelion greens, Wild Violet leaves & flowers, and Wild Leeks. I am heading out soon, with my yogurt quart container bucket and trowel, to see if the mighty Spring Leeks have popped up big enough to dig.

It has been a long winter and a hard won Spring for us Waaaay Northern New Yorkers. Today is day 3 of sunshine and no snow floating down. The ground is finally bare, save for a few pockets of the "white stuff" here and there, on the northern sides of trees, hills, etc. 

*After a long winter of heavy foods, our bodies long for light and fresh. Our body cells crave the nourishment from the Wild Ones in our lawns. 

The 4 plants surrounding Mother Earth (image above):

Dandelion is a liver lover. She helps to promote bile flow from the liver into your gall bladder and on into the small intestine. This bile helps digest food, keeps you regular, helps balance gut microbial health, and so - so much more. Bile is a good thing. Dandelions are a good thing too. This Spring: enjoy the greens raw or saute' very-very lightly, eat the yellow flowers, and learn about the root for harvesting and use in fall and winter (Shhhh, forget I said that naughty word).  Dandelion is loaded with chlorophyll and beta-carotenes. 

Wild Violets are Springs gift of flavor, color, and Vitamin C. Our bodies love vitamin C after a long, dark, cold winter. This is why I love citrus fruit by the time February rolls around. No, citrus is not local, but sometimes a girl has got to do things to survive. Vitamin C is a scrub brush for the body, a bit of Spring cleaning for you cells to perk things up, get firey Spring into Summer metabolism revving, and boost the immune system after the cold, dark days.  Feel free to eat the greens and flowers in salads. See below for *sustainable harvest info. Always leave plenty for reseeding and regrowth year after year.

I just read a blog post on Wild Violets and how they are the bad ass weeds of your lawn. (From the post: One of the most difficult weeds to control in the lawn is wild violet.  This native plant may look cute and dainty, especially in the spring when it produces pretty purple flowers. But in reality it is an aggressive weed with an unusual flowering quirk that results in thick mats of leaves that can choke out your lawn.) Yes, I was and am laughing quite loudly. An aggressive weed?! Look out folk, the violets are coming to get you! Seriously people, violets (and dandelions) are pretty color in the sea of green. Who wants a perfectly groomed, institutional like lawn. Nothing like some wild flowers to break up the never ending grass AND violets only grow to a low height... no mowing needed where violets take over. Seems like a win win to me: color, food, no mowing required. 

White Pine: Placed here because I Love White Pines. They are a Tree of Wisdom. Pines are evergreen, like I need to tell you that. Their green-ness all winter long keeps the landscape colorful and is the hope of the Spring green to come. Their needles are high in Vitamin C.  Harvesting to make winter tea (be gentle when you make tea, keep it covered while steeping. See link above.) is a dose of Vitamin C. 

Wild Leeks: I will keep this info quick & simple. I love Leeks. There is much info on Leeks here on my blog, just do a search (Dandelion as well).  These Spring beauties are a gift to digestion, the intestines, the liver, cellular health, and life in general. Eat raw, saute' very gently, add to soups and stews (I add Leeks after the soup or stew is made and the heat is turned off). Just enjoy them, bad breath and all.

Please do so with extreme consciousness of only harvesting what you need for right now's meal. Do not ever over pick - over dig the Leek patch. Go to a different patch for your next meal. I really freak when I see people harvest huge pails of Leeks (or any wild plant) with no regard that they just destroyed the whole patch. Be kind. Take only what you need right now. 

My April 23rd Waiting For The Wild Ones Spring Tonic

• 1 organic lemon
• handful of fresh, organic cilantro
• local, raw honey
• well water (no chlorine or flouride)

1. Juice lemon and place juice in blender. I scrape out the lemon peel with a grapefruit spoon and add to blender.
2. Add 2 cups water to blender. Carefully rinse citrus juicer and add liquid to blender. Do not waste anything.
3. I eat a chunk of the lemon peel. Good nutrients here and anti-cancer antioxidants.
4. Add the handful of cilantro leaves and stems to blender.
5. Add 1-3 tbsp. local, raw honey.
6. Cover and blend to liquidy consistency. 
7. Let settle a minute or two and pour into a quart canning jar. Rinse blender carefully & slowly with gentle low stream of water, from top of blender down, to save every bit of goodness and pour the "cleaning water" into your quart jar. You should have a quart now. If not, fill the quart.  Enjoy.

I do not add ice cubes to the blender in Spring. We are trying to warm digestion as we move into the warmer weather. Iced drinks squelch digestion and contribute to poor digestion, reflux, etc. 

Relaxing by the Raquette, reading a book sipping my Cilantro Lemon Aid, and deeply grateful for the Sunshine of Spring!

*Please harvest very responsibly and never take more than 5-10% of the patch of wild foods. Other beings need to eat. The patch needs to be able to restore itself for sustainability for the next 7 Generations. Nature is not providing just for you. Be kind. Be gentle. Be conservative, caring, and Love the Earth's bounty.

The " Back Story" of Voluptuous V™

Sometime in early 2014, a friend requested support with menopausal vaginal symptoms. I did a Google search looking for a product to help soothe and lubricate her vulva and vagina. I found several that were sort of natural but nothing that met my standards of a product I would put in or on my own body. I have a deep commitment to health... if I would not eat it, I will not use it for body care. 

I gave up and told her that I would create a 100% natural and organic product to soothe her vagina voluptuous again. We had a good laugh in my kitchen and over many conversations since. 

2 days later I had whipped up a batch. I called it Voluptuous Vagina™.  VV™ for short. I wrote about it in many blog posts on my "other" blog that is exclusively for female centered health topics: WiseWomenRedTent   

For 3, 4 years... maybe longer, my gal friend used it. I gave out jars to friends and clients locally and in various places about the USA.

Forwarding to May 2017... I tell Shelby Connelly of Five Elements Living that I am thinking of finding someone to make it in big batches and sell under my label: Paula Youmell, RN, Wise Woman RN®. 

Shelby said without hesitation: Hell No! We are making it! 

I said: Seriously?

To which she said: YES!

Shelby is an amazing front end woman: designing product packaging and marketing our business/product together. I get to do what I love: create in the herbalist's kitchen.

Long story short... Five Element's commercial kitchen is where I hang my hat and herbalist's apron 2 days a week to make this luxurious formula for soothing the female anatomy. 

To learn more or purchase your 2 oz jar of Voluptuous V™, visit our website pages:

https://fiveelementsliving.com/shop/voluptuous-v-2-oz-jar/

http://www.paulayoumellrn.com/voluptuous-v-luxe-feminine-emollient/

We are committed to woman's health, topically & internally, for whole body-mind-spirit health. 

Goodbye to Plantar Warts W/O Chemicals!

Are you pestered with nasty plantar warts? They can be painful, irritating little villains on the bottom of our feet.

Below you see my son's foot plastered with several plantar warts and a big cluster on the ball of his big toe.

Here you see his foot with thin slices of raw, fresh garlic (organic and local, from Birdsfoot Farm, of course!). 

How these warts got so out of control you ask? They inhabited a teen's foot. He never bothered to tell me until the collection had become overwhelming. 

Here is how we managed to get rid of them in just about 2 weeks time. 

Night Time Wart Therapy:

• place thin slices of raw, fresh, local, organic garlic over each wart.

• Apply duct tape to hold garlic slices in place.

• Apply thin, well fitting cotton socks to kid's foot.

• Send kid to bed.

Day Time Wart Therapy:

• After showering put 1 drop of essential oil onto each wart.

• Sit still until essential oil dries on foot.

• Get dressed and head out for the day.

Essential oils I used: Rosemary, Tea Tree, and Oregano as seen above. A couple of times I used Thyme essential oil.

Repeat Night Time and Day Time Wart Therapy until the warts literally peel off in layers. Underneath will be beautiful, new, pink skin. This wart be gone process took about 2 weeks and was relatively painless. Well, except for the groaning and moaning of a 13 year old because I was making him take care of these viral buggers. 

This garlic and essential oil therapy would work on regular skin warts as well. 

Immune MishMash in the kitchen

When a touch of the flu hits your home be prepared with some tools to boost the immune system:

1. Brothy soups (bone broths are nice)
2. Elderberry syrups or tinctures (Check out my elderberry article in the next Potsdam Food Co-op's newsletter, coming soon)
3. Flu tonics: (No Time For Getting Sick, everyone around me was sick and needing my care, I had to be the one to stay functioning!)
4. Herbal teas: nettle, yarrow, rosemary, peppermint (Instructions for making medicinal infusions, teas, click the herbal teas link 
5. Hot baths with plenty of water (or the above immune herbal teas) to drink  while bathing. Fevers need to be kept hydrated and allowed to do their work. A fever's purpose is to destroy the microbes causing the sickness with their heat. Fevers are part of your immune response for healing infections. If you reduce fevers with medications and cold baths, the heat of fever cannot work for you. Keep the feverish person very well hydrated to avoid the problems of fever that people fear.
6. Whole food green drink such as SuperFood Plus
7. Foods rich in:

• Vitamin C (lemon water?),
• selenium (brazil nuts anyone),
• zinc (pumpkin seeds?)

I was making a pot of soup, pictured above, to offer something brothy for my sick kid's bodies. The flu hit and one kid had a fever for 11 days. Mom care was required. As I am making the soup, "extended fever boy" is lying on the couch around the corner and says to me:

Jake:  "What are you making for dinner Mom?"

Mom: "Soup"

Jake:  "Your soup is scary to me. It always contains one or more of the following:

• animal carcasses (bone broths)
• rotting bean matter (miso)
• vegetables that most of the modern world have never heard of!

Mom: "Thanks for the vote of confidence."

Jake: "I don't appreciate finding scary things in my scary soup. The soups usually taste good but what is in it terrifies me. I observe it very carefully before I eat it."

Makes a Mom run to the kitchen to create healthy fare for her loved ones!

The Soup Recipe

1. Bring 3-4 cups of water to simmer, slowly, no need to boil. Keep pot covered and on lowest heat.
2. Saute' a medium onion chopped into fine slivers. Saute' in butter from pastured animals, animal fat, or coconut oil.
3. Grate or finely chop cabbage, about 1 cup.
4. Grate a small celeriac.
5. Add both to onion saute' and quick stir fry.
6. Add above veggie mix to the simmer water and keep heat as low as possible. Do not boil this soup.
7. Finely chop kale and saute', about 1 cup.
8. Grate a carrot and add to saute'.
9. Toss into saute' some frozen red pepper strips that you perhaps froze before growing season ended.
10. Stir fry all 3 together and add to veggie soup mix in pot.
11. Add a pinch or two of cayenne to soup.
12. Peel and press 1-2 cloves of garlic into soup.
13. I then added 3-4 tablespoons of South River Miso's Sweet White Miso. 
14. Last addition was the flu syrup sitting on the counter. It contained raw apple cider vinegar, raw honey, garlic, onion, ginger, and turmeric. There was 2/3 to 3/4 a cup left in the jar. I dumped it all into the soup and stirred it up.
15. Soup was finished and ready for serving to my terrified kid.

The only thing else I would have added, had I some bone broth on hand, would be bone broth instead of the water at the beginning. I recommend keeping bone broth made and frozen in wide mouth quart canning jars for flu emergencies. 

Happy immune boosting soup making. I hope you efforts are appreciated and not creating a reign of soup terror!

Making Bone Broth:    From my educational handout on bones and minerals

Bone broths are made with fish, chicken, turkey, beef, and lamb bones and a tablespoon of vinegar to liberate the minerals.  Put bones in a sauce pan, soup pot and cover with water, just enough to cover bones. I squish the bones down into the pot. Add the tablespoon of raw apple cider vinegar and cover the pot. I soak the bones in the vinegar water overnight and slow simmer for hours the next day. I gently bring to a simmer on the stove top. Then I place in a pre-heated 220 F oven and leave for 4-5 hours if chicken bones and longer if harder bones. Remove bones and use as a soup stock for veggie soup or eat the broth as is (add a bit of unrefined sea salt to taste). If making veggie soup, I saute' the veggies before adding to the hot broth to avoid simmering the broth anymore.

Wanting The Work

I confess. I am an observer of people. I think it is part of the path I walk on this earth. I observe to try and find solutions for people as they struggle with life's challenges. In my previous blog post I spoke of Working With What We Already Have. On this note, I want to remind you that each and every one of us, has inside of ourselves, ALL that we need to heal; to reach every goal we have for our physical, emotional, and spiritual health.  We just need to work with what we have, call up our strengths (and we have far more than we think or give ourselves credit for having), and put into action the steps we personally need to create a healthier lifestyle.

OK, so first... my floor, back to working with what I had and my promised update. Here are finished pictures of the floor. Not bad for 100+ year old floors that the pro floor guy told me my best option was to bag them and start over!

Perfect? No.

Shabby chic? Yes.

I am happy!

Working in health care (true health care and not just disease symptom management) for 30 years and most recently for 20+ years in personal health education,  I have made discoveries. We often have amazing goals for ourselves. We know where we want to be with our health, our body weight, and our physical wellness (emotional & spiritual wellness as well). Our end goals are very clear to us and we do truly want to attain these goals. Most of us have pretty good ideas about what we need to do to get to our goals.

Here's where things get sticky: wanting the work that leads us to these goals of health, weight loss, healing, physical fitness, emotional and spiritual happiness, etc.

In order to be successful at reaching our goals, we have to want to do the work to get there. This means changing the way we eat, what we eat, and our lifestyle habits little by little, step by step (or making sweeping changes if that is how you best function) and sticking with our changes to reach our goals and beyond. Maintaining health means living these newly incorporated eating and lifestyle habits for life, changing them up a bit as the seasons of the years and our lives evolve and need something different. (An example would be slowing down to embrace aging gracefully: giving you body more recovery time between fitness routines and allowing for more sleep at night than when you were 20!)

Reaching and maintaining our goals, for life, is a true "on top of the world" feeling!

The work comes in when we have to suffer a little to meet the challenge of change. I will give an example here in weight loss. In order to lose weight we have to change the way we eat, get rid of the garbage factory made food, and learn to eat less. With this comes the struggle to get through the feeling hungry challenges. If you are used to eating large meals, the challenge will be to leave the table feeling less than full and relaxing, breathing, and moving through this feeling knowing you will be ok, you will survive without feeling stuffed and full all of the time. Going hungry is the work of losing weight for some people. Wanting this work makes reaching the goal of weight loss easier and more acceptable for you to accept the challenges that lay before you.

This is true of many forms of lifestyle change to improve (yes, even heal) lifestyle diseases. To reach the goal of saying goodbye to diabetic, cholesterol, or hypertension medication and ill health symptoms, we must want the work that lies between the present dis - ease in the body and achieving the goal: major eating and lifestyle changes, living completely without sweeteners, and being OK with this and the impacting consequences of our changes.

My job as a natural health educator RN is to give you tools to support you through the WORK of making change and achieving goals.  I have raved about the power of yoga to heal on numerous occasions. I am throwing it out to you again because that is just the kind of gal I am... repeat, repeat, repeat until someone actually listens to me!  (I keep thinking this will someday work with my kids!)

Yoga IS Snake Oil

Why I Love Yoga And Other Thoughts On Whole Food, Whole Health Healing

5 Shocking Ways Yoga Causes You To Lose Weight

The above three blog posts are inspiring posts on the benefits of yoga. I encourage you to explore what makes your mind, heart, and soul sing so that the path of the work comes more easily to and for you every day. Maybe for you it is meditation, prayer, martial arts, Qi gong, walks in the woods, etc. Find your personal soul medicine and practice it daily. Wanting the work will become second nature.

Much love, Paula

PS Upcoming Fall Online Class: 

Herbs For Enhancing Your Natural Health

PPS Beloved Beet Recipe!

Substance part of the beet dish:

6 small to medium local & organic beets, gently steamed (save and drink the steam water)
2/3 can organic chickpeas
1 handful each of organic walnuts and pecans
1/2 handful organic pine nuts

Dressing:

2/3 to 3/4 cup full fat yogurt, from pasture raised cows / goats / sheep, etc.
2 tsp. local maple syrup
Fresh herbs of your liking: Basil, Oregano, Mint, Spearmint, Thyme, Tarragon, Chives , Garlic chives, Rosemary (I used all of these from my herb/weed garden out in front of my home)

Serve on a bed of local, organic, baby greens & sprinkle or slather with chunks of soft goat cheese

Spring Fling with Nettles

Stinging nettles poking out of the ground, 4/16/15.

I grow nettles in the "flower" bed up against my home. I have been asked on many occasions: "What person in their right mind would plant nettles in any flower bed and the bed right up against the house?" The answer is obvious to me; I am not in my right mind and who wouldn't plant nettles so close to the house? They are oh so close when I need them for soups. stews, stir fries, pesto, tinctures, medicinal infusions, etc.

Now here is the double edged sword with this situation: they are close at hand but these 'lil buggers like to run and take over the world just like mints. They create this under soil runner that, well, just runs, and runs, and runs spiraling out of control. I spend the spring pulling the renegade nettles out of the rest of the flower bed in front of my home. When I planted them, 5 years ago, I politely asked them to stay in their space on the side of the house. I even dug down into the soil and planted sandstone pieces to deter them from running. They out smarted me.

As aggravating as this can be, I do have a steady supply of spring nettles that I do not feel guilty about pulling. I snip the leaves to eat and plant the runners along the yard's edge hoping for yet more nettles to eat and make medicine with.

My bowl of nettle tops and leaves.

A close up of 2 nettle tops ready for dinner.

Nettles in the pan, a gentle saute' in butter is all that is needed.

The stems that I gently cooked first;  why waste the nutrients?

Cooked nettles waiting for me to consciously devour them.

The finished salad with nettles scattered across the top.

I have made mention of my Spring difficulties around food. All winter I graciously and gratefully eat local cabbage, root veggies, and squash. I save my frozen local summer veggies to tide me over when I can no longer stand the thought of a root veggie and cabbage slaw. Yes, it does happen. (My winter leftovers are waiting to be made into sauerkraut when I can dig enough wild leeks to enhance this kraut batch.) 

I yearn for local food: asparagus, greens, fiddle heads, peas, strawberries...

To survive until the local food is bountiful once again, I buy food from California. There, I confessed. The above salad is Romaine lettuce, celery, carrots, and juicy red peppers from California. I also buy non-local fruits: mango, banana, kiwi, citrus, and canned organic pineapple. I am desperate for neatly gift packaged sunshine to tide me over to the local food scene. A ripe mango has a serious amount of sun waiting to burst out of its skin. I bow my head in gratitude to the people, the trees, and the soil that brings me these gems to keep me happy.

I plopped the above salad down in front of my kids, minus the nettles of course. They would have flipped had I expected them to eat Nettles! (They did each have a small spoonful that they chucked into their mouths and barely chewed before swallowing. Someday they will appreciate the things I have exposed them to...) Here was my salad response:

"Finally, a real salad. No more nasty cabbage - root veggie slaw! Yay!"

Poor kids, they suffer so.

"Wow, Mom broke down and bought something that didn't grow within 20 miles of our home."

When do they learn to not harass the person keeping them in food?

Tip for the day: Get outside. Snip some nettles. Hey, dig some wild leeks and saute' them together, ever so gently. Enjoy the taste sensation, the local wild food, and the spring nourishment for your body. Oh yeah, don't bother sharing with the kids!

To create your own female energy spring fling:

Join the Female ♀ Moon Cycle Wisdom Training

Tuition, this year, stays at $72 Bucks in honor of My Mom,

an awesome female, & her Birthday (April 17th)! 

BUY HEALING COURSE NOW