Today... & Rethinking Winter Veggies

Rethinking Winter Veggies:

Here are two questioning comments I hear often around changing the diet to a whole food and seasonally based one:

1. There are no vegetables that grow in Northern NY in the winter time. I have to purchase kale, cucumbers, tomatoes, and other vegetables that are grown in Florida and California. Otherwise, what would I eat?
2. OK, so I am getting to know the local vegetables that are available in late fall and winter but what do I do with them?

My root veggie picture,

inspiring me from the kitchen wall!

A list of winter storage vegetables available in Northern NY:

• cabbage: red and green
• winter, hard squash (there are many varieties)
• beets
• carrots
• turnips
• rutabaga
• celeriac
• radish
• salsify
• burdock parsley root
• parsnip
• potato
• onion
• garlic

Farms and stores to purchase local (winter) vegetables in Northern NY: (I am certain this is not an all-inclusive list; investigate and find a farmer who grows good food near you!)

• Martin's Farm Stand
• Potsdam Food Coop 
• Nature's Storehouse

CSA Farms for Winter Veggies: (Again, not an all-inclusive list BUT to find more, go to www.gardenshare.com, Gardenshare's Local Food Guide and find a farmer near you who offers what you are looking for.)

• Kent Family Farm
• Birdsfoot Farm
• LittleGrasse FoodWorks

OK, now for the cooking part. I am not going to put recipes here. I am more in favor of people learning to improvise in the kitchen: grab what you have and be creative based upon time honored methods of cooking and seasoning. Trust me, it is easy. Take a deep breath and just relax and let the cooking flow!

1. Mashed potatoes are yummy! Try any of these root veggies in the mashed version, adding milk and butter. Try several root veggies steamed up and mashed together. Hint: When you steam, simmer, or boil the root veggie: use the least amount of water necessary and simmer gently. Maybe an inch of water in the pot, depending on the pot size and the amount of veggies. (Do not "rolling boil" them to death; it kills the flavor and the nutrients. As you boil off the nutrients you are boiling away the flavor!)  Pour the "simmer" water off into a coffee mug and drink it. There will be just a little bit of water left by conservatively adding water and simmering gently.
2. Roast any or all of the root veggies. Chop into bite size chunks, coat with your favorite oil sturdy enough to handle the oven heat, and roast for 35-45 minutes. Stir every 10 to 15 minutes and stab with a fork after 30 to test for tenderness. You want to create crunchy, cooked veggies, not mushy veggies.
3. Soups, stews, stir fries are always good options.
4. Squash, well... it is squash, roast it up. Steam them if you are short on time. Oven roasting can take 1 hour or more, steaming takes 20 minutes. A butternut squash, raw, grates up nicely into a winter veggie slaw. Just add chucks of apples, maybe a few raisins, and an olive oil - apple cider vinegar dressing seasoned with cinnamon, ginger, cardamom, and nutmeg.
5. Cabbage is yummy in soups, stews, and stir fries. Saute' a pan of onions, potatoes, and cabbage and serve with your favorite protein.
6. Make cabbage and grated root veggie slaws. (If you click that link back there, you will get one recipe from me! But... it is one I have given you many times!) This is my nightly favorite to add a "raw" salad to the winter meal fare: good fiber, good nutrients, and good enzymes from raw foods!

The above slaw is grated: red and green cabbage, celeriac, purple and orange carrots, and a Braeburn apple. The apple was so juicy I only added a bit of olive oil, a dash of cinnamon, and called it "dressed!"

Please Remove Shoes & Negative Attitudes

I painted this door sign years ago. I have glued and removed it from a couple of front doors. I was inspired to create it because of a bumper sticker: "Mean People Suck." I also related that sentiment to negative people and their energy.

This past Saturday I watched the documentary film Symphony of the Soil. I was reminded of the beautiful method of how soil rebuilds itself when we care for it in natural ways, recreating nature's gardening methods.

Another message that was clear to me: how farming with chemical fertilizers, pesticides, fungicides, and herbicides is much like fraternizing with negative people - soil / soul sucking!

These chemical means of farming literally suck the life out of the soil. Chemicals slowly and insidiously kill off the soil microbes, fungi, earth worms, and various other life forms that are essential to healthy soil and life on this planet. Chemically farmed soil becomes dry, pale, lifeless, and infertile. Food grown in this soil is nutrient deficient like the very soil it was grown in. 

Negative people and negative energy (i.e. watching, listening, or reading the news) do the same to us. These things slowly and insidiously suck the life from our body, mind, and soul. Negative energy in our life is a real force that leeches the nutrients from our every body cell just as chemical farming leeches nutrients from the soil.

Chemical farming is a stress to the soil, to all biological life, and to this planet.  (All are one and the same.)

Negative people and negative energy stress our physical body, our emotional/mental being, and our soul. Negative energy activates the stress response. This response eats up nutrients from our body cells. This is one reason why stressed people get sickly looking (pale like the stressed soil), age faster, and contract more acute illnesses (colds, the flu, etc.) and go on to develop more chronic lifestyle diseases than relaxed, peaceful people.

Touch each other's lives, and your own, gently!  Northern Sun T-Shirt!

POSITIVE Action to take:

Surround yourself with warm, loving, positive energetic people

AND

Be a warm, loving, positive energy person!

See and inspire the good in everyone, including you!

Whole food RECIPE:  Tourlou Greek Mix-Mix (made with local ingredients!)

This is positively delicious!

• 5-6 medium ripe tomatoes (Richard Paolillo's & Vanessa Bittner's Old Market Farm)
• 1 medium eggplant (Kent Family Growers)
• 2 medium red potatoes (Keim Amish Farmer)
• 1 large red pepper (Keim)
• 1 large red onion (Birdsfoot Farm)
• 4-5 good size cloves of garlic (Birdsfoot Farm)
• 2 bay leaves
• 1/2 cup olive oil (I used 1/4 cup olive oil and 1/4 cup of Kriemhild Dairy's pasture raised butter)
• dash of nutmeg and thyme, I am a heavy handed dasher! I would say a good full tsp. of thyme and slightly less than a tsp. of nutmeg
• unrefined sea salt and fresh ground black pepper to taste after cooking

The finished Tourlou, Mix-Mix, with chickpeas. 

1. Cut veggies into bite size chunks and mix together well (except garlic)
2. Spread out in the bottom of two 8 x 13 baking pans
3. add oil, butter, bay leaves, nutmeg, and thyme and mix together
4. Bake at 350 F for 1 hour, set timer for every 20 minutes and mix-mix away adding water to not "fry" the veggies! This makes for a juicy creamy mix-mix!
5. If veggies not tender enough after 1 hour, give them a few minutes more
6. When finished cooking add the garlic via garlic pressing into the mix of veggies
7. Serve and add salt / pepper to taste
8. Serve with chick peas added to the mix or chunks of chicken
9. A side of whole grain pita bread, warm of course, is nice
10. Perhaps a 'lil Greek goat's milk feta too!

Hints:

• This dish can be eaten hot or cooled. Traditional Greek serving is when cooled allowing the flavors to meld. 
• I have used zucchini, yellow squash, buttercup & butternut squash, sweet potatoes... The eggplant, tomatoes, and onion are required... after that, add veggies to your delight. The more you make, meaning the fuller the baking dishes are, use more tomatoes to add to the creamy goodness.
• Another serving suggestion: To get a raw veggie salad in with this yummy dish serve with a Fall cabbage-root veggie slaw OR  sauerkraut.

Enjoy!

NAKED Skin Care

NAKED Skin Care, Natural Skin Care That Is

I used to make my own shampoo, conditioner, lotions, face creams, blah, blah, blah.  I still do make my own face stuff but really, how much time do I have?  Homemade gluten free bread, homemade veggie slaws, 100 % homemade meals from local foods, and fermenting my own veggies.  There IS only one of me!

I have had psoriasis for 15 years, just after the birth of my eldest son.  Hmmm, coincidence?  Anyhow, I have pretty much kept it to a very mild issue with diet, sunshine, yoga, and natural lifestyle choices.  Gluten free is a huge help!

Then, along comes Eli, Son #2.  He developed psoriasis at 8 years of age.  It's a gut and whole body health issue but no time to write a book to explain all that in detail.  Try to get an 8 year old to leave gluten alone.  (Someday he will wish he listened to me...gluten intolerance, if continually irritated with gluten can become full blown celiac disease.  It's just like pre-diabetics and diet or orally "controlled" diabetics who continue to indulge in sugar... just wait, they can develop full blown, insulin diabetes from the continual irritation of sugar in their systems.)

Yes, We will be doing another Gluten Free Workshop; me and the Local Living Venture.  Sign up for their newsletter and get informed!   Use this email address and ask them to subscribe you:  sustlivingproject@gmail.com

OK, so I digressed a bit, forgive me.  I was looking for natural skin care for psoriasis to help my son.  His is much worse than mine, but, may I add, completely disappears when he leaves gluten out of his diet.  So, anyhow, I found these products.  I know apple cider vinegar is good for the gut and good for the skin.  Keeps the microbes healthy and in check.  But I did not want to make the products myself.  Again, how much can I do everyday?

LOVE this company's stuff:  http://www.justnaturalskincare.com/Psoriasis/ALL-skin-psoriasis-products.html

Bottom Line:  Psoriasis Advice

1.  100% Whole food diet... am I a broken record about this or what?!

2.  Gluten free, no refined sugar.

3.  Naked sun:  as naked as you are comfortable being outside!  Sun to the skin, protect the face (it's the wrinkle factor on the face!).

This is the email, I just received from JustNatural,  offering a 20% discount in March.  There is no better way to try something new than with a discount! OK, maybe free, but that is not an option!  They even have products for stopping hair loss with age.....

JustNatural's Coupon

      Use 

March2014

  as coupon code

20% off

Shop Today use code March2014 at checkout

Click to visit 

JustNatural

    We wish a warm thank you to all of our wonderful customers

www.justnaturalskincare.com

11101 S. Crown Way Wellington, FL 33414

Copyright © 2014 Just Natural Products LLC. All rights reserved.

Again, we wish a warm thank you to all of our awesome customers!

We would like to introduce and share with you the quality of natural hair and skin care products.

In nature many ingredients can be found that are beneficial for your hair and skin care needs. But in today’s hectic world of constant marketing the plain truth is often hard to come by.

Hair care and skin care products that are made with chemicals are often touted as being this or that solution. The reality is that chemical ingredients are often used in hair care products to replace the more expensive and effective alternative, that is real natural and organic ingredients.

Please consider choosing products with fewer chemicals and your hair and skin will thank you for it. We ask that you try natural hair care products and experience the change for yourself.

We bring nature closer to you.

Celeriac LOVE Update!

Celeriac LOVE Update

I am determined to create celeriac lovers out of you!  The below saute' was made with 100% Kent Family Growers veggies and Kerry Gold butter from Ireland (not very local but I am having a tough time finding local butter from grass fed cows!).

Dinner:  

1.  Gently saute' onions in much yummy butter, 2-3 minutes.

2.  Add grated celeriac and saute' gently for 2-3 minutes.

3.  Pop in some chunks of frozen red peppers and green beans (Thank you Megan Kent for putting these veggies up!).

4.  Crush one large clove of garlic and stir it all up.

5.  Cover cast iron pan & turn off heat.

6.  Finish making my root veggie slaw, the rest of dinner selections, and serve up the yummy celeriac dish, see below!

My Advice:  LOVE your celeriac.  It will LOVE you back!

Check out the Kent's interview on North Country Public Radio!

PS  For those of you who have been following my lust of root veggies, fear nothing, I have not abandoned my love for the humble beet!

Gospel of the Slaw

So, you may be wondering if I have lost my mind, maybe a new chapter has been added to the Bible that you did not hear about yet, or something weird is going on... well, it is none of the above.

I have the best encounters with people I work with, one on one and in group settings.  People are truly amazing when we allow them to be at their very best.

I am often encountered with the "I eat nothing but salads and I still cannot lose weight" issue.  I try to explain that summer vegetable salads, in the fall and winter, are very cooling to our body.  Summer veggies are for summer eating.  When we summer cool ourselves, in the winter, we also slow our metabolism.

Want to rev up that metabolism with warming, winter nourishing veggies?  Try a root veggie and cabbage slaw.  Recipe below.

Now for the title, it goes back to the people I meet thing I mentioned above.  An endearing client labeled my slaw recipe as the "Gospel of the Slaw" and paid the good recipe forward to many friends and family members.  The slaw is a great way to get yummy, raw veggies into your winter diet and keep it all seasonal.

Be well, eat slaw.

PS  Grating a butter nut squash and spicing the salad dressing with cinnamon, cardamom, nutmeg, ginger, and vanilla is another fun way to enjoy raw winter veggies.

Root Veggie & Cabbage Slaw

Assemble enough vegetable to feed the people who will be gracing your dinner table, red and green cabbage and root vegetables:  beet, parsnip, rutabaga, celeriac, carrot, purple carrot, turnip, winter storage radishes (bigger than the summer salad radishes), kohlrabi, salsify, burdock, horseradish, etc.

Fine chop red and/or green cabbage

Grate, on a metal cheese grater, root veggies. Pick root veggies you grow or can acquire locally.  I use 2-4 root veggies with the chopped cabbage, choosing different root veggies with each meal.

Add a grated apple.  My kids eat more, and more willingly, when the juicy sweetness of a grated apple is part of the salad.

Mix together in a bowl with the above dressing

Cover and refrigerate until meal time.  I make this dish last and serve immediately with every fall and winter meal.

Optional:  add a few raisins, add walnuts, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds… just make it yummy for you.

Salad Dressing

1 cup organic extra virgin olive oil

1 cup raw apple cider vinegar

1 tsp. organic prepared mustard; preferably made with apple cider vinegar, not grain vinegar

Dash unrefined sea salt

Dash fresh pepper

Crush clove of garlic

Herbs to taste:  rosemary, basil, oregano, thyme, parsley

Optional: 1 – 3 tbsp. dark maple syrup or sucanat unrefined sugar

I make this dressing in a Ball, wide mouth, quart canning jar so I always have it available for dinner salads, whatever the season.