From the category archives:

vegetable

What’s for Breakfast?

Pastured soft boiled eggs on gluten free toast. Bright yolks.

At a recent workshop I was asked,”So, what do you eat for breakfast?”

I paused. 

Why? Because sometimes my breakfast choices are things like soup. Not the sort of thing you want to just blurt out in public. And becasue we all need to discover what is the best breakfast for us.

We’ve all heard it’s the most important meal of the day – but then what do we think our choices are? Yogurt ? (Watch this it’s hilarious — I actually worked on one of those commercials back in the day – talk about karma. ) Or Toast, eggs, oatmeal, cold cereal, just coffee, a lara bar, or simply nothing. 

Why is breakfast so important?

I’ll give you a few simple reasons in bullet point:

  • Breakfast literally breaks the fast. While we are sleeping, our body is detoxifying and fasting. When we wake, our blood sugar is low.  Morning is an important time to eat something and balance your blood sugar out.
  • Our breakfast sets the tone for our day. Our choices effect our energy, mood and focus.
  • Metabolism. Eating a breakfast that works for you energetically will support your metabolism.

So, what’s the best thing for breakfast?

That depends. Every Body is Different.  Here’s how you can test it out:
Download The Breakfast Experiment. I give this exact form out to my clients– it will help you figure out what really works for you. It’s deceptively simple and the results are life-changing.
Give it a go and let me know what you find out.  If you feel you need more support, you can always schedule a breakthrough session.
So, what’s for my breakfast today? Homemade Broccoli soup. Well, it’s what works for me (today).

Fresh, organic broccoli soup, it's what's for breakfast.

 

 

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Rawkos! A travel food.

Happy Labor Day weekend! It’s time to celebrate all the toil and sweat you’ve put into you’re year. 

Here’s a fantastic recipe that will keep you in the summer mode. This is a popular favorite from my Seasonal Cleanses (Join me in September for a healthy kick-start)–It’s great food to travel with and requires NO COOKING. Rejoice the Rawko!  It’s like a taco but it’s raw – not raw meat – raw foods (means no cooking, more enzymes, more energy). 

Wraps

  • Bunch of collard greens*, rinsed and de-stemmed – leaving 2 halves (depends on how many people are eating– figure 2-3 wraps per person)
  • Pat those dry
Sweet Cucumber Salsa
  • 1 apple – peeled, cored, diced
  • 1 cucumber – peeled, seeded, diced
  • 1 medium sweet yellow onion – diced
  • parsley and/or cilantro – washed and diced
  • a few pinches of Celtic sea salt (this is a high mineral salt- very good for you)
  • Fresh squeezed lemon
  • Add all ingredients together, then add in salt and lemon – make sure it really gets on that onion! Toss, let sit. 
Rawko “meat”
First, let me say, I am not anti-meat, I am pro sustainably-raised, grass-pastured meat*. I am pro health for our bodies, and health for the planet. So why the non-meat tacos – er- rawkos? Because they are delicious. Because raw foods pack an amazing amount of energy and vitality, and because everyone loves new and exciting foods that make them feel good with no negative repercussions.  So here you go:
  • 1 -2 cups of raw organic walnuts (again, depending on how many people you are feeding)
  • 2-6 TBS of gluten free tamari (go easy on this — it can get real salty quick)
  • Add to a high speed blender or food processor and blend it up
Making Rawkos
  • Lay  your collard wrap on a flat surface
  • Spread 1-2 tsp of the rawko “meat” onto the wrap length-wise
  • Add some salsa (this offsets the heavy flavor of the walnuts nicely)
  • Here, I added some sunflower sprouts for some more green and texture
  • Roll up and enjoy. 
You can pre-roll these and eat them on a car ride — or pack the ingredients separately and take to work, beach, or party. 
*When I travel I also make  an organic turkey and goat cheese wrap that you can eat in the car. Just add shaved onions and apple. Divine. 
Let me know what you think. Happy Labor Day Weekend. 

 

 

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Best picnic salad ever.

With all the picnics and outdoor bar-b-ques and joyful summer happenings abound, I thought I’d share this quick and tasty salad.

I made up the other day when meeting a friend for a picnic in Prospect Park (Brooklyn).

On a side note about BBQs and parties and keeping your summer figure, I employ a method I like to call:

“I’ma bring what I’m gonna eat. I’ll gladly share it with you.”

This way, I know if I show up and my only options are pulled pork, pig candy (please don’t ask), garlic bread, and a paltry salad, I’ve got myself covered with something that I know I want to eat, I know I enjoy, and I can share it with others. (You may recall my super bowl Sexy Pie post).

So here’s a refreshing summer salad for you to share with friends!

Oh! I almost forgot — the best part of this salad is that it is s u p e r quick to pull together. To recap, it’s the best becasue, it’s tasty, it’s easy to make, it appeals to many, and it’s good for your looks. I’m open to names for this one. Post below.

Best picnic salad. Ever.

Ingredients:

1 carrot

1 beet

1 cucumber

1/3 white onion (or bunch of scallions)

1 apple

1/2 -1 TBS Apple Cider Vinegar (raw)

1-2 tsps Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Celtic sea salt (most mineralizing salt) to tatse

Optional Fancy Stuff:

Chopped up fresh mint

Chopped up spinach

 

Directions:

1. Wash and peel all vegetables .

2. Grate all vegetables with cheese grater – use the larger holes

3. Also grate the onion. Don;t grate the green onions if that’s your onion source. Chop those.

4. Mix together.

5. Add vinegar, olive oil, and salt to taste.

6. Putt on a snazzy sun hat and waltz out the door.

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Asparagus. What the Cool Kids Know About Spring Seasonal Eating

Over here in the northeast, you wouldn’t know it was spring, what with all the rain and jacket weather we’ve been having, except… All the early spring foods are making their appearance. Big time.

The Mighty Asparagus

The Mighty Asparagus!

Taken from a food-grown-in-the-ground perspective, this is the time of year all of the fresh foods come “springing” forth. I’m going to let you in on some inside secrets. What all the seasonal eaters know, is that this is the season of some seriously good eats!

Right now, asparagus is fresh, sweet and delicious. This is very different from the asparagus sent around the country year-round from California. This is the asparagus local to your area, grown from soil rich with microbes, that inhabit the same places as you do. (Umm, okay – nerd alert – pumping the breaks.)

The bottom line is that this food is not only super-fresh but packed with the vitamins and minerals that your body needs this time of year, the food that mother nature intended us to eat right NOW.

Years ago, a friend of mine who worked at the Union Square Green Market in New York, started celebrating “ramps and fiddleheads!” I had absolutely no clue what he was talking about – but I was intrigued. Then a few years later I came across nettles, and my seasonal life changed. People! These foods are incredible for so many reasons.

  1. They are seasonal and they make their appearance relatively short — giving them the status of precious gem of the plant world
  2. Many of them grow wild, making them entirely more nutrient abundant
  3. They help us clear the gunk out from the winter and they hint to us which direction to take our consumption in (hint: green)

Today, I will focus only on Asparagus (so you might go out and consume it with gusto).

Portrait of Asparagus on Rainy Spring Day

Asparagus is a highly alkalizing vegetable. In fact, it is one of the most powerful alkalizers known in the vegetable world. Asparagus is believed to help with fertility and is used around the world in some form for this purpose. In each region it bursts forth from the ground and is up for about two weeks. Barbara Kingsolver writes a beautiful story around foraging for asparagus with her father in her book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle.

The “unique” smell that accompanies your urine is the quick flushing of acid waste from your blood and kidneys. This is a great alkalizing cleanse for your bladder and kidneys.

Here are a few quick ways to prepare fresh, seasonal asparagus.

To prepare, rinse and slice off the woody ends of the stems on the bias (they may be 1-2 inches only).

Simple Roasted Asparagus:

  • Slice asparagus in to bite size pieces
  • Put in a cooking dish
  • Add 1 TBS Ghee (clarified butter) or Olive Oil
  • Heat tosater oven 300˚ if using ghee, 200˚ if using olive oil
  • Add pinch of celtic sea salt to taste
  • Roast it for 10-20 minutes (this means walk away and do other things while checking back occasionally) the asparagus would be bright green.

This was so delicious, I don’t even have a photo becasue I ate it right out of the baking dish.

Simple Stir Fried Asparagus:

  • Try a stir fry with ginger, garlic and sea salt

Have either of these by themselves (I eat a whole bunch at one sitting), over millet or quinoa, or with some brown rice pasta.

You can also check this fresh, easy Asparagus Salad recipe I posted last year (it’s below the roasted asparagus recipe). Yes, I realize keep posting about Asparagus. Maybe there’s a reason.

Enjoy!

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Almost Spring-time Easy Broccoli Soup

On the east coast we’ve had a little winter Revisit. However, Spring is just around the corner! Try this super easy Broccoli soup to get your green on and warm up at the same time. As we go into Spring, we can follow mother nature and eat lots of greens. Greens have low caloric density and tons of nutrients and fiber.

Here’s a recipe form my 4 week cleanse. This is a soup you can indulge in and still shed your winter weight.

Almost Spring-time Easy Broccoli Soup

All measurements are estimates, play around and use your instincts.

You’ll need:

baking dish

high speed blender or food processor

toaster oven or oven

Ingredients:

  • 2 broccoli heads and most of the stem – washed and roughly chopped
  • 4-6 cloves of garlic – whole
  • 3 TBS olive oil
  • 1 cup of vegetable stock (or water)
  • salt to taste
  • 1/2 tsp onion powder
  • Eden Shake to taste and for garnish

Directions:

  1. Wash and roughly chop broccoli. Trim the woody part of the stem, use the rest
  2. Add broccoli florets, stems, and peeled garlic to a baking dish with water still on them
  3. Coat with olive oil
  4. Add some salt
  5. Roast in toaster oven (or oven if you prefer) on 250º for about 30 minutes– we do this on low because of the olive oil. Olive oil can become damaged in high heat and create free radicals in our bodies, so when heating be gentle and use low heat
  6. Remove from oven and transfer to blender or food processor
  7. Add in vegetable stock or water, salt to taste, and onion powder
  8. Blend until smooth.
  9. Garnish with Eden shake or parsley — or just eat as is. As much as you like.

Enjoy!

 

 

 

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5 Simple Tools to Beat the Winter Blues

Many people are feeling the winter blues. We’ve had a cold and precipitous winter, but take heart! In 2 months it will be April. The flowers will be blooming, the spring shoots will be coming up.

NOW is the perfect time to start readying yourself physically, emotionally and spiritually for spring. The days are getting longer, it’s all very exciting. So let’s get our bodies into shape for the burst of energy and joy that happens when spring finally breaks!

Here are 5 tools you can use to beat the Winter Blues, enjoy the last of winter, and prepare your body for spring.

1. Eat dark, leafy greens.

And if you’re doing that already? Eat more. Dark leafy greens promote light, flexible energy. They are nutritionally dense powerhouses and packed with chlorophyll.  Chlorophyll is created by soaking up the sun’s bright energy.

Chlorophyll is to a plant as  blood is to a human. When you eat greens in abundance during the cold, bleak winter months, you are summoning the essence of spring and summer.

Just look at all the pictures in this post. Which does the Bok Choy Recipe picture (below) remind you more of?

Flushing your body with greens is one of the most rewarding things you can do.

2. Make at least 51% of your food raw.

Many of us gravitate to cooked foods during the winter months, but if you eat a little over half of your diet in raw veggies, you can start to release weight, reduce inflammation and lower cholesterol (to a name a few things). Raw foods contain incredible enzymes and nutrients that get lost once we cook our food past 108º. The way I like to eat raw veggies in the winter is to take them out of the fridge well before I consume them – this way they are room temp, and not cold! Use raw foods to start the slimdown down, reduce inflammation, and get ready for spring.

3. Capture more time.

Consider winter a retreat. Winter is the perfect time to go inward and s l o w down. It’s a good time to do a gentle food cleanse (winter cleanse coming soon).  Use this time to connect with your spiritual side, start new habits, reflect, stretch, create new projects. If you’ve got kids that are going bonkers – start a project like building a birdhouse and readying it for spring.

4. Take a liquid Vitamin D supplement.

I’m not too big on supplements but there a few I reccomend. Vitamin D3 is one of them. Almost everybody is low in this hormone (it is not a vitamin) and recent studies suggest that Vitamin D deficiency can contribute to infertility, cancer and other diseases. Simply put, I find when I up my Vit D, I’m just happier.

5. Eat seasonally.

As you match nature’s rhythms, you sync up with them. Winter doesn’t feel so miserable and spring feels much closer.  Focus on soups, beans, winter greens, squashes, sweet potatoes, and warming teas. And don’t forget to eat 51% raw.

Here’s a surprisingly delicious recipe for baby bok choy and mushrooms. It tastes like it’s cooked, but it is raw, fresh and full of enzymes and nutrients that will give you a lift.

Bok Choy and Mushroom Salad

Serves 1

This is easy and quick — experiment with other vegetables

Ingredients:

1 head of baby bok choy – keep leaves intact, chop stems

1 handful of shitake, cremini, or oyster mushrooms – clean and slice to desired thickness

Dressing:

1/3 cup olive oil

1/4 cup wheat free tamari

2 cloves of garlic

Directions:

1. Wash, drain and prep bok choy and mushrooms

2. Add oil, tamari and garlic  to food processor or high speed blender and blend until smooth

3. marinate salad with half of the dressing (save the other half) and let sit for 15 minutes to a few hours. The longer the salad sits, the more wilted and cooked tasting it will become.

Let me know what you think!

How do you beat the winter blues?

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Stinging Nettles: High in Protien, Great for Weight-loss, Anemia, Good Vibes

Nettles are an edible wild spring green that pack an unbelievable amount of nutrition (see below) and help with all kinds of conditions including weight-loss, anemia, mucus, allergies, etc. The season for Nettles happens over a few weeks, so NOW is the time to look for them and get ‘em while they’re here.

WHAT DO YOU DO WITH THEM?

Glad you asked. I make them into a pesto and use it everything (not just pasta)! I stir it into grits, have it with eggs and asparagus, stir it into quinoa, etc. You can combine with basil if you like or just use the Nettles. There are lots of possibilities,pine nuts, walnuts, almonds… Below is a recipe for the Nettles pesto I’ve been making and how you might add to your everyday diet. After I post this I’m going into my kitchen to make a half year’s worth to freeze. You can also read about how good it is for you below.

ADVICE: Use tongs! They sting until you blanch them.

HOW THEY’RE SO GOOD FOR YA!

Nettles are one of the most nutritious greens on the planet. Cooked or dried they lose their sting.
The entire plant can be used.

-Highest levels of beauty producing silicon in any food.
-Vitamins A, C, beta-carotene
-Chlorophyll
-Immune system builder
-High Iron content
-They’re unusually high in protein (40%) for a plant
-Nutrient-dense, they make a good overall tonic for strengthening the body
-Useful in treating anemia, high vitamin C content ensures that the iron is properly absorbed by the body.

Uses:
The juice of roots and leaves, mixed with honey or sugar, relieves both bronchitis and asthma. Greens, juice, tea, powder forms.

Weight Loss:
-Increase the function of the thyroid gland:
-Increase metabolism—helps burn away fat while increasing energy.
-Relieves mucus in the colon allowing for the release of excess waste.
-Mineral rich, which helps satisfy hunger. Overeating often is a search for minerals.

Blood Purification:
-High caliber blood purifier.
-Diuretic properties help flush the blood and cleanse thru the action of the kidneys.

Other known uses:
-Combat and relieve allergy symptoms (especially hay fever)
-Anti-arthritis or anti-rheumatic agent,
-Used as a pain reliever and anti-inflammatory,
-Used as a lung tonic for ex-smokers
-Helps skin heal from eczema, or hives
-Bursitis,
-Tendinitis,
-Laryngitis,
-Kidney stones,
-Lowers blood sugar naturally
-Relieves the symptoms of sciatica and PMS

EXCELLENT FOR:  toxicity, poor skin quality, weak nails loss of overall luster.

RECIPES

Nettles Pesto (and nettles tea!)
By now you know how incredibly healthy and nourishing nettles are . This is my favorite way (so far) to get my nettles on.

1 bunch of Nettles
½ C pine nuts
2-3 cloves garlic (chopped)
Olive oil (best to do this by sight, but start with 1/8-1/4 C)
Optional: Basil and/or mint (you don’t need these to taste great)
Salt to taste.
1.    Use tongs to handle Nettles, they will sting you until blanched!
2.    Bring a pot of filtered water to boil enough to submerge the bunch of nettles you have.
3.    Rinse the Nettles- using tongs- in a bowl with cold water and gently agitate to clean off dirt, drain, repeat 2 more times.
4.    When water is hot or boiling places nettles – using tongs- into the water and push around until the color changes – and they begin to brighten and plump – just a few seconds.
5.    Remove by pouring water into a mesh strainer or colander sitting over a bowl – so you can capture the water. Set aside this Nettles water and drink as a hot tea. Drink it plain or add some mint to it.
6.    Place nettles, garlic, pine nuts, (basil and/or mint if desired) and some oil into a food processor (or Vita mix)
7.    Add more oil for desired consistency, add salt to taste
Serve with zucchini or spaghetti squash pasta. Dip veggies into it; serve over roasted cauliflower, or with anything, really.

Zucchini “Pasta” - if you’re not into traditional pasta, try this with your pesto…

1 medium large zucchini per person.

If you have a mandolin or Benriner this will be perfect for the job, and you can hook up the julienne attachment for perfectly formed noodles.
If don’t have a mandolin, and you can either use a vegetable peeler or a knife. The peeler method will give you long flat noodles, and if using a knife, just cut the zucchini into thin slices, stack up, and cut again lengthwise into thin strips.
If eating raw, dress them with a little olive oil, or some nettles pesto.
Add fresh chopped olives or tomatoes.
You can also boil water, and add the noodles to the water to cook for about 1 minute for a slightly different texture.
Take out and immediately blanch in cold water, or cold running water, to prevent over cooking.

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Seasonal Foods: Asparagus 2 Ways

It’s asparagus season in the Northeast which means it’s time to eat and enjoy this early spring vegetable. Asparagus is a perfect  for the spring and summer seasons: It’s a diuretic and helps cleanse and strengthen the kidneys. It is rich in chlorophyll making it a terrific blood cleanser. It’s also known worldwide as a superior fertility food.

Plan on eating your asparagus soon after purchase, when it’s tastes are peak. Try these simple preparations and let me know what you think.

Roasted Asparagus

Prep Time: 3 minutes
Cooking Time: 7-9 minutes

Ingredients:
1 Bunch Fresh Asparagus
Olive Oil
pinch of salt

Directions:
1. Pre Heat Oven (or Toaster Oven) to 200 degrees
2. Wash Asparagus removing dirt
3. Bend stalk and let break naturally, discard woody stem and cut nicely to clean up the break
4. Brush or rub with Extra Virgin Olive Oil
5. Sprinkle with sea salt (I use Celtic salt for it’s high mineral content)
6. Place in a casserole dish in oven for 10-20 minutes

Fresh Asparagus Salad

For this fresh, bright, springtime recipe, you’ll want to use the asparagus raw, but slice it thin and on a diagonal. Peel the stem before you slice with a vegetable peeler to reveal the tender shoot.

Prep Time: 10 minutes if you’re feeling relaxed

Ingredients:

1 Bunch Asparagus
1-2 Fresh squeezed lemons (to taste)
Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Sea Salt
Freshly ground pepper

Finish with either:

Pine nuts coarsely chopped (my favorite)

or

1-2 oz wedge parmigiano-reggiano cheese

Directions:

1. Place the pieces in a bowl and toss with lemon juice, olive oil, and salt and pepper to taste
2. When ready to serve,  add the pine nuts and toss OR use a vegetable peeler to shave the cheese over the top
3. Serve at room temperature or slightly chilled.

Tonight, I’m adding fresh peas to the mix. I’ll Keep you posted.

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