Green Banana and Peanut Butter Smoothie and Lower Fat Guacamole Wrap

This morning was far more rushed that I prefer. I had a number of errands to run and with the temperatures predicted to reach 100 I wanted to get out and back as early as possible. Right after Dan left for work I straighten up the kitchen made a smoothie and ran out the door. Here is my on the go smoothie from this morning:

Green Banana and Peanut Butter Smoothie
Serves 1

Ingredients:

1/3 cup oats, ground into flour
1 frozen banana
2 tablespoons reduced fat peanut butter
2 collard leaves, shredded
¼ teaspoon powdered ginger (for the anti inflammatory properties)
¼ teaspoon cinnamon (to help the body digest the fruit sugar and provide antioxidants)
1 tablespoon ground flaxseeds
water and ice (to make the smoothie liquid and cold)
stevia, to taste (if necessary)

Directions:

Process the oats into flour in your blender first. Now add the other ingredients and process until smooth. Add as much water and ice as you like. I used about 1 cup water and 6 ice cubes.

Nutritional Information:

Amount Per Serving
Calories - 415.59
Calories From Fat (31%) - 130.11

Total Fat - 15.37g
Saturated Fat - 2.4g
Cholesterol - 0mg
Sodium - 177.37mg
Potassium - 772.18mg
Total Carbohydrates - 62.97g
Fiber - 11.86g
Sugar - 17.46g
Protein - 14.49g

Comments:

This is one of my favorite smoothies. I don’t have them often but when I do this seems to be the one I make. The collards do add a little “grassy undertone” but the smoothie is sweet from the banana and rich from the peanut butter so it works, IMO. ;-)

I add collards for their nutrition. They are a good source of vitamin A, and K and a decent source of calcium. Since they are in the same botanical family as broccoli they are more nutritious when lightly cooked or raw. I like that the blender does the work of breaking down the cell walls to make the nutrients more absorbable.

Health food store:

I poured my smoothie into a quart jar and ran out the door with coolers to do a little quick shopping. We needed some medicinal mushrooms, astragalus and turmeric (with piperine) from the health food store. While I was there I bought a big bag of tulsi tea.  I also bought brown lentils, garbanzo beans and some organic bay leaves.

Library:

Next I ran to the library and hit the jackpot on healthy books. It was a productive stop. I grabbed the following:

“The All-Pro Diet” by Tony Gonzalez. I bought this to read what his nutritionist has to say about protein but I also wanted to see his workout routine. ;-) Tony is a fan of T. Colin Campbell and was mentioned during the lectures for my Cornell certificate program. I am curious to see how he eats.

“Sports Nutrition: From Lab to Kitchen” by Asker Jeukendrup. I grabbed this one for the title alone; they had me at from lab to kitchen. ;-)

“The Eat-Clean Diet Recharged” by Tosca Reno. I am a huge fan of Tosca Reno and own her other books. I am hoping this one has more vegan options, but only time will tell.

“Easy Green Living” by Renee Loux. I enjoyed Renee’s earlier book, “The Balanced Plate” so I wanted to see what this book was about. The titled sounded promising.

“The Complete Book of Raw Food” by Julie Rodwell. I was looking for vegan books at the library that I didn’t own and there weren’t any that I wanted to read. I supposed that means I own to many cookbooks. I picked up this raw book because I am always looked for more raw recipes. While I am not and probably will never been a raw foodist I do like raw food especially in the summer.

Wegman’s:

After the library I stopped at Wegman’s. The nearby DSW was calling my name. But I resisted, somehow. ;-) I convinced myself that summer was almost over and that I didn’t really need more sandals. Who said that? LOL

I only needed a few items for Wegman’s so I was in an out in well under 15 minutes. We needed some ascorbate C powder for our green and white tea to keep the EGCG bioavailable longer.  Remember vitamin C is heat senstive so add at the end of brewing or to cold tea. I also was out of barley, bulgur and macadamia nuts.

Home for Lunch:

Running around from place to place in the heat was not my idea of fun so I was very happy to get home to the A/C. The problem was that I left so early this morning that I didn’t have time to exercise before I left. While I needed to exercise I was also hungry. Hunger won out and I made a quick collard wrap with lower fat guacamole. Here is what I did:

Lower Fat Guacamole filled Collard Wrap
Serves 1

Ingredients:

½ Haas avocado, peeled and pitted
½ cup green peas, if frozen defrost
2 tablespoons salsa
1 teaspoon lime zest
¼ teaspoon cumin seed, ground
1 pinch cayenne
1 collard leaf, stem end removed and stem vein shaved flat with your knife
½ cup romaine, for extra crunch
5 slices cucumber, for more crunch

Directions:

Mash the avocado, peas and salsa together with a fork. Add the salsa, lime zest, cumin and cayenne.

Lay the collard leaf on your cutting board light green side up. Fill with the guacamole. Top with cucumber and romaine and roll up like a burrito.

Nutritional Information:

Amount Per Serving
Calories 219.96
Calories From Fat (53%) - 115.72

Total Fat - 13.8g
Saturated Fat - 1.92g
Cholesterol - 0mg
Sodium - 284.15mg
Potassium - 764.45mg
Total Carbohydrates - 21.74g
Fiber - 10.47g
Sugar - 5.93g
Protein - 6.68g

Comments:

This is good but definitely messy. It would not be good to take to work but if you are eating at home go for it. I happen to be a huge avocado fan so this is great to me. If you don’t have any green peas you can make this dish with cold cooked yellow spit peas or white beans. It also works with edamame.

Dried tomatoes:

Last night I turned the dehydrator down to 115 and the tomatoes remained in the dehydrator an additional 12 hours. When I got home from my errands the tomatoes were dry.

Here they are before

and after drying.

I store them in a jar until I need them.

This weekend I will buy twice the amount of tomatoes to dry. I am hoping to use them in place of some of the canned tomatoes I would typically use. I am not overly concerned about BPA since I am not of child bearing age, nor do I have young children at home. However anytime I can reduce a processed food (in this case canned tomatoes) from our diet I think it is a good thing.

Exercise:

I have been putting it off long enough. I need to knock out my cardio and abdominal routine before I change my mind. I will be back later with whatever we end up having for dinner.

Collard Wrap Directions and Why I Use Them

I mentioned earlier this week that I like to use collards in place of flat bread when I want something portable to eat. I started using collards when we cut back on our flour consumption. But now I actually prefer them to bread. There are few reasons for this which I want to highlight:

1. Calorie difference: 1 collard leaf has less than 5 calories versus 100 calories for the average whole wheat flat bread.  I think all these little savings add up and make a difference over the long run.

2. Nutrition difference: collards are rich in vitamin A, folate, calcium and potassium and bread isn’t.

3. Texture: Collards don’t get soggy if you make them ahead of time and pack them to eat later.

4. Price: A bunch of organic collards with approximately 16 leaves (or wraps) was less than $2.00. You are not going to find 16 organic whole wheat flat breads for that price.

While I started using collards as a way to avoid flour there are many more benefits to using them as a flat bread replacement. I would continue to use collards as a bread replacement even if I weren’t trying to avoid flour.

I wanted to provide a few pictures of the specific techniques I use to make a collard wrap. I mentioned that you needed to cut down the stem but I wanted to give more instructions on that and provide a picture. I lay the raw collard leaf on the cutting board with the underside of the leaf facing up. Use a sharp thin knife and lay it flat and shave the stem. The end result is pictured above. I find it is easier to make a few passes and shave the stem down a little at a time.

Once the stem has been cut down it is time to fill the wrap. You can use anything you like for the inside. On this particular wrap I used super flavorful fat free hummus, healthy caponata and a tablespoon of almond feta (no oil version)

Now it is time to roll the wrap up. Fold up the leafy part of the wrap to keep the filling from sliding out the end while you are trying to eat it.

Next roll the wrap like a burrito.  If desired you can cut off the top if it isn’t filled to the end. I don’t do this if I am packing them to travel.  If you are planning to take this with you wrap it up in waxed paper or aluminum foil. Collard wraps travel well since they don’t get soggy. 

That is all there is making collard wraps. They are just as versatile as flat bread filled wraps and much better for you.

Unrelated note:

My sweetie is downtown at his office today. He and Walid worked until almost 11pm last night and are back at the office today. Since I am home alone I decided to make a day of it and spend some time relaxing. There will definitely be a long soak in a hot tub probably with a book. Maybe even a glass of medicinal vino. But before I relax I need to cross some items off my to do list.

I hope you are enjoying your weekend. The weather is gorgeous here, sunny and upper 70’s. Sounds like a perfect day to me. Talk to you soon.

Spicy Collards with Caramelized Red Onions

My maternal grandmother was a Southern Belle from South Carolina. She cooked in a very southern style most of time. Collard greens were often on her dining table in the summer. Her version of collards included pork and was cooked for a very long time. My collards have a lot of flavor, but they also retain more nutrition.

Collards are a member of the cruciferous vegetable family, which I like to include in our diet to assist in fighting cancer. Cruciferous vegetables retain more nutrition when they are lightly cooked. Since collards are a tough vegetable in order to enjoy them lightly cooked you need to slice them thinly.

Spicy Collards with Caramelized Red Onions
Serves 4

Ingredients:

1 red onion, cut in half and thinly sliced
¼ teaspoon of red crushed pepper
¼ teaspoon of kosher salt
1 bunch of collards (15 large leaves), thinly shredded (amounted to approx 5 cups shredded)
1 tablespoon of sherry vinegar, or to taste

Directions:

Cook the red onion in a heavy bottomed skillet (preferably cast iron) until the onions have softened and begun to caramelize. Add the crushed pepper and salt and cook for another minute before adding the collards and sherry vinegar. Cook the collards until they wilt. This should occur in less than 5 minutes over medium/low heat. Collards are a member of the cruciferous vegetable family and retain more of their nutrition when lightly cooked.

Nutritional Information:

Amount Per Serving
Calories - 24.47
Calories From Fat (8%) - 1.97

Total Fat - 0.24g
Saturated Fat - 0.03g
Cholesterol - 0mg
Sodium - 127.36mg
Potassium - 79.8mg
Total Carbohydrates - 5.15g
Fiber - 2.11g
Sugar - 0.21g
Protein - 1.42g

Comments:

These collards have a lot of flavor. They are sweet from the caramelized onions, hot from the red pepper and acidic from the vinegar. I thought they were a nice combination of flavors. My husband thought they were a little too chewy. I frequently have to remind him that lightly cooked vegetables are more nutritious. Overall I would say they had a good complex flavor, and a nice chew.

Collard Wraps with Roasted Garlic Hummus, Walnuts and Grated Carrot

Tonight I decided to make an easy dinner from things I had in the refrigerator. I like to experiment with food and today I made collard wraps. I had purchased the collards from the farmers’ market this weekend because they are part of the cruciferous vegetable family. I love to include as many cancer fighting foods in our diet as I can.

This was my first time to make collard wraps and it was a little more difficult than I expected, but I think that I have figured it out. Take the collard leaf and remove most of the thick stem (but not all). I sliced the bulk of the stem from the leaf. It is important not to slice out the stem completely, or it will be more difficult to keep the filling inside the wrap.

When the stem is mostly removed I smeared the bottom half of the collard (the end near the stem) with roasted garlic hummus. I put chopped walnuts, finely diced celery and grated carrot on top the hummus. Next I rolled up the filled collard like a burrito and sliced it in half and served it cold.

Collard Wraps with Hummus, Walnuts, Carrot and Celery
makes 2 servings

Ingredients:

4 large collard leaves, bulk of stem removed so they are easy to roll
½ cup of walnuts, chopped
1 carrot, grated
2 stalks of celery, finely minced
freshly ground black pepper to taste
1 cup of roasted garlic hummus

Directions:

Mix the walnuts, carrot and celery together. Add black pepper to the nut and vegetable mixture according to your taste.

Cover bottom ½ of the collard leaf with ¼ cup of hummus. Add ¼ of the nut and vegetable mixture on top of the hummus. Roll the filled collard up like a burrito and cut in half. You can secure the wrap with a toothpick if necessary.

Nutrition Information:

Amount Per Serving
Calories - 324.4
Calories From Fat (55%) 177.25

Total Fat - 21.14g
Saturated Fat - 2.06g
Cholesterol - 0mg
Sodium - 495.08mg
Potassium - 625.38mg
Total Carbohydrates - 28.8g
Fiber - 9.17g
Sugar - 3.89g
Protein - 10.26g

Comments:

The collard makes a better sandwich wrap than I expected. It will take a little time to become proficient rolling the collard. However, since this is so much healthier than eating flour based wraps, I will be incorporating more collards into our diet in lieu of whole grains wraps. I think the texture of the walnuts was necessary to give this “sandwich” substance. I also believe that you need something “gooey” like a bean dip to help hold the filling in the wrap. The raw collard imparted less green flavor than I expected.

Next time I may add a few whole or lightly mashed chickpeas for texture. I also think a little lemon juice or zest would be good added to the vegetables on this sandwich.