Lime, Miso and Vanilla Dressing & Eat to Defeat Cancer

I really should know better than to let so many days go between postings. That or I need to learn to cover less in the update posts. It actually took me over 4 hours on Friday to get the post up with all the photos and that was after I had written most of it the prior day. Yikes! That is why I haven’t been able to fit posts into my schedule recently. Even on a good day I spend an average of 2-3 hours writing a post, working up the nutrition information for recipes, taking then selecting and reducing photos and getting everything onto BlogSpot. When you wonder why I skip posting some days now you know why. It can sometimes be tough to work that much time into my schedule. I could always post something shorter and without as many pictures, recipe details and/or health info but how much fun would that be? ;-)

On a related note I have been toying with the idea of changing what I include in my posts every day. If any of you have any suggestions regarding things/topics you would like me to cover I would love to know what is on your mind. Before I make any drastic changes I will post what I am thinking about and ask you for feedback. I want to the blog to continue to be something that is useful for all of you that take the time to read.

Our food Friday, Saturday and Sunday was not terribly exciting. We had our usual oatmeal and green smoothies for breakfast. Dan had to go downtown to his office on Saturday making food that day a bit dull. However I did make one salad dressing on Sunday that everyone enjoyed so I wanted to share that with you.

Dan remembered the lime and vanilla dressing that I had made before and asked me to make that again. When I looked it up it contained olive oil. You know that I wasn’t going to use oil now so I had to decide what to include to emulsify the dressing. I decided to try white miso and that worked well. Here is what I did:

Lime, Vanilla and Miso Salad Dressing
Serves 4

Ingredients:

1 organic lime, zested and juiced
1 teaspoon white miso
½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract (not the imitation stuff)

Directions:

Combine everything and whisk until the miso is broken up. No one wants to bite down on a big chunk of miso. ;-) Refrigerate the dressing in a closed container until needed.

I used this dressing on a salad of mesclun, Asian pear, blackberries and slivered almonds and the salad disappeared.

Nutritional Information:

Amount Per Serving
Calories - 10.36
Calories From Fat (10%) - 1.02

Total Fat - 0.12g
Saturated Fat - 0.02g
Cholesterol - 0mg
Sodium - 53.85mg
Potassium - 23.27mg
Total Carbohydrates-  2.45g
Fiber - 0.7g
Sugar-  0.44g
Protein - 0.31g

Comments:

This is a great dressing to use on a salad with fruit. You will be seeing this turn on the blog again since everyone enjoyed it so much.

The other dish that I made for lunch on Sunday was roasted veggies (carrots, onion, mushrooms) that I tossed in lemon juice and zest immediately after roasting. Then I added zatar (a Middle Eastern spice blend of thyme and sesame seeds) and sumac (another Middle Eastern spice). I placed the veggies on top of quinoa.

Sunday night we needed to have dinner but I didn’t have any leftovers in the refrigerator. For dinner I made a batch of queso (this time with nutritional yeast, cumin and chili powder added) and used that to top quinoa and a lot of mixed veggies. I wanted to mention that because the sauce is very useful and one of my go to items when I need something quick. Without the nutritional yeast this sauce has also been popular with omnivores.

Golden Raisins:

Jenny asked me what brand of golden raisins I buy and that is pictured above front and back. I like theses because they are organic and only contain raisins no preservatives or other chemicals.

TEDx Manhattan:

Since Dan was downtown working on Saturday I had a chance to watch most of the TEDx program that was streaming live. Dr. William Li who I tuned in to see was a two part program. The first part was a repeat of this talk. The second part was a brief follow up to his talk. He mentioned his website “Eat to Defeat” Cancer and talked about some of the new science. You can join his site for free, I did, and get access to the list of foods that result in anti-angiogenesis (stopping the blood supply to cancer).

Dr. William Li was on the Dr. Oz show a few weeks ago and talked about eating hard cheese for the vitamin K2 it contains. You will not be surprised to know I did a little research and found out that there is a vegan item with more K2 than hard cheese. The only problem is that item is natto. I happen to have natto in the refrigerator but have not been brave enough to eat it yet. If any of you have any tips on how to make it less “gooey and gelatinous” I would love to hear your suggestions. ;-)

Happy thoughts:

I have many things to be happy about today. Here are my happy thoughts now:

• Woo hoo! The 8 nights of the Great Health Debate have ended. It was interesting to hear numerous people discuss health and I took a lot of notes and have many things to research. However it is also nice to have all that time back. I am looking forward to a more leisurely schedule this week.

• Sunday was the 24th anniversary of the day Dan and I met. I realized that we have now been together more than half my life. In one respective it feels like we couldn’t have together that long and in another it seems like we have been together forever. It is so nice to be married to my best friend.  :-)

• Our weather today (Monday) was glorious! It was wonderful to reach 65 early in the afternoon. Too bad it was crazy windy but the temperature was great. I loved having the windows open for a while today to air out the house. Nothing smells better than fresh air. ;-)

• I am really looking forward to spring now after the heat wave we had today. Spring is my favorite season! I can’t wait for my azaleas to bloom again. I am also looking forward to getting outside everyday to get fresh air, play in the garden, and ride my bike. Ahhhh spring is great I can’t wait for it to arrive.

Signing out:

It is time for me to log out so I can unwind. Tomorrow I have an appointment but hope that won’t keep me from getting a post up. I hope Valentine’s Day was good for you. Talk to you soon, hopefully tomorrow.

Simple Roasted Veggies with Vegan Queso just another Monday

It was nice to head back to the gym bright and early this morning. I never get tired of this place. Who said that? LOL

Since my knee is still not 100%, though it did improve after a weekend without cardio, we opted to cut the workout short and call it quits after 45 minutes today. I didn’t want to push my knee too far a risk a relapse since it has improved so much over the weekend.

This morning we were back to oatmeal with mixed frozen berries, cinnamon, powdered ginger, ground flaxseed, and sliced almonds.

Lunch was a bowl of ribolitta leftover from yesterday.

Then it was off to the dentist for me. With all the other doctor appointments lately I have been remiss in getting to the dentist which means extra deep cleaning and scraping for me. Yay! Not really. Good thing I like Regan so much or this would be much more painful. Regan did a great job (without any needles woo hoo) on keeping the discomfort to a minimum. This is coming from someone with a dentist phobia too. I go back to the dentist again Wednesday and then I am finished. Gotta love that right?

After my dental appointment I ran out the library to pick up an exercise DVD I had put on hold and came out with 3 more books and another DVD. Seriously when do I think I am going to find time to read and watch this stuff. *shakes head* Given that I have been too busy to finish all the Christmas decorations up yet I need to have my head examined LOL. I did pick up Ani Phyo’s newest book “Ani’s Raw food Essentials” that I hope to read in the next few days. As soon as I do I will let you know what I think.

When I got home I had a quick snack of an orange and two Brazil nuts. I try to eat two Brazil nuts everyday for the selenium. Most days I remember to eat them though I am better at giving them to Dan than I am eating them myself. I should worry a little more about me. I know that would make Dan happy since he fusses at me about this particular issue often.

By the time I was ready to start dinner it was after 6pm and like usual I had no idea what I was going to make. I had a couple of acorn squash that I could use and today seemed like a good day to get one into the oven given that the cold weather is back again. I decided to roast everything in the oven and make a quick 5 minute sauce to top the veggies. This is one of those dinners that take 10 minutes of work, and some oven time and dinner is on the table. This is more of a method than a recipe but here is what I did:

Simple Roasted Veggies with Vegan Queso
Serves 3 (dinner for both of us last night and leftovers for Dan’s lunch)

Ingredients:

1 acorn squash, cut in half, seeds removed then cut into bite-sized chunks
3 parsnips, sliced reasonably thinly
2 sweet potatoes, cut into bites-sized chunks
2 poblano peppers, cut into bite-sized chunks
1 onion, peeled and cut into bite-sized chunks
I batch of vegan queso (my numbers assume you used 1/3 of it)
1 green onion, thinly sliced
6 sprigs of fresh cilantro, minced

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees convection. Place the veggies on a half sheet pan keeping them in quadrants by veggie to make it easier to remove any that are cooked sooner than others. Bake for 30 minutes and check to make certain the harder veggies (the squash and potatoes) are tender. Mine cooked for approximately 40 minutes.

When the veggies are almost ready, probably at the 30 minute mark, start the vegan queso. I roughly followed the recipe I linked to above except I added nutrition yeast, chili powder and cumin to taste. I wanted this version to be more flavorful since the veggies were plain.

To serve top the roasted veggies with a little sauce and sprinkle with the green onion and cilantro.

Nutritional Information:

Amount Per Serving
Calories - 417.56
Calories From Fat (7%) - 30.74

Total Fat - 3.67g
Saturated Fat - 0.66g
Cholesterol - 0mg
Sodium - 88.54mg
Potassium - 2150.79mg
Total Carbohydrates - 94.78g
Fiber - 20.56g
Sugar - 21.49g
Protein - 8.85g

Comments:

What I like about meals like this is that they take very little work from the chef. I was literally in the kitchen less than 10 minutes and most of that was watching the sauce to make sure it didn’t stick. This is one of those incredibly easy meals that I turn to often when it is cold outside and I am not much in a mood to cook. This is also good over a bed of whole grains (quinoa, brown rice, or millet).

Typically this is the type of meal that I wouldn’t bother to post in detail because it is so easy. But then I realized that there are many nights other people don’t to fuss in the kitchen either. I think you will find yourself turning to this method often this winter when you just need healthy food fast.

You can vary this dish with any veggies you have on hand. That is how this type of dinner comes together for me. Mushrooms are good in this, so is cauliflower and cherry tomatoes.

Why are the holidays for indulgence?

I am going to start this by saying that I realize what I wrote on this topic goes against the vast majority of Americans. However I think it is important to point out the deleterious health impact of holiday baking.

Staying away from cookies, candy and cake this time of year takes an almost herculean effort. Why do most Americans think the holidays are reason to indulge or worse over indulge? Don’t they understand the impact that sugar has on the immune system? Gee I wonder why there are so many colds during the winter. Between the lack of sunshine (vitamin D) and the sugar coma it isn’t really surprising. Throw in that people aren’t as active when it is cold outside reducing the immune system even more and I think the increase in the incidence in colds makes complete sense.

Don’t get me wrong we used to do the same thing here. I would make a half dozen different flavors of homemade marshmallows frequently chocolate covered to give to friends. But that was before I completely understood the impact of sugar on health. Now that I know better I can’t get on board with the idea of holiday baking. Just because something is a tradition doesn’t make it a good idea. Vegans would be the first one to say Turkey though traditional isn’t necessary for Thanksgiving. Somehow women (vegan or not) have equated the holidays with baked goods. It is as though they think that if they “deprive” their family of baked goods they are being mean. I see it exactly the other way. Most baked goods are nasty unhealthy concoctions to me and I wouldn’t have them in my house.

Which brings me to a question …. What is your opinion of baked good (cookies, cakes, etc.)? Do you feel that you have to make them for your family? If yes I would love to hear why. Is it that you need more information on the detrimental health impact or is it something else?

Happy Thoughts:

It is hard to believe that today is only Tuesday. I feels much later in the week to me than that. I guess it was because our weekend wasn’t as restful as normal. Here are my happy thoughts:

• My dental appointment went well (no needles or pain) and I will be finished with this phase by Wednesday. Yay!

• Tuesday afternoon watched the PBS documentary “Anti Cancer” by the doctor that wrote the book. It was good and follows the book fairly closely. If you are someone that remembers things that they watch and hear better than something you read this would be for you. I picked this up from the library yesterday.  I will include my review soon. I want to watch it twice first.

• I very briefly considered making some vegan cookies to give away during the holidays. Thankfully I came to my senses first. I would feel bad afterwards knowing that something I did for the people that mean the most to me was unhealthy.

Signing out:

That is going to be it for me today. I need to get ready to run to the gym. Since the gym didn’t open until 11am today we decided to go after work rather than work out at home. I hope all of you are having a happy and healthy Tuesday. Talk to you again tomorrow.

Mustard Glazed Roasted Veggies ... So Good

This is a tease for the roasted veggies I improvised tonight. These use no oil and are bursting with flavor.  I love it when an experiment exceeds my expectations.

Friday:

What a glorious morning we had here in the Mid-Atlantic today. It was a bit warmer than it has been with temps in the mid to upper 50’s early today. We quickly shot up to 70 by 11 am. I don’t think we could be having a more perfect day weather wise.

Breakfast:

My day starting making fresh veggie and fruit juice (see yesterday) but today the liter of juice actually made it to Dan’s lunch bag. ;-)

For breakfast I had 2 cups of the fresh juice and a few walnuts halves to assist my body in processing the fat soluble vitamins. I like the taste of the fresh juice. Hopefully I can continue to make the juice in the mornings. It is a lot of work to make fresh juice and takes 30 minutes or more, but I think the nutritional profile makes it worth the trouble on most days anyway. ;-)

Dan decided he would have a green smoothie this morning for breakfast. What? Shocked right? I know I was. ;-) I made his smoothie with: 4 kale leaves/stems roughly chopped, 2 frozen bananas, ¼ teaspoon cinnamon, ¼ teaspoon powdered ginger, 1 tablespoon flaxseeds, a handful of walnuts and water to process.

Exercise:

Once Dan was off to work it was time to exercise. I don’t normally talk much about exercise since this is primarily a food blog but exercise has become an important part of my life. There is something about weight lifting that makes me feel strong and capable that I enjoy. Exercise also seems to help me feel more alive. Getting your blood pumping can be a good “high” and it becomes addictive.

Thoughts on food:

Dan and I were talking about food this morning and I had an epiphany. Sometime over the last year I have come to view food as a way to nourish myself and not a way to indulge. I don’t know exactly when that happened but it did and it makes staying healthy SO much easier. In the past I would decide what to cook based primarily on flavor but now I am very content to have green smoothies, a huge salad or bowl of bean soup. Of course you will still see things like the sweet potato torta from a few days ago but I wanted you to know what was going through my head now. I feel like this was a huge step for me so I wanted to share what was happening.

Thinking about my prior diet I can say health used to take a back seat to flavor but no longer. The longer I eat a whole food plant-based diet the less I have any desire to eat things like cake, pie, cookies or pasta. Even pizza doesn’t appeal to me the way it used to. I think that I feel so good eating this way that the idea of putting unhealthy or less healthy things into my body just feels wrong.

The biggest obstacle I had to achieving an uber healthy diet was my friends and family. Only having Dan on board with the dietary changes make it tough to eat healthy when we were with others. Thankfully we have Ian and he can accommodate us and our friends but even then we still frequently default to whole wheat pizza too often. :- / It is tough to be healthy in an unhealthy world but it isn’t impossible.

I have a very good friend (who I know would prefer to remain nameless) that I have been nudging in the vegan direction for some time. I spend a great bit of time trying to think of how to get my friend to try eating like we do for a month and see how that changes things. So far I have had no luck. I think my friend believes it is too time consuming to eat like we do. Since I don’t agree I wanted to outline how I make it happen.

Breakfast is typically a green smoothie, fresh veggie and fruit juice, or oatmeal. The smoothie and oatmeal are both very quick to make and eat. The smoothie can go into a travel mug to drink on the way to work and it is tasty way to consume veggies in the morning. Woo hoo! I know I am not right. LOL

Lunch is almost always intentional leftovers from the prior night or a huge salad. The leftovers are quicker, but a salad doesn’t really take that long to make.

Dinner is where I spend a little time cooking. If you make a big batch of soup, hummus, or whole grain early in the week you can get a head start on dinner. I love to quickly cook a few veggies and place them on top of a grain for dinner. Add a bowl of soup and a small salad and you have a quick and nutritious meal on the table.

Some of my favorite tips for getting a healthy meal on the table are to keep any of the following on hand to mix and match to make a meal:

• roasted veggies (you can used these on top of grain or salad) …see dinner tonight
• hummus (great with veggies dippers or on salad)
• beans (these can be combined with grains and veggies or used on a salad)
• whole grains (make 3 or 4 days worth to used in veggie and grain salads, or as base for cooked veggies)
• marinated veggies (these are great in collard wraps, or on salads)
• nut cheese (this one can get out of hand and is calorie dense but can be great in a collard wrap or on a salad)
• keeping a variety of nuts in the freezer to adding to dishes or making nut based sauces
• trying to eat at least one big salad a day (preferably more)
• keeping falafel, bean burgers or seitan in the freezer helps to get a quick meal on the table too

I hope some of that helped one or two of you. I struggled regarding what to eat and how to make it quickly when we first changed our diet. The first 6 months I did a lot more cooking than I do now and it made it hard to stick with this lifestyle. Since I have started to plan for intentional leftovers life has been much easier in terms of cooking.

Lunch:

Today for lunch I decided to make myself a couple of collard wraps. I filled them with fat free hummus, the vegan mozzarella and partially dehydrated tomatoes and they were delicious.

Vegan Mozzarella:

The flavor on this was great, the texture was not quite right for using on a sandwich, though I think it would be great on top a pizza or baked dish. I want to play around with the recipe a little bit before I post it. I think I can get the texture right soon, which may have to happen this weekend because I loved the flavor so I want to share this but my OCD thinks it needs to be perfect, LOL.

Snack:

For a snack this afternoon I had the end of the red cabbage and apple dish with seitan. This time I ate it cold like slaw (no quinoa) and I think I may prefer it cold.

Dinner:

When Dan came home tonight (earlier than usual) I had not started anything for dinner. Having an afternoon snack a little over two hours earlier meant I wasn’t very hungry. We both opted for a salad tonight for dinner. I haven’t made roasted veggies in a while and thought I would try something new.

This is more of a method than a recipe so I will describe what I did. I combined 3 tablespoons of both Dijon and red wine vinegar and whisked until it was creamy. Next I added a little stevia, to taste. I cut up four carrots, 2 purple Peruvian potatoes and grabbed a handful of green beans. I tossed the veggies in the marinade and placed them on a silpat covered baking sheet and roasted them at 400 degrees until they were the texture we prefer.  Some veggies cooke faster than others.  This technique will work with most veggies.

Here are the veggies before they were roasted.  The final salad was pictured at the top of the post.

This worked surprisingly well. I loved the flavor it added to the veggies. All I had to do was put the veggies on top of shredded romaine and top with chopped walnuts and we had dinner. This was so quick and easy it will be showing up on my dinner table again soon. I can’t wait to make variations of this.

Signing out:

That is going to be it for me tonight. I hope everyone is having a great start to their weekend. Talk to you all again soon.