Holistic Moms Network Presents: Seasonal Diets and Eating for Cleansing Cost: FREE When: April 21, 2011 at 7pm Where: Arlington United Methodist Church, 716 S. Glebe Rd, Arlington, VA
I’m thrilled to announce my first live event in the D.C. area! Come meet me and other holistic minded moms as we talk about the best way to welcome spring: a seasonal, cleansing diet. There will also be a speaker specifically discussing the benefits of raw food.
You’ll learn about:
- What a springtime cleansing diet is all about
- Options for your lifestyle
- The awesome effects of a clean, seasonal diet
- How to overcome common challenges
Plus, one HMN member will win a free Reinvent Yourself 21 Day Detox program package!
About once a month I have a marathon coaching day, where I set up on the couch and talk to 7 or 8 clients in a row. Whew! These aren’t my regular clients though – they’re my student groups from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. As a graduate in the Immersion program I’ve committed myself to these guys for the past 6 months or so, acting as a health coach/business coach/open ear/mentor/friend.
It’s kind of cool to go through IIN again, this time from a new perspective. Hey, I know a lot of you are interested in IIN because I get a ton of emails about it – if you want the scoop, check out their upcoming Q&A webinar on Tuesday June 8th. Sign up here and please tell them you heard about it from Michelle Pfennighaus.
But I will tell you – these marathon sessions are a long day on the phone for me! I have a break for lunch, during which I whipped up a really easy seasonal lunch. It’s one of those things where you look in the refrigerator and just piece something together! I started with the radishes I picked up yesterday from the farmer’s market. Most people think of radishes as raw slices for a salad, but I love to cook mine in butter and include the greens. I find them much tastier and more versatile this way.
Every tree down our street is in full bloom, making me feel like I’m in a movie. I know it’s just nature’s way but I think it is so darn cool how they all know how to bloom at the exact same time. No meetings, no email, no Skype-ing. The trees just do what they do, every year.
I guess in our own human ways we also come alive each spring too. Like, WOOHOOOO IT’S NICE OUT! In my yoga classes I’m teaching a lot of heart-opening postures because it feels good to backbend and feel wide open in the sunny weather. To bloom!
The net result? I’m inspired me to relax and enjoy life a bit more. It’s been a really busy winter – a really busy year. My one year anniversary of Find Your Balance has come and gone and I barely had time to acknowledge it. Since starting this business I’ve done a million things I’ve never done before – one after another after another. Whew!
So when it came to planning food for the week I was like…huh…dinners…hmmm….i dunno…
I went to Whole Foods and stared into my cart until something came together. Seriously, I added and took away bunches of carrots, peppers, beans and greens until my brain finally formulated a vague plan. (I do not recommend this technique unless you have an extra hour to spend at the store. I must have looked like a crazy lady putting the same head of celery in my cart 3 times and taking it out again.)
When the mind says ” You can’t have a Cadbury egg until you finish the bag of hint of lime tostitos” you know it’s time for a cleanse.
Ahh, truer words have never been spoken. This is a quote from one of my friends on facebook – I saw it today and it spoke to me. Here’s why:
I spend pretty much all day every day giving advice on how to eat well. Get more greens, cut out sugar, kick the caffeine habit, etc. The problem is that I am also a human being. As such, I enjoy cadbury eggs and hint of lime tostitos as much as the next person.
Italian women like to munch on raw fennel, or Finocchio. Have you ever tried it? It’s a cousin of carrots and dill, with many nutritious qualities. From Whfoods:
The most fascinating phytonutrient compound in fennel, however, may be anethole-the primary component of its volatile oil. In animal studies, the anethole in fennel has repeatedly been shown to reduce inflammation and to help prevent the occurrence of cancer.
I mean, that’s good. But – ick! Anethole is what gives fennel that anise or licorice flavor. I think it’s yucky! I don’t even like Twizzlers because they look like licorice.
Pssst! Don’t forget to enter to win Green Smoothie Revolution – what a smart way to get your greens!
If there’s one vegetable you buy this week (and I hope you’ll buy more than just one) make it cabbage!
While most of Boston celebrates St. Patty’s day by drinking too much and mobbing South Boston for the parade, I rub my hands together eagerly waiting for the days to follow. It’s the very best week of the year to buy cabbage at a huge discount!
I’m a grocery nerd. So what?
Cabbage belongs to the Cruciferae family of vegetables, which is my all time favorite. Also in this family? Kale, broccoli, collards and Brussels sprouts. These are veggies with serious nutritional power. But we’re not just talking vitamins here, people. We’re also talking about phytonutrients.
Smoothies are a pretty hot ticket item these days. I see ‘em being sold for $8 at cafes and touted as healthy so everyone can feel good about themselves.
Let’s be honest though. Most smoothies being sold at restaurants or take-out places are full of sugar. They’re the “healthy” person’s ice cream cone.
Wait – I can already hear what you’re thinking! “There’s a place near me that makes fresh smoothies from real fruit!” I think that’s great if you have that nearby. But still, $7 or $8 for a smoothie? Yikes. Plus, I hear a lot of people talk about drinking fruit smoothies for breakfast. If that’s the case, chances are you will be starving by 10am. Most of us need some fiber and not so much sugar first thing in the morning. (Unlike juicing, smoothies include the whole vegetable with all of its fiber.)
As with absolutely everything, when you make it yourself you save big bucks and have 100% control over the ingredients. And so, I present to you….green smoothies!
I like to plan. I like lists and calendars and reminders and to-do lists. My Franklin Covey planner is always within arm’s reach. So you can imagine how I go about making dinner, right? Recipe, grocery store trip, list, check, check, check.
Except when the Farmer’s Market has FINALLY arrived in Boston! Every Tuesday and Wednesday from now until I think October, Copley Square is bustling with fresh veggies, homemade goods, and Red Sox fans dressed up in suits for their day job. Other markets in the area will open soon, but Copley is the first.
I had this dilemma: the gym is near the Farmer’s Market. If I went to the gym first, I risked missing out on the best picks at the market. But if I went to the market first, I had to bring all my veggies to the gym locker room. It’s a nice, clean, cool locker room. I went to the market first. See, always planning.
But as you know, at the Farmer’s Market you’re never sure what they are going to have until you get there. It’s gonna be fresh and wonderful but planning is less important than just going and seeing what looks good. I navigated through the stands, picking up green curly kale, collards, garlic scapes, arugula and…wait, now what are these?
Beautiful reds, pinks, purples and whites stood out among the early season’s greens – Easter Egg radishes! And the embryo of dinner formed in my head at that moment.
Just like beets, radishes have gorgeous greens that are often overlooked. In fact, radishes themselves are often overlooked. I knew them from the supermarket salad bar as a kid – ick!! To me, those tasted like onions, something with a sharp bite. But fresh lovely radishes like these cooked up in some butter are tender and sweet, with plenty of health benefits. This recipe took about 15 minutes total because I had some leftover brown rice already cooked.
Easter Egg Radishes, from tips to tops
1 bunch fresh radishes, with greens
1 cup chopped walnuts, toasted
3 Tbl. organic butter
1 Tbl. olive oil
1 garlic scape, chopped roughly (or 1 clove garlic or 1 small shallot)
2 cups cooked brown rice
3 Tbl. lemon juice
S+P, to taste
1. In a small pan, dry toast walnuts. Set aside. Wash and chop radishes into pieces of about the same size, and chop greens separately.
2. In a large pan, heat butter over med heat. Add garlic scape or chopped garlic or shallots. Cook for a few minutes, until browned. I included the entire garlic scape and the green ends turned nice and crispy in this stage.
3. Add radish pieces to the pan, mixing to coat in butter. Add S+P. Add a splash or two of water and allow steam to help them soften. When soft and color from the skin begins to bleed into the whites of the radish, transfer contents of pan to a bowl and cover.
4. In same unwashed pan, add leftover brown rice. Stir to coat in remaining butter/garlic flavor and heat. Add S+P. Remove from pan and set aside.
5. In same unwashed pan (this is good for dishwashing time later!), add olive oil and chopped greens. Sitr and add S+P to taste. Allow greens to wilt but not to the point of mush.
6. Prepare plate with greens on the bottom, a scoop of rice, then radishes and top with walnuts and some lemon juice. I used the horrid kind from a yellow squeezy thing bc that’s all I had. Oh well! It was still delicious!
Don’t forget to enter to win your free bag of Massa Organics brown rice. Enter here!
As I am in the business of helping others try new things and taste new food, it seemed about time to try farro. Oh, have you not heard of my little farro friend? He’s not very well known, sadly. The package I found at Whole Foods described farro as “Unhybridized wheat” and the one fact that seems undisputed is that farro is an ancient grain from Italy.
Well, it certainly was more expensive than regular wheat! (If you can’t find or don’t want to shell out $8/lb. for farro, by all means substitute barley or wheat berries in the recipe I’m going to share with you today.) But I was taken by it’s history and mystique, and as it turns out, its delicious flavor.
Farro, cooked and drained.
While I was in the mood for trying new and unusual things, I adapted this recipe to include baby vidalia onions, fiddleheads and ramps. Why not? Springtime is only once a year, people. I was mostly afraid of screwing up these fairly expensive ingredients: ramps were $9.99/lb. and fiddleheads were $7.99/lb. My hope is that when the Farmer’s Markets FINALLY open here in Boston I can find them cheaper.
Baby vidalia onion, roasted.
Fiddleheads, rinsed.
Ramps, naked.
This recipe basically happens by cooking up each individual ingredient separately, then mixing it all together and topping with a delicious citrus dressing. Expect that your first bite will be so delicious your eyes will open super wide and begin to roll in your head as you savor all the delicate flavors of spring in your mouth. Not to toot my own horn but hot damn this was good! And although the recipe may seem long, it only took me about an hour start to finish.
Springtime Farro adapted from 101cookbooks.com’s Heather’s Farro Recipe
3 cups farro (or barley, wheat or spelt berries)
splash of apple cider vinegar or lemon juice
3 baby vidalia onions with green tops (sometimes called spring onions)
12 ramps
1/2 lb. fiddleheads
2 cups cooked chickpeas
1/2 cup goat cheese
1-2 cups whole basil leaves
about 6 cups of mixed lettuce greens
3/4 cup olive oil
s+p
For dressing:
2 shallots
1 lemon, juice and zest
1 orange, juice and zest
1/2 grapefruit, juice and zest
1/2 grapefruit peeled and chopped
1 Tbl. white vinegar
1/4 cup olive oil
1/3 cup nutritional yeast or parmesan cheese
S+P to taste
1. Soak farro overnight or at least a few hours in a bowl of water with a splash of apple cider vinegar or lemon juice.
2. Slice onions lengthwise, toss with 1/4 cup olive oil, s+p. Place face down on cookie sheets and roast in the oven at 350 degrees for 35 minutes.
3. Drain and rinse farro. In medium saucepan, cover with 1-2″ of water and bring to a boil. Turn down heat and simmer until tender but not falling apart. Mine took about 20 minutes.
4. Rinse ramps and slice off roots. Cut white bulbs from leaves and then slice leaves into 1″ pieces. Heat 1/4 cup olive oil in a pan over med heat. Add bulbs and a dash of S+P, and cook for a minute or two. Add leaves. Cook 1 minute or until soft. Set aside.
5. Rinse fiddleheads well. Heat remaining 1/4 cup olive oil with a dash of S+P in pan and cook fiddleheads for about 5 minutes, until crisp-tender. Taste along the way so you can tell when the flavor goes from pretty good to mmmm very good! Set aside.
6. When onions are done, remove from oven and slice off green tops. Slice bulb into quarters and separate the sweet, roasted layers.
7. When farro is tender, drain and combine with onions, ramps and fiddleheads. Add chickpeas.
8. Prepare dressing: Cook minced shallots over med heat for about 2 minutes. Turn off heat and add the fruit juice and zest. Mix with oil, vinegar, nutritional yeast and S+P.
9. On plates, create a bed of lettuce and basil leaves. Add farro mixture and top with dressing. Add grapefruit pieces and crumbled goat cheese as garnish.
If you are going to have leftovers, I’d store all the ingredients separately, especially the dressing.
Thirsty after all that cooking? Try making an iced infusion by soaking a dried herb like rosemary in 2 cups of boiling water. Steep for up to an hour, then transfer to a pitcher and fill with cold water. Chill in the fridge and serve over ice.
Iced rosemary infusion
So, what is your favorite springtime meal? Don’t forget to enter the Mom’s Real Food Recipe Carnival by May 10th to honor your mom and share some of her cooking inspiration with the rest of us!
Finally, last weekend Max and I took our first trip to a local farm! So awesome. It felt like another world. I mean, I didn’t have any cell phone coverage out there. Crazy, right? It was worth it though. Even when buying the most expensive eggs at Whole Foods I wonder…gee…does this company debeak their chickens? Am I eating eggs from chickens who are stuffed 10 to a cage and never see the light of day? What about the milk I’m buying? Has this cow been fed hormones and antibiotics to keep her producing milk constantly, even while preganant? Is that the kind of business I want to support?
I digress. But seriously, this is what I think about when I shop. That, or I’m thinking damn I forgot my reusable bags again!
So we’re driving down a dirt road past a sportsman club and lots of trees, wondering where this farm is…then, well, we saw the cows! Big, brown, furry looking things. Cows are furry? Did you know that? I did not. They were all hanging out, eating grass, covered in mud. Everything smelled kind of…good. Earthen, sort of. Max assured me that this was only because it’s still cold in Massachusetts. In the summer, the smell would probably shoot past “earthen” to downright “stinky. Ah, well.
Inside the barn everything was on the honor system. We bought fresh eggs and milk, beef and pork and left a check in the jar. Simple stuff. They also had yogurt, duck eggs and goose eggs! Maybe next time. I’ll admit the prices were a bit higher than at the store, but not by much and the freshness can’t be beat. This is quality food that I can feel good about. When was the last time you thought THAT about a Subway $5 Footlong?
Ok, ok I can hear what you’re thinking: “Go to a farm, is she crazy? i don’t even have time to go to the bathroom!”
So for you folks, you’re in luck! It’s time to join your local CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) for summer shares! Joining a CSA allows you to experience farm fresh foods without ever seeing a dirt road. They truck it in, and everyone subscribed goes and picks up their share once a week at the local dropoff point. For anyone in Boston interested in a CSA, please email me and I’ll give you the deets about one in Central Square or one in Medford. For all my lovely readers outside of the Boston area, check out LocalHarvest.org to find a CSA near you.
Finally, if farm-hopping sounds crazy and a CSA is too much commitment, I urge you to look for your local Farmer’s Market. This summer I’ll be spending a lot of time at the Medford Farmer’s Market but there are markets all over the place. Go look. Seriously. Prices at the market are always good and the food is fresher than the stuff that travels on planes, trains and automobiles to get to the supermarket.
I help busy people find balance in their over-worked, over-stressed lives. Trust me, it's not an all-or-nothing situation! A few shifts in diet and lifestyle can rock your world like they did mine. (And if you're a health coach, I can help you do the same for your own clients.) Read on
