celebrating 6 twice!

our jewel's birthday falls close to thanksgiving.
so after our thanksgiving gathering, we enjoyed birthday cake with the whole family.

my sister make the cake with our jewel's two favorite colors :) it's nice to have a sister who's willing to do that for you, huh? it's even better that she's good at it.  unfortunately, my sister had to make the 5+ hour drive down w/ the cake... which also meant that she had to make it a few days in advance - which all to say made for a hectic week for my sister.  thanks, sis!

Happy 6th!

our precious jewel turns 6 tomorrow. to celebrate, we took her to see mary poppins in the big apple.
she absolutely LOVED it!  the adults enjoyed it as well... surprisingly.  it was such a sweet moment to see our jewel enthralled by the acting, the singing, and all of the theatrical effects!

happy birthday, my dear one!

eating right

my man and i started a detox - ok, detox in the most loose sense of the word... but then the weekend rolled around and that just went down the drain.  so, then the plan was to go on the plan during the week and then have more flexibility during the weekends, but then last night i didn't feel so hot and all i wanted was broth and all the broth type stuff we had was ramen... so that went that... but we're starting it again today.

i've been an advocate of the weston a price's diet for years now (advocate doesn't mean i have the will power to follow it all the time, but i do believe in it and do try).  i thought mercola does a good job of succinctly summarizing it so i'll cut and paste his paragraph here as well as link up to his page.

The main points of a weston diet are as follows:

• The foods were natural, unprocessed, and organic (and contained no sugar except for the occasional bit of honey or maple syrup).
• The people ate foods that grew in their native environment. In other words, they ate locally grown, seasonal foods.
• Many of the cultures ate unpasteurized dairy products, and all of them ate fermented foods.
• The people ate a significant portion of their food raw.
• All of the cultures ate animal products, including animal fat and, often, full-fat butter and organ meats.

When he analyzed his findings, he found that the native diets contained ten times the amount of fat-soluble vitamins, and at least four times the amount of calcium, other minerals, and water-soluble vitamins as that of Western diets at that time.

Their diets were also rich in enzymes because they ate fermented and raw foods (enzymes help you to digest cooked foods), and their intake of omega-3 fats was at least ten times higher than in today's diet.

So, based on that here's our weekday plan:
breakfast and dinner: liquids - ie. smoothies, juice, etc.
lunch: solids but have to consist of the above. 

So, what does that mean for us?

here's what we're eliminating:

1. all breads from our diet since they are pretty much processed unless i make whole wheat bread, but since i'm trying to stay off of gluten, i haven't made any lately.  
2. caffeine - my man doesn't appreciate this one since his love affair w/ espresso.
3. refined or processed anything - this basically means that i have to make everything from scratch. no crackers, no cookies, not even flour tortillas :(

what can we have:

1. fruit
2. veggies
3. meat, poultry, fish
4. nuts
5. legumes

i'm still trying to figure out the whole liquids part. while smoothies are great, if it's mostly fruit then that's a crazy amount of glucose hitting your system all at once and that's not the best way to go... so i'm still working on that one.  this morning i kind of cheated and had eggs. we'll see how this goes. 

a man's perspective

i saw emilly clark's post done by her hubby and i just had to laugh at some of the items on his list of how to be happily married to a decorator.... esp #7, only because i've seen the look on my man's face when i've come home w/ something that just looks awful.. or when i've said, hey! let's go pick something up!  i'm so blessed w/ a patient man who's willing to put up w/ all of my decorating ideas :)

no grain bread update

the bread turned out pretty good - i think this would taste really good w/ some natural PB and jam.  the only thing is that the bread doesn't rise. it's definitely more dense than a loaf of regular bread, but it's pretty comparable to a loaf of 12 grain in terms of density.  also, i may cut back on the salt next time; maybe 1/2. it was really good when it came out of the oven. i'm going to go have a slice w/ my chicken soup :)

 

as a follow up, my man and our jewel gave the cookies and bread two thumbs up. however, my man commented that the bread was a little dry and so would be best w/ something else, ie. jam, eggs, etc... 

cinnamon cookies recipe (no grain)

i saw a recipe for cookies using almond flour on this site.
i made some modifications and here's what i ended up w/:

cookie recipe:

1C almond flour
1/2C rapadura
1/4 cup coconut oil
1 large egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/8 tsp ground nutmeg

1/2tsp ground cinnamon

1/16 tsp ground ground clove

Pre-heat oven to 350 F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper or a non-stick baking mat. Stir together flour and Sugar. Blend in oil, egg, vanilla, and remaining spices until well mixed. Form into 1-inch balls on a cookie sheet and flatten each with a fork. Bake for 8 minutes or until set but not brown. Allow to cool for 2 minutes on baking sheet then remove to wire racks to cool.

they came out pretty small and the batter only made one baking pan of cookies, but it tasted pretty good and i would definitely make it again. it makes me want to make another cup of tea to go w/ it.

no grain bread

i'm on a roll people, i'm hooked on the almond flour! you know, i've been trying to go gluten free for a while, but i felt like having to say no to bread just wasn't worth it. i figured, that i was just going to suck it up and deal w/ the side effects because well, i'd rather be in pain if that meant i could have bread... well, i saw this recipe for bread and this might be the turning point to going gluten free :)

Gluten Free Simple Bread
2½ cups blanched almond flour
½ teaspoon celtic sea salt
½ teaspoon baking soda
3 eggs
1 tablespoon agave nectar
½ teaspoon apple cider vinegar

1. In a large bowl, combine almond flour, salt and baking soda
2. In a medium bowl, whisk the eggs, then add agave and vinegar
3. Stir wet ingredients into dry
4. Scoop batter into a well greased 6.5 x 4 inch loaf pan (this loaf pan may have been discontinued. Stay tuned...)
5. Bake at 300° for 45-55 minutes on bottom rack of oven; until a knife comes out clean
6. Cool and serve

Makes 1 loaf (about 12 slices)

* Note: i will be substituting the agave for honey.

No grain apple cinnamon muffins

I saw a recipe for no grain banana muffins and got a craving. however, i didn't have enough bananas, so decided to make apple cinnamon instead.

i tweaked mine a bit and here's what i ended up w/:

2 1/2C almond flour (freshly milled from crispy almonds - see her recipe). i set mine on the finest settling on the mill
1/4 C coconut oil
1/2 tsp B.P.
1/8 tsp ground nutmeg
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/8 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp sea salt
3 eggs
* i would have added 1 tsp of vanilla extract if i had any.
2 apples peeled, cored, diced
1 handful of craisins

preheat oven to 300 degrees. mix all together in mixer and spoon into muffin. this was enough to fill a one-dozen muffin pan. 50 minutes at 30 degrees.

note: this was really moist and quite tasty! i knew it was a keeper when my man asked if he could take one to work this morning - and he NEVER takes food (since they serve breakfast in the office).

technology bah!

the search engine on blog doesn't work and i can't figure it out. any clues anyone?
can't i just wave my wand and say ta-da?!

it's a snacky kind of day

our jewel stays home w/ me on mondays...
it's cold, wet, and dark outside, so we spent the day in - doing school and making lots of food in our pjs :)

in the background, we're dehydrating some nuts, to make crispy nuts and we have the crockpot going w/ some kale bean soup for dinner (i just threw in some potatoes, carrots, 1 onion, 2 1/2 handfuls of kale, 1 cup of pink beans, salt, pepper, bay leaf, and some parsley, 5 or 6 C of turkey stock, oh and a dash of paprika and some cajun seasoning because i wanted it peppery). for brunch, we made sweet cornbread , and jello.

it did congeal like jello - but it was more like soft jello. you can't cut blocks or shapes like you would with the store bought jello but it was the perfect school snack.

and for a really simple snack, bananas w/ all natural peanut butter and chocolate chips.



what can i say, it was one of those snacky kind of days.

healthy jello

i really am not a fan of that artificial jello sold in the grocery stores. there's no nutritional value in it. but i saw a recipe for it on the healthy home economist site, so i thought i'd give it a go.

it's basically 3C of fresh juice - from a juicer. i made it w/ apple juice.
whisk in 1 1/2 TBL of gelatin (dissolved in a few ounces of boiling hot water). pour into a glass container and store in fridge overnight.

simple, fresh, and no artificial food colorings in your jello!

* note, i tried this w/ strawberries and pineapple before pureed in my vitamix blender and it didn't go over well... so i'm going to stick w/ the juicer.

it's time to PRAY, people!!

for the past several years, i've tired and tried and tried to find a toothpaste my man would like that is also healthy.

we've tried:










there have been others, but i'll just highlight these.. mainly to say - i've been on a LONG mission to find one that my man will like. the above all are fluoride free (fluoride is a chemical that is often found if most toothpaste that is actually quite toxic). but even the ones above have glycerin in some of them and glycerin can impede the remineralization of your teeth and in the long term, lead to cavities. a long story to say that i have found a new alternative to toothpaste, but i've already asked my man and he emphatically rejected even trying it. but i told him, that's ok... i'm just going to start praying about it and we shall see! buhahahahaha!

if you're daring, it's basically, 3 parts baking soda, 1 part sea salt. mix, shake. put a small amount in the palm of your hand and add just a little hydrogen peroxide until it makes a paste. put on toothpaste and brush. (note, can't use hydrogen peroxide if you have metal fillings in your teeth). if you want to read more about it, check out this guy's website.

here's a tip.

i'm making a cake out of a mix! gasp! i know, it's so bad for you. but right now i'm craving chocolate like no tomorrow. so i made the cake, but instead of vegetable oil (so bad! i want to tell you to throw it right in the trash, but i won't be so bossy- ha!), i used coconut oil. have i told you the benefits of using coconut oil? it does well w/ heat - unlike other oils that go rancid when you cook it (sunflower, canola, vegetable oil, even olive oil, etc). i also like it because it adds just a hint of coconut flavor to the cake... making it more flavorful and rich. this is the abbreviated version of the benefits of coconut oil. if you want a better explanation - i don't blame you - then check out what mercola says about it.




chocolate icing:
in a double boiler:
mix 3/4C semi sweet chocolate morsels
3 TBL butter
1 TBL raw honey

mix frequently until melted. then pour over cake. yum!!

as a follow up, here's our jewel enjoying her cake the next day. it was still really good (but not nearly as good as when it came out of the oven). she said she should get a big piece because it's ALMOST her birthday.

fall dishes

don't you just love fall?!

i couldn't wait to start cooking fall dishes!

crock pot it! sausage soup:

1 lb of left over hot italian sausage, sliced
1/2 onion
3 stalks of celery
1 carrot
4 C chix broth
2 bay leaves
salt, pepper
2 tsp parsley
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 1/2C northern beans

throw together in the crock pot and let it do it's magic.
* note - i love cooking the beans rather than getting them from a can. they really are so much healthier for you and it's easy peesy! rinse beans, then i leave the bag of beans in a crockpot w/ lots of water (about 2 inches past the beans) all day. i pore out that juice, rinse again, taking out the bad beans, and then set the crockpot on medium overnight. in the morning you have cooked beans. i put some in my soup and the rest i'm saving to make hummus/ greek platter for our church potluck. they freeze really well!

the other meal i made this week that turned out well:

roasted sausage and vegetables:
slice up 3 mild italian sausages
1 large russet potato
1 large sweet potato
2 carrots, cut in big chunks,
1/2 onion, cut in big chunks

put all in a large oven ready pot, get your child to put on some plastic food friendly gloves and then let them do the rest:

mix together 3-4 TBL lard (i used some grapeseed oil and some chicken lard i had on hand), salt, pepper, minced 2 cloves of garlic, 2 tsp dried parsley, 1 tsp thyme, 1 tsp rosemary, and really whatever other italian herbs you want to throw in. and then pour the mixture over the vegetables, making sure the veggies are evenly coated w/ the oil mixture.

pop into oven 475 (preheated) for about 45 minutes.

this would go really well w/ this danish red cabbage:

DANISH RED CABBAGE

1 medium red cabbage, shredded
4T butter
1T sugar
1 t. salt
1/3 c. water
1/3 c. vinegar

last 10 minutes:
1/4 c. red currant jelly
2T grated apple
1/2 c. juice from pickled beets (optional)

Mix all together and bake, covered, in 325 degree oven for 3 hours (stirring about every hour). Add jelly and apple and juice from beets and bake another 10 minutes or so.

Best made ahead and reheated the next day.

fall is for discovery

we went for an afternoon walk by the canal and through a park.
isn't it so inviting?


it was a precious mommy/ daughter time. we talked about trees, ivy plants, berries, gardens, friends, school...