newsworthy: Bittman, Oatmeal, and McDonald's

Soapbox alert: Fast food is NOT HEALTHY and it shouldn't be a part of anyone's daily diet. Can we agree?

Before you tell me that your life is too busy to live without fast food, I want you to ponder the effects that most fast foods have on our health and our environment. Cheap calories, as Mark Bittman points out in this opinion article, are often the unhealthiest of the bunch. From corn-fed beef to chemical-laced breakfast options, there's nothing healthy that comes off a fast food menu. (To be fair, I do enjoy Chipotle and think they offer good options, including organic vegetarian black beans and locally-sourced vegetables. But that's the only fast food place you'll catch me at!)

As Bittman points out with the oatmeal scenario, it is actually faster, cheaper and umpteen times healthier to make your own oatmeal at home. (I think the same can be said for salads, sandwiches and even french fries; and we should all just quit eating corn-fed beef burgers and mechanically-separated chicken nuggets cold turkey. Ahem.)

In the spirit of offering you an inexpensive, easy, and fast oatmeal recipe (even though I highly recommend this pumpkin oatmeal), here's something to fit the bill. It's ready, from scratch, in about six minutes. It's sweet without white sugar, and packed with protein, potassium, fiber, omega-3's, heart-healthy whole grains, and deliciousness. To add to the healthy factor, we always use local honey, local and organic pecans, and organic rolled oats, bananas, and almond milk. Mmmmm.

Banana Oatmeal

1 cup milk (we use unsweetened almond milk to add more protein)

1 cup rolled oats

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

1 very ripe banana

1-2 tablespoons honey, to taste

2 tablespoons ground flax seed

2 tablespoons pecan pieces

In a small saucepan, stir together the milk, cinnamon, and vanilla. Using the back of the spoon, mash up the banana in the saucepan. Heat this mixture on medium just until it begins to boil. Add the rolled oats and stir. Add the honey, flax seed, and pecans, and continue stirring and heating until the oats are cooked through, about 3 minutes.

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honey, there's a food source in our backyard.

The mornings are usually a little hectic around our house. For me, at least: I tend to run around like a busy-body while Ryan knows how to keep it nice and relaxed. I start with the best of intentions—going for a jog, perhaps, or waking up a little early to make breakfast or even earlier to make it to sunrise yoga. The alarm goes off, I let myself fall back asleep for a little while, and then by the time my eyes open, it's 7:15 and I think of all the things I want to accomplish before going to work at 9.

Today we were rolling along quite nicely, though; I took Fin for a walk around the 'hood while Ryan did a workout, and then got home in time to get ready at a leisurely pace. We talked, we laughed, and then I remembered I had yet to pack my lunch.

Now, I pride myself on packing my lunch almost every day. Commendable, I know! It's just so I can justify buying hot pink lunch boxes and these awesome reusable organic cotton snack bags from Etsy.

I digress! When I went to pack my lunch this morning, suddenly in a rush, I realized I was out of lettuce. But I wanted to pack a sandwich, and being a vegetarian, I really needed lettuce to make it worth my while. Otherwise I was looking at a cheese-and-apple sandwich and I don't care how gourmet the bread/apple/cheese is... that's not a full lunch. (This is the sammy I had in mind, but with sprouted whole grain bread, lightly toasted—yum!)

Then I had a revelation. We have a food source in the backyard. Well, let me just walk ten yards away, then, and cut some fresh lettuce from our garden.

All this to say how unbelievably awesome it is to have a food source literally in our backyard. I am so proud of our baby lettuces (we've been eating our lettuce and spinach all week, see that gorgeous salad?!) and can't quite express how excited I am about more veggies springing forth from our raised bed.

Major props to my husband for building the most beautiful garden bed. I can't believe I haven't showed you photos yet! Here it is covered in snow; you'll notice my super-duper cat barricade, consisting of wire on top of the soil and then bird netting draped over PVC pipe arches, tightly secured around the perimeter with garden stakes. Yep. No cats allowed. More (better) photos to come as I remember to take and post them. Duh.

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comfort food from another place

After a long and surprisingly hectic day at work, I had one thing on my mind: comfort food. I wanted something warm, spicy, and rejuvenating. Dinner had to be easy, cheap, and use up some things I already had on hand: a tall order.

Suddenly, a craving for Indian food hit. My previous experiences trying to cook Indian food didn't go over too well, but then I happened upon this recipe for chickpea and spinach curry. Easy! Healthy! Almost identical to what our friend's mom had made for us months ago! Exactly what I wanted! And I could cheat a little with a magical ingredient called Red Curry Paste. Ha-le-lu-jah.

It also called for spinach, which was the one veggie in the garden ready to harvest. Before covering up the raised bed (again) for our latest, greatest cold snap, I carefully trimmed back our baby spinach, brought it inside, and rinsed it. Ryan took one look at it, then looked at me to exclaim, "Wow! It looks like real spinach!"

Indeed. Real spinach. Real, delicious spinach. From our backyard. A gal could get used to this.

This was one of the easiest recipes I've thrown together in a while—not to mention one of the most satisfying. Even if you've never cooked Indian food before, you'll be able to master this in one try. We scooped it up with multi-grain tortillas from Central Market, which we lightly toasted in a dry cast iron skillet (they're great toasted, too). And maybe we added a little butter on the top. Just maybe a little. . . a little bit of butter. Yeah.

I actually followed this recipe at Jen Loves Kev (which she got from off of broadway) pretty square-on, resisting the temptation to add yogurt at the end or put more ginger in at the beginning. But, feel free to riff on the general theme. Who knows what you might discover.

This can be easily made out of pantry staples, which makes it even better: a can of garbanzos, a can of chopped tomatoes, and a few common spices. Looks like we'll be stocking red curry paste from now on, too.

And can I just point out how healthy this is? A high-protein, low-fat, antioxidant-rich, ginger-spiked dinner with a multi-grain side. Makes for great leftovers to boot. . .

What are you waiting for?!?

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inspired: self-full.

Not a photo of food. GOAL, though.

So I had this a-ha! moment today while reading one of my favorite blogs, A Practical Wedding. Yes, its' technically a wedding blog (but in reality, SO much more!), and yes, our wedding happened, oh . . . about four months ago, but it is so very inspiring to me. I flirted with other wedding sites for a few weeks after our wedding, but have pretty well nixed my penchant for scrolling at 60MPH through inspiring (or aspirational) wedding photos. But I've stuck with my smart, sassy blog friends over at APW.

And while reading Tuesday's post, wherein author Meg encourages women to be self-full, I felt inspired. Inspired to keep doing what I'm doing, yes—but more so. I'm inspired to start doing it better.

Which brings me to this blog. January was so good to me, but most of that was because, wouldn't you know. . . I was really good to myself. I spent a lot of time laughing, running, working out with my husband, focusing on our health and well-being, and exploring yoga. I stretched limits both mentally and physically and found out that I have so much more space within myself in which I can expand.

I started reading a daily meditation and keeping a gratitude journal, where I write down five things I'm grateful for everyday. I set new goals and found little ways to improve across the board. And I shared all this with my husband.

In the kitchen, I renewed a commitment to local, organic produce. I harvested our first baby greens from our garden (which is currently covered with a tarp, because it's 20 degrees outside!), and have been putting together meals in the spirit of whole-ness.

It occurred to me that while this blog is mainly about creating fresh, healthy, and fun foods, it can also be a sounding board for inspiration. From now on, I'm setting a goal to post a newsworthy blog each week, sharing with you an interesting food-related article. I'll also bring you a post like this, albeit hopefully a little shorter, about something inspiring to me. Maybe food-related, maybe not; but always keeping the health of body, mind, and soul in the focus.

My hope? That my journey toward self-awareness and, dare I say, enlightenment might inspire others. So much of what has taken me through the last 31 days has come from what I've read, what I've experienced, and most of all, from really connecting with people around me.

So, in the spirit of my first yoga session of the week, I leave you with my favorite yoga teacher's most inspiring (paraphrased) instructions: Open to the winds of change, the winds of grace; let your heart shine. Be f*$%@g awesome.

Photo: Lululemon Athletica.

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on thinking, then acting

After plenty of prodding from plenty of people, I ordered the Desert Island Sampler from Rancho Gordo. My heirloom beans arrived in all their glory this week, and even I was shocked at my level of excitement for cooking dry beans when I got home Tuesday night.

First up? The Rio Zape beans, which (according to their package) had hints of coffee and chocolate. While mulling over what to cook them with, I perused Rancho Gordo's bean-cooking instructions. "Cover with water, broth, or beer..." Wait—notes of coffee in the beans? Wouldn't you know, I had two Real Ale Coffee Porters in the fridge! (Best. Beer. Ever.) Dare I use our most precious beer to stew beans? Since I've seen it bottled and on tap at many of our favorite spots lately, I opted to use half a beer for the beans. The other half? For the cook, of course.

So the other revelation (beer + beans being the first) I had that night was to roast my two favorite vegetables together. After my cousins cooked dinner for us (Amy made awesome butternut squash risotto and Callie brought this incredible salad, complete with roasted broccoli and lemon-poppyseed dressing), it dawned on me that maybe, just maybe, I could combine the two.

Without so much as an effort to Google whether it had been done before, I immediately chopped up the squash and threw it in a baking dish. The broccoli followed, and 40 minutes later I was mmm-ing my way through dinner. The beans turned out great; they weren't as different from pinto beans as I was expecting, but they were indeed quite tasty. I thought the real easy weeknight show-stopper was the vegetable side. I'm biased, since these are my favorite veggies, but.... It's still darn delicious. And it's gorgeous. The greens and the golds and the flakes of bright red—just lovely.

Spicy Roasted Butternut and Broccoli

1 pound broccoli florets, fresh or frozen

1 pound butternut squash, peeled and cubed

2 tablespoons EVOO

salt and pepper to taste

crushed red pepper flakes, to taste

Preheat the oven to 425. Chop up the veggies and toss in a baking dish. Mix evenly with EVOO and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Add about 1/2 teaspoon (or more, or less) crushed red pepper flakes. Give it all one more good stir and plop that baby in the oven.

Roast for 30-40 minutes, or until broccoli is slightly crisped and browned on the tips and butternut is fork-tender (or even softer).

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a new lease on life

January started with so much promise. We began the year with a joyful evening spent with close friends; we made promises to ourselves and to each other to start fresh, eat right, exercise, and do the Earth a favor or two.

And I'm pleased to say that January is delivering.

My husband came home with great news yesterday, news that means his unbelievably strong willpower and unwavering efforts in all aspects of health are paying off. I couldn't be prouder of him! I have found a new passion—one that makes me feel alive and vibrant and want to share it with the world—in yoga. Together, we're making choices that make us look and feel and act better. Healthy minds, healthy bodies, healthy spirits.

We have joined a new CSA and got a box of lovely winter veggies from Johnson Backyard Garden. I haven't turned to butter once for these perfect vegetables, and not a thing has gone to waste! We ate kohlrabi for the first time. We've been cooking beans in the pressure cooker (more on that when I get my first shipment of Rancho Gordo heirloom beans) and have been cooking more whole grains than ever before.

Did I mention that, at the moment, there are no dirty dishes in the sink? I'm on a roll, folks!

So! There you have it. A January success story. And with it, the success of our hyper-local dinner from last night. We've got sprouts growing in our raised bed, but they had to be thinned out. I harvested some of the rejects and dubbed them "micro-greens;" we pretended to be in a five-star restaurant and downed a beautiful salad with red and green baby romaine (from JBG), micro-greens from our own garden (turnip, radish, parsley, lettuce, and cilantro thinnings to be exact), a greenhouse tomato grown in Marfa, and homemade balsalmic vinaigrette.

Yes, it was amazing, but the tomato? Definitely a summer crop, not a winter one.

For the main course, we had a surprisingly satisfying soup, adapted from this white bean soup from Whole Living. In that same CSA box we got the most beautiful head of green cauliflower. I was quite resourceful and even used the leaves for this recipe! It's delectable, creamy, high in protein and nutrients, and low in fat. The leftovers are just as good if not better, and the tiny bit of parmesan? It's divine. You must not skip the parmesan.

Cauliflower, Broccoli, and White Bean Soup

1 small head green cauliflower (including leaves), chopped into bite-size pieces

1 cup broccoli florets (I used frozen)

2 1/2 cups water

1 15-ounce can canneli beans, drained

1 cup onion, diced

4 cloves garlic, minced

3 tablespoons EVOO

salt and pepper to taste

shaved parmesan (for garnish)

In a 3.5-quart pot or saucepan, bring the water to boil. With a steamer basket, steam the cauliflower and broccoli just until bright and lively. Drain—reserve the water—and set aside.

In the same pot, heat the olive oil over medium heat for about 30 seconds. Add the onion and garlic and stir. Saute until translucent, about 5-7 minutes.

Add the beans and the reserved 2 1/2 cups steaming water, and bring to a simmer. Taste and season accordingly. Carefully add the cauliflower and broccoli. Remove from heat.

Using a blender, carefully puree the soup in batches. Return to pot, bring to a low simmer, and season to taste.

Just before serving, shave a few bits of parmesan on top of each bowl. Enjoy!

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and in this new decade....

Like most of the rest of the world, we sat with our friends just before the clock struck midnight to ring in the new year, and talked about what a year it had been.

What a year, indeed.

We started it engaged. We bought a house. We painted a wall for the first time in our lives. We planned a wedding. Then we had a wedding. We went to Mexico and swam in the ocean. I stuck with the vegetarian thing (it's been a whole year, can anyone believe it?!). We built a vegetable garden and planted our first seeds. We tried some new things, we had successes and failures. We shared our first holidays together as husband and wife. And in between all those huge things we did, we shared many adventures. There were bicycle rides and jogs and laughter and tears, and so much more.

It was a pretty wonderful year.

So, here comes 2011, and I have to be honest. I just put up the Christmas decorations today and I'm feeling a little empty, as is the living room. We don't have any huge things to check off our to-do list this year; last year was so full of huge life changes, it's hard to imagine what this year may hold. This year I think we want to travel; we want to be more healthy than ever (it's working this time, I promise); we want to learn new skills.

As for food, I want to continue what we've been doing, with a few small changes. We're starting to branch out a little and it's exciting. I hope that since I won't be so distracted, I'll have more to share here.

I'm learning how to cook with a pressure cooker, and soon I'm betting every one of you readers out there will order one. Pretty amazing stuff.

And, in about 60 days, we'll (hopefully) be harvesting the first veggies from our little garden. Swiss chard, spinach, lettuce, and turnips await!

So, here's to wishing you the happiest year in 2011.

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