Sunday, October 14, 2012

Chow-Daaah!

Charissa and I are from New England. Our coastal culture is a source of pride and affinity toward all sea creatures. Meaning, eating them.  If it swims, crawls and wiggles, it's fair game.
We've grown up noshing on fish, quahogs, squid, shrimp, crabs, lobster, clam cakes, clam boils, seafood casseroles and bisques.  

So it should be no surprise that we sorta had chowder running through our veins, too. 
Which is also partly why we were overweight, obese and sick. Not so much from the seafood itself, (though maybe) but from the butter, heavy creams and breading that often married the cuisine. 


One day, as often happens here, I had no idea what to make for dinner. 
I had a bunch of odds and end ingredients that I couldn't configure into a meal. Potatoes, corn, onions and green onions. And cashews. 
But then it came to me.
I'd read somewhere about how to use nut creams as bases in soups and decided to give this a go as a chowder recipe.



Ingredients:
4-5 medium red potatoes, washed & unpeeled and cubed
1 yellow or white onion, diced.
4 stalks green onion, sliced
frozen or canned sweet corn
sea salt, pepper, cracked red pepper





Heat 4 cups of water on high to a boil. 
Add potatoes and onions for about five minutes
Turn down to medium high heat, add green onions then let simmer till potatoes are soft. 
Add corn, cashew cream & stir.
Add sea salt, black and red crushed pepper to taste.

Cashew Cream:
2 cups soaked cashews (for 1 hour)
4 cups water

Place ingredients in Vitamix and blend till creamy smooth. Put in a sealed refrigerator safe container. Cashew cream keeps for up to 3 weeks.  

++++

My husband was just as pleasantly surprised as I was. The cashew cream gave this chowder the creaminess it needed, and tasted great. The pepper, salt and cream added to the soft potato texture, and is just like I remember it back home in New England. 

As my relatives would say, "That's some wicked good chow-dahh!"






Saturday, October 13, 2012

The Rules of Freedom

We often attribute good health to two things: nutrition and exercise. And often we'd be right; that these are the most integral components--foundational even-- in maintaining good health.

However, many experts take a holistic stance. Meaning, they explain that there are various other parts that contribute to our well being, too, including, but not limited to, our relationships, careers, finances, home environment, and spiritual food, just to name a few. Seems to make sense, right? And if we're honest with ourselves, we recognize how many of these factors are almost always in flux (given the amounts of stress placed on each), which can make life difficult to maintain healthy balances.

While I don't necessarily know exactly what "balance" means in terms of each person's health, but especially with mine, it doesn't mean I stop trying to "be" healthy. This, of course, never guarantees endless bliss and energy. In fact, some days trying to be healthy just plain stinks. But every so often clairvoyance comes, whether it's a great, feel good day, a wonderful edifying conversation, or the joyous peace in Jesus (even in the midst of a bad day) that reminds me I am God's child. It becomes clear that some of these things I can control, while others descend without expectation, and simply as a gift from God.  

So back to what I can control. Striving for good health, to me, starts with what I eat.  Though not the end all, it certainly helps sets the stage for a day of better nourishment. But then there are those darn cravings.  (And they don't go away, I'm told.)  Even the healthiest (and honest) gurus admit to caving in and binging from time to time.  While I've found that certain junk foods do not interest me like they used to, it's often likely that as soon as I mention one specifically, I start thinking about and wanting it!  Aren't we such weirdly wired creatures? I can't be alone on this, right?

And that's okay. For me, and most of us, it's simply about being honest. In spite of cravings and shortcomings, I love learning about how nutrition improves health and can heal, especially when people are in crisis. That's what has intrigued and motivated me the most to help create this blog. It's never been just about losing weight, but about presenting the growing scientific and medical evidence which shows that we can reverse many diet related diseases like diabetes, inflammation and cancers.  I myself was on the precipice of some very serious arthritis, which has since significantly subsided. Also, my husband's IBS is gone. Aaaaand we've both lost weight almost effortlessly. All through eating a highly raw and plant based diet.  Yes, we still have the occasional junk food fest, and cook more in the winter months. Only now, when we start to feel off, healthier habits have been ingrained and we have more tools to help get ourselves back on track.

Nevertheless, the other, more holistic point experts make is if you want to eat chocolate cake, bacon or fried chicken on occasion with the people you love and love to spend time with, then that can be--and IS--as much of a health protocol as juicing and eating kale by the truckload. Seriously. There's evidence to back up the good feelings and immune system boosts we receive by simply feeling secure, loved and taking pleasure in our food.

It's all actually quite freeing, don't you think? As a wise woman once told me, "It's all about knowing the rules, and knowing when you can break them."  . . .Okay, she was referring to grammar, but I think there's a take away in that for our health, too.

Yes, whole foods and exercise are the foundations, the "rules" if you will, for good health. But each of our bodies are a labyrinth of intricate wirings, of chemical reactions and fluctuating hormones which all need to be fed differently throughout our lives.  And while I will continue to recommend to anyone who wants to know how we've gotten healthier on what to eat --through a plant based diet rich in greens, seaweeds, fruit, vegetables, legumes, nuts, seeds and whole grains --sometimes one does themselves a better favor to dance a jig around the kitchen table with their toddler ...while eating cake. We'll work on whether it's a raw food cake later.

Salud!







Friday, October 5, 2012

Vitamix Promotion!


Photo courtesy : The Vitamix Blender

Both Charissa and I are Vitamix customers. And we can't say enough wonderful things about this product.  Besides the early morning smoothie routine, we make dressings, desserts, and soups with this thing.  You've all seen our recipes, yes?  If not, here you go. At least one step in almost every recipe calls for blending.  

As Charissa mentioned in a previous post, we've tried many blenders. Some of them were okay for a little while, but none of them stood the test of time. Either they didn't have the strength to hold up to our daily needs, or were awkward and downright dangerous to use.  After hearing many great things about the Vitamix (a five year warranty, easy to clean and use, and makes SMOOTH smoothies), we finally decided to invest . Well, I did first. Then after my annoying but rave reviews, Charissa saved her pennies and got hers. 

Several months and recipes later, we couldn't be happier with our investment. It's amazing how appetizing and gourmet the Vitamix makes our food appear.  But this is the blender that many restaurants use, after all. Plus, it helps get a ton of nutritionally dense, plant based foods and smoothies into our diets that we wouldn't normally if we had to prepare it non-blended. Especially greens. 

Photo courtesy of
green_smoothie.jpg
When I learned Vitamix is always looking for happy customers to promote their product,  we didn't hesitate at the chance to join their affiliate program. We love it, use it every day and want to help others get healthy too,  We receive a small commission on each sale if you order through us. The incentive for you is you get free shipping directly from the company by using our promo discount code. And if you are satisfied with your product, you can become a future affiliate, too. 

Vitamix stands by its product. As mentioned, there is a five year warranty, and if anything (ANYTHING!) goes wrong with it, Vitamix will make sure you have your blender back in working order-- as the high speed, state of the machine-that-can-liquify-wooden-blocks that it is. (When you're blending frozen bananas or anything dense each day, that point comes in handy.)

PLEASE CLICK HERE FOR A DIRECT LINK TO THE VITAMIX SITE WITH A CODE FOR FREE SHIPPING, WHICH IS A SAVINGS OF $25 ($35 in Canada). If you don’t like ordering over the Internet, you can call Vitamix Account Mgr. JP Minard and order directly from him at his direct line of 440-782- 2303 (800-848-2649 Ext 2303). The discount code if you do it that way is:
06-007869.

If you've been researching which kinds of equipment to buy to improve your health nutritionally, I can't think of a better way to accomplish that than with a Vitamix blender. Especially since out of all my gadgets--the dehydrator, spiralizer and food processor-- I use the Vitamix most. 

Please save your time and money--learn from Charissa and me and our multiple expenditures on inferior blenders. Unless you're in a financial pinch and want to have a cheaper product for the time being (believe me, I understand how that goes), we suggest skipping the hassle altogether. Don't endure undesirable chunky smoothies, blender motor burnout and overall poor quality and use. Consider buying a Vitamix. It's a worthy investment.  

With the help of this product, we've sustained our healthy BMI's for over a year! 


 Order online or toll free. And don't forget to give them the discount code! 
www.Vitamix.com, 800.848.2649. Discount code: 06-007869
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