foraging 101

dandelions

lambs quarters

         For the past few weeks I have had an abundant supply of wild greens in my backyard.  Lambs quarters and dandelions are growing with abandon. Both can be eaten raw as salad greens, used in a smoothie, or quickly sautéed or steamed with some garlic and a squeeze of lemon juice.  Dandelion leaves become bitter as the leaves grow bigger and older, so harvest the smaller ones if you don't like bitter greens.  The yellow flowers are edible and look very pretty in a salad, or you can put them in your smoothie.  Lambs quarters is a mild tasting green and can be substituted in any recipe that calls for spinach or chard. 

            In a few weeks we are looking forward to a bumper crop of blackcaps.  What's growing in your backyard?

budding blackcaps

it's all about the pleasure

         Guilty pleasure is an uncomfortable term and particular to this country.  I didn't grow up with the notion of "guilty pleasure." But here many people feel guilty about indulging because it is perceived as unvirtuous.  This kind of belief goes back to this country's puritanical roots and makes for a twisted relationship with food.  The result is that many feel guilty about fat (bad bad butter, bad bad whipped cream), about dessert, about chocolate.  From it came the further belief that what we enjoy tastes good, but must be forbidden and bad, and what's good and healthy must taste bad (or else it couldn't possibly be good for you).

            Hence the French Paradox.  For the longest time Americans couldn't understand that French people eat fat (butter, triple crème brie or crème fraîche), but are not necessarily fat.  Of course it's not about excess and gluttony but about quality over quantity ( a great little read on the subject is Mireille Guiliano's French Women Don't Get Fat).  Maybe the recent revelations that we actually need fat in our diet and that chocolate releases endorphins will help to turn the tables for our enjoyment.

            All that pseudo virtuousness is not healthy for the mind.  In a recent NY Times interview famed French chef Eric Ripert said about food and eating: "I do not understand the idea of guilty pleasure.  It's all about pleasure."  Live a little - it's better for your mind, it's better for your body.

good dental diet

             A few days ago, when I went for my biannual cleaning, the dental hygienist noticed that I had a lot less plaque than the last time around.  Lo and behold, we changed our diet quite a bit since then, cutting out almost all sugars, refined carbs, all starchy and sweet vegetables, as well as most grains, and eating a lot more vegetables in general.

            In the 1930s dentist Weston Price studied the relationship between dental health and diet of indigenous people versus people from industrialized countries.  His famous study linked deformed arches and crooked teeth as well as poor general immunity to poor diet, not only in Western people but also in the younger indigenous generation whose parents had adopted more Western types of foods.  Nowadays we are quite aware of the effect of sugar on teeth, but Price also pointed deeper, to vitamin and mineral deficiencies in food due to poor soil conditions - already then.  From our present perspective, almost a century later, with processed foods having crowded out even more whole plant-based foods from our diet, and from knowing that our soils are yet more mineral deficient, the picture looks even worse.  When I was a kid it was quite rare for children to get braces; now it seems so ubiquitous.  

            The message is clear - cut out the sugar, increase your veggies, and opt for organics if you can, since plant-based organic foods have a considerably higher mineral and vitamin content.  The Weston Price study shows that your grandchildren will thank you for it.

veggie candy

           Here is an ode to the avocado.  If you are not so convinced that vegetables are the single best thing you can't overdo in your diet consider my favorite veggie "candy."  Avocados are not only a fabulous superfood but also utterly delicious in their creamyness and so versatile.   Like truffles they go both the savory and the sweet way (...alright, so truffles may be in a league of their own).  I love them for breakfast (I have never liked sweet breakfasts, maybe because of my German upbringing) mashed up with some lemon, dulse flakes, sea salt and chia seeds, and a toasted Ezekiel tortilla, or smashed up on a piece of warm toast with some salt, pepper and lemon juice.  Because of their high fat content (77% of their calories are from fat, 18-30% of a Hass avocado is fat - Hass are the ones you want, not the bigger, more watery, less fatty Florida avocados) you won't be hungry until lunchtime if you eat one for breakfast.  Avocados go the sweet way, too, because of their mild and relatively neutral taste.  Try this avocado-chocolate mousse recipe, two superfoods in one dessert, and super delicious.  I love avocado salad dressing, basically a lemon juice/olive oil vinaigrette with some avocado creamed into it.  And follow this link to much more exotic and creative uses for avocados (not sure about the foot scrub, though, sounds like a waste of good food).

            And what exactly is so good about avocados?  They are nutrient dense, high in fiber and rich in healthy monounsatured fats (oleic acid specifically, which helps lower cholesterol and triglycerides and reduces inflammation), they contain lutein (for eye health), folate (especially important when pregnant), vitamin E, vitamin B6 (regulates sexual hormones - the Aztecs associated avocados with fertility, the Mayas with aphrodisiacs), glutathione (a cancer fighter), potassium (double that of bananas), and magnesium.  Avocados are highly alkaline and alkalizing, which helps to reduce inflammatory conditions and stabilizes blood sugars.   And lastly, if you are not into spending an upcharge for organic avocados, conventional ones show almost zero pesticide residue due to their thick skins.

            I buy avocados in very large quantities, keep them in the fridge and pull several out at a time so I always have enough ripe ones around.  

wild eating

         Onion grass grows wild everywhere in my area, wild thyme covers large patches of a friend's lawn, and I found purslane in between our stone patio slabs.  Not that any of this would provide enough for a meal, but the idea of foraging is no longer associated with having to make ends meet but is rather fashionable.  During the summer months foraging learning walks are offered in many places, and lamb's quarters and nettle tea don't sound as far out as they might have twenty-five years ago.

            Danish chef René Redzepi became world known for the fabulous and wondrous New Nordic meals he makes from locally foraged foods at Noma, his Copenhague restaurant.  Last year he opened a  pop-up restaurant in Japan, currently he is in Australia doing the same, as the NY Times reports.  In both places he worked together with local foragers and created dishes with ingredients even the locals didn't know about.  Redzepi pushes the edge of making meals of ingredients we would walk right by even if we saw them by the ocean, in the woods or a meadow.

nettle

            But purslane, a slightly sour succulent and wild growing crunchy "weed," has become so popular that I find it now in big bunches at my farmer's market in the summer.  Nettles were the scourge of my European childhood (I fell into a hill full of nettles as a 6-year old and suffered for days), here I don't see them much, but the tender young leaves make a delicious salad (without stinging) or a tea can be brewed from the dried leaves.  Mushroom foraging requires more experience and expertise than finding edible greens because many edible mushrooms have a similar looking but poisonous alter ego - so novices beware.  During wartimes my grandfather foraged for mushrooms and one of the trips resulted not only in a meal but also stomach cramps for the entire family.  But all wild onion weeds are edible (you recognize them by their smell), and lambsquarters, dandelion and purslane are easy to recognize.  So if you don't spray your lawn take a walk when spring arrives and see what sprouts.  I think I'll look for a foraging walk to get to know all the foods I have been walking right by.

lambsquarters

super crop

         You can eat it in seed, flour or oil form, you can make clothes and rope out of it as well as biodiesel fuel, paper and building materials.   Meet hemp, the old/new super crop.   Pretty much the only thing you can't do with hemp is get high on it because it's not the same as marijuana, although they both belong to the cannabis family.   It's a super plant and super food that withstands drought, thrives in poor soil, and grows fast.

            Hemp oil is extremely rich in essential fatty acids, and according to David Wolfe of Superfood fame "the only known food with ideal ratios of omega-6 and omega-3 fatty acids."  The oil is also used in body care products.  Hempseed is a complete protein, the leaves are edible and you can make tea out of them.  The seeds can be made into butter, bread, beer and milk, similar to a nut milk.  Hemp's fiber is one of the strongest fibers on earth, hence its use for rope.  But it can also be made into clothing.  Hemp clothing is better than cotton in every way - warmer, more absorbent, stronger and more resilient, accepts dye better, extremely durable and it becomes softer and more comfortable the longer you wear it.   Hemp can grow pretty much anywhere in the world and yields 2.5 times the fiber the same area planted with cotton would yield. A biodegradable plastic can be made from the stalk as well as building materials like insulation, fiberboard, and hempcrete, all non-toxic and non-off-gasing.

             Hopefully, the silly hemp ban in the US that dates back to the 1930s and was engineered around political and monetary interests will be lifted soon as people become more aware of this super crop.  

super superfoods

                      A lot has been written in the past two decades on the need to return to real food, which consists of one-ingredient foods from nature put together in a meal (i.e. fresh spinach sautéed with garlic and olive oil), as opposed to manufactured foods that come in boxes and packages (i.e. breakfast cereal or Western omelet mix).  But evolution is always about shifts and new developments in order to evolve to higher levels.  Going "back" to grandmother's foods is a good thing but not necessarily sufficient and the end-all.  Our soils, even organic soils, have been depleted of minerals and trace elements resulting in less nourishing produce, and our bodies are subject to more pollution than ever.

       superfood dried goji berries

              Superfoods to the rescue.  These are foods that are only now available to us outside their geographic growing area, both because enlightened interest and scientific research have brought them to our awareness, and because modern transportation logistics make them accessible.  Superfoods are foods with an incredible amount and array of nutritional components.  David Wolfe, Renaissance man and superfood guru, has been researching superfoods for over twenty year and has written many books on greater nutrional subjects.  I hadn't even heard of some of his superfoods such as maca, AFA blue-green algae, or marine phytoplankton.  The others on his list of 10 were more familiar to me: goji berries, cacao, all bee products, spirulina, aloe vera, hempseed and coconut.  From radiation protection to cleansing the body from toxins and metals, to immune system rebuilding and activating the body's own healing powers, these new and not-so-new foods are exciting to learn about and incorporate into your meals. 

superfood AFA algae

gluten or grain free?

                       "Being" gluten free is all the craze these days.  It seems almost chic, like belonging to an exclusive club.  "I'm gluten free, are you?"  On the one hand there is this aura around exploring different dietary constraints, on the other hand are some genuine health issues aggravated by grain and sugar.  Both have a high glycemic index and turn quickly into glucose.  Recreating all that wheaty stuff, especially baked goods, with other flours, like oat, brown rice, or tapioca may work for some.  But it is not sufficient for those with inflammatory conditions and conditions that become aggravated or are caused by an overacidification of the system, such as rheumatoid arthritis, cancer, lupus, or diabetes.   In broad strokes grains, dairy and sugar have an acidifying effect on the body, which worsens inflammation and promotes tumors, while fruits and vegetables alkalize it.  For people with such conditions grain free is the way to go (and sugar and dairy free).  Grainfree literally means no bread, no pasta, no pizza, no pastries, not even in a paleo diet version. 

diet, exercise and wellbeing

For a while there it seems that Coca Cola had us duped into believing that exercise, more so than diet, is the most important factor for weight loss and wellbeing. The Coca Cola Company gave almost $3 million to the American Academy of Pediatrics over the past three years, as the NY Times reported yesterday in a spill-it-all article, in addition to infiltrating many small community organizations with their web of donations and sponsorships, and having "bought" dieticians and scientists. Talk about covert and not-so covert manipulation and unscientific science.             The bottom line is this: diet is tantamount to a healthy body, more so than exercise. You cannot make up for poor food and drink choices by exercising more, believing in exercise alone as a ticket to a healthy body. It is much more important to clean up your diet, learn to shop and cook, and to make healthy food and drink choices. Once you've got that down pat exercise is a complementary component for sure, keeping in mind that every body - or everybody - thrives on a different type of exercise and on different weekly amounts. A gentle and automatic weight adjustment and an increase in energy and wellbeing naturally follow a switch to a wholesome diet.

valuable vegetable scraps

We eat lots of vegetables, and especially lots of greens, which goes hand in hand with tons of vegetables scraps. But stop - no need to throw them away and waste them. In fact, calling them scraps indicates that we think of them as lowly. Here are some ideas of what to do with your valuable raw vegetable leftovers, nose-to-tail in vegetable speak:

• Wash them and put them all in a big pot, cover with water, cook for a few hours - voilà, a beautiful vegetable stock you can use for making soup or adding cold to your green smoothie instead of plain water. More minerals to you. The stock freezes well in big glass jars or freezer bags for more soup on a cold day.
• Juice your stalks, stems, roots, outer leaves, cabbage cores, apple cores too, and benefit from all those beautiful minerals and trace elements (your veggies will have more if they are organic or homegrown).
• Use all your "other" greens - beet greens, carrot tops, celery leaves, radish greens, kohlrabi greens - like you would spinach, chard, collards or kale: sautéed, raw in salad, added to a smoothie, making pesto from them (i.e. carrot top pesto), added to soup, or juiced.

  

• Broccoli crowns are delicious, but my family loves the broccoli slaw I make from the stems: mix the shredded broccoli stems with a vinaigrette of olive oil, a generous amount of lemon juice, crushed garlic, salt, pepper and lots of finely chopped parsley (I am partial to curly). Better the next day, but you might need to reseason - more salt and pepper, more lemon juice so it's got some kick.