nose to tail

Growing up I loved eating split pea soup with smoked pig's tail. I remember seeing pigs' ears on display in our butcher shop, and we regularly ate liver and kidney. I also liked sliced beef tongue on a sandwich. Later on when we lived in France I had sweetbreads and brain (both very delicate and creamy tasting), in China duck tongues (a bit tough) and chicken feet (didn't like those at all), and I still love eating head cheese on buttered German black bread with a slice of pickle on top.When we eat lobster I collect everyone's discarded lobster heads and enjoy the innards (and that creamy green stuff) with a big glob of homemade mayonnaise at least as much as the tail and claws. Indigenous people consume every part of an animal, nothing goes to waste. In foodie countries like France and China every part of an animal is turned into a signature dish (ris de veau aux morilles - doesn't that sound delicious?). But more recently in this country, and with increasing affluence, we have turned our noses up at organ meats and somehow have come to think of them as eeeewwwww and yuck.

In reaction to that the nose-to-tail movement has sprung up and with it the art of butchering is being resurrected. In contrast to supermarket butchers, who are not trained to take a whole animal carcass apart and seldom see its innards, many young butchers are interested again in learning this craft with attention to all parts of the animal, and what to make with them (not only sausage). Organ meat (only from grassfed animals!) is densely packed with nutrients. As a matter of fact, predators first go for the organs of a fresh kill. My acupuncturist, who is versed in Chinese nutritional principles, always reminds me to make bone broth (please reread an earlier post on bone broth) in the wintertime and eat organ meats.

this or that?

processed cheese slice with yellow dye #5

or

raw-milk artisanal cheese from a small farm?

canteloupe melons tasting like cardboard

or

freshly plucked cherry tomatoes bursting with sun-ripened flavor?

cornfed-antibiotic-supplemented-growth-hormone-infested beef from a feedlot cow with red dye #3 to make it look fresh

or perhaps

no meat at all?

artisanal cheese

this or that?

our unsung heroes

            In the end how much does an investment banker's work really contribute to my quality of life? Nada, nothing. Same goes for a real estate developer's work, a sports champion's work (some people may disagree, but I believe certain professional athletes are vastly overpaid for what they do), and many other overpaid and overvalued jobs that we have come to admire simply because they earn lots of money. Instead I'd like to sing a song to our unsung heroes, the farmers. They are generally underpaid and overworked for the long hours they work and the incredible risks they have to take year after year. Yet without them we are nothing, not even alive. No farms, no food, as the bumper sticker goes. Weather conditions are a real gamble and a constant source of worry for farmers. Wet or dry summers mean less money. And what about several-year droughts?  What about the difficult decisions between new technologies and true sustainability?  The question whether bigger is better?  Farmers simply don't get credited or appreciated for the importance of their work.

Many pioneering young farmers do this job out of conviction and passion for a better world, and unfortunately have to work for a pittance. The government should be giving away farmland to willing and qualified farmers to encourage farming in areas with a sustainable climate (certainly not out west). Why not subsidize small farms, sustainable farms, organic farms, new farmers? That would acknowledge the value of the farmers' life sustaining function.   We ought to thank our farmers, we ought to celebrate them, we need to support them.  

Guess where I went today?

Green Goddess Dressing

Oh, how I love that name.   It's the name that first sparked my interest in this dressing, the green thing came second. I'm very much into green foods these days, chlorophyll being the most direct translation of sunlight into living energy we can feed our body. And the goddess thing in a dressing name is just very timely in a day and age where we are perhaps (I so hope) beginning to realize again our interdependence with Gaia, and the importance of balance between male and female, when the male energy has been dominant for the past 2500 years or so. The interesting thing is that this dressing was actually invented over 100 years ago, as a blog post in Simply Recipes explains. The original recipe calls for a combination of mayo, sour cream, a few anchovy filets for saltiness, lemon juice, parsley and chives. It comes out pretty thick, rich and gloppy. But there are many variations out there, some more runny for a real salad dressing, some more firm to be used as a dip for anything (veggie sticks, for breakfast on toast, with fish, with tortilla chips, you name it), some substituting yogurt altogether for the mayo and sour cream, some adding garlic (I like that one), another one adding avocado for creaminess (super healthy, great idea, cut back on the mayo when you do this), and then of course adding tons of whatever herbs you have around - from the usual parsley and chives, to dill, chervil and tarragon, also mint or cilantro.   I like substituting the sour cream with whole milk yogurt (Greek and otherwise, depending on how thick I want the dressing/dip), I also like the garlic, but be careful with the anchovies - too many and it starts to taste fishy. A favorite breakfast thing in my native country is a dummed down version of the whole Goddess thing by simply mixing farmer's cheese (same consistency as Greek yogurt, which is a perfect substitute) with lots of chives and a pinch of salt, and eat it as a spread on black bread or toast.

Go green and try them all!

let food be thy medicine

A lot of food bashing has been going on in recent years about the Western Diet, and rightfully so. While many cultures have been using foods to heal the body through their various properties (as in Chinese or Ayurvedic medicine for example), over here we have been eating food that actually makes us sick, as in cancer, diabetes, arthritis, food allergies, heart disease and what not.   Those sick foods have been euphemistically labeled the Western Diet. But what if foods could actually heal, as Dr. Hippocrates of Ancient Greece already said - "Let food be thy medicine, and medicine be thy food." Eating properly actually keeps us healthy and full of energy, or supports the healing process by boosting our immune system if we have healing to do.

            Seems that many of us have to relearn what healthy foods are (also see my earlier post on live and dead foods). Healthy foods are not processed (if it has more than one ingredient and comes in a package or a can it's processed) but are as fresh and local as you can get them (more life energy), have not been sprayed with toxins (yuck, who wants those accumulating in their body?), have been grown in healthy and rich soil that has been fertilized as naturally as possible (otherwise, where are the minerals and trace elements supposed to come from?), meat comes from grassfed animals (corn makes cows and their meat sick!), as does dairy, which should also be unpasteurized, unhomogenized and raw. And make green and red your favorite colors. Leafy green vegetables have been labeled a superfood because they have such a concentration of vitamins, minerals and trace elements (more so than fruit!), and are high in fiber, low in calories and carbs, while the reds are loaded with antioxidants and phytochemicals.

            And lots of raw (no, I'm not an advocate of a raw food diet) is especially good for you (do green smoothies if you don't like to eat your greenies raw - blend an avocado, leafy greens (stems and all), lemon juice, an apple or a carrot for slight sweetness - voilà, the healthiest breakfast prepared in minutes (and believe me, it makes you feel full and satisfied).

more time for lunch

"Madame," the waiter in the small town of Amboise in France said to me with a serious face, "I cannot serve you if you don't have enough time for lunch." My daughter and I were on a breath taking whirlwind group tour through France and Spain and we had a 2:30 château visit scheduled. We had just breezed into town from Chartres. It was 1:45 when we sat down in the little sidewalk café, and I had just told the waiter that we had 45 minutes for lunch - not a lot. Well, the French like to take their time with meals, and rightfully so, have their wine, linger, chat - especially on the week-end. And here I came to tell the waiter to rush, on a Saturday of all days. It went very much against his grain as well as mine. I hate to rush meals. As a matter of fact, I hate to rush, period. Life doesn't get much better than a lazy summer lunch in a small French town in a small restaurant, choosing whatever house specialty is on the blackboard that day - a delicious tuna tartar one day, this time a big salad with roasted pork belly and local goat cheese, another time grilled squid and vegetables and an octopus salad, a glass of wine from the area, watching the people passing by, listening to the birds, and enjoying the fantastic weather.

Life is better when it's slow.

live foods/dead foods

sprouts

I am currently researching live foods - and dead foods in juxtaposition. A lot of what you find at your local supermarket is dead food. Why such a horrendous name? Because food that's been manufactured (funny way to talk about food, no?) in a factory (yep, that's where breakfast cereal comes from, or processed cheese, or bottled dressing) has no life energy. Dead food is basically any food that comes in a carton and is sold in the center aisles of your supermarket. Food advocates have long recommended to shop the perimeter of your supermarket in order to eat better, where produce, fish and meat, bread and dairy are sold - although even supermarket meat (and fish), and supermarket dairy and breads are adulterated (which is a whole other chapter). So what are live foods? Food is created through a transformational process of sunlight into energy, photosynthesis. A raw green plant grown above ground is just about as live a food as you can get, as its relationship with the sun is so direct.  So, salad in other words, leafy greens and anything raw, hence the recent craze over the Raw Food Movement. A tub of I Can't Believe It's Not Butter, or Cheez Whizz, or Funny Frosting in a tub is just about as far away from sunlight energy as you can possibly get - zero, zilch, nada life energy, empty calories, no minerals and vitamins for sure. The further removed from sunlight a food is, the less life energy it has. Meat is two steps removed from sunlight because the animal eats grass, which in turn grew with the help of sunlight. Meat from predators is yet further removed from sun energy, which may well be the reason why humans don't usually eat it (there are some exceptions with some indigenous tribes, as far as I know).  Lion steak anyone?

DSC07233

Some of the alivest (is this a word?) food is sprouts, and leafy greens for example have more direct life energy than say root vegetables. Have you ever thought about the fact that some of the largest animals on this planet are plant eaters? Elephants, rhinos, cattle, hippos, dinosaurs (the largest of them all) are all greens eaters, whether grass or leaves.  Wheatgrass and barley grass juice are some of the most healing potions you can ingest.  Take a look at what you currently eat and consider adding more greens and more raw foods to your diet.  It will increase  your energy level.

the color of life

I find the color Green very soothing. It seems restful to my eyes. I love when vibrant green begins to mix into the drab gray browns of winter and slowly takes over by the end of May. I can look at an expanse of thick juicy green grass for ever and feel peaceful. Walking in the woods I enjoy staring at the dense green tree canopy.            "Green, the result of photosynthesis, which creates all of our food, is the color of life," says Petra Fromme of AZSU. The NY Times reported in a recent article on the color green that blue and green are the world's favorite colors. Our vision is optimized for green, says Bevil Conway of Wellesley College.

DSC06711

Not only our mind, but our body, too, thrives on greens, whether in the form of leafy green vegetables, that miracle healer wheat grass juice (2oz of it provides as many nutrients as 5lbs of raw vegetables - wow!), that other super healer chlorella algae, and various other mineral rich sea vegetables.

As Popeye already said.....

grass fed is best

I used to think that the most important improvement to our dairy consumption was to buy organic milk, butter and cheese, what with the grow hormones and antibiotics they feed the poor cows these days (and that make it into our body and into the groundwater). But I have had to adjust my thinking. Buying organic butter, and cheese and milk, only assures that the cows were fed an organic (grain - gulp) diet (which is unhealthy for the poor animals and makes them sick).  That meat from grass fed cows (their natural diet) is healthier for us than from grain fed or grain finished cows has gradually trickled into mainstream awareness (less fat, more healthy Omega-3, higher in various other micronutrients).

But the same is also of course true for milk, cheese and butter from grass fed cows - much higher levels of vitamin K2 and Omega-3 fatty acids, which actually promote heart health (yes, eat more of it!).   Studies have shown that countries where cows are mostly grass fed (Ireland, Australia) have much lower levels of heart disease!

Organic butter really does not buy you much, butter from grass fed cows does.

no snack packs

Not sure why so many parents are at a loss for healthy snacks to give their kids for school, or when they return home in the afternoon (or for themselves for that matter). There is no need for a snack to come in a little packet. There is no need for a snack to be something ready made from the supermarket. There is no need for a snack to be full of sugar, salt and a whole bunch of unpronounceable ingredients. A snack can very well be something so easy and natural even your child can put it together in minutes and consider herself a mini chef. Case in point - apple sauce. I cook it in big batches and freeze it in glass jars. My daughter devours it. It is one of the easiest things to make and one of her favorite snacks. I also put it in her lunchbox in a little plastic container, and should you have leftovers (not in my house) you can serve it over hot cereal, and it is delicious on a piece of hot buttered toast. Teach your kids to make it: simply cut up lots of apples, a whole big pot full so it's worth your while, remove cores but leave the skin on (!), add lots and lots of cinnamon and a few tablespoons of water (just so the apples don't burn until they begin to sweat), put on low heat, simmer until soft, purée in a food processor - yum.

Case in point - vegetables with dip. I recently got a big bag full of snap peas from our food coop. They were sweet and crunchy, great to munch on like that, and they easily last several weeks in the fridge. We ate them with a dip made with Greek yogurt, paprika, salt, and caraway seeds, and also with homemade hummus (other case in point).

Snacks don't get much easier and healthier than that. Also look back on an earlier snack related post - there's no food - with more ideas.