FIBER, FIBER, FIBER

I’ve taken a few nutrition classes, read parts of health books here and there, and I’ve thought about my diet quite a bit. I know for a fact that there’s a lot I don’t know and yet i also know that without having taking those classes and read those chapters or articles that I would still have a pretty healthy food intake. I can thank my family for this essential trait.

I’ve pondered the habits which I developed in my environment and then compared it to those who ate in radically different ones from myself and I came to my one preferred, completely scientifically untested( by me ) thesis that the best thing you can do for your health is eat more fiber.

 You may be someone who perceives fiber rather negatively.

“It doesn’t taste good!”

“It has an awful texture!”

“It makes me fart!”

“It gives me diarrhea!”

It reminds you of All-Bran cereal when you were young and it took you too long to eat your bowl of cereal which left you with a pile of unappealing brownish colored sludge… YUM!

But these are all misconceptions for those of you who don’t know.

Fiber is a component of Carbohydrates. However, it isn’t a single substance, rather it’s a grouping of a variety of different compounds with affect the body in numerous ways. Fiber can’t be digested by the body’s enzymes and thus doesn’t count as a calorie. It isn’t digested by the body. Because of this, people used to think of it as a useless, as filler. However over the last 50 years, studies have started to show us its positive benefits.

It’s worth pointing out that one aspect of fiber which is inherently positive and doesn’t take a scientist to prove, is that it’s almost always a part of nutrient rich foods which are low in fat.  Eating high fiber foods mostly means eating foods high in vitamins, minerals and antioxidants.

Fiber is mostly found in legumes, vegetables, fruit and grains. You don’t get any from meat…(i eat meat alright, i just think we eat too much of it for various reasons that i will explain in my future blog posts.. so come back and visit the site frequently!)

Fiber is good for some of the following reasons. As mentioned before it fills you up without actually being digested by the body which means it’s impossible to gain weight by eating too much fiber. It’s found in healthy foods. It fills your intestines up which slows the intake and breaking down of foods in the stomach which means your energy and nutrient intake is done more evenly. It reduces constipation, protects you from Colon and rectal cancer, heart disease(by reducing your bad cholesterol; yes there’s good cholesterol), obesity and finally helps those who suffer from diabetes.

It’s true that suddenly changing your diet to high quantities of fiber will most likely give you diarrhea, gas and bloating, so it’s best to add fiber to your diet slowly and let your body adjust to the changes.

Add a fruit per meal, choose whole foods, eat more vegetables and less meat.

It is recommended that the daily intact be between 25 to 50g for women and men. 50g is alot, but eating around 30 to 35g per day should be easy once you make the right food choices.

Extend your life! Eat fiber! (ahahah, is there some fiber interest group paying me for this!? haha)

PEARL BARLEY GOODIES

I have two new recipes for you today. The idea for them originated with my desire to expand my use of healthy cereals and grainsin the foods i make. I like to organize my meals around a protein; add some healthy carbs and some vegetables and there you go: A nutritious, tasty, and varied meal.

There are a number of ways to play with those 3 components of a recipe. Idealy, you want a mix of textures, colors (yes, I think food is more apetizing when it looks appealing!), tastes and ingredients. Additionaly these aspects should complement each other. In any case, these were some of my challenges when thinking about how I would use the barley I decided to experiment with.

Honestly, barley is not an ingredient i’ve eaten often. My fondest memories of it revolve around eating it in heart warming fall and winter beef stews. I’ve also had it occasionaly as an alternative to rice in a risotto. Of course, it’s also used for malting, and thus i’ve enjoyed quite extensively while drinking beer and whisky, but that doesn’t really figure in our “healthy” category…

With this in mind, i took some pearl barley which i had in my cupboard and let it soak over night in order to prepare the next day. I thought about what i could make and as usually is the case, I came up with my recipes while looking through my fridge and figuring out which ingredients needed to be used the soonest.

Firstly, taking my inspiration from it’s wonderfully chewy texture in soups, I decided to prepare a asian and vegetarian style soup. My second idea was slightly more elaborate and evolved as I cooked it(which is also often the case… haha). A delicious red beet, goat cheese and blood orange barley risotto is what i made.

Here are the recipes;

1- Asian style vegetarian soup

 

INGREDIENT LIST; Barley, tofu, celeri, carrots,brussel sprouts, shitake mushrooms, onions, garlic, ginger, pepper, soya sauce, chilli flakes, hoisin sauce, black bean paste, and coriander leaves.

• Prepare barley; soak overnight and dry roast in pan 
• Make a nage(light vegetable stock) with onions,garlic, ginger, carrots, celeri, bay leaf, and shitake stems, pepper, and of course water. Let it simmer as long as possible. This is great to have in the house, so make a lot and freeze into individual cup sized portions if possible. Use it for risottos, soups, stirfrys, etc.
• Marinatetofu cubes in soya sauce, chilli flakes, hoisin sauce, and black bean paste
• Cutcarrots, brussel sprouts, celeri, and shitake mushrooms into small bite size pieces
• Strain stock and keep liquid, not ingredients! (I have a funny story i’ll one day share with you about this…)
• Add the ingredients to the stock and simmer until vegetables are a desirable consistency. I personally like to add the celeri at the very end because I like the crunch. this is also the point where i add a few coriander leaves.

2-Red beet, blood orange, barley risotto

INGREDIENT LIST; Barley, beets(in this case red, but use yellow beets if that’s what you have), toasted walnuts, goat cheese, parsley, blood orange juice and zest,

• Prepare barley; soak and dry roast in pan
• Cut beet or beets into small cubes, boil in quite a bit of water, depending on how much barley you’re cooking, try a 3 to 1 ratio, even 4 to 1 just to be sure, eventually you’ll be able to improvise and not actually use any ratios.
• On a medium high heat, finish dry roasting the barley and then add relatively small amounts of beet water to the pan; don’t cover the barley with it. What you want to do is slowly imbibe the barley grain with the color and flavor the beet water, letting it soak into the barley and evaporate to concentrate the flavors. When the pan starts become dry and void of liquid, repeat the procedure until the risotto is cooked to your liking; has a nice rich color and then add the remaining beet cubes. You don’t need to use all the water. The texture will never be the same as a starchy rice risotto. The barley grains retain more of their chewy consistency. 
• Take off the heat.
• Add goat cheese, orange juice, 1/4 to 1/2 a cup depending on how much you’ve cooked, some of the orange zest, finely chopped fresh parsley and the toasted walnuts.

I served the risotto with a cauliflower puree, a seared chicken breast which i finish with some lemon, orange zest and parsley. I finished it all with a fennel salad in honey, mustard seed vinaigrette which i served on top of the chicken.

So there you have it, two recipes which you can enjoy barley in. They’re simple to make once, cheap and healthy, so don’t cook rice or pasta tomorrow night, get some barley, soak it and start thinking of the various ways that you could have fun using it.

Healthy unhealthy snacks… :)

Homemade guacamole and salsa

I’ve never been much of a sweet kind of guy. I’ve always preferred savory foods, perhaps this makes me lucky, i don’t know. I’ve still had many vices; junk food, butter, heavy french foods, salt, salt, salt… hehe

I’ve always managed to avoid giving in to my vices by keeping my cupboards bare of unhealthy snacks and foods. Instead of having a bag of chips, I have nuts, or sardine cans, or veggies and dip… Simple foods that i can nibble on when hunger strikes or I’m just procrastinating about something I need to do…

Another way to avoid eating too much junk food is to eat acceptably healthy snacks such as corn chips with healthy dips or salsas. Fill yourself up with nutrients and still get the pleasure of that salty crunch.

With this in mind, I looked through my fridge and found ingredients that needed to be used (making dips is simple, and great when you need to use older ingredients that aren’t as fresh as you’d like them to be) and made a homemade guacamole and a homemade salsa.

 

Both are simple and are full of healthy nutrients.

Here’s the ingredient list for both; fresh Cilantro(coriander), coriander seeds, cumin seeds, green chilli pepper, avocado, red onion, lime, lemon, green bell pepper, carrots, tomato, dried basil, garlic, olive oil, salt+pepper

Guacamole

1. cut avocado, remove seed and skin, finely chop red onion, garlic, cut tomato, cut cilantro leaves, cut chilli pepper(remove membrane and seeds for less spicyness)
2. toast cumin seeds and coriander seeds in pan, about tbls, until they start to pop in pan. avoid burning them
3. use grinder or mortar and pestle to powder your toasted spices
4. mash avocado, add lime juice, lemon juice(not too much, to taste) mix in ingredients from #1
5. add about half the ground spices(to taste, i’ve kept some for the salsa) salt+pepper
6. taste, balance flavors
7. enjoy

salsa

1. finely chop the green pepper*, tomato*, carrots*, red onion*, garlic, chilli pepper, cilantro
2. toast and grind cumin and coriander seeds
3. mix all ingredients, add olive oil, lime juice, lemon juice, and season
4. enjoy

*I think this salsa is much better when all the ingredients, especially the carrots are cut into nice tiny little cubes. the carrot then is barely noticeable and adds a slight crunch the flavors thus mold to each other better

One last recommendation i would make is that you should look for chips that are low in sodium, saturated fats and trans fats.

Here are some nutrients that these two dishes offer;

• avocado is high in dietary fiber, vit B6, vit. A, vit. E, folacin and more
• Tomato is a good antioxidant, great source of vit. C, vit. A, and vit. E
• Carrots are extremely high in vit. A( 3 1/2 oz of raw carrot gives you around 600% of your daily necessary intake!), they’re also high in Vit. C
• Green pepper is a good source of Vit. C, Vit. A, Vit. B6

get your soup on (with video!)

Video link here.

On today’s menu we have a quick, cheap and easy soup to make. There aren’t many ingredients, and they are all easily accessible during the whole year.

The soup is a nice mix of simple carbohydrates and complex carbohydrates, it offers lots of fiber, some protein, beta-carotene and other important vitamins and minerals. You can make it in advance and freeze it or keep it in the fridge for a few days.

Here are the basic ingredients;

red lentils

carrots

sweet potato

green chilli pepper

chives

water

yellow mustard seeds

salt+pepper

orange zest

Other ingredients which would make it even better; lemongrass, cilantro, parsley, cumin seeds

The basic recipe;

1-rinse and boil lentils

2-cut sweet potato into small cubes and add to boiling lentils

3-grate carrots

4-finely chop chives and chilli pepper. remove the membrane and seeds if you don’t like spicy food

5-toast mustard seeds

6- when lentils and potato are ready, combine the other ingredients, turn off the heat and enyoy!

FRESH QUINOA SALAD RECIPE, + VIDEO

watch video here

RECIPE;

red and white quinoa, 1/2 cup

5 strawberries

small yellow mango, half

mint

1 shallot, or a bit of red onion

cashews

walnut vinegar, tbls

olive oil 2 tbls

salt + pepper

cook quinoa, let cool and mix in ingredients, adjusting flavors to your tastes

enjoy!

QUINOA

 

Quinoa is a cereal from South America which should be added to most diets. A staple food of Incans, today it is mostly cultivated in the alpine regions of the Andes. It is smaller than rice and round in shape. There are a few colors available which are a bit different in taste. The taste ranges from a slightly bitter flavor to a sweeter nuttier flavor. The most common and usually on the sweeter side of taste, is white quinoa.

What makes Quinoa a great ingredient is that it offers a full protein; it contains all 8 essential amino acids (the building blocks of proteins). It doesn’t contain gluten and is a good source of thiamine, folic acid and vitamin C.

It’s quick and easy to prepare and works in a number of various ways. You can eat it warm or cold, in salads or as cereal. It can be used in savory dishes or sweet ones. It’s a neutral flavor that can be mixed in with a number of other tastes that also provides an interesting flavor base to work with.

Recipes will be posted soon.

Vitamin D! how to get it? do you need it?

Vitamin D has been in the news a lot lately.

It’s a fat-soluble vitamin which means that it can be stored in the body and is not excreted through your stool or pee. This means that there is a potential for overdose and toxicity.

Last summer, in 2007 the Canadian Cancer Society said that based on current research adults should consider increasing their daily dosage to 1,000 IU of vitamin D daily during the fall and winter months, in consultation with a health-care provider.

The Institute of Medicine of the National Academies and Health Canada has set 2,000 IU of vitamin D as the daily maximum tolerable amount.

Vitamin D isn’t very easy to come by when it comes to nutrition; fatty fish and egg yolks are the only natural food sources. There are also products that are fortified with it such as Milk, rice or soya drinks and in rare cases cheese products.  It’s usually produced naturally in the body through exposure to the sun’s ultraviolet rays, however, the problem is that people who live in northern climates where the sun isn’t as strong and the days are shorter and greyer have a lot of trouble producing the vitamin naturally during the fall and winter months. People of dark skin are even more prone to having Vitamin D deficiencies because of a chemical in their skin which reduces the intake by the body of the vitamin. It’s also becomes harder for people over 50 to produce the vitamin through sun exposure, which makes it even more important for them to take vitamin supplements when the weather demands it.

Vitamin D helps your body by strengthening your bones, thwarting different forms of cancer, staving off multiple sclerosis and autoimmune disorders as well as fighting infections.

While i’m usually not one to recommend vitamin use because i think it’s unecessary given the easy access most of us have to healthy nutritious food, i think that taking a vitamin D supplement of a 1000 IU 4/5 times a week during the fall and winter months seems like a smart choice to make. There’s a lot of data referring to its various benefits and taking a vitamin is simple and will guarantee minimum levels. I don’t subscribe to the idea of using pharmaceutical vitamins for nutrition but when it’s a vitamin that isn’t widely available i’ll recommend it.

Cold winters and bad habits

There is something about the winter which makes eating healthy, light foods less desirable than during the summer. Some reasons include available ingredients, the fact that rich aromas and flavors warm the soul and that we tend to shrug off health in favor of indulgence.

“Why eat healthy!? I’m already freezing my @#$ off

Over the past few weeks, i’ve fallen into this bad habit. Making rich and delicious foods that have helped to ward off the cold but have left me feeling slightly guilty and complicit in our society’s indulgent ways… Of course this feeling faded quickly and i made sure to eat my fruit and veggies to balance my nutrient intake.

The truth is that my problem has more to do with my general dissatisfaction with my habits then with my recipes. Although rich in saturated fats and sodium, the recipes themselves included vegetables, a good quantity of fiber, protein, vitamins and minerals, which made them well rounded and acceptable. 

However, i want to cook great food that is very healthy. I believe in it. There are so many fantastic vegetables and alternative proteins to saturated fat rich meats, to create an almost infinite amount of great recipes. These are the recipes i want to explore, to create. My habits recently have been overwhelmingly influenced by french cooking techniques. I’m eating too much meat and go about creating my recipes around a meat protein. Time to make some changes!

 Less saturated fats! Less meat! Less frying! Less Sodium!

there you have it; addition by substraction

YUMMY NUTRITIOUS GOODNESS!

Hello world! Let’s celebrate together

Welcome to my new blog. I am going to use this space to celebrate food, its effect on well-being and our environment.

This is my first blog and I will slowly learn to make it more interesting for you and I. Please send me comments and ideas. I will do my best to reply.

I think that it’s important for me to point out that I am doing this out of a love for food and a belief in the positive impact it can have on individuals, the environment and society as a whole. My focus here will not be to criticize but hopefully to celebrate, although that might change has my blog focus becomes narrower with experience.