Homemade and Healthy

Eating Well

November 4, 2010 By Sylvia 8 Comments

Seems like the internet is abuzz with information on eating well, eating healthily and eating whole and/or organic foods lately. My family has been eating whole foods for years. However, I am finding through discussing nutrition and eating better with others that the expense, or the assumed expense, of eating well and the fact that many people don’t know where to start with whole food recipes, keeps them from attempting to change their diets.

Whole foods are not necessarily expensive when you do your shopping and comparing. Organic foods are very expensive in most areas of the U.S. I have had to adopt this philosophy when it comes to food:

I will educate myself about nutrition and nutritious food preparation.

With my budgeted grocery money I will buy the best foods I can afford and prepare that food in the best way I know how.

I will work at finding healthy foods I can afford.

I will not stress and worry if I can’ t afford organic foods.

I will not allow others opinions to create guilt and envy in me.

I will be a good steward of what God has given me.

Not everyone is at the same place in life, so every one can’t afford to buy organic meat, vegetables and other foods for their family. But we can all buy the best we can afford, learn to prepare it healthily and perhaps even grown some of our own foods to help cut down on cost and so that we can have organic foods.

Here’s what I have done to help my family eat more healthily. We have six people at home right now so I understand what it is to struggle to feed everyone healthily and on a very tight budget.

The first thing I did was to educate myself about whole foods and organic foods and what a truly healthy diet consists of. The American people are finding out slowly that they’ve been handed a load of junk when it comes to what is healthy and what is not. If you haven’t been informed in the area of nutrition, here are some resources you should read and view.

As far as I am concerned, the following resources are required reading and viewing if you want to learn about nutrition and the fallacies that the FDA has perpetuated with the American public. I have a general knowledge of nutrition and health that I gained in college and through life experiences. You probably also have some understanding of nutrition. These resources will build on what you know and challenge you to make healthy changes.

The movies Fast Food Nation and Food Inc. There are other movies like these, too. You can search out the ones you want to view.
The website for The Weston A. Price Foundation and GNOWFGLINS (God’s Natural Organic Whole Foods Grown Locally and In Season)
The book by Sally Fallon called Nourishing Traditions.

Second, I looked through many, many cookbooks and recipe collections to find recipes that reflect the way our I want to feed my family. I found a few books and some websites that I use frequently for ideas and recipes. I collected these recipes and put them in a binder.

It helped that I had already started making simple meals. I stopped making casseroles and complicated dishes years ago. Simple recipes with few ingredients is a good way to make sure you are eating healthily.

Then finally, I set out to change our eating habits, without breaking us, by doing these things:

* Got rid of the JUNK. I eliminated chips, purchased cookies and desserts, carbonated drinks, artificial sweeteners and processed foods, canned soups, packaged crackers, boxed meals. Love your Velveeta? Yeah, I know, me too. But there are healthy alternatives to Velveeta and real cheese tastes better. In fact, there are healthy alternatives to almost all the junky foods we’ve grown to love.

* Cut down and changed the fats we consume. I use grapeseed oil for frying and olive oil for using in dressings and toppings. I have also cut down on the amount of frying I do. We are southerners and we do fry some foods every now and then! For those big frying jobs, I use palm oil and coconut oil in small amounts. I totally cut out butter substitutes and shortenings. That was a problem for biscuit making. Instead of shortening I use lard. I guess that’s shocking, but lard is a natural product and used in small amounts, infrequently, it is better for us than shortening. I use butter in some recipes for flavor.

* Made the switch to Whole Grain. Use whole wheat in place of refined wheat flours. Buy or make your whole wheat crackers, bread and treats. I started using quinoa more often. I had started using it about 25 years ago, but not very often. Now we have it about twice a month.

* Use dried beans instead of canned ones. Dried beans are still very inexpensive, cheap even! Cook them, separate them into meal sized containers and freeze them. We eat beans about three times a week.

* Made our own! You can make your own taco seasoning, cajun seasoning and other seasoning mixes. Most of those mixes contain other ingredients that you don’t want like MSG. Consider growing and using herbs instead of seasoning mixes and making your own version of Mrs. Dash! Its inexpensive and easy to do. I started making our yogurt about 28 years ago, you can make it too. Try my yogurt tutorial.

* Started buying organically grown meat… but don’t stress if you can’t afford it! The only real organically raised meat I can find is elk. I buy it in small quantities. The rest of the meat I buy, is not locally produced. Most stores now offer chicken that is produced without hormones and antibiotics. My philosophy is to look for the best I can afford. Buying better quality may mean that you must cut down on the amount of meat your family consumes and that you must be more frugal with your leftovers.

* A price book is a great idea. I just recently started using one. I go to three different stores on grocery day. They are all within 2 miles of each other. I write down prices for items that I use frequently and then compare them so that I can get the best price on an ongoing basis.

* Buying Bulk. I buy all my flours, meals, baking supplies and some meat there. Look around your own area, there may be more than you think. Try Googling for “Bulk Store Locater” sometime and see what you can find.

*Started growing our produce. We grow nearly all our own produce and yearly we are increasing the amount we grow. You may not have space or knowledge to grow your own. Lack of knowledge can be cured! And a good place to start is your local Home Economics and Ag-Extension Office . Check the Yellow Pages. They will have growing information pertinent to your area.
Lack of space is a bit harder to contend with. But we have container gardened with great success over the years. The Ag-Extension Office is the place to start for this information, too. But consider some internet sites:

Of course when you grow it, you need to know how to preserve it. So a its a good idea to get a Ball Canning and Freezing Guide. There are sites all over the internet that will teach you how to can and freeze too, but the best source is your local Ag-Extension office. They have all kinds of literature and even a Home Economist to walk you through it.

The next step I recommend is to find a good cookbook that has economical and really good tasting recipes. I can start you off with three books that I own and can vouch for and some websites where I go to find simple whole foods recipes.

More With Less Cookbook by Doris Janzen Longacre
Saving The Seasons by Mary Clemens Meyer
Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon – this is the book I used to learn about kefir and it brought back to me the things I learned in the past about naturally fermented foods.
Wardeh’s GNOWFGLINS site
The Nourishing Gourmet with Kimi Harris
Annette’s Sustainable Eats site

Since I made these changes, my family has felt better, been healthier with fewer colds and ailments, some have lost weight and I have definitely saved money. I hope you will start the process of learning how to eat more healthily.

Filed Under: Cooking School, Homekeeping, Homemade and Healthy, Menu Planning and Menus

Broadening Horizons In The Kitchen

August 2, 2010 By Sylvia 3 Comments

There’s a new way of cooking and eating these days and you’ve probably heard about some of these new cooking methods and foods: Sprouting grains,Whole grains,Locally grown produce,Organic,Agave,Cane sugar,Rapidura,Spelt. I could go on and on.

What is basically happening in the Food World is that folks are tired of being unhealthy, don’t want to start being unhealthy, have all kinds of allergies and sensitivities, want to be more “green” in their food preparation and purchase choices, want to be better stewards of God’s gifts, and just want a more simple way to prepare nourishing foods for themselves and their families.

Its a marvelous thing that has been going strong for a long time. And while there have nearly always been proponents of healthy eating in the U.S., for the past 20 years or so the information has steadily been growing and easier to find. With the advent of the Internet, information on eating better is literally at our fingertips.

I grew up in the southern U.S. where bacon and lard, cow milk and butter have traditionally been part of the every meal. I grew up on a farm where big meals were a part of life. There was variety but there were those staples that are pretty much taboo nowadays.

A cartoon movie I saw once pretty much summer up the view on food groups where I came from: “Whiskey, Beans, Bacon and Lard.” Ok maybe not so much the whiskey. And there are some really delicious, nourishing foods here in the south. But my lifestyle isn’t like my Grandparent’s lifestyle was. I don’t get up at 4 a.m. and start working outside in the fields til after dark. And my body doesn’t need the fat and calories that their bodies needed. They ate a typical southern diet and were not obese at all. They didn’t have heart disease or high cholesterol. Some of that may be genetic, but I think a lot of it is the fact that they were so extremely physically active.

Today I have found a need to broaden my horizons in the kitchen and embrace new and sometimes strange ways of preparing food and eating it. Its as if disease and obesity lurk around every pop-tart. I want to make those changes now so that I can be as healthy as possible and I want my children to have a good start in life.

Here are some of those changes I have made. Do your own research and see what changes you need to make.

Raw Milk - Raw milk from grass fed cows has everything a body needs to live. The human body needs 20-22 proteins to function properly. 8 of these proteins are essential, we have to get them from our food. The remaining 12-14 we can make from the first eight via complex metabolic pathways in our cells. Raw cow’s milk contains all 8 of those essential proteins.

Eliminated white and processed sugars – white sugar is high on the glycemic index and is dangerous for our blood sugar, insulin levels, digestive enzyme count, weight, and the pancreas. It also damages our body’s immune response. There is just so much wrong with white sugar that its hard for me to justify using it at all.

Naturally fermented foods – I make yogurt, naturally fermented beets and other vegetables. I make kefir and kombucha. I use the kefir to make other things like salad dressings. These really aren’t new ways of preparing foods. I grew up with naturally fermented foods. Mother made kraut and put cucumbers down in the kraut to make pickles.

More Raw Foods – We’re eating more and more raw vegetables and grains. I have a great Muesli recipe that is completely raw, even has kefir in it.

Basic Meals – Instead of casseroles with 15 ingredients and complicated dishes that contain processed ingredients, I make simple meals. A meat dish might contain 5 or fewer ingredients and I use the best meats and vegetables I can afford. I grow most of our vegetables organically and use them. We are able to buy organic elk and pork.

Cooking From Scratch – Actually I don’t think just cooking from scratch is enough but it is a good start. I’ve always cooked from scratch but now I am more concerned with the ingredients, where they came from and how they are processed. I’ve always made my own noodles for example. But these days I make sure that I either buy organic wheat to grind or buy organic flour. The fewer pesticides, fungicides,insecticides and other junk in our food the better.

Soaking Grains – I talked about soaking grains and beans and flours in this post. I think its an easy way to get more nutrition into your food!

I’m buying organic free-trade coffee beans, using rapidura, molasses and cane sugar in place of white sugar
in recipes too.

I kind of thought it would be too time intensive and too much work to add to my already heavy work-load here at home to start changing things up so drastically in the kitchen. It really hasn’t been. The biggest problem has been teaching this old dog new tricks, new ways of doing things that I have to do any way.
Once I got over that hurdle it was easy peasy.

Filed Under: Cooking School, Homemade and Healthy

Easy Lunch Idea ~ Japanese Noodle Soup

May 12, 2010 By Sylvia 2 Comments

We love having foods from different cultures and countries so I have several Easy Lunch Ideas that are loosely based on those kinds of foods. Its a lot of fun and interesting to have a food from a country you are studying during the school year, and some of the recipe make it into our regular line-up and stay all year. Japanese Noodle Soup is one of them.

Japanese noodles are made from several different kinds of flours. There are udon noodles made from flour, noodles made from rice and there are noodles made from other grains. The ones I prefer are soba noodles, made from buckwheat flour. This soup can be prepared using whatever kind of Japanese noodle you like.

There are several ingredients that you may not have heard of, so I’ve tried to link them to pictures and descriptions. None of the ingredients are difficult to find. I have seen them all at Walmart and Kroger in the International Foods isle.

Ingredients …..

3-4 tsp dashino moto (I buy it in little packets, it is a fish soup stock that is the base of many Japanese dishes) OR you can use bonito flakes instead.
5-6 cups water
1/4 cup low sodium soy sauce
enough for 4 servings (make a ring with your thumb and forefinger, the amount of noodles needed should fit in that circle)
2 green onions, sliced
any other add-ins you like, such as, reconstituted dried mushrooms, shrimp, thinly sliced carrots, diced tofu, dried seaweed, broccoli rabe or frozen/frozen spinach.

Making the soup …..

Bring the water and dashino moto to a boil
Add the soy sauce, noodles, and tofu if used, and cook til the noodles are done.
Add the onion.
Add the other ingredients you choose to use.
Simmer til the greens or mushrooms are done, or is you aren’t using those ingredients, simmer until the noodles are tender.
Serve. Nummy.

You can use bits of meat to make it more filling,. Cook the meat while before you cook the noodles.

Filed Under: Cooking School, Homemade and Healthy, Recipes, Tutorials

Coconut Milk Chicken

May 10, 2010 By Sylvia 7 Comments

Coconut Milk Chicken is one of those recipes that my whole family likes and looks forward to. When I first started using coconut milk in cooking, my husband didn’t like the flavor. So, I changed over to lite coconut milk and the flavor wasn’t so pronounced. He liked it!

Coconut milk gives the food a very nice flavor and adds a creaminess without using dairy products. You can change up the spices and herbs in this recipe to suit yourself. This particular recipe uses cumin, coriander, cayenne and tumeric. I make another version using basil, oregano and black olives.

First you will make up your spice mixture. Then you will toss the spice mixture with some de-boned, cooked chicken before putting together the rest of the dish……

Spice mixture ~ In a small bowl combine:
1 tsp ground cumin
1/4 tsp ground cayenne pepper or more to taste.
1 tsp tumeric
1 tsp ground coriander

Toss spice mixture with 3 cups cooked, de-boned chicken, cut into chunks or you can use whole wings or thighs.

Rest of ingredients
salt and pepper to taste
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 medium onion, slivered
2 cloves garlic, minced
3 whole tomatoes, seeded and chopped
1 14 oz can light coconut milk
1 handful chopped fresh parsley

Toss the chicken with the spice mixture, let it sit for about 5 minutes.

Heat a large skillet over medium high heat, add the olive oil, onions and garlic, cook til the onion is tender but not browned.

Add the chicken, tomatoes and coconut milk. Heat to simmer, reduce heat and simmer on low for 10 minutes. Add a little water if it is too dry for your tastes. Add salt and pepper to taste. Add parsley and serve over brown rice or quinoa.