Oh...My...SUGAR!!

Everyone knows soda isn't great for you.  We try to limit how much our kids get.  My husband and I used to drink it, but could count on one hand the times we have had it in the past 3 years.  It is typically reserved for a special treat if the kids ask for it.  And even then, I try to go with root beer or something that I view as not quite so bad (I don't know why, I'm sure it has just as much sugar as others)  About a week ago, my son had a party at school and chose Mt. Dew to bring with.  No, it was not my proudest parenting moment.  I had just read an article about how many tsps were in a gram of sugar the day before.  It works out to 4g = 1 tsp sugar.  So doing the calculations, here is how much sugar is in a 16 oz bottle of Mt. Dew (which is technically 2.5 servings, but who measures that out, so I'm going on the assumption that this is what one person drinks.

Almost 1/2 CUP!!!!  I think I will be limiting even more-YUCK!
Let's hear it for water :-)

Poached eggs and veggie 'hash'

I have been wanting egg poaching pods for quite a while.  I have not tried poaching an egg before in the traditional method, but my husband has, not getting the results we wanted.  Poached eggs should have the nice firm whites with runny yolks.  When we were on the cleanse, he made a poached egg hash, that turned out more like a hard yolk egg on sweet potato hash.

I bought some poaching pods this past weekend and tried them out this morning.  They worked PERFECTLY.  Firm white with a yolk that ran off into my hash.  It was wonderful!

Here are what the pods look like.  They have a tag when you purchase them with directions on how to poach eggs and make other things like Flan.  SUPER easy.

My recipe for the hash is as follows.

Sweet Potato Veggie Hash with Poached Egg
-makes 2 servings
2 large eggs (poached according to pod directions-needs 4 minutes to cook so it is a good idea to start 1/2 way through the cooking time of the veggies)
1/3 large sweet potato, peeled and diced
4 stalks asparagus, cut into 1/2" pieces
1 C fresh spinach, roughly chopped
1 small zucchini, diced
1 small onion, diced
Coconut Oil

Place 1/2 Tbsp coconut oil in a pan on medium heat.  Once melted, add sweet potatoes.  Cook over medium heat until slightly browned, stirring often.  Add asparagus after about 3 minutes.  Cook 2 minutes, stirring often.  Add in onion and zucchini.  Cook until onion is opaque and soft.  Add in spinach and stir/cook until wilted.  Place on plate.  Sprinkle with salt and pepper to taste (you won't need much at all)  Top with poached egg.

Meatless Stuffed Peppers

Another recipe I have made this week is stuffed bell peppers.  No meat.  Veggies and Rice only.

Stuffed Bell Peppers
6 Green Bell Peppers, cored
1 1/4 C cooked Wild Rice
1 1/4 C cooked Brown Rice
1 or 2 Zucchini, diced
2 stalks Celery, diced
1C Baby Carrots (or 2 large), diced
1 Red Onion, finely diced
1 Yellow Onion, finely diced
1 Roasted Red Bell Pepper, diced
1 can Water Chestnuts, diced
1-2 eggs, whisked (these are optional-they help bind the rest together but aren't necessary)
1 can Tomato Paste
1 can Tomato Sauce
Dried oregano
Sea Salt and Fresh Ground Pepper to taste
Olive Oil
(optional is to add some diced roasted poblano peppers or diced jalapenos to add some heat to the dish)

Preheat oven to 375.

In a small bowl, empty both cans of tomato.  Add approximately 1 tsp oregano.  Whisk until smooth.

Place peppers into baking dish/casserole dish.  Place 1 Tbsp tomato mixture into bottom of each pepper.

Bring a large pan to medium heat, add one turn around the pan of olive oil (about 1/2 to 1 Tbsp)  Add in onions, celery, carrots.  Cook for 3 minutes.  Add in zucchini. Cook stirring frequently until veggies are crisp tender and onion is opaque.  Stir in rices, water chestnuts and roasted red pepper.  Heat through.  Turn off heat and cool slightly.  Place in a bowl and add in the whisked eggs until fully mixed.

Fill each bell pepper with rice mixture.  Top each pepper with remaining tomato mixture.

Cover casserole dish and bake at 375 for 1 hour.  You can remove the cover 15 minutes before done.  Remove from oven and let stand for 5 minutes.

Getting Creative

My husband and I are in the middle of a cleanse/detox program from Standard Process.  It is 21 days of no processed, no sugar, no caffeine, no alcohol.  The first 10 days are also meatless, with protein coming from shakes with protein powder.

Eggs are not on the plan, but they are a pure protein/fat so we have added them in place of shakes, especially for lunch.  We can have a portion of brown or wild rice, or lentils daily.  This calls for a rice cake, not the over processed kind, but there are organic cakes that have only organic brown rice and sea salt, which technically, fits the bill.  Day 11 we are allowed to have fish or chicken for the remaining days.

I had heard about mixing egg and avocado, but wasn't quite sure about mixing what I perceived as guacamole with a hard boiled egg.  Well, let me tell you, I am a believer!  I made an egg salad sandwich of sorts for lunch today.  Healthy protein, healthy fat, the perfect mid day meal.  This recipe replaces the non healthy mayo with avocado, which adds the creaminess.  Here is what it looked like along with the recipe, which is quite simple! Good for you and it was amazingly filling.

'Clean' Egg Salad Sandwich
1 hard boiled egg
1/2 avocado
1 Tbsp spicy brown mustard
1 organic brown rice cake
3 lettuce leaves
salt and pepper
paprika

In a small bowl, mash together the avocado and the egg yolk.  Finely chop the egg white and add to the bowl.  Add mustard; salt, pepper and paprika to taste.  Mix well.  Place salad mix on top of the rice cake, top with paprika.  You can add the lettuce under or over the salad, or eat separately.

Wild Rice Pilaf, heavy on the veggies

Here is my second recipe that is good on the cleanse, as well as off.  We still make this almost weekly, even without a specific food diet.  This is something my kids love, and it is a great way to get your veggies and grains all in one pan, which honestly, some nights is a bigger deal than others!  It goes really well as a side to trout or salmon.
Wild Rice Pilaf

1C wild rice, cooked according to package directions.
1 red onion, diced
1-2 shallots, finely chopped
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 fennel bulb, fronds removed and bulb diced
(you can chop up some of the fronds as well like you would dill)
2-3 carrots, diced
1 sweet potato, diced
2 parsnips, diced
2-3 celery stalks, diced
8oz package baby Bella (brown) mushrooms, diced
1 red bell pepper, diced
1 green pepper, diced
2 zucchini, diced (one yellow, one green gives the dish nice color
2-3 hot peppers, finely chopped (totally optional-we like hot food!)
Fresh Thyme
Fresh Parsley
Olive Oil

In a separate pan, cook the mushrooms until done to your liking.  Only turn once, otherwise they will be soft.

Over medium heat, add 1 tsp olive oil to the pan.  Add root vegetables first (carrots, sweet potatoes, parsnips).  Cook for just a few minutes, stirring often so they don't burn.  Add in onions, garlic, shallots, fennel, peppers.  Cook until just opaque.  Add herbs and zucchini.  Cook a few minutes so zucchini is still firm.  Add wild rice (if on the cleanse diet, add enough for about 4-6 servings, you will have plenty of leftovers.) and heat through.  Add more olive oil to taste if needed at any time during cooking.

Add salt and pepper to taste.  I like to use Truffle Salt at the end too-but that's only if you really like the wild mushroom flavor.  You can use dried herbs in place of the fresh, but you need to add them with the first veggies so they have time to work in.  In my opinion, you can't beat the fresh herbs.  Their cost isn't as hard to stomach when you realize you can use one of the small packages for multiple recipes.

With this recipe, you can add or take out any vegetable you like (some we have added include leeks, peas, pea pods, cabbage, artichoke hearts).  I like it all diced for consistency, but that's just me :-)  You can also cook longer if you prefer the veggies softer.  We liked a little texture to it-I cook the veggies so they were still crisp.

You could also replace the wild rice with lentils (another approved grain on the cleanse)  Both work quite well with this dish.

Veggie Tacos recipe

I was asked to put a few recipes up by my sister in law, who is a chiropractor.  Her clinic offers a 21 day cleanse that my husband and I have done yearly for the past two years.  Since we like variety and love to cook, we had to come up with a few different ideas to make it through the first few days especially, since there is no meat involved until day 11 of 21.
This is our recipe for veggie tacos.  We also made taco meat (ground beef or chicken) for our kids when we had this, since they did not go on the full cleanse with us.  All other items were the same.

Vegetable Tacos
1 each red, green, yellow peppers, sliced thin
2-3 jalapenos, seeded and sliced thin (red or green)
1 red and 1 white onion, sliced thin
2-3 cloves garlic, sliced thin
1 zucchini, cut julienne or peeled thin using a vegetable peeler
2-3 carrots, julienne sliced (optional-we added them from time to time for variety)
1 head romaine lettuce, stem ends trimmed, leaves left whole
2-5 diced roma tomatoes (or other fresh tomatoes)
2 green poblano peppers, roasted, skinned and seeded, then diced
1 lime sliced into wedges
Cilantro
Ancho chile powder
Cumin
Avocado
Green Onions
Brown Rice

Slice avocado in half, remove pit, cube and place in small bowl.  Mash avocado, add 1-2 sliced green onions, 1/4 cup chopped cilantro, lime juice and cumin to taste.  Set aside.
Heat skillet over high heat.  Add peppers and onions (and carrots if using).  Continue to stir so still crisp, but browned on at least one side.  Use a little water so they don't stick to the hot pan.  You are making this like fajitas.  Once onions and peppers are just about done you your liking, add in the garlic and zucchini.  Cook slightly so the zucchini is still crisp.  Add about 1 tsp of oil (olive or grapeseed) to the mixture.  Add in chili powder and cumin to taste (about 1 tsp of each)  Mix well over medium heat.

Serve all items on the table family style so each person can adjust what they like on their taco.
Lettuce leaves serve as shells.
Brown rice (see cleanse portions)
Diced Tomatoes
Avocado (guac mix)
Pepper/Onion mix
Roasted Poblanos
Lime Wedges
Green onions and Cilantro to garnish
Additional sliced jalapenos for garnish

Little Szechwan St. Paul never disappoints

We had lunch today at Little Szechwan in St. Paul on University Ave. with some great friends who are foodies too.  There is a standing challenge between the couples who can order the spiciest dish.  We have had some great ones...Fish Fillet with Szechuan Peppercorn and Fish Fillet in Spicy Tofu Broth are two of the most memorable dishes.  Today our friend ordered the Beef in Szechuan Spicy Broth and won hands down.

The szechwan peppercorns are deceivingly hot-a clear broth with fish, green veggies and stalks of peppercorns.  The spicy tofu broth and the beef in spicy broth are dishes that not only have a chili oil slick on the top of the bowl, they also have an obscene amount of chili flakes and at times sliced serrano chilies. 

An article on the wall from Dara Moskowitz, Food Critic at City Pages said that "Little Szechuan is the real deal, a Szechuan specialist that uses chili peppers the way blizzards use snow."  Perfect description! 

Other great menu items are the green beans, fried rice, lettuce wraps and egg drop soup (all of which are loved by the kids).  Little Szechwan has a wide variety of heat in their dishes.  There is something for everyone on their menu.  Portions are large, reasonably priced-you will come away full, with plenty of leftovers for another meal.

Here is our spread from lunch today

Up close and personal of the Beef in Spicy Szechwan Broth

Fish Fillet in Spicy Tofu Broth from an earlier visit