Kale, glorious kale!

Long ago, in a far away land, I went to college. When my mother drove me there . . . ooooooo. Well, she had spent about two hours between me standing in line to get my keys and then carrying things up to my third floor room. Then we ran into town to set up a bank account for me, run an errand, and dashed back to campus in time for the welcoming speeches for orientation. There we were surrounded by new, incoming Hanpshire-ites (who actually LIKE being called "Hampsters" - Hee, hee.), older students who were there to lead Orientation activities, and of course, staff and faculty. My mother spent most of THAT hour looking around, with her jaw visibly hanging open, at the students and incoming students and their distinctive images and appearance, shall we say. At the end of this she said, "I've always taught you not to talk to strangers, and now I just don't know what to tell you." (Ha! As an important note, when I graduated, my mom had come full circle on this. Hampsters don't walk across the graduation stage in cap and gowns; they wear what they want. And BOY DO THEY. My mom took three or four pictures of me, and about 37 of the fellow graduates saying, "I hope you don't mind, but for me it's a little like going to the circus!")

Hampshire College is a place that encourages and supports extreme individuality (I say that knowing I'm bringing to mind "extreme sports." It's intentional - Hampshire is a glorious, and extreme place. Worthy of another post unto itself . . .  oh yeah, I've been working on that post for nigh unto 3 months now.  .  . so stick a pin in that). It does this in terms of educational philosophy and curriculum, as well as in other ways. What's hilarious is that from pretty much the moment that I entered kindergarten I was very obviously, "that girl who's a little different" in my K-12 school experiences, and in comparison at Hampshire, I was something of a subversive because I was so "mainstream."  I found very quickly that the ways I had tested the boundaries and pushed the envelope were not so great as those of my new peers. I hadn't taken a year off to hike Europe, I had never dyed my hair or made my own clothing from natural fibers, I hadn't quit high school in favor of homeschooling myself so that I could do MORE, I hadn't published anything, and I had to ask someone what kale was! I went to a vegetarian potluck and was thrilled about the rice salad, the grilled corn and roasted red pepper salad, the stuffed zucchini, but, "what's this green stuff? Spinach?"

A few years later, I moved out of the dorms and into Hampshire's on-campus smaller setting housing (I hesitate to call them "apartments" because they are generally shared with 5-8 people. Which is a lot. But they have kitchens and living rooms. Which was what I was looking for at the time) and my "mod-mates" and I split a share of Hampshire's farm. I want to say that for a semester's worth of vegetable we each chipped in something like $30-40 dollars. The catch with farm shares is that you get whatever portion you get of whatever has been harvested. It's not like you go in and say, "I want tomatoes, garlic and zucchini this week." Early on we got a few strawberries, tomatoes, and things like broccoli, basil, and onions. Even fresh flowers one week! But once we got into November and December, the winter vegetables populated our share - sweet potatoes, other roots, and lots and lots of kale. I used to go pick up the share, take the kale, and just stick it gingerly in the fridge and hope fervently that the adorably young, hippie, dancing student we lived with would know what to do with it. Often times she picked up on the silent brain-wave from me and obliged.

But, I also was part of a group that met every Monday with a potluck dinner attached to our meeting. And so, finally, inevitably, it was an early December afternoon and I had been so busy finishing math assignments (another thing that branded me as subversively "normal" at Camp Hamp), planning my teaching, and writing a chapter of my thesis that I hadn't had time to plan what I would bring to the potluck. In the back of my mind I thought, "I'm sure that we have some corn chips and cheese . . . ??" No. I descended to the kitchen and found no crackers to put peanut butter on, no corn chips, no sweet potatoes I could quickly roast or mash, aiiiiiIIIIIIIEEEEEEE. (I made this noise in my head A LOT that year as I balanced being engaged with work with teaching AND writing a thesis. Sometimes in excitement and other times in utter, flat-spin-esque PANIC.) Ok, self, what DO we have. Well, we have kale. A quick walk down the hall to knock on Sara-dancer-girl's door, "Umm, what can you tell me about kale."

I think she saw the anxiety in my face because I remember distinctly her pausing for a quick beat before saying, "Why don't you just steam it lightly and then borrow some tahini from me to serve with it for the Counselor Advocates." (I might not've known what all of our vegetables were when we got our weekly share portions, but one of the things I had done for our mod/flat was to create a calendar/board thingy so that we could communicate the 28 different directions we were all going in at all times and be sensitive to what was going on in each other's lives. Ahhhh Organization, my long-time companion.)

I did just this, and all of the vegans at my meeting DELIGHTED at my offering. I was kind of like, "Umm, ohhhh-kaaayyy." But here's why: first, I'm not a vegan. Second: I ADORE vegetables. I have always felt this way. Mushrooms, asparagus, salads, bring it on. My parents never had to negotiate with me to get me to eat my veggies. With only two exceptions: not a fan of beets. Aaaaaand, I don't like cooked cabbage. Well, kale is a form of cabbage.

Fast-forward many years, and here I am in Boulder. If ever there was a place MORE dedicated to local,  farmers-market, veggie-full eating than Hampshire, here it is. I am a long way from Kansas, as it were - in my first month living here alone I encountered kale 4 times. (And while I didn't think, "ewww" I also wasn't like, "Oh, I'm definitely getting THAT.")

But, the story doesn't end there. I have wonderful, entertaining, health-minded, whip-smart friends, and two that live in Jersey mentioned kale or cooked it in foods I was sharing with them. One of them is the "Ima" (mom) in my Jewish family, and when I returned to visit, she had kale in a soup for the start of the Shabat meal. I thought, "hmmm, kale. Perhaps I have judged you unfairly." Another is perhaps the most entertaining person I know in real life. She revels in making fun of stereotypes and can often be found discussing how, as a lesbian woman, she knows she is expected to eat kale and bang her tambourine with tabbouleh and quinoa flying out of it. (Biggest giggle of all.) She also posted a recipe for kale salad on FB.

Eureka!!

Simple, not cooked, fresh ingredients, come to meeeeeeeee. I made this salad last summer because I needed a break from lettuce and cucumber based salads and didn't want to cook vegetables. Very quickly, kale became something written in bold, all-caps on my grocery list each week. In fact, when I lost my job and started planning my budget down to the tiniest detail, I cut many things out of my grocery list, of course. But what was remarkable were the things I cut from my grocery list specifically IN ORDER TO SAVE KALE.

If you had told me that the year before, I would have bet money on the opposite result. But, here is the thing, despite all of the hype about super foods (we hear it hawked at us all the time. Acai! Pomegranites! Brussel Sprouts!) kale is pretty much a super-hero. It has a great anti-oxidant profile (of course) but it's also a green so it can stand in for lettuce or spinach, but pound for pound has massive amounts more of fiber. It also has high amounts of absorbed calcium, vitamin C, B6, potassium, and folic acid. (Read: my friend was right in that lesbians should eat kale, but not because they love women; instead, because they ARE women.) Kale is profiled as helping to prevent cancer, heart disease, high cholesterol and blood-pressure and osteoporosis (Psssst! The leading disease threats for women in the U.S. are cancer, heart disease, and stroke. Cello.) Most of us would have to eat a stir fry of vegetables to get all of that, and then something separate to get the eye-health promoting lutein and folic acid kale also has. See? Superstar.

But, since kale was a little intimidating for me, I had a knowing nod and smile when my good friend posted yesterday, "I'm never intimidated by any vegetable (or most food for that matter) but I bought kale at the grocery store this weekend and I'm ascared of it!" Kale is wonderful and amazing, but I too had some not great introductory experiences with it. One feels a little like they need to either MAKE themselves eat this power green, or like they need to be credentialed by the Food Network as an expert or something to unlock the tastiness of it.

So, I'm here to tell my friend (and I suppose all of you, also) that kale need not be feared. First, think of it as being tougher (as in, able to withstand more handling, cooking, etc. ) than lettuce, but milder than spinach. Thusly, it will seem like something you can add to pasta, soups, or stir fries much more easily in your head, instead of some elite vegetable that you place gently in your fridge and hope someone else eats (as I once did).  Secondly, unless you really LIKE steamed vegetables or tahini, let us give my former friend and roomate Sara-the-dancer her due for bailing me out of a jam, but don't steam it and eat with with tahini. You will feel like a vegan, and then you'll begin to worry that you need to BE vegan in order to appreciate kale. In my experience this is followed closely by a panic of, "If I'm a vegan, I can't eat cheese! If I can't eat cheese, then I can't have cheese-fries. Why would I ever give up cheese-fries for KALE? aiiiiiIIIIIIIEEEEEEE! " So, no, no tahini. Don't set kale up as the enemy of bar food. That's not a winning strategy.

Next up, when buying kale, you march yourself bravely into the produce section, and don't worry about the people in hemp clothing! You have just as much right to that kale as them! Fourth, I prefer the flat-leaf or "dinosaur" kale, but whatever you get, it should be such a deep green it should almost have hues of blue and purple in it. And finally, kale is listed on the "dirty dozen" of produce that is high in pesticides. Here's the gig, as I see it: even if you're buying organic, we all need to acknowledge that labeling things as organic is a business, and there's big money in it. There's a list of CHEMICAL pesticides approved for use in certified organic farms, and they aren't necessarily less harmful than those used by non-organic farms. Buy local if you can, but whatever you do, let's all just agree that thoroughly washing our produce is something that's part of life now, mm-kay? (As a sidenote, I will note that like lettuce and spinach, your leafy, deep green-blue kale will last longer in your fridge if you don't wash it until you're using it and it's dry in it's little bag in your crisper drawer.)

Now, eat some yummy kale. (DO EEEEEEETTTT!)

Here are my recommendations:

Kale Salad (courtesy of the lovely and indomitable T-budd): Kale, grape tomatoes, pine nuts, lemon, olive oil, salt and pepper (scallions, carrots, feta optional)

Cut the kale into thin ribbons, almost chiffonade. Then I cut those in half cross-wise so they are more fork-able. Cut your little tomatoes in halves and thirds. Add to bowl. Mix well and add pine nuts to taste. Squeeze a whole lemon over the salad (I use bottled juice in a pinch but an actual lemon makes a taste difference for me) and add about 1.5-3 tblsps of olive oil. Salt and pepper to taste. (Add chopped scallion and/or shredded carrots and/or crumbled feta to change up this salad). I eat some version of this almost every week.

Kale Soup (courtesy of Allrecipes): Now, almost all of my winter soups go like this - oil, onions, whole spices or fresh ground spices, saute, then add either carrots or bell peppers and bay leaves, then add broth, beans or lentils, salt, other spices and herbs, boil, simmer. (I add other "secret" ingredients to dress up soups depending on which one I'm making. Beer, mustard, lemons, fresh rosemary, etc.) Kale can be added to any one of those soups. It can also be made in the recipe in this link with sausage, beans, potatoes, and hot peppers.

Kale chips: Kale, oil spray, mixed spices of your choosing, oven.

Admission - kale chips have horrified and worried me for some time, even after my kale-conversion. My cousin oven baked some this year and then tagged me in her FB post describing them as having dried out and turned to "salty dust." Ugh. I felt almost responsible since I had been touting my kale-love-affair on FB for many moons at that point. Also, store-bought kale chips are groddy and expensive. aiiiiiIIIIIIIEEEEEEE!

My awesome friend Lauren (I think she is a Hampster at heart, though she attended a different college) turned me around on this one just a couple of days ago.

Set oven to 375-400 degrees. Spray a baking tray lightly. Cut the spines out of your kale leaves, and lay the halves down on the tray. Spray them lightly. Sprinkle with you spice mix of choice (We used Savory Spices "Capitol Hill Blend" which has shallots, salt, pepper, chives and parsley in it but I could have used salt and lemon pepper, the pesto blend, or many others . . . and probably will begin experimenting!). Flip the leave halves over and repeat this process on the other side. Place in pre-heated oven for about 5-8 minutes, You want them to make a crunchy sound when you bight them but not be fall-apart-baked-to-death. After we reached minute five we began checking them each minute in order to hit just the right amount of bake-age but not go overboard.

Kale stir fry: vegetable oil, low sodium soy sauce, fresh ginger finely chopped, scallions, garlic, white pepper, meat of choice (we use cheap boneless chicken), kale leaves chopped coarsely, veggies of choice (the best blend so far have been mushrooms, bell peppers, and broccoli)

I marinate the chicken cubes in a bowl with a medium amount of vegetable oil and soy sauce with some white pepper and a sprinkle of chopped ginger, add oil to a skillet/wok and then quickly saute the ginger, garlic, and scallions. Then I add the protein, reserving the "sauce", and add vegetables according to how fast they cook (mushrooms last because they cook down faster, kale in the middle, things like carrots or broccoli at the beginning since they cook slower. ) Add sauce at the end, serve over rice noodles.

Things I plan to try:

Kale with pasta: pasta, kale leaves, garlic, tomatoes, feta, olive oil, pine nuts

Add some cut tomatoes and torn kale to cooked pasta (spirals? orrechiette?), lightly roast pine nuts in olive oil and sauteed garlic, add to pasta, sprinkle with feta.

Kale with apples: kale, green and tart apples, walnuts or almonds, balsamic vinegar.

Braise kale leaves and apples lightly, garnish with chopped nuts, add a splash of balsamic. YUM!

So, although this post is really a gift for my friend (be not ascared of kale, chicca! I overcame and transcended my first impressions and you can too!) I hope this will also help some of you embrace my new favorite green friend. Also (shameless pug), please share your kale recipes with me! 

A week without logging

I have been aware that food logging is a valuable tool for managing not only my weight but any issues I face with food for a long, long time. It was mentioned to me as a calorie tracking tool when I was (well, this is shameful) 10 years old. Like most people, the idea of counting all calories consumed, every day, forever, failed before it ever began. As in Benny and Joon, "The answer is in the question." Can I successfully count calories forever? No. For lots of reasons. It's tedious and daunting, and so without my emotional buy in, it will not help me feel helped. It's also really, really easy to miscalculate, because most people don't have a lot of training on judging what a serving is, and carrying around a food scale is impractical. And, I was TEN.

The other problem with food logging, is that without some training, some counseling, and a lot of introspection and self-knowledge, it can easily devolve into just counting calories or servings of food types. Here's the problem - not all calories are created equal and neither are all people, with respect to those calories. Diabetics need to concern themselves very closely with carbs. If making a trade off, protein and fat will always be better for someone with any insulin issues - this was illustrated when someone close to me recently made a birthday cake for a diabetic and told me that she had substituted apple sauce for oil in the recipe. I quietly informed her that I'm sure it tasted good but that she had added carbs to the cake. Meanwhile, someone like my brother who is almost entirely gluten free can eat carbs, but needs to carefully consider what kind (rice, amaranth, oats, and almond flour much better than wheat flour or wheat products). If you lined up my diabetic friend, my brother, and I, and put us all on an 1800 calorie plan, where we got those calories would make a huge difference to our successful eating, but I doubt any of our food logs would match. People have particular needs because of their pathologies, because of food allergies, because of preferences (I don't care how gluten-free and protein-full cottage cheese is. I just can't do it, folks.) and because we're all special and unique like snowflakes. (smile)

Calories are special too. For me, 280 calories could be over my discretionary calorie allowance, could be what my trainer is recommending as a small bump in fat servings for a week (a really good week of almonds, bacon, and some olive oil, I might add), or could count as a way to estimate two carb servings. In my case, I need to also be very, very careful where those 280 calories come from, not just because of my food allergies (which are weird, and more extensive than I'd like. I am lucky in that strawberries and peanut butter aren't off limits, and I have it all figured out as to how to eat dairy in a way that works for me. But, I do sometimes wish I could be a grown up and drink wine or eat dried fruit. ) or my suspected insulin resistance, but because food is my kryptonite.

Like most people, I suspect it would always be better to get 280 calories of broccoli than 280 calories of M&Ms, and yes, I'm gluten sensitive, so brown rice or spaghetti squash is always going to be better than bread. But I also have to think about if the thing I'm thinking about eating is going to set off a desire to eat something ELSE. I do eat bread, about twice a week. This is less than most people eat bread in a day. and I have to carefully place it in my path because if I eat it early in the day, I will metabolize it faster, but it might also fire cravings for other bad carbs. I do eat pizza, sometimes, but I have to decide ahead of time what the "rules" are for eating off plan, and if possible, store up some discretionary eating and extra cardio to "pay for it."

The real price I pay is when something sneaks up on me and clobbers me with its enticing smell, or beguiling voice telling me that popcorn for dinner sounds like a really good idea. I have to work very carefully to avoid these moments, much the way I see alcoholics trying to remove temptation from their lives, particularly early on in their sobriety. Those addicts can choose to seek out new friends and activities, so that they will find themselves confronted with their drug less and less. They can't live in a bubble forever and will eventually be offered a glass of wine or to go to a party, of course. But they can side step it for awhile - for long enough to log some time in a new normal. I've written about this before - I can't. I can't go to a wedding without being confronted with food, or most recently, a birthday party with a lovely funfetti cake. I can't go on a date or to a friend's awesome awards ceremony without food at least being a consideration. What I can do is decide that I'll have twice as much salad on my plate as pizza, on that date, and only eat two slices, to say no-thank-you to the cake, and then get busy doing something else, and to ask someone who is getting up to bring me ONE breadstick at the awards ceremony and then drink two bottles of water and remind myself I don't need to eat dinner twice. (Having someone else get the breadstick was key, by the way, because it meant I never had to be faced with any other food choices, or a plate to fill. I've said it before - I am lucky to have awesome friends). But here's what I can't do, even if I do all of that. I can't NOT bring food into my house, and I can't not eat.

I wish I could reach down and find some supernatural ability to not eat for, like, 28 days. Like the movie I imagine I would magically, and with heartwarmingly hard-won victories and new choices, find my feet on the path of recovery if I could manage this for a month of rehab. I also imagine that if eating weren't such a necessity I'd feel released. It would be a relief because it's actually exhausting to think this hard about food every day, every meal, every snack, every choice, from the moment I wake up (with my low blood sugar screaming in my head, "Wake up! Eat. ASAP!") until I go to sleep. The only thing more exhausting is the numbing, woolly-headed feeling and accompanying guilt brought on by NOT thinking about it and discovering I ate the whole box of Cheezits. So, I choose the lesser of two exhaustions but sometimes wish I had a less thorny, less insidious, less ever-present kryptonite.

So, for those keeping score, I am eating around the following limitations and restrictions:

• Gluten sensitive. In case you didn't know, gluten is hidden in absolutely everything. (Not just things with wheat in it! Tea! Mixed spices! Fruit bars! Protein shakes!)  For me I try to have this work out to one serving or less of gluten a day, or 7-8 a week. I sometimes am way under or sometimes a bit over. (Right now, it's a bit higher because while some things are easy substitutions - e.g. eat rice instead of bread - others are more difficult and things like gluten free chips, waffles, and granola bars are expensive and I'm on a tight budget these days.) But if I'm doing well with it, it makes a big difference in my energy level, skin, and allergies.
• Allergic to MSG - no Chinese take-out for me. Boooo.
• Allergic to preservatives - this means I can almost never eat dried fruit or off a buffet. It also affects me in certain cheeses, dried fruit, and wine. So, when I eat at your house and you make something cooked in a bottle of Merlot and garnished with Craisins I'll have to politely decline.
• I do much better with dairy if it is partially broken down and lower fat, such as yogurt. (Y'all can pry the greek yogurt from my cold, dead hands. I'm unlikely to EVER give it up even if it turns out it's not as miraculous as I think it is.)
• I can only eat 4-5 servings of carbs a day, and honestly, it is better if half of them were during or before lunch.
• I avoid most soy, because, let's face it, I don't need any more hormone issues. (But I love miso soup so I haven't completely removed soy. Also, in case you don't know, soy is secretly in everything too.)
• And I hate Dill and Mayonnaise with the passion of a thousand burning nuns.

Oh yeah, and eating itself is a problem, because it might set fire to the fuse and cause me to rapidly want to consume moremoremore.

This is where planning comes in. I can read all the books I want on strategies to beat cravings (and I do) and I can go to therapy and meditate (and I DO) but the very best thing I can do is to take charge of my food AGGRESSIVELY. This means a campaign of austerity including planning meals, planning what I will cook, and then shopping for that and only that. When shopping it means being thoughtful and ascetic and feigning ignorance of the existence of trigger foods. Then, as quickly as possible, I need to cook said food, because if it sits uncooked, popcorn for dinner starts to sound like a most excellent idea. Once the food is cooked and in my fridge, it should be idiot-proof, but of course there is the matter of avoiding temptation outside my house, and exercising a lot of control inside my house when it comes to portion size, added calories, and making sure I'm getting my 1-2 servings of fruit, 4-5 servings of vegetables, 4 servings of carbs, 2-3 of dairy, 7-9 of protein, and 2-5 of fats. It's a big job, and cruel task-master, keeping track of all of this. (Note: I measure portion sizes, and meet those servings, but only measure calories on certain items. I'm not against measuring calories anymore, but this works better for me to function and not feel overwhelmed.)

So, of course, this is where tracking my food comes in. I've been using various methods to log food for 4 years. FOUR!!!! I've done it online, carried a couple of different journals around, used logging tools created by my dietician, and all kinds of permutations of these activities. One of the best things I ever heard about the value of food logging came from Weight Watchers. I have to say, Weight Watchers should probably have a disclaimer that says, "does not work for those with insulin resistance" because they do treat all carbs as if they are created equal (4 points of M&Ms are just as good as 4 points of yogurt!), alas. Still and all, I would re-pay every cent I spent there to have learned this way of thinking about logging: Logging your food means acknowledging accountability as your best weapon. If you see patterns emerging, you can tackle them. If you find meals that are working for you, or food choices that help you with portion control, you have a record. But most of all, if you mess up, you write it down in full, and then you walk away with clean hands and a fresh start because you held yourself accountable. You don't have to keep beating yourself up about it. If it means releasing judgment, if it means not always hating myself for something I did three weeks ago then I. Will. Do. It.

So, I log food. Every day. At its best, its invaluable for not only accountability but for planning. Because as I'm writing down that I had some lovely (gluten free) oatmeal with breakfast, I'm thinking about what carbs would make sense in the rest of my day - a cup of rice at lunch gives me 2 carbs, and leaves one more for dinner, maybe a pita with some hummus to get a serving of fat in? Planning and anything I can do to support it is a great predictor of success for me, even if it also increases my control-freakishness. And even when logging is not at it's best, at the very, very least it lets me check in with my trainer and he can either nod approvingly, or he can say, "Umm, two beers? Two?!"

Why then, would I not log last week? Well, for one, I was out of paper. And didn't have it in my bank account to go get some. But, then, I started wondering . . . what would happen without my clipboard to keep me in line? This article suggests that logging is a way of evaluating ourselves, and thus, supplying our own behavioral modification. I became really interested to see what new patterns would be at work, and what old pitfalls would await me.

Here's what happened.

• I still did 5 hours of cardio and nearly 3 of lifting
• I had two drinks
• I ate pizza, but only two slices
• One day I was really hungry and had 3.5 servings of dairy instead of 2-3
• I drank two diet sodas instead of one during the week
• I ate half a small bag of M&Ms but then got such a sugar-rush headache I threw them out
• I ate all the vegetables in my fridge. Like ALL of them.
• The two loaves of bread in my freezer remain there
• I did limit myself to that one breadstick at the awards banquet
• I yelled down a serious voice in my head advocating for for yo with reeses pieces on it and had half a mango instead.
• I was still anxious at each occasion where I ate food not prepared in my house
• My only big unplanned eating was a bowl of popcorn with some butter. 3 of the 4.5 cups of the popcorn count as one serving of carbs on a day when I was low on carb servings, but the rest, the butter, and eating them at 8pm were less than ideal

Now, the nature of logging as you go through the day means you have a tighter rein on what you actually ate. So, it's possible that in there, I ate an entire box of Cheezits and forgot, but I'm pretty sure that didn't happen. I ate off-plan, but not radically off plan in any given deviance, and most importantly, when I ate a big bowl of popcorn, or a breadstick, it didn't set off a chain reaction of eating everything in sight. Again, I could be mis-remembering, but since I also lost 2 pounds last week, I don't think I am.

I'm cured! Ha! Not really. Addicts are always addicts, and I will go right back to logging this week, but it's good to know that I'm headed in the right direction and building new habits in a way that is starting to take hold in my brain. New neural pathways are catching fire. They may not be able to burn faster or hotter than the old patterns YET but they are present. It took 10 weeks of grocery shopping carefully (eating healthy on a budget is the subject of another post coming soon), doing something like 95% of my own cooking, and lots, and lots of quiet time to myself to get here. (I would guess but don't know for sure that doing the cooking myself is almost as important as planning the meals and measuring the portion sizes - being intimately connected with my food makes it much easier to know what I'm eating and be very accountable but also to be very mindful when I'm eating our of my fridge.) But, there is a new consciousness taking root from all of this time I've had to do this thoughtfully, all this getting right with myself, all this meditation, reading, logging, and creating a new level of accountability for myself. It now seems like with enough attention, with enough mindfulness, and with enough professional supervision and input, I could handle birthday parties and banquets very differently some day. So, you know, check back with me in 4 years. (smile again)

Thanksgiving recipes

As I mentioned a couple of days ago, I am doing some serious cooking for Thanksgiving. I have always helped with this meal, from being a little girl helping to "clean" spoons, to getting a little older and helping to set a table, serve and clear, to becoming a young adult and beginning to contribute first one, and then a couple of dishes at each Thanksgiving meal. This was the first time that I was cooking so heavily for the meal, but I was so excited to dig into most of a Thanksgiving menu . . . you will notice that I had nothing to do with the protein. That is most definitely the way it should be - as someone who recently returned to meat eating after a 12 year absence I am so not worthy when it comes to buying, much less preparing meat! Luckily, I had a good friend who not only made the turkey and stuffing, but invited me over.

Here is what I made, and how people liked it.

Butternut Squash soup
Credit: adapted from www.epicurious.com

This was a big hit. I made this mostly because I wanted to do something with a butternut squash, but was surprised that it was yummy and that I wasn't the only one who was really into it!

Ingredients:

• 4 large shallots, chopped
• 1 medium carrot, chopped
• 1 celery rib, chopped - I excluded this since celery isn't my thing
• 1 (15-ounce) can diced tomatoes, drained
• 3 large thyme sprigs
• 1 Turkish or 1/2 California bay leaf
• 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 1/2 pounds butternut squash, peeled, seeded, and cut into (1-inch) cubes (about 3 1/2 cups)
• 5 cups water - I used three cups of veggie broth and 2 of water
• 1/4 teaspoon grated nutmeg
• 12 bottled cooked chestnuts, chopped (1/2 cup) - I am unsure I'll do this
• I added chopped fresh rosemary

Preparation

I halved the squash, oiled it, and baked it at 400 degrees for 45 minutes

Cook shallots, carrot, celery, tomatoes, thyme, and bay leaf in oil in a 4- to 5-quart heavy pot over medium-low heat, stirring occasionally, until softened, about 8 minutes.

Add squash, water, nutmeg, 1 teaspoon salt, and 1/4 teaspoon pepper and simmer, covered, until squash is very tender, 20 to 25 minutes. Discard thyme and bay leaf.

Purée soup in batches in a blender until smooth (use caution when blending hot liquids). Thin soup if desired and season with salt and pepper.

Ladle soup over chestnuts in bowls - I did not do the chestnuts

Cooks' note: Soup can be made 2 days ahead and chilled, covered once cool. Thin slightly with water if necessary.

I also whipped some heavy whipping cream and served a dollop in the soup. Yummmmm.

Roasted Brussel Sprouts

Credit: Michelle Brazier and Heather Robinson

I was probably the only person there that was really into these, but I loves them. I wasn't going to roast veggies and not make them!

Ingredients

• Fresh brussel sprouts
• Coarse salt (I use a Himalayan pink sea salt)
• Olive oil (about 3 tablespoons)
• Crushed red pepper

Preparation

Cut the tough end off of the sprouts, and halve them. Toss them in a bowl with the olive oil, salt, and crushed red pepper. Place on a cookie sheet, bake in high heat oven (400 - 450 degrees) for 15-20 minutes or until crispy and carmelized to taste.


Roasted Cauliflower
Credit: Me

This was another hit. I think the thing that makes them so good is the special salt I used.


Ingredients

• 1 head of cauliflower
• Olive oil - about 2-3 tablespoons
• Salt - kosher salt, or smoked grey salt

Preparation

Slice the stalk and leaves off of the head of cauliflower. Cut the heads and stems into pieces that are Goldilock's-sized - not too big, not too small. Toss with oil and salt. brown in the oven at about 400 degrees for about 10-15 minutes until the tops begin to brown.


Fork Mashed Potatoes with fresh herbs

Credit: Me

These went over VERY well. I had tested these potatoes at three previous Thanksgivings so I was glad they fit well into this Thanksgiving too.

Ingredients

• 2-3 bags of mini-red potatoes, soaked but skins on
• butter
• salt, to taste
• pepper, to taste
• Fresh herbs - chopped (Rosemary, Thyme, Sage)

Preparation

Boil the potatoes until tender (but not mushy). Drain and cool for a few minutes, and leave the skins on. Split the potatoes with a hand-masher, and then add butter a tablespoon at a time - start with a couple of tablespoons. Sprinkle in salt and pepper and begin to use a fork to mash the potatoes. Slowly add more butter, and the freshly chopped herbs.


Chocolate Chess Pie

Credit: My Mama.

This is not everyone's thing, but for those who like, it, they really like it.

Ingredients:

1 stick butter (melted)
1 1/2 C sugar

2 eggs

3 T cocoa

1 small can of evap milk

1 t vanilla

Preparation

Stir sugar and cocoa into butter.  Add eggs one at a time, beating well, that's beating, not heating after each

(** BEAT-NOT-HEAT is a joke from back in my high school days. On a boring Sunday my bestest friend everest came over and we capriciously decided to see if their were ingredients to bake cookies. We scoped out a recipe from my mom's giant recipe box, and got started. My mom has beautiful handwriting, but her "h" curls back towards the stem, looking a little similar to a "b." On a faded recipe, we couldn't tell the difference and thought it said to HEAT the butter and sugar.  So . . . we did! And as we added the other ingredients the dough turned into cement. Without baking. Beat! Not Heat!) 

Add vanilla and milk.

Pour into an unbaked pie shell.  Bake at 350 for 45 minutes.

Apple Bundt Cake

Credit: www.epicurious.com

I took this to Thanksgiving and then brought it as a dessert to another friend's house. It was well liked by several people, and honestly, once the apples are peeled it's super easy so I think it may become something I make more often.

Ingredients

• 4 medium Golden Delicious apples (about 1 1/2pounds), peeled, cut into 1/3-inch pieces - I added one gala apple as well
• 5 tablespoons plus 2 1/2 cups sugar - I used only 4 T of sugar on the apples and only two cups of sugar in the batter
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 4 large eggs
• 1 cup vegetable oil
• 1/4 cup orange juice - I used a little extra.
• 1 tablespoon grated orange peel
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3 cups all purpose flour
• 3 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

• Powdered sugar

Preparation

Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease and flour 12-cup Bundt pan. Mix apple pieces, 5 tablespoons sugar and ground cinnamon in medium bowl. Combine 2 1/2 cups sugar, eggs, vegetable oil, orange juice, orange peel and vanilla extract in large bowl; whisk to blend. Stir flour, baking powder and salt into egg mixture. Spoon 1 1/2 cups batter into prepared Bundt pan. Top with half of apple mixture. Cover with 1 1/2 cups batter. Top with remaining apples, then batter.

Bake cake until top is brown and tester inserted near center comes out with moist crumbs attached, about 1 hour 30 minutes. Cool cake in pan on rack 15 minutes. Run knife around sides of pan to loosen. Turn cake out onto rack. Cool at least 45 minutes. Dust with powdered sugar. Serve slightly warm or at room temperature.

Cranberry Sauce

Credit: Adapted from www.allrecipes.com

This was the easiest thing I made, and it was . . . ok. Most people don't really care about the cranberry sauce, and I think that's how this one went.

Ingredients:

• 12 ounces cranberries
• 1 cup white sugar (I only used 3/4 C)
• 1 cup orange juice
• sprinkle of Cinnamin
• Sprinkle of fresh ground nutmeg
• Sprinkle of orange zest
  

Preparation

In a medium sized saucepan over medium heat, dissolve the sugar in the orange juice. Stir in the cranberries and cook until the cranberries start to pop (about 10 minutes). Remove from heat and place sauce in a bowl. Cranberry sauce will thicken as it cools.

Pumpkin Bread

Credit: adapted from my Mama

Ummmm, on second thought, this is one of the only things I bake really well, to the point that people ask for it. And I don't want to reveal how I've altered my mom's recipe. So, this, and one other recipe of something that I cook (black bean soup!) will remain the creative property of me. But I'll make them for you!!

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving and had a lot of reminders of things you are grateful for.

The giving of thanks

I have four bags of mini-potatoes in my house.

Normally there is just no way that purchasing this many starches and having them here and readily available for munching would be a good idea. But food rules sometimes don't work at the holidays. The dilemma is that if I add up all the holidays, parties, nights out, weddings, baby showers, birthdays, Super Bowls, etc. there are in a year, I'd have to throw in the towel on roughly two months of every 12. I'd have to give up on 1/6th of my year, and then dig myself out of that the other 5/6ths of the time. Not a good plan. For instance, I can't throw out my food rules and good nutrition for all of Christmas and New Years.

The thing is, Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. My most favoritest ever. It's not about the food. I mean, it's not NOT about the food (especially since I grew up eating some of the best stuffing and pumpkin pie around at this time of year), but for me, what I like about Thanksgiving is that it's for everyone, equally. Every family has the opportunity to figure out what kind of holiday they want this to be (with maybe one caveat for the families that are subsisting in poverty and not able to make ends meet). A day to watch football? A time for all to gather round the TV and make fun of the parade? A formal holiday with crisp table linens and napkins in laps? A time to name things that everyone is grateful for? All of these are possible ways to bring Thanksgiving into your house. It doesn't matter if you believe in God. And if you do, it doesn't matter if that God for you takes the form of Allah, Hashem, Buddha, or JC. No one has to buy gifts, or figure out of their card is PC enough to fit all situations. There's no wrapping, and no returns. Just people who like each other deciding they want to spend this day together.


To be fair, my mom would point out that for every thing I name that makes this holiday awesome by not having to be done (hanging blinking lights!), she can come up with a task she has had to do to pull this holiday off in style in the past: buying and carrying in a heavy turkey, stuffing it, getting up early, early, early to stuff said turkey and cook it slowly. But since I never cared about the bird or eating it (and then went vegetarian for 12 years) I'm conveniently leaving that part out.

What I like is people who like each other sharing this day in whatever way seems like the best way to appreciate each other and the day. I do like the food, but for me it's more about the relaxation, and as an adult, the true enjoyment of sharing the preparation of food with others. For a couple of years now, I've been unofficially trading Thanksgivings back and forth between my mom's house, and my sister's house. I've enjoyed the differences in traditions and celebrations, the chances to catch up with separate branches of my family, and the food in both places. My mom's Thanksgiving is very much about her working quite a bit to have a very nice meal where everyone sits down at the same time, whoever everyone is. Although we wear jeans, that's relatively new at my mom's Thanksgiving so when she wants me to help lay out a table cloth or set the table, what I remember is the earlier Thanksgivings in my life where I wore dresses and tights. We do still sit down all together and say a blessing, jeans or no. So, I'd say it's a slightly less casual secular Thanksgiving. Not a formal meal by far, but a lot of work is put into presentation nonetheless.

My sister's Thanksgiving is a turkey of a different color. It bears saying that the first time I was there, the whole kitchen was torn up and two saw horses and a particle board were part of a makeshift table we prepared and served food on. So, a little different than the Thanksgiving I grew up with in Connecticut (smile). I remember calling my sister before that first trip to Texas and asking her if she had expectations for what people wear to her Thanksgiving. I laughed when she said she had three expectations about that particular Thanksgiving:

1. That everyone contribute a dish, even her youngest, who at the time was 6.
2. That her husband get the kitchen sink working before the meal (which we were actually having on Friday)
3. That everyone put clothes on and not be in PJs.

I laughed, but it's important to note that there was actually one child on that Thanksgiving who waged a brief and failed attempt to remain in PJs. And yes, the sink went in and got working before the meal . . . just. It was epic. Because everyone had to take turns in the kitchen to prepare food, and because absolutely each and every person at the meal made part of the meal, regardless of their age, other jobs (sink plumbing!), interest in or talent for cooking, it was much more about getting everyone's dishes done than about serving them nicely. I really enjoyed taking the focus away from perfection and presentation and putting it on contribution and collaboration. It made the meal-prep no less time-consuming but very entertaining. The food turned out great (as did the sink) and I noticed how everyone was very excited to eat, check out each others dishes, and see how their dish would be received. I still remember my oldest nephew tossing pecans and marshmallows while making the sweet potatoes (and trading stories about each others siblings. Ha!), my oldest niece talking to me very seriously about green bean casserole, my youngest niece's face when her pumpkin pie came out of the oven, and my youngest nephew asking for help with his chocolate pie. It was a great meal.

I say that, like I've ever had a bad Thanksgiving meal. (Though that one was particularly memorable, in food as well as in company) I have never liked turkey, though I don't dislike it either. Everything else - delish. I do like cranberry sauce, pretty much any vegetable that is dished up, most mashed potatoes, and let me not understate this, my mom's stuffing is THE BEST. I also need to be honest - I adore pumpkin pie. Over the years I have worked really hard to enjoy these things in moderation. One plateful, not four. More vegetables than anything else on my plate, no need for bread if I'm having stuffing AND mashed potatoes. Drink lots of water. Basic tips like that.

So, I'm excited to try all of this out at a new Thanksgiving table this year. For the first time, I am celebrating a major holiday in Colorado. Since my mom is coming here for Christmas in just three weeks, it seemed silly to buy a ticket and go there for Thanksgiving. Initially I thought I might just spend the day by myself, cook a yummy meal (Risotto and soup crossed my mind. So did nachos. I'm serious. ) and watch movies. That would have been completely fine, but I ended up with a better offer. My very good friend, the same one who invited me for a mini-cation up in Steamboat Springs invited me to her house for the giving of thanks. she's been to enough of my parties to know I can cook, so we kind of skipped over the niceties "oh thanks for inviting me! what can I bring?" and went straight to menu planning. Turkey or pork tenderloin? What kind of pie? Since part of our friendship was forged when we used to work together and I would bring her pumpkin bread, I assumed that it was assumed that I would bring that! So, now that we're just a couple of days away and my recipes are researched I'm getting excited to cook. I did my initial shopping last night (hence the potatoes) and will likely do my final shopping tomorrow morning. Here is what I think I am making:

• Pumpkin soup. This would be my first slow cooker recipe. (sidenote - anyone want to share slowcooker recipes with me?) I'm honestly thrown by how easy the recipe is - it seems like a trick! -  so I've also been looking up a butternut squash soup just in case.
• Pumpkin bread
• Roasted cauliflower
• I will probably also bring roasted brussel sprouts. And my host and hilarious friend is making another veggie. this gives me a chance to fill a plate that is mostly veggies
• Either chocolate chess pie or apple cake. Or BOTH!
• fork mashed potatoes with fresh herbs
  

It's actually funny that I'm making the mashed potatoes. For yeaaaaaaarrrs now, at my mom's it's been my job to ready the potatoes for making. My mom has a a bit of a gross-out ick-factor with washing and peeling potatoes. So, I've always done that, and then boiled and readied them for whipping. This recipe that I'm making this year is not a uniform whipped potato, but rather one with skins, fork mashed so that they're "real" with herbs added for taste. Butter, yes. But with all those flavors, no need for cream. They were a hit with my nieces and nephews so hopefully they'll go over well this year too.

I'm sure this sounds like a lot of food I'm making, overkill even. But thanksgiving is a little about that. My hope is the pumpkin bread will get tucked away by my host as a gift for her (since she has done so much for me). I can't really prepare for this meal without making a dessert. I may not even eat dessert, but making one has always been part of my mindset for this holiday since being three and watching my mom turn out pie-crusts and grease and flour pans. The potatoes and veggies will take me an hour for all three recipes so I'm so not worried about that.

I want to contribute. I want to be an adult helping to make this meal. I'd rather put more time into cooking than eating. I want to say thank you to my friend for giving me a weekend away and for having me for this holiday. And, I think this might be a good way for me to test some recipes and then post them here. (Would readers like that, I wonder?)

So, those potatoes will get made and brought, and left behind. I will not bring them home. They will find a better home with my friend and her family. I will eat protein and veggies, and yes, I will have some carbs too, though I will probably save some for drinking rather than eating them all in a pile of potatoes on my plate.

Final note: in addition to the four bags of potatoes, there is a can of whipped cream in my house. Such an item usually does not survive more than 24 hours despite my best intentions. I am determined it will accompany me to my friend's with no needs to hastily and shamefully replace it on the way to her house so I am writing it here to commit to restraint!

The morning after

No, I’m not talking about “the walk of shame.” (Though the many, many sisters discussed this very things last night! Ha!) I’m not even talking about a hangover (I drank lots of water last night and went to bed with a light snack of Aleve in order to wake up ready to go). I’m talking about the day after a day of unplanned eating – parties being especially hard since it’s when everyone wants to make their most delicious treats such as famous brownies, family recipes of drinks, and snacks that are hard for even the most disciplined to walk away from.

We had a great party yesterday. It’s nice to both be a real grown up and be able to kick back at the same time. There were no kegs or shouting (well maybe a little shouting), nobody got sick and as far as I know nobody did anything they feel remorse for now. I mean, I did get handed a pool cue and told to play, and I did then watch as the only one of my balls to get sunk went into the pocket by the power of my opponent but . . . I can live with that. I’ve found in life that it’s good to know your own strengths and weaknesses. Cooking, yes. Telling the occasional funny story, yes. Photography, ok. I can do most of what I want to do with a camera. Singing, working on it. Playing pool, not so much. (It’s a little ironic, actually. I perfectly understand the geography and physics having “minored” in math but I can’t ever seem to execute the geometry I am seeing for my potential shots.)

When we got to this lovely rental house and began discussing this party, I had some suggestions of things to make. I had even brought some recipes and spices. The response I got was that whatever I wanted to cook was fine by everyone. So, I made an insanely organized list, grocery shopped, and then cooked for several hours. Now, I don’t mean to brag, but I can make a decent menu from scratch and feed a group pretty darn well. I am not a gourmet cook, but I am a solid cook who can follow a recipe like a champ as well as improvising with most ingredients. I wouldn’t even make it through an hour of cooking in Kitchen Stadium, or anything, but I can usually pull off feeding a large group with interesting and delicious dishes.

It brings me a lot of pleasure to cook for people. It also gives me an opportunity to insert some dishes that are satisfying and palatable, but not nutritionally empty or dangerous. Let me say that there were no  Cheezits, real or metaphorical on the table. (We had chips on the table, but I had seen to it that the ones we purchased did not have a voice that loudly called to me.) There were a lot of healthy salad side dishes, three different proteins, some cooked vegetables, and our desserts were either made from scratch or involved fruit, or both. (Note: I’m not saying that made the desserts guilt free, but at least they were without preservatives, corn syrup and other unknown ingredients). I managed to make three side dishes and some kabobs that would allow me to have a meal that was gluten free, filled with fresh and raw produce, and had a great protein without having to worry what the rest of the group or the guests thought about gluten, high protein, raw vegetables, or low carb eating. This is my secret challenge to myself whenever I am cooking for a group – can I cook around my and everyone else’s food restrictions and just make food that is delicious and interesting without having to apologize by saying. “I’m sorry it’s gluten free,” or, “I know that isn’t quite right but so and so is allergic to onions and nuts.” (I didn’t make that up. I once threw a party and had a guest who was allergic to nuts, wheat, dairy, onions, and garlic.)

As someone who has both medical and psychological issues with food, I know how hard it can be to be that person in the group that has to turn so many things down that they finally have to explain, “I can’t eat that.” Food is ubiquitous in our lives. Most of us have not attended many parties, gatherings, meetings, or conferences where food wasn’t a centerpiece of how people were made comfortable. It’s difficult to be social without it, and for me, it’s difficult to be social with it. I want to be able to eat without worrying that the next day I will feel physically bad from something that doesn’t agree with me (too much gluten or preservatives being the big culprit). I also don’t want to be feeling emotionally bad from what I ate. I would rather listen to my friends stories and conversations, not the loud clanging in my head of food yelling at me, “Heyyyyyy, heeey-aaay! I’m over here! Don’t you want cheese? Don’t you want chips? What about this tray of brownies? Yooo-hoo, over here.”

If I look very carefully over my food choices yesterday, I feel I can honestly say that the dominant elements were, in descending order: vegetables, protein, and beer. Yes, there were a few tastes of dessert, and therefore some white flour and white sugar in my life, but my blood sugar, deep sleep, and ability to get out of bed and feel alright 8 hours later are a testament to the fact that I didn’t overdo anything. I wasn’t anywhere near “on plan” but the ideas of plan (to eat smaller amounts more frequently, and to compose my eating mostly of proteins and vegetables) lingered. Of course, there was one thing missing from my eating yesterday – my food log. I’ve decided to set it aside this weekend and see what some mindfulness and trying to really hear the signals of my body can do for me. But since I won’t be walking miles every day when I return home, I should probably bring that back.

For me, it’s very interesting to be a member of the first species in history to have to deal with the negative effects of having too much food. I’ve been sitting on this porch a lot watching birds, and squirrels and listening to seals a few feet down the hill and thinking that they probably only notice food when there’s not enough of it. The problems of too much are unique to humans. It’s fascinating to watch how much profit comes of this. Not just the food companies who sell amazing amounts of products that are amazingly un -needed and bad for us, but then the corollary companies selling 100 calorie packs, Weight Watchers food, diet plan memberships and the list goes on and on. While there is clear evidence that we are evolutionarily programmed to eat what is in front of us and as much of it as we can, and to enjoy carbohydrates and fats more, I can only blame so much on ancient humans. My evolutionary programming may be responsible for my brain confusing cravings for need, but I am responsible for how I respond to that.
 
Some of the best accountability I have found is to log my food. That joined with some techniques to breathe through and question cravings, to pause before eating more, and holding close the ideas that most of the time, on most days, I really should exercise, and eat mostly proteins and vegetables is likely to help me forge my own solution. In the meantime, being part of hosting the party and bringing the food to the table, knowing what was in it and preparing it makes it a lot less likely that I will eat like a zombie (I could write multiple posts on my intense love for and interest in zombies), not knowing or caring what is being steered in my mouth, and more likely that I’ll be invested in the food being not only good, but an offering of good options. So, I cooked for three hours, and while some might not think that is a good use of vacation time, it was some of the best medication for me, and for FRED who wasn’t invited to the party and who didn’t crash the gates this time.

With that, I’m off to add some more whipped cream to my coffee, because I am on vacation and should live a little, after all, and then another day of walking, walking, walking, and sisterly love.