Tag: cleaner living

Homemade Granola

The house smells wonderful this morning as I’ve made a batch of homemade granola. It’s delicious and also good to know all the ingredients are whole foods from sources I’ve scrutinized myself.

Including the chia and flax seeds is a way to add Omega-3s into my diet. Using coconut oil helps reduce my Omega-6 load because even organic granola includes seed oils.

Im using a recipe titled “Maple and Chia Seed Granola” by Maria Provenzano, changed a bit based on what we had in the cupboard:

  • 4 cups old fashioned oats
  • ½ cup slivered almonds
  • ¾ cup pumpkin seeds
  • 2 tablespoons chia seeds
  • 2 tablespoons ground flax seeds
  • 1 tablespoon sesame seeds
  • 1 teaspoon cinnamon
  • ½ teaspoon salt
  • ½ cup pure maple syrup
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • ½ cup coconut oil, measured then melted
  • 1/2 cup shredded coconut
  • 1/2 cup dried berries and/or raisins
  • 1/4 cup dried apricots, diced into small chunks

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.


In a large bowl, combine the oats, slivered almonds, pumpkin seeds, chia seeds, flax seeds, sesame seeds, cinnamon, and salt until well mixed.


Melt the coconut oil in a small pan over low/medium heat until melted. Combine the coconut oil and maple syrup together, and mix in the vanilla.


Pour the oil/syrup mixture over the oat mixture, and use a spatula to mix it together so that everything is evenly coated.


Line two baking sheets with parchment paper (not wax paper, not aluminum foil), and evenly distribute the granola between the two sheets.


Keep the granola somewhat compact, because that prevents it from getting too crunchy; it allows the center to stay chewy, and the outside pieces to get a bit more crunchy.


Bake at 325 degrees for 12-14 minutes, or until starting to become slightly golden around the edges. Don’t bake longer than 14 minutes.


Allow the granola to cool for at least 10-15 minutes after baking. If you skip this step, then the granola won’t come together.


After it has cooled, add in all the extras like coconut flakes and dried fruit.


Put it in a good jar with a tight-fitting lid.

Here’s the original recipe: https://www.fromscratchwithmaria.com/maple-chia-seed-granola/

Yum! It’s half gone already.

A Good Jar

Each time I save a good jar from the recycling bin, I feel a little closer to my elders who went through the depression. I remember those comments… Hey, don’t throw that out. That’s a good jar!

I love how the cabinets and spice rack have changed since I started detoxing my home. Bye bye, plastic! Hello glass, steel & sustainability!

How about you?

Food Babe

Many years back, at a rained-out fourth of July party, stuffed in a garage apartment with a bunch of people, I was talking to my friend Corey about an idea I had to investigate food additives and sources.

This must have been an idea for a newspaper column because the internet was (at the time) still in its infancy. Blogs hadn’t been invented yet, nor social media.

She thought about it for a moment and then foresaw how paralyzed a person would become, unable to make decisions about eating, unable to trust food and food sources, unable to relax and enjoy a meal.

Which got me thinking about the pressure on papers back then, needing advertising revenue to keep afloat, and needing to NOT offend the advertisers.

I didn’t pursue the idea.

Years later, I became aware of The Food Babe, Vani Hari, and was glad that someone had done this and was gaining a following.

This woman recently gained national attention when she spoke at a healthy foods round-table, which included Senator Ron Johnson and now-HHS secretary RFK, Jr., and other folks I’ve talked about on this blog, showing us the visible difference between the US formula for Froot Loops vs. the Canadian product.

Soon after, she led a group of protesters to the General Mills headquarters, where company officials refused to even come outside. She delivered a petition signed by thousands of people (including me), asking them to follow through on an old promise to remove dyes linked to ADHD and other behavioral issues.

Some General Mills employee even put a hand-written “Get Off My Lawn” sign in the window.

Her actions sparked change, and many people will benefit from it.

She is now part of the push to clean up infant formula. It’s so upsetting to find out that formulas often contain seed oils, corn syrup, and heavy metals. Are you kidding me?

I breastfed my kids, but I remember being admonished/warned by the pediatrician not to give my infant plain old water, or weak chamomile tea.

These were things that my mom and grandmother had given their babies (including me) in the heat of summer…. and we turned out fine!

Anyway, check out her website, sign up for her newsletter, or give her some likes or a follow on the socials.

It’s eye-opening!

https://foodbabe.com/

If you’ve got 4 hours of spring cleaning to do this weekend, listen to the entire round-table while you work:

The Dangers of Seed Oils

I have wanted to write about this for a while but I’m a bit out of my depth, and so I’ve put it off… but it is critically important and the little that I know has really changed my eating habits.

I recently came across this Instagram post by Dr. Mark Hyman, which sums it up nicely.

Abundance

We recently found out about a local grocery co-op that carries only healthy whole foods. Our daughter bought us a share as a Christmas gift. 🎄 🎁

I’ve been three times so far, and my husband Jimmy came along this last time. We are really happy with the foods available!

The co-op carries produce from my farmers’ market connections, including Botanical Ben’s mushrooms and veggie sprouts.

They carry a lot of bulk products and encourage folks to simply bring their own jars.

Abundance Food Co-Op

Great Resources

Stumbled across some great resources lately and I wanted to share them here. Thse were all serendipitous…

This doctor has a YouTube channel and provides very down-to-earth advice on how to stay healthy and avoid cancer. Check her out!

This doctor popped up in my Twitter feed, and I don’t know much about him, but WOW, I wish my doctor was handing out a sheet like this to his patients, including the healthy ones.

I have already incorporated a lot of these into my daily/weekly routines over the last year, and it’s great to have those ideas reinforced by a doctor.

The “seek” button on my car radio pulled up this radio show/podcast, which looks interesting. I happened upon their report of the Dirty Dozen and the Clean Fifteen:

https://loe.org/shows/segments.html?programID=25-P13-00004&segmentID=4

Food Colorings, Part 2

Christmas has come and gone, and yes, we did make cookies. Knowing that food dyes are linked to cancer, I went out in search of non-toxic alternatives.

I didn’t find any in the local stores. I did find them online, but after exhausting local options and then returning to my search bar, I found them out of stock.

Does that mean that other folks are looking for non-toxic alternatives? 🤔 I hope so!

So this year, we went without. Our cookies were the color of our non-GMO organic flour, and the frosting was transparent. And we loved them anyway (though it was hard to tell the lemon cookies from the almond ones).

This weekend, I found the colors I was searching for at the Abundance Co-op. My daughter gave me a share & membership for Christmas.

Fun Fact: The old dyes in my cupboard actually have a resale market! At least the brown glass bottles do. I found them online today priced between $10 and $25 per bottle. Huh!

Food Colorings

Yesterday, the FDA banned Red 3 from foods and medicines.

While this is technically a good thing, its more of a baby step / half measure in the move toward a healthier society…

Why?

  • Red dye 3 was banned from cosmetic products 35 years ago because of its link to cancer. 35 years!!!
  • There are thousands of other additives that are just as toxic that are still being used in many foods, medicines, and other products. Most of these are banned in other countries.
  • This particular ban gives companies TWO YEARS to reformulate the food products. A lot can happen (or be reversed or forgotten about) in two years.
  • This ban gives pharmaceutical companies THREE YEARS to comply! Are you kidding???
  • It solves 0.01% of the problem with untested food additives.

The best thing this ban can do is simply awaken the consumer to the problem and lead them to change what they buy and eat.

In Praise of Salads 🥗

Salads are so healthy, and I am lucky to have had them throughout my life as a regular part of the dinner meal, whether at my childhood home or my grandparents’ house.

It’s a tradition that my husband and I have kept going and one that I hope lives on as our kids make their own homes.

🥗

It was one of the first things I helped with as a child (one step up from setting the table). My Mom would tell me that a “true chef would never cut lettuce leaves with a knife” and would instead tear them gently. I’m not sure if that’s true, but it sounds right.

I’m sure she just didn’t want any little kids wielding a knife in her kitchen, lol.

Those salads usually included iceberg lettuce, tomatoes, and celery with a simple vinegar and oil dressing. Sometimes, we got fancy and added black olives or Spanish (manzanilla) olives.

And we always had the salad as the final course… the logic was that the roughage (fiber) and vinegar would escort all the other stuff from the night’s dinner through the system and do some clean-up work in the intestines.

Yes, we talked about this at the dinner table when I was too young to use a knife.

When we went to my grandparents’ house, the salad was similar but often included half an avocado. If half an avocado doesn’t sound like much to you, well… you must not have spent time in Florida prior to Hurricane Andrew. Those old style “Tampa avocados” were as big as a football.

If I had a time machine… that’s what I’d go get…

These days, I like to get fancy with my salads. I usually start with Romaine lettuce and tomato. Those are the basis.

To that, I add whatever we have, including fresh spinach, a shredded carrot, artichokes in vinegar, olives of any kind or a scoop of muffaletta, slices of sweet peppers, diced onion, mushrooms, cucumber, avocado, thinly sliced purple cabbage, celery, cheese (Feta or parmesagn), and any kind of sprout (broccoli, radish, alfalfa, etc.).

Sometimes, I throw in apple chunks, pear slices, or orange sections. Sometimes, we throw in sunflower seeds or crushed pistachios or cashews.

In the summer, I like to find new types of lettuce and new varieties of tomatoes at the farmers’ market.

My Nani had a trick where she would cut into a garlic clove and rub it on the inside of the bowl prior to adding any ingredients. I always seem to remember the trick too late. 😕

Lately, I’ve been moving my salad to the beginning of the meal, rather than the end. This is because of the hacks I recently learned to lower blood glucose levels.

Here’s the details on that, from the Glucose Goddess, Jessie Inchauspé who I hear just got her own TV show!!! 🙌