Day 5 of Dr. Fuhrman 10 in 20: Apple Pie Oatmeal, Creamy Kale and Mushroom Casserole

Breakfast: Apple Pie Oatmeal

¼ cup old fashioned or steel cut oats 

½ cup water 

1 apple, peeled, cored, and diced 

dash cinnamon 

1-2 tablespoons raisins or currants 

2 tablespoons chopped walnuts 

Combine oats and water in a small pot, bring to a boil, then  reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes. Stir in remaining ingredients. 

Note: If using steel cut oats, double the amount of water and simmer for 20 minutes or until tender. 

Score: 9.5/10

Well, since I love to cheat a bit, I used almond milk in place of the water. This was very satisfying. Liked it a lot.

Lunch was supposed to be black bean lettuce bundles, but I missed it. I ate breakfast, dropped Avery off at preschool, and hiked up near the Y in Provo with my exercise buddies. It was beautiful. On the way there I drank a protein shake. By the time I got home with Avery it was 2:45 pm. Our friends came over and stayed until 5 pm. So, I just ate dinner.

Dinner: Creamy Kale and Mushroom Casserole 

4 servings 

½ cup raw cashews or ¼ cup raw cashew butter 

1 cup unsweetened, unflavored soy, hemp or almond milk 

2 cups small fresh or frozen broccoli florets 

1 cup chopped mushrooms 

1 cup frozen artichoke hearts, thawed and chopped (see note)

2 cups chopped kale, tough stems removed 

1 teaspoon no-salt seasoning blend such as Mrs. Dash 

1 teaspoon onion powder 

1 teaspoon garlic powder 

¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Blend the cashews and non-dairy milk until creamy. Add to a 9x13 inch oven-proof baking dish along with broccoli, mushrooms, artichokes, kale, and seasonings. Bake for 40 minutes. 

Note: Frozen Brussels sprouts may be substituted for the  artichoke hearts

Score: 9/10

This was better than I thought it would be. The cashew cream stuff added a lot to the casserole. A sprinkle of nutritional yeast might be good on this. The only complaint I had was the serving size. As you can see in the photo above, there's not a ton in my bowl. This is probably due to the cashew and almond milk mixture. I should've had a salad in addition. Instead, I just ate some strawberries and called it a night.

Casserole before it went into the oven

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Green Smoothies (Samoan Style)

One thing I've missed in Samoa is my morning green smoothie. We have some friends here that brought their Vitamix with them from the States. Every morning they have a smoothie with papaya, banana, niu, oatmeal and almonds. I don't think it would have been worth the weight and space in my suitcase to lug a Vitamix to Samoa, but some mornings I wondered...

A shout out to  Beth Hunt. She is, among other things, a retired school principal, counselor, teacher and head librarian, a Talking Matai, an institute teacher and our volunteer secretary at the dental clinic in Pesaga. Most import to know about her though is the fact that she heard me moaning about my lack of a blender several weeks ago and generously offered to let me borrow a Ninja that she wasn't using.

 HALLELUJAH!

Now that I had the blender, the biggest problem was what to use for greens. There is a vegetable called laupele that people grow in their back yards here. It's supposed to taste a little like spinach. Since it grows kind of wild and no one really likes green vegetables that much in Samoa anyway, you can't find it in the stores. Unfortunately I don't know anyone that has laupele in their back yard. That only left me one leafy green to use that you can find at every market here in Apia. Bok choy. It wouldn't be my first choice, but after some experimentation I developed my Samoan green smoothie.


It contains:
1 small head of bok choy (chopped)
1 cup of coconut water from a fresh niu
1 cup of papaya
1/2 a lime (peeled)
2 misi luki bananas (peeled)
1 cup of yogurt
Green Smoothie Girl's Green Light powder and Tri-omega Superfood.

I'm showing a picture of the yogurt because this stuff is smooth, creamy gold. It costs 23 tala a container, or over $10 US. Sometimes Farmer Joe's will mark it down to 5 or 10 tala a few days before it expires (depending on what mood they're in. Fa'a Samoa). We snatch up a few cartons whenever we see it marked down. Otherwise Mark grumbles all week if I pay full price.

My green smoothie is ready to drink. The Ninja doesn't blend as smooth as a Vitamix. I end up with crunchy bits of bok choy.  At first I hated it because they were bitter to chew. Now I've gotten used to it and actually love my smoothie each morning. One good thing about the crunchies is that they give me a reason to chew my smoothie.

It might be a little ironic that the only cup we have in our little kitchen that is big enough to hold my smoothie is a McDonalds' thirsty-two ounce soda cup that someone who lived here before us left in the cupboard!

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Mom's Visit Day 7 - Corn Butter, Hemp Milk, Kara's Raw Class, Naturally Leavened Bread, and Salmon Fishing in the Yemen

This was a big day for mom and me (as far as food is concerned). We started off the morning making corn butter (scroll down in link to find the recipe). Okay, pretzel rolls and corn butter may not be a typical breakfast, but it was actually pretty good. You could definitely taste the corn meal, but the texture was a lot like a spreadable tub of butter.

Next, we tried our hand at making hemp milk. I know what you're thinking, hemp? really? When you first try it, the hemp taste is very apparent. The more we drank it the more we liked it. It was very creamy and slightly nutty. I don't think I'd make this just to pour myself a glass, but I think it would be great in things. We'll both make this again.

When mom and I were at Goodearth, I picked up the free health magazines by the door. In their Delicious Living magazine, there's an article titled "Bring Back Hemp". When we saw it, we'd been debating on whether or not to make hemp milk. It seemed like a crazy coincidence! Here's the text from the article:

Despite its patriotic beginnings as an American farm staple (even Washington and Jefferson grew it), industrial hemp labors under a federal ban that equates it with its cousin, marijuana—making hemp the only plant that’s illegal to grow but legal to import, process, and use in the United States. June 4–10 marks the third annual Hemp History Week, a campaign to restore the plant’s historic reputation. Learn more about hemp’s impressive qualities, including these, at votehemp.com.

Nutritional star
Gluten-free, low-carb hemp is nutritionally dense, packed with fiber, protein, ten essential amino acids, and an ideal 1:3 balance of omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids. It tastes great, too: nutty and mild. What can hemp not do? Get you high: It contains little to no THC, marijuana’s psychoactive ingredient.

Versatile
Smart body care companies incorporate hemp oil as an outstanding moisturizer. With a smaller carbon footprint than cotton, hemp turns heads as an eco-chic fabric. Alt-energy pioneers tout it as a biofuel. And when it comes to food and beverage—cereals, nondairy milk, raw seeds, bars, powders, cooking oil, and more—the sky’s the limit.

Eco champion
Needing no pesticides, herbicides, or GMO interference, hemp grows like, yes, a weed. Farmers love it because, in addition to being a low-cost, sustainable crop with myriad applications, hemp enriches the soil in which it grows and requires about half the water that other crops do.

Try: Dr. Bronner's Hemp Peppermint Castille Soap; Food Should Taste good Hemp Chips; Manitoba Harvest Hemp Hearts; Nature's Path Organic Instant Hot Oatmeal Hemp Plus; Navitas Naturals Blueberry Hemp Superfood Power Snack; Nutiva Organic Hemp Oil; Vega Shake & Go Bodacious Berry.  

We had a raw food class lined up with Kara (my friend Kendra's sister-in-law) in the afternoon. It was a lot of fun! Kara was an excellent teacher and nice enough to give us any of her recipes that we asked for.

Here's what we learned to make at the class:

Veggie Springrolls with a Thai Nut Dipping Sauce,

Coconut Cream Pie using the meat and water from fresh young coconuts, Pumpkin Pie without any pumpkin,

and finally, Zesty Kale Chips. They're covered in a raw cheesy non-dairy dip that Kara showed us how to make. I guess her kids like to eat the Cheesy Dip with fresh veggies too. Sounds yummy! The kale chips that Kara had going in her oven (on the dehydrator setting) weren't quite crispy yet, so we took home the batch that we'd made during the class and put it in our oven, with the door propped open a bit, on the lowest setting. They turned out very good. The only problem I had, was that we'd put too much cheesy sauce on the kale, so I couldn't eat very many kale chips at one time... just a little too zesty.

Our next class was in the evening at Dr. Matt McClean's Chiropractic office in Provo. It was all about natural leavening. Here's his website about naturally leavened bread. He and his wife, Amy, both taught the class. It was really interesting, but we learned so much over the course of two hours so I think I'll just talk about it in a separate post.

Right after our Natural Leavening class was over we drove down to the Water Gardens movie theater in Spanish Fork to catch the 9:15pm showing of Salmon Fishing In the Yemen. It was a good movie. Ewen McGregor and Emily Blunt did a wonderful job making the characters and emotions seem real. It was a great story (based on true events, I guess) and had some great cinematography. There was something that bothered me about it, though. I don't like love stories where one (or both) of the characters is already married... no matter how bad their marriage may be.

Kara's Raw Recipes:

Raw Pumpkin Cheesecake

Filling

4 c. cashews

2 c. agave

2 c. carrot juice

about ½ c. pumpkin pie spice (start with this and adjust to taste)

Blend to a smooth batter

Crust

1 c. pecans

1 c. almonds

1 T. agave

1 tsp. cinnamon

1 tsp. salt

1 tsp. pumpkin pie spice

Process to mall chunk flour

Add 1 T. (or more) coconut oil until crust comes together in the right consistency to press into a pie tin or springform pan

Press crust. Pour filling on top. Place in freezer until firm. Do not leave out or it will turn runny again.

Raw Coconut Cream Pie

Crust

¾ c. hazelnuts, ½ c. pecans, 1 c. almonds

½ c. fine coconut

½ tsp. salt

large spoonful coconut oil

½ c. soaked date pieces

Process nuts until chunk  flour, add other ingredients, press into 2 pie pans.

Filling

¼ c. coconut yogurt

1 c. coconut water

2 T. coconut oil

1 c. agave

¾ c. soaked cashews

meat from 2 young coconuts (2cups)

½ tsp. vanilla

Blend.  Put in crusts. Put flaked coconut on top.  Freeze until set up.

Raw Corn Casserole

any vegetable except greens, some ideas…

corn

broccoli

cauliflower

bell pepper (2 different)

green onions 

radishes

Sauce 

1 avocado

1 c. almonds

lemon juice

Spike (or other season mix)

salt and pepper

water to desired consistency

Raw Pea Casserole

any veggie except greens, some ideas…

 peas

cauliflower (small pieces pulsed in Cuisinart)

celery

green onion

red bell pepper

mushrooms?

avocado?

Sauce

1-2 c. cashews

lemon juice

salt

water

(raw sour cream)

(seasonings, if desired)

Spring Rolls

Asian rice paper wraps , soaked in warm water until pliable

spring garden mix

micro greens or sunflower greens

sprouts (any variety)

avocado

zucchini strips 

basil leaves

green onion

red bell pepper

Wrap veggies in rice paper and serve with Thai Nut Sauce

Thai Nut Sauce

1 c. cashews, soaked for ½-1 hour

½ c. olive oil

½ c. tamari or Baggs Liquid Aminos

½ c. + 1 T. agave (to taste)

4 cloves garlic

1 T. lemon juice

Blend until smooth

Raw Cheesy Sauce

1 c. raw cashews

1-2 bell peppers

4 garlic cloves

1 c. nutritional yeast

6 T. lemon juice

Seasoning to taste  (smoke, taco seasoning, seasoning salt, etc.)

Salt

For dip – combine and blend in vita mix. For sauce – add water to desired consistency.

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The After (cleanse) Party

Carrot Dogs and Other Grilled Veggies

The day after our cleanse (last Friday) we had a BBQ over at Kendra's house. Since I am still trying to avoid meat and dairy, I decided to bring some carrot dogs (as I mentioned in my last post).

I called my mom before I started making them in order to glean any last minute advice. She informed me that the only part I need to be careful about was the parboiling. She told me about a time where she'd overcooked the carrots and they ended up mushy after grilling them. I became so paranoid about overcooking the carrots that I hovered over the boiling water for 12 minutes, until I couldn't take it anymore, stabbed them with a fork and thought they were done. Turns out they could have used more time. The carrots were a bit crunchy after grilling.

The flavor was actually very good. Andrew had one and said that he liked it. Kara (Kendra's sister-in-law) said that she might be able to get her kids to eat them... don't know if a carrot dog would fool children, you can still tell that it's a carrot. On Sunday Nelsie (friend of the family and sister to Kendra's brother-in-law's niece's husband - whew, gets confusing with a large family!) asked me to tell her how I made the carrot dogs because she really liked how they tasted. She said that she was skeptical at first, you know, being a carrot on a bun and all.

As a side note, the carrot dogs are good on a bun with the usual hot dog fixings, but gross eaten alone. Don't put one on your plate and start eating it with a fork and knife, trust me (too much smokey-vinegary flavor).

Here is how they are made (with pictures):

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