Apricot smoothies

A local couple has a backyard farm, Amadio Ranch, that is truly enviable. And this week their Apricots are coming into their own. THEY ARE DELICIOUS! And because they are organic and fresh off the tree ripe, they are quick to bruise. So rather than trying to eat them all plain, I thought it would be fun to try some of the most ripe in a smoothie. It was so good, I played around with the recipe until I came up with this:

6 very ripe apricots (pits removed)
1/2 cup plain greek yogurt
1/4 cup unsweetened plain almond milk
1/2 teaspoon orange marmalade
Ice Cubes

Blend and enjoy! Smoothies are super simple, and this one is high in protein and not TOO high in sugar/carbs despite it's sweet and slightly-tangy goodness. According to sparkpeople.com it has 30 carbs, 2 fat, 13 protein and 5 of that is fiber. I'm thinking of making them into a compote to have on pork or chicken next.

How do you like your Apricots?

Super Easy Kale Chips

I have always thought Kale chips sounded interesting and a fun way to get kale (which is not my favorite veggie) into my diet. Kale has multiple reasons to eat it. High fiber content (a dark leafy green) and vitamins that my body craves. Here are some interesting nutritional facts about raw Kale:
 http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/vegetables-and-vegetable-products/2461/2

Personally, Kale always makes me think of working in a noisy, smelly, disgusting kids restaurant as a teen. We stuffed it between bowls at the salad bar, and would be required to pull the dirty leaves and replace them with clean ones if and when something from a bowl spilled. I did mention it was a restaurant that catered to kids right? There were many spills. It was a disgusting job, but someone had to do it. And for this reason alone, I never wanted to eat Kale.

Now that I'm an adult dealing with diabetes and multiple allergies, it seems to make sense to try vegetables which I am NOT allergic to, and which are good for me. So when we saw Kale on sale at the store the other day, I grabbed it up and announced we would be making "Kale chips" which sounded good to Patch, and she promised to make a delicious Kale salad which she learned from Roger, her friend at work who is a wonderful chef. So far, no salad has materialized, but my friend Jenn came over and we braved the chip making process.

Guess what?!?! It is not disgusting or difficult. In fact, it was so easy, I made more TONIGHT! I just couldn't even wait till someone was around to enjoy them with me and made a single serving size from a single Kale leaf. Below is the super easy recipe I used tonight, which makes one bowl of Kale chips. I ate them with almonds to add some healthy fat and protein. I recommend only making enough for one serving so that they are perfectly crisp and delicious. If you want more the next night, they are so easy to whip up that you can do it again like I did. Easy peasy!  Now ON to the recipe.

Super Easy Kale Chip Ingredients:
1 tablespoon Extra Virgin Olive Oil (EVOO)
1 Kale leaf per person
1 teaspoon seasoned salt

Super Easy Kale Chip Instructions:
Preheat oven to 350
Tear popcorn sized pieces off the spine of the Kale Leaf/s
Wash the Kale and DRY WELL (it helps them be crispy for the chip like consistency)
Cover non insulated baking tray (cookie sheet) with parchment paper
Toss Kale in EVOO
Sprinkle with seasoned salt and mix
Cook at 350 for 8 minutes, then turn over and cook for 2-4 more minutes or until edges are brown

HINT: Make sure to take out of the oven when edges are brown and do not cook too long or I was told they will become bitter. I found if torn into popcorn sized bits they cooked up perfectly in about 10 minutes, turned once in the middle

At the turning point you can sprinkle on some Parmesan Cheese if you wish, but it's not necessary. We turned them with wooden tongs, which turned out to be perfect, but you could also simply flip them with your fingers if you're more daring (EVOO on the leaves will be hot)

Super Cheesy Kale Chips:
1 tablespoon EVOO (or 1/2 a tablespoon per leaf)
1 Kale Leaf per person
1 teaspoon dried garlic
1 teaspoon of basil
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1 tablespoon of Parmesan Cheese per leaf (or Vegan Parm if you are one of my Vegan friends)

Follow the instructions above!

You can change these recipes to your preference. You only need enough EVOO to coat the leaves and you don't want them to be overly coated, so I would recommend about 1/2 a tablespoon per leaf.

I used sea salt seasoned with garlic and rosemary and forgot to cut the amount down since I cut the recipe in half. Actually, I didn't measure just shaked it over the leaves, turned them and shook again. OOPS one shake too much They are VERY salty and I tend to avoid salt. But they are still delicious!

A Veggie Meal Adventure with Milo

My best bud and "bro" came over today. We haven't hung out in a LONG time. We both didn't really realize how long until we started talking about our lives and realized there were things we didn't know had happened. Really major things.

But one thing hasn't changed. I still love cooking and being creative in the kitchen with my bro. It's always interesting, because we both have very different food issues.  You can check out his awesome blog , Vegan Meal Adventures at  http://keepingvegan.wordpress.com

Today's Veggie Meal Adventure Recipe:

Garden Veggie Adventure:
4 small white eggplants roughly chopped about 1/2 inch cubes
1/2 white onion chopped
1 small banana pepper minced
1 clove garlic minced
1 can diced tomatoes
1 tablespoon dried parsley flakes
1 teaspoon basil
1 dash of salt
1 dash of pepper

Mix all together, and bake at 425 for 15 minutes (If I could change anything about this I might add another pepper those are delicious! And another clove of garlic plus a can of tomatoe sauce could be a fun way to cook this up as well.

Quinoa Porridge:
1/2 cup quinoa
4 tablespoons flax seeds
1.5 cups water
boil then bring down to a medium low heat and cook while chopping and cooking vegetables (approximately 25 minutes until it reaches the porridge consistency you prefer

We spooned 1/2 on a plate for each of us, and about a ladeled the vegetable mixture on top. It was delicious and it is also great over polenta porridge or fried polenta coated in parmesan (or vegan parm) with almonds for a bit of added crunch.

It can be a completely vegan meal if you don't use cheese or substitute your own vegan cheeses

Cajun Orange Pork Chops

I really love this Diabetes Family Friendly Cookbook magazine we picked up. The best recipe we had yet was the Cajun Orange Pork Chops. I can't wait to have it with some salad tomorrow as left overs. It was so good, I'd like to share the recipe with you, and you can find it here: http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/Cajun-Orange-Pork-Chops thanks Patricia Harmon from Baden, Pennsylvania. So if you want to check out the magazine I think they're for sale online at tasteofhome.com and some of the recipes are there as well.

I was worried about trying this one because I'm not big on spices usually, but I've been trying out new recipes. Turns out, the Cajun Orange Pork Chops weren't that hot after all. Just a nice spice to go with the intense orange flavor. DEEEELICIOUS! The orange juice, marmalade and seasonings made a really great marinade. Who knew!?

It's really worth trying new things. Food can be delicious AND healthy. And the left overs are so much more awesome when it's home made.

Smoothies not dead?

When I was diagnosed with diabetes earlier this week I thought smoothies were a bygone pleasure. And since spring is very short here and summer is starting in Laveen, I was looking forward to some creative smoothies. Then I noticed that my sparkpeople.com menu was recommending an orange smoothie. I altered it a bit, but it's pretty yummy. A bit tart, a bit sweet. I think the amount of sweet depends greatly on the sweetness of the fruit you use.

Here's the recipe they recommended:
1/2 cup plain lowfat yogurt
6 oz orange juice
2 tablespoons 1/2 and 1/2

Here's the recipe I used:
1/2 cup plain greek yogurt (not vanilla, i'm allergic to that plus it usually means more sugar in the yogurt)
1/2 cup orange juice (another thing I thought I couldn't have now)
3 tablespoons almond milk (plain, unsweetened)
5 medium strawberries (these would give a great texture and more sweetness if frozen, but I believe that also might alter it's healthfulness so didn't use frozen ones)

Let me know what you come up with. Smoothies are very personal and unique. I used to LOVE strawberry banana smoothies, sometimes with a bit of peanut butter. But when I found out bananas were one of the foods causing my hives I quit eating those immediately. I still miss the flavor, but there are plenty of other smoothie flavors to be enjoyed, so I look forward to trying some of them out this summer.

Peppers are delicious

This week seems to be focused on peppers. Our Jalepeno plant finally flowered and started growing some Jalepenos! And the same day, I bought 6 banana pepper starter plants and transplanted them to the raised bed on the southwest side of our yard and fertilized them all with fish emulsion.

The next day, I found the fish smell was apparently too tempting for our dogs. I assumed it to have been the little chihuahua, but apparently it was the terrier mix, Pepper. Carlie had seen her doing it, but had just thought she was eating one of the cherry tomatoes and hadn't checked. Carlie is not really a tomato fan, so I guess it wasn't as distressing to her as it would have been to myself who has been caring for the plants, or Patch who LOVES tomatoes. However it was not a tomato she was eating, it was a pepper plant she was knocking over.


Glad I found it soon enough to rescue it! Now it's planted with the banana Peppers and they seem to be perking up for the most part. One lost all it's leaves, but the others seem to be doing OK. What a relief!

Finally, I planted some bell peppers and some Chinese hot peppers that have a bit of a bell shape with hot flesh and seeds, but also have sweet wings on the sides. Those should be interesting to try. I'm not much for hot peppers, but Patch and Carlie are, so I thought it would be fun to plant some. Besides the planting calendars all say it's a good time for peppers in our area, so hopefully we'll get some good results!

Recently I discovered a delicious way to use bell peppers. I sliced them into 4 scoop like portions, filled them with a mix of herbs and small lettuce leafs like arugula, and sprinkled them with almonds. YUM! And today I added heirloom tomatoes (the multi color kind) and smoked gouda, and put it all on a piece of sourdough. WOW! The flavors are amazing. It's a pepper kind of week!

Meal and Exercise Plan

Since I last posted to this blog, I have been officially diagnosed with diabetes. On the up side, I think they caught it soon enough to be treatable without insulin. I'll find that out on the 16th when I see my new Endocrinologist. On the down side, the medicine makes me feel really sick. I have more energy as my blood glucose numbers go down and as i have committed 100% to eating healthy, but I feel super nauseous to say the least. Still, I do see the blood glucose numbers seem to be going down and over time hopefully they will continue to do so. In order to do the most I can to help that happen, I'm going to be taking all prescribed medicine and seeing all my doctors, working out including riding my trike everywhere I can, planning meals ahead, eating/cooking healthy 100% of the time, and taking my blood glucose 3 to 5 times a day.

This morning I sat down and scheduled exercise time. Patch has been wanting to get out to the gym for a while now, but hasn't been going by herself and I hadn't been healed up enough. Now that I'm healed up enough it just seems to keep being one of us saying we should go to the gym but then letting something else get in the way. So I asked her to sit down with me every week when she gets her schedule and plan gym dates. Today we did that for the first time and it totally stressed her out for some reason. But we did plan basically every other day (except Mondays) to be gym days, and the days in between (except mondays) I'll ride my trike or go for a walk and hopefully a friend will walk with me on occasion.

In an effort to keep track of what i'm eating, my blood glucose levels and exercise, I resumed use of sparkpeople.com and bought a diabetic friendly cooking magazine that has some delicious sounding recipes. Last night we had chicken fajitas, and tonight we're going to have spicy turkey tacos.  I'm going to look through the freezer and see what types of fish we have for tomorrow night's menu. I'll keep updating this blog with our menu and any recipes I can.