Latest info, recipes, tools & gadgets to create a healthy diet
Archive for April, 2012
Yummo-schmumo!
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Herbs taste good and make excellent photo subjects. Dill with morning dew drops.
Spring Delights
Confused on how to say that, well I had to guess at how to spell it! It’s an expression I use all the time when I taste something delicious, and yesterday was one of those days. I was cleaning out all the winter weeds from the herb garden. In the process I had to dig up a few volunteers that had come up in the middle of other herbs, and managed to break a stem off the oregano.
While preparing a salad for lunch I pulled out all the fresh herbs I had just gathered from the garden and proceeded to add some to the salad. Yummo-schmumo. There is nothing that will perk up a salad like the addition of fresh herbs. I added just fennel, oregano, and parsley, but it made a taste sensation that is missing throughout the winter months.
Winter Doldrums
During the winter I’m relegated to using dried herbs, but they just don’t carry the punch of fresh. No matter what way I dry my own surplus, when I get to use my first bit of fresh it’s like an explosion of flavor that I’ve not had for many months.
Herbs that are amazing additions to salads include – fennel, oregano, lemon thyme, tarragon, basil (all the different flavors), rosemary, parsley, salad burnett, and marjoram.
Share Your Favorite Salad Addition
I’m sure I’m missing a few great additions. What do you add to your salads to make them unique? Please share with us all in the comment box below.
Know What You’re Eating
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Eating with awareness has a new meaning. You need to know if there are toxins lurking in your food.
I think most of you saw the write up about Coke and Pepsi having to change their formula to stop using a carmel color that was contaminated with a known carcinogen. How many other foods are compromised in some way? Many more than we would like to acknowledge.
I’ve talked some about GMOs and how if you eat anything with non-organic corn, soy, canola, or cottonseed oil you’re probably eating GMO food. Now they’ve started with sugar beets!
We all got a good scare when they came out with the findings about BPA and I would have thought that all organic, natural, or “health” labelled foods would have changed can their lining immediately. It wasn’t that easy, though, and until last fall all the canning companies were still using a BPA plastic lining. I was shocked because I had been carefully buying organic tomato puree, only to find out that I was still getting BPA until just recently.
Unfortunately the canning companies were in a bind, as certain foods will leach the metal in the can into the product if you don’t line it. Tomatoes were especially problematic. They were researching frantically trying to find a product that would work under canning conditions and they finally found one last fall. So, at least for now, your organic tomato products are safer.
How can you keep up on all of this? Well it is definitely a task and one that I’m not perfect at, but you can visit the web site for Center for Food Safety, as well as download the app for you iPhone or iPod. Another site is Environmental Working Group. They also have an app that lists the dirty dozen; the 12 most pesticide laden foods, and the clean 15; those foods you don’t have to worry about buying organic (although it’s nice to support organic farmers as much as possible).
I know there are numerous other sites that have excellent information, as well, and as I find them and look them over for accuracy and non-sensationalism I’ll post them here. In today’s world eating healthy means more than just quitting junk food. It means being vigilant about what is in everything you put in your mouth.
Entertaining With Some Cupcakes
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The office would love these!
Guest post written by April Gibbs
I’ve never been turned away at a party for bringing cupcakes along. See, I’m really into baking cupcakes and I come up with all kinds of awesome varieties for baking them. I’m always looking for the next big great recipe too!
I’m not quite sure what got me on my cupcake baking kick a few years back, but I’m glad that I did because I’ve never looked back and my coworkers love it when I bring them with me to work. One thing I want though is an apron to wear while I’m making these, so I looked online for one and saw the site www.debtsettlementfamily.com/calculate. Even though that’s not what I was initially looking for, I decided that I could really use their help, so I’m using it.
I found a cute little apron on sale from Anthropologie that was exactly my style. So I had to buy it before it sold out! It fits in perfectly with the rest of my kitchen decorations, which is really lucky and makes the purchase that much more worthwhile!