EASY JUICE-BASED MEALS

  This week I took lunch with me to work instead of eating out (in which cases I mostly eat plain salad with soy sauce and bread). I came up with a simple plan how to fix both breakfast and lunch simultaneously in two steps.

Cucumber-avocado soup with wholemeal spelt flatbread.

Step 1: The previous evening make two juices. One is fruit-based for breakfast the next morning, and the other veggie-based for lunch the next day. Store in air-tight glass jars in the fridge.

Step 2: In the morning Vitamix your fruit juice with a big bunch of green leaves until creamy and smooth. Voilá, your breakfast is ready!
            Now Vitamix your veggie juice with one ripe avocado until creamy and smooth. Voilá, your lunch is ready! Pour back in the glass jar and take to work.

The beauty in juicing is that you can combine nearly anything together, and still come up with a nice taste. Natural tastes of fruits and veggies are so subtle that they mix well. I usually buy whatever is in season in the grocery store, and either make single juices or combinations according to my imagination. It´s all good for me!

  Now that I´ve been juicing mostly every day for a month, I can honestly say I´m feeling the difference. It is simple to put it in a nutshell: I feel satisfied. Never did think a thin cup of liquid could fill me up, but it does! It is a different, new kind of fullness I can feel in my throat rather than stomach. When I´ve had enough, the thought of more food & juice starts to feel repulsive. And it takes a lot longer to feel hungry again than before. I´d like to think it is because of the abundant amount of nutrients I´m getting now. No matter what the reason, I feel better and stronger now.
  I´d had a juicer for  years and years, but never did I drink juices this much and regularly. The biggest reason for that was that my old juicer didn´t extract as much juice from the same amount of produce as my new one, making more go to waste.

This is apple juice blended with two leaves of kale. Kale makes a nice, thick froth.

3/4 cucumber juice, 1/4 apple juice blended with 1 small avocado. Needs no salt.

  I´m impressed by the power of juice!

THURSDAY TORTILLAS

  Thursday and tortillas rhyme and swing, making my Thursdays as healthy as these vegan and low-fat tortillas are delicious. It is still a weekday, not yet time to indulge in unhealthy and hard-to-digest party foods of weekend. Especially this weekend when it´s Easter!

A complete meal. Marinated veggies and tofu as the filling.

As much as I like to eat home-made foods, tortilla bread is one thing I cannot do. It always ends up either too thick or too thin, and it always tears apart (I use wholemeal spelt flour for the dough). So this is one place where I take a shortcut, buying them ready from the store. I figure that filling them with fresh, fibrous vegetables adds up to a lunch on the healthy side overall. It´s okay to aim for perfection, but it´s also okay to understand it is impossible (and inhuman  =).

  The recipe (yields two big fajitas):



1/2 small zucchini, thinly sliced
1/2 orange bell pepper, thinly sliced
1-2 tomatoes, halved and then thinly sliced
5 mushrooms, thinly sliced
3-4 kale leaves, finely chopped
6 oz. (200g) firm tofu, cubed

Mix all with this marinade:
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 tsp soy sauce
black pepper
1/2 tsp cumin
1 small clove garlic, minced
cayenne pepper, to taste
a squirt of raw honey

+ Let sit in room temperature for 15-30 min, mixing occasionally.
  Ladle on tortillas, roll up and enjoy.

  If you like yours more creamy, some plain (soy) yogurt or avocado do the trick well!

  This is my version of the always gorgeous Mimi Kirk´s fajita recipe from her book Live Raw. She is such an inspiration!

I HATE KALE- GREEN CHOCOLATE SMOOTHIE

  My ten-year-old son hates vegetables. Cucumber and potatoes are the only things he´ll eat without a suffering face. But behold, Vitamix to the rescue! I have found a sneaky way to incorporate raw leafy greens into his diet, without him refusing one bit. In fact, he now asks for kale almost daily!

Chocolate smoothie, what a perfect way to start the day (and hide greens)!

A high-speed blender makes an unbelievably creamy and smooth texture. This stuff is very different from the produce of an "ordinary" blender, that leaves the smoothie more or less chunky.

The recipe (serves 1):

1-2 handfuls of kale (or other leafy greens)
1 banana
5 medjool dates
1-2 Tbsp cacao nibs
vanilla
3 tsp cacao powder
1/2 avocado
1-2 cups soymilk (for him, for myself I use water)

+ Blend everything until creamy and smooth.

This is satisfying and filling, and keeps us all going until lunch time.

KALE & CRANBERRY SALAD

  This is a super delicious, and healthy, kale salad I had today for lunch:

Cranberries and orange rule the taste, followed by garlic and kale. I never imagined plain kale could be this delicious in a salad!

The recipe (serves 1):

First make the dressing by whisking together:
1/2 orange, juiced
1 Tbsp apple cider vinegar
1/2 small clove garlic, minced
pinch salt
pepper to taste
dash of soy sauce
1 Tbsp olive oil

Then pour half of it over:
100g kale, destemmed and finely chopped. Mix and squeeze the kale with your hands for a while to make it softer. (This is when I started drooling... =)

Finally add and toss in the rest of the ingredients:
1/2 orange, peeled and cubed
a snug 1/2 cup (1dl) dried cranberries
1/2 red bell pepper, sliced finely
1/2 parsnip, grated
1/2 shallot onion, finely sliced
3/4 cup cottage cheese

Serve immediately or refrigerate for up to two days.

This recipe is a slight variation to Mimi Kirk´s "Upscale Kale Salad" from her book. I basically just replaced nuts with cottage cheese and left out additional sweetener (agave or dates). That lady can make some darn tasty raw food dishes, and look fantastic doing so at 75!

EATING PLAN FOR SAMHAIN

 My stomach has gotten picky lately, so I´ll have to make some changes to my usual eating habits. It is unhappy with cooked vegetables, nuts and seeds (much fat in any form), and legumes. I don´t know why, and how long it´ll last, but for now I need to replace those foods with something else.
  So here is a brand new, healthy and slimming, eating plan for Samhain, with a new perspective. It now includes some organic dairy and even fish once a week.

 9.00am Breakfast:
 a cup of green tea
 a green pudding made with leafy greens, fruit, and vegetables

Green pudding made with dinosaur kale, zucchini, banana, and water.

1.00pm Lunch:
a cup of water + 20 drops of Echinacea extract
raw-food meal + an avocado, or 3.5 oz. (100g) cold smoked salmon (once a week), or 7 oz.(200 g) cottage cheese

A sample lunch of veggie dip, the sauce made with either avocado or organic sour cream.

4.00pm Tea:
a cup of green tea
a generous cup of flavored yogurt

Yes, dinner is really this simple, a bowl of yogurt. This one is apple & cinnamon flavored. It provides some fat, protein, and good bacteria for the gut, and acts as dessert for the day. Going cold turkey with sugar does not work for me. This much I allow myself.

7.00pm Snack:
a cup of green tea
1-2 apples

9.00pm Nightcap:
a cup of herbal infusion + soymilk
(and raw vegetables if hungry)

Saturdays: feel free to eat your favorite foods!

  This plan bases on one I created when I was sixteen, and lost nearly twenty pounds with it. I was way too skinny then, but luckily soon I left for the U.S. for a year as an exchange student, which fixed the problem more than enough. =)
  I use Erica Palmcrantz-Aziz´s book to guide me with the daily lunches. It keeps the menus varied and interesting without having to think for myself. =)

  I hope my stomach will agree with this plan, as it did twenty years ago. Wow.

ELIXIR OF YOUTH

  A couple of weeks ago I bought a few cans of mild cider at a grocery store, and the cashier lady asked me for id. Me! You need to be 18 here to buy it, and I´ll be 37 next month! Yipee! I thanked the nice lady and told her how she had just made my day. =)

  Every now and then I hear people say how I look younger than my age, including a top photographer (in which case I lost a photo shoot because of looking so young =(, and the head of my modeling agency). My age is not yet an issue to me. 36 is totally young these days. After all, fifty is the new thirty now!

  Still taking care of oneself helps to keep the good looks, and makes you feel great. One of the secrets to a lively and healthy (a.k.a. youthful) appearance is raw leafy greens. The darker the better. I prefer fresh greens over dried superfood ones. Now kale is in season, so it is time to enjoy it.
  After getting a high-speed blender (Vitamix) for Christmas last year, I have been able to enjoy super smooth green juices. They say that when food is broken down to such tiny particles, your body can use it up better. So I figure blending raw leafy greens I get the most out of them. I prefer blending over juicing because then the juice still includes all the fiber too.

A fountain of youth, raw green juice with pulp.

    The recipe (for one):

5 leaves dinosaur kale (or any available raw leafy greens as much as your taste buds can tolerate)
4 sprigs of mint (or any fresh herb desired to taste)
20 drops of Echinacea (I use merely for taste, but possible health benefits are only a big bonus. My aunt has used it for decades, and swears on it´s cold-preventing properties.)
water

+ Blend the kale and mint in a high-speed blender with 1 1/2 cups water until all smooth. Add water enough to reach 2 cups. Pour into a glass and add the Echinacea drops. Stir and drink with your lunch for extra boost.
  Shine, radiate, and get ready for compliments!

HIBERNATING KITCHEN GARDEN

  Snow has taken over the lands here. It is nearly winter solstice, and I can feel it in my bones too. It is so dark in the mornings that it is difficult to get up no matter what the time is! And so dark again at 4pm, that it is hard to resist the soft comfiness of the living room couch...

Sometimes I wish I could just sleep off the entire dark and cold winter. Like nature does.

My small and humble kitchen garden is covered with snow. It has earned it´s rest after surviving last summer of neglected care... =)

The other day, one of these short and dark ones, my daughter (who loves food) found the last stems of kale still standing up from the ground in my kitchen garden in our back yard. She must have remembered eating them in the fall, because she went straight up to them and took a big fat bite of the frozen and snow covered curly leaf! It was so hilarious. She was perfectly happy for the next ten minutes chewing on the fibrous mouthful. What a cutie. =)

Raspberries are only a faint memory by now.

Think I went overboard with the rabbit fence? Yes, there is a small cherry tree inside, somewhere... We got it from my sister two summers ago, and I´m so terrified something might happen to this tree. It would be soooo embarrasing to kill it!

The only thing alive still in the garden is my compost.

Never before have I been able to keep it going this well at this temperature. Usually it freezes as the snow falls, but not now baby! Outside it is 10 Fahrenheit (-12 Celsius) and on the inside 86 F (+30 C). Yipee! I know it will not last through the entire winter, but the further I can go tossing our bio waste in here, instead of the trash, the happier I am.

Yum yum, food for my kitchen garden in 2015. I´ll take the mass out in the spring and dump it into another bin, where it can further decompose over the winter of 2014-2015 . Then it will be ready to be used as fertilizer in my garden. Honestly, I´m sure my daughter and I produce 90% of this material. The other 10% comes from my husband´s coffee brewing. What is it with the male sex, why won´t they eat their vegetables?!

  Rest in peace, I wish I could too! (On second thought, it is X-mas soon, and I would miss out on all the chocolate, and the excitement in my kids´ eyes before opening the presents, and seeing Santa, and watching "It´s a Wonderful Life" on tv. I take it back. I´d like to hibernate through the dark and cold, but set the alarm clock for X-mas, New Year´s, and sunny days. =)
 

DETOX MORNING DRINK

  Sometimes I just crave green drinks. The urge comes and goes, but I interperate it as my body´s way of telling me it is time to take it a little lighter for a while. As my body is my temple - my home - I need to respect it´s needs.

  Here is what I had for breakfast the other day:

A large plateful of veggies...

... blended into a smooth green drink. It is amazing how much greens fit into a 1/2 liter pint!

The recipe for "Triple Green Juice" (serves 2) :

3 cups chopped fresh kale
1/2 stalk celery, chopped
1/2 seedless cucumber, chopped
1 carrot, chopped, or 1 apple cut into 4 pieces

+  Place all ingredients in a juicer and squeeze, or puree in a blender with a little spring water.

   I did not have kale, so I used lettuces and some wild edible greens from the garden instead.
  The taste was definitely healthy and surprisingly  pleasant! Another positive surprise was to find out that I did not become hungry until three hours later, only a little before lunch time anyway.

  The inspiration overall, and then the recipe above, came from Mayumi Nishimura´s book, Mayumi´s Kitchen, which I bought recently. She introduces a loose approach to macrobiotism, petit macro. That seems like an easier path into the somewhat confusing world of macrobiotic eating and lifestyle. I´m very excited about the world petit macro opens the door to!

EATING PLAN FOR IMBOLC

  When I was fifteen I became interested in eating healthy. That´s when I quit eating meats, fish, and eggs.
   Some years ago I reduced my consumption of dairy, and noticed an even further improvement in my health. I no longer had mucus in my sinuses (which never was a problem overall, but still there was a noticable difference). Today I call myself nearly vegan (because I do eat honey, and occasionally have some  milk chocolate). And I feel great!

  My eating plan for Imbolc is based on something I came up with in my teens, when first starting to eat healthily. I became even a bit too thin then (for my own standards), so I know this can´t go wrong now either.
  (Now I must point out, again, that my goal is not to lose weight now, but rather maintain my current state. If I do see a drop in the scale, that´s just another excuse to have an extra dessert!)

Home-made gluten-free muesli. A staple food in my diet. The recipe for a big batch: 4dl toasted rolled oats (toast in a dry skillet until fragrant), 4 dl puffed quinoa, 4dl coconut shreds, 2dl cacao nibs, 2dl sunflower seeds, 3dl chopped cashews, 4dl dried pineapple, 2tsp vanilla sugar. Mix everything and store in a glass jar. Eat as much as you like. For each new batch you make, I recommend changing the recipe a bit. For example use buckwheat instead of oat, or try dried figs instead of pineapple. You get the point.

Waking up:
 a glass of water + a splash of lemon juice

Breakfast:
1/2 liter green tea
a green smoothie (The base: 1 banana, a handful of greens, a handful of nuts/seeds, a pinch of salt, and water. To this I add on Mon: ginger, Tue: lemon zest, Wed: cocoa powder, chili, and vanilla, Thu: goji berries, Fri: any kind of frozen organic berries, Sat: cocoa powder, chili, and vanilla, Sun: any kind of frozen organic berries)

Lunch:
1/2 liter water
Mon: a big salad with beans
Tue: any kind of greens (spinach, broccoli, kale, green beans...) with vegan margarine and beans
Wed: vegan soup and home made bread/scones
Thu: gluten-free pasta with vegan bolognese sauce
Fri: stir fry with tofu
Sat: ANYTHING I WANT (and have craved for during the week)!
Sun: mashed potatoes and carrots with smoked tofu (ready from the store) and fresh veggies

Dinner:
1/2 liter green tea
home-made gluten-free muesli with soymilk

Supper:
1/2 liter herbal tea with soymilk
2 dl plain soy yogurt with a swirl of honey
(on Saturdays also some dairy-free dark chocolate)

  Now I don´t have to ponder about my eating. I simply go by the plan. Easy and healthy, just the way I like it!

GREEN DRINK

  Drinking with meals is not fashionable nowadays. I go against the grain by gulping down 1/2 liter per meal. That just suits my digestion better. I´m all for intuitive eating and eat how and what feels right.

  Plain water is not very attractive to me, unless I´m really thirsty (which is quite rarely). I have tried to learn to drink plain water with lunch, and I have made progress, but overall I want some variety. Squeezing some lemon juice in is an old trick that works. The other day I tried a new trick:

Salad greens in an easy-to-drink form; a blended green juice to go with lunch.

The recipe:

1/2 liter water
1/2 lemon, juiced
handful of greens like kale or spinach (the darker the better)
a few leaves of sage (or any fresh herb you like)

+ Throw all in a blender and process until the greens have nearly dissolved. 

  This is not in my menu every day, but at least twice a week. It much depends on what I´m eating. For example with soup I would choose plain water, because if I didn´t want to drink it all, I could give the rest to my common ivy at the end of the dining table.  =)

ENERGY BOOST-BREAKFAST

  Dark days have been upon us for weeks now, and I must admit, darkness is draining some of my energy. But this morning I whipped up a green smoothie in a bowl, and voilá, now I´m bursting with energy!

In the pint there is not beer... it is green tea with a little honey. The bowl fits 1/2 liter, so I can say I´m no light eater! =)  Shredded coconut imitates an idea of snow fallen on top. This amount has kept me satisfied for four hours, and counting...

  The recipe:

1 banana
3 kiwis
lettuce/kale (any green leaves)
water/orange juice (if you happen to have fresh citruses)
shredded coconut
sunflower seeds

+ Blend the fruit and greens in a blender with some water/juice. Be careful with the amount of liquid you use, so the mixture won´t get too runny and thus difficult to spoon. Top with coconut and seeds.
  Enjoy the energy!

TOTALLY HEALTHY GREEN SMOOTHIE!

  Green smoothies have been a hit for a while, but I wonder, do everyday people enjoy them regularly? I know many of the people I know wouldn´t even touch one, even if offered ready-made, and for free.
  I have phases when I crave green smoothies more often than on other times, but I do drink them year round. Last summer I had a two week period, when I ate only raw food. That was what my body craved at the moment, and since I was on a holiday, it was easier to pull it through. I try to listen to my body´s needs, and satisfy them as well as I can.
  Here´s my staple green smoothie for this time of the year:

I still have lots of kale in my garden, so I use that to achieve this rich, beautiful green color

.

Sunflower seeds, pecans, almonds, anything goes on top of this thick smoothie to make this a complete meal. I´ve tried more liquid smoothies, but I prefer these thicker ones that you can spoon away.

The recipe (for one person):

1 big bunch of green leaves ( I used kale here )
1 banana
orange/tangerine juice (freshly squeezed at home)
small piece of fresh ginger
handful of seeds/nuts to sprinkle over the smoothie

= Blend the greens with the juice first, as finely as your machine can work it (this is especially important when using hard greens like kale). Then add the banana and ginger, and blend again until a smooth texture is reached. You can add water,if needed, and in case you run out of juice, there is plenty of flavor in the smoothie to keep it still mouth watering. Pour into a serving bowl and top with the seeds/nuts of your choice.
  This is a filling breakfast or a snack, which keeps me going for about five hours.
  Toast to your health!

KALE FOR HEALTH!

  I have just recently introduced kale into my diet. Before I always only did cabbages and broccoli. But kale has turned out to be a great success! The taste is mild and it contains masses of chlorophyll, which, like we all know, is the perfect food for us humans. I grew some in my own garden this year.

I have two types growing in my garden. And they literally grow until the ground freezes for winter, and stay fresh even under a layer of snow!

  Kale can be used fresh/raw or cooked. The leaves are quite tough to chew on, so I prefer to juice them, or blend in green smoothies when I use them raw.
  This time I made a delicious, creamy stew of kale, and served it over whole Basmati rice.

Here I have the kale stew simmering in a skillet.

And here it is served over Basmati rice. Lovely and oh-so-healthy! While I was eating, I got to enjoy some of the last rays of sunlight for this year. Heavenly!

   Here is the approximate recipe (for one):

Bunch of kale (as much as you think you can eat)
1 onion
1 clove of garlic
olive oil
soy cream
vegetable stock
little corn flour/starch
vegetable margarine and your favorite fresh herb to season and garnish

+ Chop the onions finely. Sauté them in a skillet until soft. Add finely chopped kale, and let simmer until softened and shrunk in size. Pour in some veggie stock and cream, and let cook until vegetables are nice and soft. Thicken the sauce with corn flour.
  Serve with whole Basmati rice and place a generous dollop of vegetable margarine on top, and garnish with your favorite fresh herb. I used parsley here, since it was the only one still fresh in my garden.
  Totally yummy, and good for you!