Box Readers
Box Readers
Sitting on the floor of Safeway might seems a bit, um, odd? But that’s exactly what we did yesterday when hitting the inevitable sugar-cereals-versus-healthy cereals weekly debate. I’d just had it altogether with the constant arguing over food. I sat down on the ground and had the kids bring me a box of Cheerios. I showed them the nutrition labels (again) and pointed out that Cheerios was going to be the sugar threshold of cereals in the house.
I invited the kids to bring over boxes of cereal they were interested in. Cocoa Krispies (afterall, they must be *just like* Rice Krispies but with cocoa?), both Rice and Corn Chex, Kix and Trix. They brought Cinnamon Life and Golden Grahams. They brought Fruity Cheerios and Raisin Bran. Soon we were all heckling at the boxes: “Kix, you silly people isn’t for kids, it’s for a sug-ar high!,” says my daughter. Corn Chex and Rice Chex have vastly different nutritional values (rice is better). Some “healthy” cereals were low in fat and carbs but slamming high in sodium. The big kicker was SmartStart which for being smart is pretty dang stupid. The cereal that boasts anti-oxidants and a nice and healthy label is heaped full of sugar. One of my favorite sites, Nutrition Data demonstrates just how UNhealthy SmartStart is: two stars for weight loss, but four stars for weight gain; a heaping 43 grams of carbs (14 g sugar) and almost 300 g of sodium. It has almost double the sugar of Fruity Cheerios (a FruitLoops competitor). What is smart about this? Huh? I’m renaming it StupidStart.
I gave the kids a choice: they could pick a cereal with little to no nutritional value and high sugar content (ie: StupidStart) and it would count as their treat for the day, or, they could pick one of the healthier alternatives *and* get to go to Powells to fill the treat drawer. I know that in the end, the intake of sugar is the same, but I wanted to make the choices clear. I’d rather the kids know what they are eating than assume that all cereals are created equal. They both picked out healthier cereals and proudly walked around the store, each with a box of cereal: Rice Chex and Special K.
The actual nutrition wasn’t the point, it was the lesson about understanding our food and how to understand our food and how to make choices of food. Of all the ways kids are influenced by food choices, our seem to make the right decisions by choice. Nutrition labels are a great way to demonstrate choices. I’m proud of theirs.
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100 Mile Diet: An Unsurmountable Challenge?
I quit chicken about two months ago. In some ways it’s completely freeing, in others, a pain-in-the-butt. There are days I cook with chicken stock, take sips from my kids’ Chicken Tortilla Soup knowing full well there are a couple of dead birds that went into making that bowl of yumminess. As I get older, I’ve come to understand how important food is to how I feel. Eat crap at the holidays? Feel like crap in January.
I’d heard of the 100-mile diet a few times before. It’s not a “diet” per se, it’s more like a lifestyle choice. In our daily lives, we eat “fresh” food that travels over 1500 miles before it gets on our plate. That’s a bumpy road to the table. Now, I’ve tried the vegetable and fruit delivery from local growers and I love it. There is absolutely no denying that the food looks and tastes so much better. But I’ve always found problems with the foods that show up in my box that we don’t eat at home. A few pounds of rutabaga just can’t be used in this house, even if I cooked with it every day for a week.
Then there is the issue of proteins. We live about 30 miles from the beach — there are plenty of fresh fish to eat and even more shellfish. Is it the best I’ve eaten? Not so much. And how about the turkey, beef and pork? My in-laws live near the famed Harris Ranch and that is a lot more than 100 miles from here. Cheeses are easier. There are some good dairy options that are very local to the Bay Area. If we could just live on wine alone, I could sustain myself in 20 miles (I think that’s how far away Ridge Winery is). Since I can’t live on hooch alone, I’m faced with the issue: Can I sustain our family’s diet on 100-mile radius of available foods?
100 Mile Diet
According to the 100-Mile-Diet website, I can shop as far south as Salinas, maybe stretching to Fresno, and get a bunch of local goodness from Watsonville, Hollister and Gilroy. I can get food from as far north as Sacramento (they have food in Sacramento?) and up to Santa Rosa. Now, can I do it?
The answer is, probably. The truth is, I probably won’t.
The Localvores movement has hit San Francisco, and smartly, they choose the month of September to take their 100-mile challenge. Perfect weather for fresh fruits, vegetables of both summer and fall seasons. I’m guessing the second week of January isn’t the right time of year to start the challenge. The Eat Local challenge folks keep a great blog with resources, recipes ideas and hurdles in eating within a 100-mile radius. There is also a site that made me really think seriously about this project. The Eat Wild folks do an amazing job at scoping out farms and ranches that are within the 100-mile range. They also give you resources beyond direct-to-consumer, they give you restaurants, grocery and markets that can help with the challenge. Little excuse left, I suppose.
If I were to take on the challenge, I’d have to make sure that I could provide my family with everything they are used to eating — eggs, milk, cheese, a good burger. I’d need to scope out restaurants that served locally grown fare since there is no way I’m cooking at home every day. I’d go stir-crazy. I’d want to know what grocery stores can make my life easier. Does WholeFoods do a 100-mile line of products? I’d want sneaky resources at my fingertips so I could wiggle my way through holidays and birthdays. And, I’d need to know that I can cheat and take my kids to the McDonald’s drive-thru on a whim.
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Tastes Like a Dive
I concocted some random recipes the other day. The favorite? A sloppy dive food-tasting mixture that’s — shock, horror — healthy and feels like you’re being glutenous.
Let’s call it Sloppy Soy
1 package Soyrizo
1 10oz. can white Hominy (I like Juanitas)
1/2 yellow onion
1 clove garlic
Sautee onion and garlic until transparent. Add soyrizo to mixture and cook until slightly browned. Add can of drained hominy. Mix together. Cook 5 minutes or until mixture is fully incorporated. Serve warm.
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Three Breakfasts Under 200 Calories
I am not a big breakfast person. In fact, it’s my least favorite meal of the day. But I’m no fool either and after reading about seven zillion Self Magazine articles on how eating breakfast can do everything from curb your appetite to making you skinnier to clearing up your skin and improving your sex life (well, maybe not the latter…), I figured I better find a way to like brekky. Here are my five top breakfasts under 200 calories:
1. Greek Yogurt (plain or vanilla) with five almonds or Tbs of slivered almonds. 1/2 baked apple. Coffee with skim milk. The baked apple is the key here. To keep them really on the low cal side, get medium green apples, slice in half lengthwise and sprinkle with cinnamon, dash of nutmeg, squeeze of lemon and quick splash of whiskey. Bake them at 350 degrees until they are soft but not babyfood, basting the apples a couple of times. The should be browned. Do this with just two apples and you have breakfast for four days.
2. Egg white omelet with crispy toast and butter, coffee with skim milk. The key here is the omelet. Get a carton of egg whites rather than wasting four eggs on just whites. It ends up cheaper that way, too. Use a small sautee pan and grill with Pam any veggies you want. I usually use whatever is leftover from the night before — asparagus, mushrooms, onion. Give the veggies a quick toss and remove from pan. Put eggwhites in at a low heat and let it take it’s shape of the pan. Add the veggies back in. Sometimes I add a tiny bit of goat cheese or fresh herbs from the kitchen too. Fold omelet and let the mixture get its groove-on for a minute or so. On the toast: I love toast, man. But toast makes me chunky so I limit the white carbs. If I have leftover piece of sourdough bread or part of a baguette, then I toast it up and put a bit of Brummel and Brown on top.
3. Ham and Cheese Sandwich, hot tea. I’ve had this trick up my sleeve for years! Take one Orowheat Sandwich Thins (completely awesome 100-calories wheat bread product) and put a hefty helping of spicy mustard on it. Place three deli turkey slices (we use Whole Foods roasted turkey since it’s nitrate-free) on top. Next put sliced tomato with a dash of salt on it. Then sprinkle with lowfat cheddar cheese. Broil until cheese is bubbly. Careful with the cheese because it can get too crispy too fast since it’s got a lower fat count.
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El Pollo Loco
Spit Chicken
When I was pregnant, the smell of chicken made me hurl at first sniff. I just couldn’t stomach even the idea of poultry. I got over it after about a year, but the icky raw chicken thing really stayed with me. I have a cutting board that’s just for raw chicken. When I cook with chicken I scald my hands cleaning off any remaining chicken guts. Even in culinary school chicken, I learned, was an icky, icky protein to work with. Somehow the clucks have come-a-calling again the past couple of weeks and I just simply can’t even look at chicken.
This latest round of fowl play came from an Ellen show (my remedy for insomnia is to plow through a week’s worth of Ellen looking for anyone interesting she’s interviewed) where she interviewed Johnathan Safran Foer about his new book, “Eating Animals” . The guy was freakishly convincing about the treatment of chickens — even free range chickens — that are grown for human consumption. I was so stunned by his findings that I got out of bed and looked up reviews of his book. I forced myself to not buy the book. I’m so close to the edge of heading back into being vegetarian that I don’t need that extra push. I’m fighting the urge to ditch all chicken products. As it is, I’ve begun cooking anything that isn’t chicken.
Sometimes I think the universe is talking to me, “bok-bok” it says, gently in my ear. I think the chickens are speaking to me. The very night I talked with La Gringa about my clucker issues, we cuddled up to watch TV and an episode of “Bones” was focused on chicken farming. And let me tell you, they let loose. The showed a plucking machine, a lady that rips the beaks off the baby chickens and the machines that actually kill the animals. They also show the vast farms of the chickens. It was done with passion, apparently, as executive producer and lead actress Emily Deschanel is a vegan. It worked. I tell you, the episode made me completely sick to my stomach. The chicks had spoken.
I’m still not sure where I’m going with all of this. I’m trying to not be rash with all of this. I both make and cook with chicken stock all the time (got veggie stock the past week), I feed a coopfull of chicken to my family and I’m not sure how I would alter that. And where do I draw the line between what I am feeling about eating chicken and what my children need for their diets? For now, I’m in a phase. We’ll see where it goes.
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Simple Carnitas
I love carnitas, even knowing what is in them. Even know I’m eating a pig’s butt and even though I know that phrase You are What You Eat. So I’m a pig butt, oh well. I love carnitas. I’ve played around with different recipes for years, but the one I made tonight rocked the house down. Here goes:
1 (about 4lbs) big fat pork butt or shoulder as long as it doesn’t have too much connective tissue and has enough meat on it
1 handful cumino (cumin)
5 cloves garlic whole
1 dried ancho chili whole
1 jar good looking green salsa (don’t get the lame stuff)
3 shakes soy sauce
salt and pepper
Rub pork with salt and pepper. Put in slow cooker. Add all ingredients except soy. Put on high for 6 hours. About two hours before ready, taste and add soy sauce. Drain some of the liquid and save. Don’t let it get dry! Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Pour carnitas on cookie sheet and put in oven until edges get a bit crispy for texture.
Serve with small corn tortillas, sour cream and lettuce. Some people also put cheese, tomato, salsa to make them more like tacos. Be sure to serve warm!
Enjoy every single bite.
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Side Gigs
