Adventures in Purple Cauliflower

Isn't this beautiful? I saw this purple cauliflower at the Farmer's Market and had to buy it. I couldn't resist the deep, gorgeous color. According to the Livestrong website, cauliflower has all the nutritional benefits of regular cauliflower but is also packed with antioxidants. Who knew this pretty flowery vegetable is a healthy source of vitamin C, phosphorus, potassium and folate to add to your diet? I usually only eat white cauliflower in crudite platters at parties, dipped in some variation of ranch dressing. I wanted to really taste this vegetable, not dressing, since it was my first time. I prepared it very simply, and must say, really enjoyed it. It's so nice to have variety at the dinner table!

Super easy: Cut cauliflower into florets. Drizzle with olive oil, season with sea salt and pepper. Roast about 20 minutes at 425*. Great to let this cook (even in a countertop-style oven) while you are working on the rest of your dinner.

Enjoy!

Have you ever eaten or even seen purple cauliflower before? This was my first time, I had to try it!

Adventures in Coconut Water, Kale and Squash

I'm just going to say it. I don't get the coconut water hype. I had tried some when I was getting my hair done a couple weeks ago and enjoyed the flavor but didn't examine the label closely. I bought some on my own today at lunch and again, picked it up blindly without reading the can. Maybe if I was totally burned out on water and just wanted the taste of something else...I just cant justify 12 grams of sugar. It was tasty, but I really think I should have only had about half of this can. In the end, I just don't think that it tasted so great that it was worth the sugar. I will stick to plain water unless I'm in the mood for a treat. In which case, I'd have ice cream and cake (hellloooo?).

I've been experimenting with red kale lately. It has the same amazing health benefits if it's green cousin, but with a slightly different flavor. It's less bitter and more mild. I still like the green kale in my smoothies much more, maybe I"m just used to it. So far I've made the red kale by sauteeing it with onion and garlic and its really good. An excellent side vegetable if you are looking for more variety. Can't beat the B vitamins, vitamin A as well as the other minerals you get from this tasty veggie!!

I bought a spaghetti squash last week and was tempted to just make it the way I usually do. That is, roast it, clean out the innards and make "spaghetti" with the strands, and eat with butter and parmesan and garlic. Well, I happened to see this recipe for Spaghetti Squash Lasagna on Skinnytaste and thought I'd branch out. I did not get any photos of it, as I made it at my parents house. Everyone was actually surprised at how much more they liked it than they thought they would. No one in my family is a fan of the spaghetti squash like I am apparently!

Have you ever tried red kale? How do you like to eat it? Spaghetti squash is in season and I'm looking forward to trying more recipes!

Be A Good Girl Now and Drink Your Veggies!

Over the last couple years I have been seeing info on the web about people making "green smoothies". It always looked like something I would try, if I wasn't so lazy. Seriously, I think God invented Jamba Juice so we would never have to clean our blender, right? Well, last week, one of my Running/Recipe Mama  friends on Facebook Adventure Junkie Mom posted something about the Green Monster Movement. I happened to be going to the Farmer's Market the next day, so I picked up a huge bunch of spinach along with my usual goodies like blueberries, bread, strawberries, etc. I came home and poked around on the website, pulled out the Magic Bullet and decided to go for it.

Trusty Dusty MB

Big Bad Bunch of Greens

 I eyeballed what looked to be about 3 cups of spinach, and rinsed well. Set aside

I also rinsed 1/2 cup of blueberries. Set aside.

I poured 1-1/2 cups of almond milk in the Magic Bullet.

I added my spinach and blueberries, as well as half of a very large banana, so you could use  a whole small banana!

I like my smoothies with some cold, icy crunch to them so I added a 1/2 cup of crushed ice and fired the bad boy up. 

I poured some out for me and my husband and my Monkey said he wanted to try some. I also told him the Green Smoothie would make him powerful. He really liked it.

I was a little nervous about trying this, but I must say, I am going to work these into my regular diet plan. They did not taste "veggie" at all. Ignoring the obvious green color, these smoothies taste like regular fruit smoothies. And I got a massive dose of greens without having to eat a huge salad, which I don't mind but its nice to have some variety. Even better, you can drink this on the go if you are pressed for time. If you have thought about trying a green smoothie, you should give it a "whirl".

Have you ever tried a "green smoothie"? What did you think?

Homegrown Green: Organic Produce Part 1

I wanted to share with you the recent progress on our backyard garden! I cannot fully express how absolutely excited I am about all the yummy vegetables that are sprouting up. Green beans, carrots, yellow onions, zuchini, yellow squash, Japanese and Italian eggplant, Roma, beefsteak and cherry tomatoes. My 4yo is excited too, always asking to go out check on the progress of his garden.

I am all about shortening the distance from Farm to Table and love supporting our local Farmer's Market. It is like an event in our family to go there on the weekend and peruse all the lovely fruits and veggies and feel the sense of community. We love to hear the music play, smell the kettle corn popping, and the kids enjoy sampling all the fruit on display. There is even a children's art area where they can have fun creating projects for Mommy and Daddy. Beyond produce, there is a vendor selling amazing flavors of hummus and pita chips, a local honey producer, flowers, plants, jewelry and much more. It's a small market with a lot of variety.

However, now that I have my garden, we will probably hit up the Farmer's Market less. We will definitely still go from time to time, but my purpose in creating the backyard garden was multi-fold (hungrigyrlism): Convenience. How perfect will it be when I want to make something and I just go out and pick a vegetable from my backyard? Community. I will love to share our bounty with other family members and co-workers. Quality. I will be able to safely say our veggies were not sprayed with pesticides, picked too early, ripened on a truck, etc. Eco-friendly. My distance from farm to table is about 15 feet. No fuel will be wasted transporting my veggies, and the air/environment will not be compromised by said transportation. Have I mentioned cost yet? Our initial investment of redwood boards, dirt and seeds was about $85. That is roughly about 2 visits to the Farmer's Market for us. We will see quite the  return and then some on our investment this summer. The redwood made the project a little pricier, probably 2x as much, but redwood is a heartier wood. For those of you interested in making a backyard garden, douglas fir would work just fine and cost less.

Stay tuned for Part 2 of my Organic Produce post, which you won't want to miss!

Do you grow any fruits or veggies at home? Any special tips you have for gardening success?

Kids and Food Foolery

When one of my favorite bloggers, Stephanie in Suburbia posted recently about her woes transitioning from baby food to a toddler diet, it got me thinking about some of the ways we got our once-picky Monkey to love "real food".

Great book!

I remember a few years ago when I first heard about the lawsuit between Jessica Seinfeld and Missy Chase Lapine, the author of the Sneaky Chef, I was a fairly new mother to a solid-food eater. Jessica Seinfeld wrote a book called Deceptively Delicious, which was a cookbook full of healthy recipes that made recognizable "kid food" healthier by disguising the healthy ingredients - usually pureed vegetables - by mixing them right in. My son was just starting to eat more kid food, and I wanted his meals to be more balanced. I thought this idea was brilliant!

Puree in action

The Sneaky Chef was a cookbook based on the same premise; it was published prior to Seinfeld's book and the author was essentially saying Seinfeld stole her idea. Seinfeld ended up winning. I actually own both books and I think they are great. It's a shame so much money had to be spent on lawyers to basically determine that this "idea" to trick kids into eating vegetables by hiding them in dishes children love is something that mother's have been doing for decades. Some argue that this isn't really teaching children healthy eating habits because they aren't learning to knowingly eat and enjoy things like vegetables. I can understand that, but I don't think it's all bad.

There are some vegetables my kids knowingly like in their true whole form. Asparagus, artichokes, tomatoes, carrots, corn and peas. Potatoes, as long as they are french fries. Artichokes and asparagus are expensive and we really don't even have those at dinner time all that often. Tomatoes, carrots, corn and peas are veggies they eat quite regularly, but I even get bored of those. My 4yo will eat lettuce if its in a sandwich. He won't knowingly touch sweet potatoes although he loved them when he was still on baby food.We have been mixing pureed sweet potatoes into their mac n' cheese for as long as we can remember!

Zucchini is a super versatile green veggie!

I try not to rely solely on the sneaky methods. I just use them to add some variety. Pureed, cauliflower, sweet potatoes, squash, and spinach are full of healthy vitamins and nutrients. And who can argue with the sheer genius of the black bean brownies? I am confident someday my kids will take servings of these vegetables and enjoy them, but for now they will just get them on the sly.  There are other "tricks" we have used to encourage our kids to eat. My husband Chip is a New York Yankees fan (I know, I know) and the way we started getting our 4yo to eat meat was to call it "Yankee Chicken." It was breaded and baked, which helped to make it totally enticing. Of course, since I'm a San Francisco Giant's fan (GO GIANTS!) we had another version we called "Giant's Chicken" which was the non-breaded, grilled version. And I can't forget the rice dish that has broccoli in it - aka "Hulk Rice." Think of the fun names for things we are already familiar with, such as "Ants on a Log." Once I started serving that as a snack it was sure a whole lot more exciting to eat than celery with peanut butter and raisins, right? And now, we don't even have to play these games with him, he just eats the food no matter what its called.  Our 2 yo has a pretty healthy appetite, so no worries there.

California rolls...its a start!

If you have a picky eater, don't despair. With some healthy food mixed with a dash of deception, and a whole lot of creativity and love, any child can get used to new flavors and colors in their food. All you can do is continually introduce foods to them and eventually they will eat them. Never did I imagine that my 4 yo who couldn't stand beans would be asking me for a burrito, or eating sushi with us at our favorite Japanese restaurant. :)

Do you have a picky eater at home? How do you achieve success at meal time? Or, do you not stress about it and hope they will grow out of it?

I was not compensated by the authors for this post in any way. I received both books as gifts from family.

Hearty, Spicy Beef Stew in the Crock Pot!

I wish I had a picture of my stew! It was made, eaten and enjoyed before I could take any photos. Well take my word for it, it looks very tasty, smells amazing and is quite yummy. I had fun shopping for the veggies at my Saturday Farmer's Market, my weekly family tradition. Pefect hearty stew for a cold day, and you can go out and enjoy your Saturday or Sunday and come home to a nice warm meal if you make it in the crock pot.

This recipe should feed 4 hungry people if served over rice or noodles.  If you have leftovers, even better - this stew tastes even better the next day.

1-1/2 tablespoons oil
2 lbs stew meat cut into 1 inch pieces
4 garlic cloves, sliced
2 carrots chopped
2 medium onions chopped
1 small can diced green chiles
1 can Mexican style stewed tomatoes
1/2 can beef broth
1/2 cup sliced green pimento stuffed olives
1 potato cut into 1 inch pieces (more can be added if you desire)
1 tablespoon dried oregano
1/2 teaspoon chili powder
1 teaspoon cumin

In a large pan on medium heat, heat half the oil and brown half the meat with 2 of the garlic cloves. Remove. I like to put the meat in the crockpot to wait for the rest of the ingredients. Brown the rest of the meat with the remaining oil 2 garlic cloves. Remove remaining meat and saute the vegetables in the same pan for about 5 minutes or so until they start to soften.
Put the meat into the crockpot if its not already there, then vegetables. Add the remaining ingredients - chiles, tomatoes, broth, olives and potato. Add your spices and combine with vegetables and meat with a large spoon. Turn your crock pot on high for 6 hours. Happy eating!

Try it, and let me know what you think. I would enjoy this with a nice glass of full bodied red wine. TGIF!