More Real Food

 My latest efforts with eating real food includes making my own granola. I have a basic recipe that calls for large oats, brown sugar, butter, chopped nuts and cinnamon. Pretty easy peasy. For now I'm using natural raw sugar but I will experiment with honey or blackstrap molasses as a sweetener. To the basic recipe I add sesame seeds (high in iron and calcium among many other things), pumpkin seeds (lots of protein and iron) and sunflower seeds(high in vitamin E and the B vitamins). I buy seeds and nuts RAW and unroasted - absolutely pure!

Put melted butter and other ingredients in a large saucepan and constantly stir over medium heat til golden brown. The first time I made this I also put it all on a cookie sheet and toasted it under the broiler because I didn't think it was crunchy enough.

I ran downstairs to attend to the dryer and when I came back up there was a burning smell in the air. I whipped the cookie sheet out of the oven and a portion of the granola was a tad burned.

However, when I stirred it all together it was absolutely delicious so I did that again this time but kept a close eye on it. There is something yummy about slightly burnt butter and sugar!!

While I was making granola and scones my daughter made this:

It was so pretty I had to take a picture! She wasn't finished yet but so far her nacho chips each have exactly one piece of onion, tomato and green pepper! Still to come - jalapenos, shredded cheese, sour cream and salsa.

Having determined that the kitties loved their new kitty bed and because it was so hard for both of them to fit into one bed I went back to Dollarama and bought two more. It was several days though before they would each sleep in a separate bed. So when I saw that they had finally figured out that they could each have one of their own I took a few photos.  Cuz that's what I do :)

Soooooo cozy! (Lily)

Totally out of it. Luna.

 I am drunk with sleep - Lily.

Can someone bring me a cat treat? Luna.

 Awww, they are so cute!! Me!

Family and Food

Right after I finished my post yesterday I received news that my sister-in-law's mother, age 95, had passed away.  Off I went to purchase a plant and had a good visit with my brother, my sister-in-law, her two brothers and my nephew. After keeping a long bedside vigil my sister-in-law was in good spirits and the focus now is on giving her mother a proper send-off.

Over the past week it's been difficult to stay on my "real food" eating plan. While helping my friend move she provided donuts, muffins and then pizza. At least there was veggie pizza! I did fairly well while looking after my brother this week as I made cabbage soup, baked chicken and cauliflower/potato/garlic mash and salad. I made more scones using my substitutions for sugar and flour and he enjoyed my molasses cookies as well.

Here's a meal from earlier in the week - chicken fajitas. This is something we eat quite often using up various veggie leftovers in the fridge. This time we're adding avocado, red pepper and fresh jalapenos, cucumber, a mix of tomato and onion and romaine. I skip the tortilla and add extra romaine to my plate. Not in the picture is grated cheese and Frank's hot sauce. I am VERY happy that Frank's hot sauce contains NO UNREAL food, no additives or dyes just real food!!

Here are my molasses cookies. I used 2 cups of 12 grain flour plus 1 cup of brown rice flour. Instead of spreading out like they used to do when I used white All Purpose flour they were more cakey due to the density of the 12 grain flour. I used blackstrap molasses which just happens to be quite nutritious!  For nutritional information on blackstrap molasses click HERE. You'll be amazed! This is the "good stuff" that remains after making refined white sugar which has NO nutritional value at all!

By the way my brother thought there was cocoa/chocolate in them and when I ate my first one I also tasted chocolate. VERY yummy cookies!

My version of fajitas :)

I tried making "flapjacks" using a recipe I received years ago in a recipe exchange. It was a recipe wherein all the baking takes place in a microwave. I found it dry and crumbly, not at all like the ones I ate in the UK. Back to the drawing board...

These don't look dry!! (Not mine!)

At my sister-in-law's house I succumbed to eating crackers and cheese and luncheon meat in addition to lots of celery and carrots. The worst thing was eating quite a few pretzels after I played volleyball last night.

I tell myself that after I fall off the wagon I just have to get back on. No point in worrying about it. I'm wishing I could get out on my bike but we've had snow twice at least in the past week as well as several torrential rainfalls. Grrrrrr! At least the sun is popping in and out today so once in a while it looks pleasant. From the inside looking out.

Real Food - Baking

I don't think it stopped raining all day! My dear child was off work today with fever, chills, cough and a host of other yucky symptoms so I had a "mothering" kind of day. You know what I mean, making hot lemon and honey drinks, cups of ginger tea, chicken noodle soup...the usual drill. Then she was looking for snacks (funny that she NEVER loses her appetite when she's sick!) but I don't really keep any snacks around, not the kind she likes anyway.

So that got me to thinking...what could I bake that would be considered REAL food?  I got out my recipe box and found my recipe for oat scones. I've made these buttery oaty morsels hundreds of times but now I looked at the ingredients with an eye to making healthier choices.

Butter - good (thank God!!!) though I need to look for organic butter
Egg - good (am buying Omega 3 eggs)
Milk - ok but I tried switching it up with organic coconut milk as it is so delicious.
Oats - large oats as they are gluten-free
All Purpose Flour - nope, don't want to use over processed refined flour. I have a lot of different flours that I buy at the Bulk Barn to use in my bread machine (that I never use but hope to soon). So instead of white flour I used whole wheat flour and 12 grain flour.
Brown Sugar - not a real food. Does anyone know if you can swap out brown sugar/refined white sugar with an equal amount of maple syrup or honey? With the first being a dry ingredient and the other being wet I didn't know what to do. I had a package of raw sugar so I went with that.
Baking Powder - not sure if there is a substitute for this, or an organic option. What is it made from anyways??
Salt
Raisins/currants

They turned out really really really good!
Very dense with the flour choices - a very oaty nutty flavour. I used a mixture of raisins, dried cranberries and currants.

I slathered on a little butter, let it melt and drizzled on a bit of honey. Delicious! Oh, and Kazi liked them too!

What I'm Eating.....

...Real food.
End of post......
Not really!

Remember the old food pyramid that advised us to have 6-11 servings of grains?! I hear it is getting updated once again. I offer for consideration the Real Food pyramid. I've been working towards this model for over a week. It requires a lot of thinking at first and I'm taking a gradual approach because there are a lot of things that are hard to give up/replace in order to LOVE what I'm eating and in order to cover all of my dietary needs - for example - protein and calcium.

For me, the most important thing to get away from is stuff that comes in packages and contains very little to NO food. Take a box of Kraft Dinner - one of Canada's favourite "foods". I've eaten a mountain of KD over the years starting when I was a wee tot and you could buy 2 boxes for 15 cents! BUT - it contains next to NO real food and provides no nutritional value. All it does is taste good and fill you up. Well, as a single parent sometimes those are the choices I've had to make. I get queasy thinking back to when Kazi's favourite lunch "food" was Zoodles!! I mean there is no such real food called a zoodle!!  So NO more. No more mystery foods!

Getting enough protein is easy as we love eggs, chicken, turkey and fish/shellfish and we eat lots of vegetables for every meal. Calcium is harder though I take a supplement along with vitamin D every day. I have to start examining labels on yogurt, cottage cheese and other cheeses to see which ones contain food but no chemicals. Sticking with organic should do the trick. I don't drink milk except for soy milk and again I stick with organic as I'd like to stay non-GMO as close to 100% as possible.

I'm not craving anything, so far. I will make things to satisfy my sweet tooth. With my Vitamix I can make my favourite food - ICE CREAM - by mixing soy milk and frozen berries. I will try to substitute honey, maple syrup, raw sugar or other natural sweeteners to re-create my favourite oatmeal cookies and scones. It can be done, it just requires some thought.

My hope is to have a stronger and healthier body. The body doesn't know what to do with UNreal foods so it stores it as fat. UNreal foods don't boost your immune system, don't strengthen your muscles, don't build bone etc. It all turns to FAT. I should know. I have a nice belly made out of licorice, ice cream, candy, pretzyls and chocolate bars. (Pssssst! I'm not giving up chocolate - just making better selections! There are choices that are organic and contain only real ingredients!)

Today I am eating:
Breakfast - organic green tea, 1% cottage cheese with raspberries
Lunch - falafel mixture (ground chicken, green/red peppers, onions, garlic and spices) over a bed of romaine
Mid-afternoon - organic green tea/cheese/half grapefruit
Dinner - green beans, cauliflower and broccoli, grilled shrimp, green salad (spinach, grape tomatoes, cucumber, onion, red pepper)
Before bed - a small yogurt

I'd like to think I can stay away from NONfood products but I know I'll want Dairy Queen eventually (VERY MUCH NOT A REAL FOOD) and I'll enjoy it! But I will try to keep to meals made from Real Food. It's a work in process!