Tag: Food

Sunday Feast

On By HanneIn Food4 Comments

Tonight was probably one of my most favorite recipes from The Barefoot Contessa.

Lemon Chicken with Croutons.

Oh my Lord.

CameraAwesomePhoto2Like the rest of her recipes, this is super easy and oh-so-delicious. I’ve made it twice by the book, so this time I added a few variations – one, I quartered some red onions, and two, I added some lemon zest to the red onions. I love lemon on just about anything, so I shove as many slices in the chicken that I can. I think the best part is squeezing the cooked lemon over the croutons.

The skin on the chicken becomes super crispy and almost spicy with the amount of salt and pepper that I cake on with the melted butter. You shouldn’t eat the skin (but let’s be honest, a little nibble won’t hurt), so I peel it off and sprinkle the baked salt/pepper over the meat for a little added taste.

A feast isn’t complete without roasted vegetables. Todays mixture included: carrots, yellow beets and CameraAwesomePhoto3celery root. I’ve been trying to check out different veggies beside the standard carrots. I did a little research and found that celery root has some wonderful health benefits, so decided to give that a try. It’s pretty starchy (and a little sweet), so it’s a good alternative to potatoes.

I love the purple carrots – not only do they add color to an otherwise boring bunch of veggies, they contain the same antioxidant that gives blueberries their colors and are good anti-inflamitories. The golden beets were also a new one for me. Much nicer to work with as they don’t stain your fingers the way the reddish/purple ones do.

The chicken takes an hour and 15 minutesand the veggies got an hour. I would’ve given them a few more minutes. The beets weren’t hard, but they weren’t as soft as they could have been. I just tossed them with a bit of olive oil and then squeezed some lemon on once they were on my place. Yum!

The croutons – the best part – are the easiest. Some cubed bread (I prefer a good sourdough) and some olive oil in a pan on med/med-high heat. Takes about 10 minutes and I toss frequently.

Does anyone else have a favorite recipe they continue to revisit?

“Your body hears everything your mind says.” – Naomi Judd

On By HanneIn Food, Health3 Comments

This was originally a facebook post that started to get long so I decided to post here instead – hooray for using my blog for more than one vacation a year!

Someone on facebook posted this article: The Undeniable Facts about the safety of Diet Coke.

I skimmed the article at first, picked up the basics of ‘yeah yeah, don’t judge people by what they eat, personal choice, etc etc.’ Sure, I’m not perfect with what I IMG_1496eat/drink (hello, I spent the 4th of July trying to recreate one of my favorite cocktails from a bar in Oklahoma*), but I do try to make good choices, and I’m slowly getting better at it. And I’ll agree that we spend far too much time judging others for every little thing they do, rather than working to make ourselves better.

But then I read the article again and I started to get a headache as I pieced together the general thought/idea of the post.

The author writes: “I don’t know if you’ve ever bothered to talk to someone who’s really old and had to do some of that live-off-the-land stuff, but you ask them if they want to go back to doing things by hand and they, like my grandma told me once when I asked if she missed the “good old days”, are probably going to come out in favor of automatic dishwashers, cake mixes, and Crisco. It’s called progress, because it is.”

…and pretty much uses it to justify why she enjoys a can of Diet Coke – carbonated water, colour (caramel E150d), sweeteners (aspartame, acesulfame-K), flavourings (including caffeine), phosphoric acid, citric acid.

How you even jump from automatic dishwashers to diet coke? And how is that progress?

Everyone is entitled to enjoy whatever (and we’ll all deal with the consequences when/if they happen), but how is it ‘progress’ to enjoy a can of chemicals and essentially make a mockery of people trying to eat healthily?  “It ends up being an us-against-them battle waged against supermarkets, farmers, and anyone not making that gross runny organic yogurt that makes me throw up in my mouth…”

It then goes to fear. “Out of the fear industry, many things have developed. Like foodbeing afraid of our food.” Well, maybe we should be. Look at these common foods/brands. Living in Denmark, I found most of these things on the shelves at the grocery store, but did you know that they have to be reformulated to be able to sell them overseas? Because stuff in the American versions is banned due to health concerns. And it all tastes the same too. So it’s not good enough for Europeans, but it’s fine for us? Remind me who has a higher rate of pretty much everything deadly? Oh, right. #murica

She continues into making it a poverty thing… is she ‘too good’ for the ‘regular stuff’ because she can afford the good stuff while poor people digging through dumpsters in Nicaragua don’t have enough to eat? She feels so bad, she has to pick the pile of non-organic strawberries that she finds at the grocery store instead? How about saying,’wow… that sucks to be poor in Nicaragua, but I’m gonna support those local, organic places because I can, and hope the whole trend picks up so that more and more will be organic and not come with built in pesticide. Maybe costs will come down and yeah… HEALTH FOR EVERYONE!’

“How does it work, that having a bountiful supply of food before me is seen as the enemy instead of a blessing?” Um… because last I checked, a can of chemicals isn’t food. That’s how that works.

Dear Julie (the author),IMG_1378
I get that you’re all about ‘things in moderation’and ‘don’t judge’ (because we shouldn’t), and that you support healthy eating too, but the article just comes across as so snarky and defensive over your poor habit. Those friends you mentioned? The ones to point out the negatives of your coke? Did you maybe think that they bring those things up because they care about you? Your article is embarrassing and so misinformed. But sure… enjoy your diet coke.

Oh, and those people that grew up living off the land..? The people that pay extra for organic produce? They know what a real tomato tastes like.

 

 

*The Flint Martini – Sailor Jerry Rum, Passion Fruit Juice, Cranberry juice and Serrano pepper. You’re welcome.

Part of the secret of success in life is to eat what you like and let the food fight it out inside. ~Mark Twain

On By HanneIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

I thought I would come here and blog daily about my ten day… whatever it is… cleanse? detox? But that proved difficult. Not because I didn’t have time, but because every single thought I had during the day was consumed with food. What can I have, what can’t I have. Have I had a lot of calories, or am I semi-starving myself? Am I hungry? Can I even do this for ten days?

I have the rest of today and tomorrow. I can do this.

It’s been such and an up and down emotional roller-coaster of fighting myself for control. I felt that I lacked support from my doctors and that was hard (I called with a question – and important one – on Wednesday morning and didn’t hear back until Friday afternoon). I feel like if I am going on something so strict for a specific ten days, I should have access to support from my doctor (since the whole thing is her idea) – esp. when my fucking kidneys ache. Luckily I recognize the pain of a kidney stone, so I don’t believe it was one (or if it was, suuuuper small), but still… if a patient complains of achy kidneys, call the fuck back!

It’s been an intense struggle of you can do this for ten days, it’s not that long vs who the fuck is she to meet with me twice and then tell me what to do. In case you were wondering, I don’t like being told what to do. I mean work-tasks are just that, work, but this… this is different.

This weekend was the most difficult – my dad cooking danish meatballs, having to skip the soccer party because of the food and alcohol, needing the fuel/energy to play my own soccer game, etc. I won’t do this again for ten days. Maybe three days to get back on track, but ten days is just miserable. It’s opened my eyes to just how much and how often (and where) people eat. But I would say 90% of my thoughts the last ten days have been about food. It’s also opened my eyes to what all goes into food, and I certainly appreciate things that are fresh and without preservatives – which can be hard to find anymore. As for sweets, I crave more decadent things – I have the urge to bake a nice chocolate cake rather than a cheap candy bar.

We’ve tried some new things – some that have really turned out to be tasty and some that… I still just can’t do the textures (*ahem* mushrooms). But baked/mashed squash was particularly tasty. We also tried mashed cauliflower which… if doctored with things I can’t have, could be… okay, but not high on my repeat list. And last night, roast brussels sprouts with a balsamic vinegar syrup which was actually pretty good.

I’m also getting used to the breakfast shake and will probably just add a little more fruit to taste once we’re back from thanksgiving. I’m not a big breakfast person to begin with and doing the shake takes the guesswork out of what to grab in the morning. It’s quick and full of good things for me. It’s a little bland as-is, but with a whole banana instead of half, and maybe some berries of some kind, it might actually be enjoyable.

And I have to say, I don’t really miss traditional carbs – bread, pasta, potatoes. We did to sweet potato and yams the past week, but without a little butter to help spread the cinnamon, it was a little…. dusty going down.

So. A good lesson? Yes. Would I recommend it to someone else needing a kickstart when other things aren’t working? Yeah, probably – though I’d suggest cutting back on the coffee/sugar a few days before rather than go cold turkey. And do yourself a favor and relax on the sports/workout those ten days.

So dear body, please have learned how to burn fat. I would appreciate it muchly.
And for fuckssake, someone get me a mocha!