Family dinners: our anchor

Tonight we were all laughing at the dinner table. Several of us had somewhat rough/blah days, but dinnertime seemed to "re-set" everybody. We all really need that time together at the end of the day.

We're a family that most always eats dinners together. It's very rare that one of us is gone -- we make it a priority to eat together, no matter how busy our lives get.

Not many American families eat dinner together regularly anymore. There have been studies correllating how well children do with how often their families eat dinner together. Statistics like that can't prove any causalities, but it sure seems reasonable to think that there's perhaps an underlying cause. Families need anchors, and dinnertime is such an important one -- it helps "center" everybody.

It's not easy to find family time with teenage kids, not when so many activities are scheduled. Especially when it comes to sports! I don't see how families manage with multiple kids in several sports. What amazes me, in a way, is the contradiction between sports (something good for health) and fast food that invariably gets eaten because nobody has time to cook (duh!).

Yes, I do spend a lot of time preparing my family's meals. It's not difficult -- just takes some planning, and an appreciative family (and I sure have one -- even if they joke, as this evening, about checking the "cauliflower index" of the meal before sitting down to dinner. We all had a hearty laugh, as our CSA box has been supplying us with a heavy dose of the Brassica family lately!

Sometimes I don't know just how time passes so quickly. Wasn't just summer? Weren't the kids in diapers not so long ago? Sunrise, sunset, swiftly flow the days...

Sunrise, Sunset
from Fiddler on the Roof

Is this the little girl I carried? Is this the little boy at play?
I don't remember growing older When did they?
When did she get to be a beauty? When did he grow to be so tall?
Wasn't it yesterday When they were small?
Sunrise, sunset Sunrise, sunset
Swiftly flow the days
Seedlings turn overnight to sunflowers
Blossoming even as we gaze
Sunrise, sunset Sunrise, sunset
Swiftly fly the years
One season following another
Laden with happiness and tears

What words of wisdom can I give them? How can I help to ease their way?
Now they must learn from one another, Day by day
They look so natural together, Just like two newlyweds should be
Is there a canopy in store for me?
Sunrise, sunset...

Why so much sugar?!?

I'm not anti-sugar, but really, why is American food so super sweetened?!?

Today I bought a smoothie at the grocery store (having just finished a workout and needing something to hold me over for teaching). I usually make my own smoothies, but this morning I got out of the door and sort-of forgot to eat a substantial breakfast -- and I don't go too far on just a cup of coffee w/ biscotti.

Anyway, I bought this "dairy beverage" and it was TERRIBLY sweet. Turns out to not only to contain HFCS (High Fructose Corn Syrup) but a long list of other ingredients like sucralose and other artificial ingredients I was not familiar with, and I could not get it down. Not wanting to waste food, I later tried to "thin" it down with OJ and plain (unsweetened yoghurt) -- what a waste -- I still could not drink the stuff. YUCK! I finally tossed it.

Busy day today, and for dinner Liesl made a quick pizza using a commercial pizza sauce (the one that comes in the Boboli pizza crust package) -- yikes, again, way too sweet!

I keep on cutting sugar out of American recipes -- last week I made zuccini muffins in an attempt to make a dent in our zuccini stash -- I ended up cutting the recipe's sugar in half!
Kids were happy: it was still plenty sweet.

So if you're wondering why I don't blog much anymore -- too busy gardening, working and cooking from scratch...

"Hiding" vegetables vs. creative cooking

Who hasn't come across picky eaters, esp. when it comes to vegetables?
"But I don't like tomatoes/beets/squash..." -- who hasn't heard that 100 times?

And I'm not talking about just kids either. I've come across many adults who have a long list of dislikes and refuse to eat a lot of vegetables.
I fully understand allergies to nuts or wheat. I respect people who don't eat meat. I understand dietary restrictions and wanting to stay away from processed foods such as white sugar (I try not to use too much of it myself). I even get that mushrooms are an acquired taste, and for many it's a "texture-thing", but what's there not to like about vegetables?!? Gimme a break!

O.K., the curmudgeon in me is really showing now. I was brought up traveling and living in several cultures, and one of the lessons I learned (besides witnessing poverty and how much more simply many people of the world live) is that it's generally considered bad manners to refuse food cooked for you (unless you really have no other choice, such as that it makes you sick).

Don't worry, I won't make you eat all your vegetables when you come over to my house. I try to keep unusual ingredients as a "side option" to let guests add them as desired. In fact, I do have a real problem with parents pile the food on and command their kids to "eat everything", invariably creating a power struggle. The way I look at it, offer them the food, and if the kid won't eat it, then they'll just have to go without. No fuss! But no alternatives either, esp. no treats! Just let them wait until the next meal... (Digression: our kids have made that choice only rarely when they were small, and no, they did not starve!)

But adults, seriously, you could try a "wee bit" of something. Maybe the way I cook beets (roasted, with maple syrup) will surprise you. No big deal if you don't care for it, but thanks for giving them a try! (Digression: and for heaven's sake, why do some people cover everything on the plate with salt before even taking a bite? That sure makes me feel like they assume everything I've cooked is bland.)

Back to vegetables! I know moms sometimes resort to "hiding" secret ingredients. Did you know that you can "hide" cooked mashed veggies (even spinach) in brownies? Vegetable really do make moist and delicious cakes (just think carrot cake). However, to me that's not the same as truly having the family eating their vegetables (the sugar and chocolate, in my humble opinion, makes it a dessert experience rather than one of eating vegetables as part of a real meal). Still, may I point you to an excellent recipe for Devil's Chocolate cake with beets as a secret ingredient).

Instead of hiding vegetables, first try different ways of fixing vegetables. Many people, esp. small children, will prefer vegetables raw or minimally cooked. I've been surprised by how often kids will eat fresh peas and many other veggies raw, but hate them cooked (esp. over-cooked). Get them into a garden at harvest time, or take them to a farmer's market, and they might just munch away on veggies you never dreamed they'd eat -- one of our local farmer offers slices of "snow apples" (white turnips) -- and you'd be amazed by the surprised faces of his customers. Yummy!

Remember when baby/toddler ate most everything? It's only later that they started getting fussy. "It's a phase", everybody said. And it is, to some degree -- just keep on offering them a variety, rather than letting their finickiness dictate what you cook. Most people need to try something new several times before they warm up to it -- the mistake we cooks often make is that we give up too fast.

Here are a couple of tricks I use with my family:
Winter squashes: try them in soups (curry is great) or even as part of the sauce in Maccaroni and "Cheese" casserole -- see Alison's Lunch for her recipe here.

Greens -- fresh is best, but they can be blanched and frozen. Try simple stir-fry, additions to casseroles and soups, and as pesto-like sauces, such as these greek recipes.

Cabbage -- tired of same old cole slaw? I've got several posts on what to do with cabbage, including cabbage cooked in a whiskey sauce, and of course, "Bubble and Squeak".

Add the veggie-in-question to a proven favorite:
Pizza - will hide a multitude of veggies under the cheese... start with small quanties!
Mexican - for example, my daughter makes a dang-good quesadilla (Barbara Kingsolver style, see link on sidebar) with cooked sweet potatoes, chard, garlic, basil, cheese, and black beans.

The flavor of many root crops will be intensified when roasted -- often tasting so much better than boiled! I used to hate Brussels Sprouts (boiled until mushy in my youth) -- but now I've discovered AK-grown Brussels roasted with just a light coating of olive oil and salt --what a difference!! For delicious recipes, go to this post from last fall.

Lastly, try eating local and in season as much as possible. The CSA boxes and Farmer's Markets have helped our family eat better -- just being in touch with what's in season. Why eat asparagus when it's not in season -- it's expensive, travelled a LONG ways, and doesn't even taste that good. But when it's asparagus season, the price comes down and the flavor goes up -- you can't lose! Maybe even buy extra to blanch and freeze -- how about making a blended asparagus soup base to freeze for a rainy day: just add dairy when reheating (cream & parmesan) for a quick meal in middle of winter.


By the way, I also strongly suggest not keeping secrets.
I cook it, they try it, and if they ask, I'll tell them what's in it.
But then again, if I suspect scepticism, I may be "vague" when asked what's for dinner: I'll call it a mexican casserole rather than specifying that it contains curly kale... just a bit of armchair psychology: gain their trust & don't deceive.

Picture Credit: Shootingstar.blogspot.com

Eating less meat

When I was young, I was a vegetarian for many years. Like many young people, I used to think in "black and white" terms: meat was bad, vegetables were good. I had read Frances Moore Lappe's book "Diet for a Small Planet" my first year in college (having just moved to the US after living in a developing country, I was aghast at the waste and conspicuous consumption) -- I became convinced that meat production was a waste of our planet's scarce agricultural resources. By the time I had children I started eating meat again -- in fact I craved it when I was pregnant!

I didn't give all that much thought to how food was raised as I was busy raising and feeding my growing family -- I was thinking less about the environment and more about cooking well-balanced meals and avoiding junk food! But it does turn out that meat production can be very wasteful indeed, and is perhaps becoming more so than when Lappe's book was first written! I'm now coming back around to thinking about those issue again. A big turning point for me was reading Michael Pollen's In Defense of Food and Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle.

As I've been learning more about where our food comes from, I find I don't care to eat industrially-produced meat, and the alternative (organic, local, wild) is much more difficult and expensive to come by. I have friends here in Alaska who will only eat meat they hunted or caught themselves -- but alas, hubby is not "into" hunting, and our freezer is already out of salmon fillets. ASIDE: in many parts of Alaska, churches and other non-profit organization have volunteers who will process road-killed moose, and the meat is donated to food banks (plus the volunteers get a cut -maybe I need to sign up in order to get some "church moose"?) -- since it is illegal for the driver of the vehicle to simply take home the moose they ran over! EOD, End of Digression.
I'm realizing more and more that not all meat (or eggs and dairy for that matter) is bad -- rather, it can vary greatly. For example, cows are naturally grass-eaters, but in an effort to grow beef faster and faster, they are now fed a diet of mostly corn (which is difficult for them to digest) and thus cattle are given lots of hormones and antibiotics. These are showing up in our drinking water! DNA analysis shows that between corn-fed hamburgers and HFCS (High Fructose Corn Syrup) that's used heavily in processed foods and sodas, Americans are starting to have a food signature that's mostly corn (an interesting movie to see is King Corn)!
The implications of how food is raised have huge impacts not only on the nutritional food value of our food, but on the health of our planet as well. So I'm finding myself eating less and less meat. I'm not a vegetarian, and I do think it's natural for humans to eat meat -- evolutionarily we're omnivores after all -- but yet, I feel less and less like eating industrially-produced meat.

This past year our family has been eating more vegetables, legumes and whole grains, due in part to getting a weekly CSA box full of fresh organic produce! And I must say that I feel healthier and even have lost some of that 40+something weight gain (without even trying -- I certainly am not the "dieting" type (more on that topic on my post Diet is a 4-letter word).

But really, how much meat do we really need to eat? Humans certainly can and do thrive on a mostly vegetarian diet. I admit that while I enjoy a good cut of meat, I find myself less willing to buy what's for sale at the grocery store. Right now I'm reading an interesting book by Nicolette Hahn Niman called Rightous Porkchop (Finding a Life and Good Food Beyond Factory Farms). The more I learn about the food industry, the more I want to get away from industrially-produced meat. I stand there in the grocery store and wonder: did this meat come from a CAFO (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation) where animals are kept in horrible conditions, standing knee-deep in their own excriments while being fattened on corn products and kept from getting sick only by heavy administration of antibiotics? Were these eggs laid by chickens crammed into barns by the thousands, unable to walk even a few steps? Did the bacon come from pigs produced in a giant warehouse operation that produces more wastewater pollution than a small city?

I do recommend the movie Food, Inc (Santa brought me that for Christmas), which does a good job of reporting on food issues without being overly sensational. It makes a really good point about how we vote on food issues every time we're at the checkout stand of the the grocery store -- as our food purchases get scanned, we VOTE with our dollars: for example, as organic products are making more and more gains in the US/World market, industry is starting to pay attention! Within the last few years, our family has switched first to organic milk, then many of our vegetables, chicken and now also beef. And of course we do love eating our Alaskan Wild salmon!

I'm still working on figuring out eggs -- there are a few with the label "organic" and many more with the less meaningful label "natural". Some brands advertise they're antibiotic and additive-free, vegetarian-fed (= no animal by-products), and even cage-free. But does "cage-free" mean they really get to roam the farmyard, or did they get an itty-bitty "yard" attached to a giant facility that very few of the chickens can even get to? Vegetarian feed is better than ground up recycled dead chicks, but then again, eating bugs is actually an important and normal part of a chicken's diet...
Ideally I'd like to raise our own chickens, but I'm worried about the wildlife factor here: would raising backyard poultry act as an attractant to the many bears (black and brown) that occasionally roam our neighborhood? I wish I could find a good local source of eggs that don't cost an arm and a (chicken)-leg! These last few years I've been buying Wilcoxfarms Omega-3 eggs available at Costco (chickens that are fed grass-based diets do lay eggs that are higher in beneficial omega-3 fatty acids) -- but it's still part of a huge factory-style operation (I think?!) -- but then again, one step at a time: at least they're not as bad as some of the other industrial producers out there...

So here I am, puzzled. I go grocery-shopping (and vote!) every week, and I want to do what's best for my family and for my planet. My boys/men certainly do like their spicy food and meat, while my daughters and I would be happy eating mostly vegetarian. So the compromise I'm making is that I try to cook more and more with organic/local produce, and while I do cook with meat several times a week, I use smaller quantities than I used to. For example, I might use sausage more as a spice than a main ingredient, or make stir-fry or curry with more vegetables than meat. I've learned a couple of things over the last few years:

• change seems easier when it's gradual.
• if I cook too "healthy" and lean, then they eat more snacks/junkfood inbetween meals.
• I am the queen of the kitchen:)
• they will eat what I cook --an awesome power, I know -- and I'll try not to let that get to my head!

Photo credits:
Meat from http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons
Eggs from http://www.zetafarms.com

Taxing sugar???

Americans eat (and drink -- in the form of sodas) way too much sugar: refined & high fructose corn syrup is showing up more and more in processed foods from breakfast cereals to salad dressings. In small quantities, these may be harmless, but the trend in our increasing unhealthiness among Western nations is alarming.

Obviously, just as it's not healthy for us to eat loads of fats, we should not consume all this sugar that's hiding in much of our food, and it contributes heavily (pun intended) to childhood obesity, heart disease, diabetes, etc. I wrote about this on a previous reflection post, entitled Diet is a Four-letter Word.

Recently, I got to thinking about something I heard on the radio one morning while barely awake when the alarm came on: a proposed tax on sugar in drinks, a penny per ounce on sugary drinks. Is that a good idea???
Pros
It would make us more aware of how much sugar we're consuming.

Some people would indeed change their habits.

The pinch in the pocketbook is not a hardship to the extend that sugary sodas are not nutrition we need: they're not "food" we need to sustain us (in other words, real food is not being taxed).

The money collected in taxes could be used for a good cause (education about dangers of childhood obesity, for example).

Cons
Diet drinks are not necessarily any healthier. Maybe they should be taxed too?!? For more info, here's more about the link between diet sodas, weight gain and diabetes.

Taxation for behavior modification is controversial -- would it really change behavior, or would people just start getting used to it after the initial "shock", and keep up the unhealthy habits..?

Would "natural fruit juice" start replacing refined sugar in most drinks, allowing manufacturers to charge a higher price, yet without significantly affecting the desired outcome, i.e. people still end up just as overweight on fructose as they do on sucrose...

Would the government end up being a "sugar police"? Is sugar the last legal drug...?

Hey, we're evolutionarily programmed to like sugar: we all know our early human ancestors had a better chance of surviving (and escaping the sabertooth tiger) if they found foods high in calories. But that's not the situation we're in, now is it?

I admit that I love dessert as much as the next person -- but I believe it should remain a special treat, rather than an abused substance!

I need a "Project" like I need a hole in the head...

I just finished reading the book Julie & Julia, and am looking forward to seeing the movie soon with Eldest, my daughter known in blogland as "Kitchensister" -- she's a great cook and I'm sure we'll enjoy seeing what probably is best described as a chick-flick food movie (at least that's what I tell my hubby as to why I need to see this movie with Eldest instead of him!).
For those of you not familiar with the movie(click for trailer here), here's the essence:
29 year old NY secretary, Julie Powell, feels a need for a project, and takes on cooking all 500+ recipes in Julia Child's famous cookbook "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" and blogging about it -- setting herself the challenge of doing it all in year's time...

I just finished the book tonight, and I admit it, I enjoyed it -- it's about two women searching for meaning in life (Julia Child also started her cooking career late in life), and the process of embarking on the "Project" helps both woman find joy in their lives.

The natural consequence of my delving into this story is, naturally, a search for my own year-long "Project" and blog about it -- something that will change my life?!?!

Shall I cook my way through all of Paul Prudhommes' Cajun recipes -- that would make my husband VERY happy, and do no good to either of our waistlines? Nix that!

shall I be the perfect "Hausfrau" and actually keep a clean house for a year? Nix that!

shall I cook my way through a different cuisine or cookbook every week? Hey, I like that idea!

shall I pull a Barbara Kingsolver and cook only healthy organic local food for a year? Noble thought, but can't realistically pull that off here in Alaska! Nix that.

shall I spend the winter cataloguing and scapbooking 20-some years worth of family fotos, including an actual digital library that makes sense? Talk about a big job!

shall I make a handknit sweater and/or make a quilt for everybody on my Christmas list? See you in a few years-- I have enough unfinished objects (UFO) in my craft area that I don't need to start any new ones for a good year. Nix that!

shall I forget all about food and crafts and practice yoga until I have the perfect flexible body and find enlightenment too? Too esoteric...

shall I ... you fill in!

Food rules at your dinner table?

I recently wrote down some of my family-of-origin's food rules, after reading Michael Pollan's request for them on the NYTimes Health page.

I grew up in Germany, near the French border. We often ate cheese & fruit for dessert, and the saying went "Kaese schliesst den Magen", literally translating to "Cheese closes the stomach".
Our main meal was "Mittagessen" or mid-day-meal, and evenings we usually ate "Abendbrot" (evening bread) -- mostly made from whole grains, plus cold-cuts, etc. Wine, beer or herbal tea accompanied that.

The saying at our house was: "Iss morgens wie ein Kaiser, mittags wie ein Koenig, abends wie ein Bettler" (In the morning eat like an emperor, mid-day like a king, and in the evening like a beggar). The idea is to eat heartily earlier in the day, and lightly at the end of the day. Much to my chagrin, my husband's pattern is the exact opposite -- alas!
However, Germans do have a 4th meal in there: there's the traditional mid-afternoon "Kaffeetrinken" that usually involved pastry -- often mom's homebaked Kuchen with lots of fruit, and sometimes even whipped cream. One of my aunts would say this when refusing a second helping; "Minuten auf der Zunge, aber Jahre auf der Huefte", which literally translates: minutes on the tongue, but years on the hip -- in other words, the brief pleasure of eating the second helping was not worth the weight gain.

Do you have any food rules to share?

Photo credit: "American family dinner", Provincetown, MA, 1942 by John Collier, Jr.
NOTE: I found the photo on civileats.com, a great website about eating sustainably, slow food movement, etc -- I recommend you check it out if you're interested in such things as food policy & culture, the environment, health, agriculture and growing your own food. I did add the link on the sidebar under sites I follow.

Home Cooking vs. TV Food Shows

It was in 2001 that I first saw an episode of "Iron Chef" on TV: I couldn't believe what I was seeing on the screen (we don't have TV) cooking as entertainment!
It was New Year's Eve, and we had been invited to a party where most of the people attending worked in the food business (the food was SUPERB, and the kitchen a mess)-- during the previous year we had become good friends with a professional in the "Food Service Business", and were first granted behind-the-scenes looks (and tastes) of the Restaurant world -- what an eye opener!

I have to admit that I'm a real sucker for European-style desserts -- so I LOVED visiting our friend at his job. Just imagine going to work every day at a fine bakery, such where he was a manager -- aaaah, the tortes and pastries were a feast for the eyes, and I longed to taste them! My young children who came with me into the bakery declared "when I grow up, I'm going to bake the best birthday cakes, all day long!"
But I soon learned that it was not just tortes and petit-foit all day long-- I naively thought it would be "fun", but that line of work is really is stressful, and our friend (who has since gotten out of the food business) will advise any youngster, who may ask his opinion, against choosing this career.

Now we like to eat gourmet food, and sometimes enjoy an evening eating at a fine restaurant, but it is a rare treat! Most of our meals are home-cooked, from scratch, and I thought that's how most people eat -- but that seems to be disappearing in America. Cooking one's own food a skill that's getting lost -- HOW CAN THAT BE?

I'm lucky that I grew up in a culture that valued cooking at home -- to my family eating a meal out (or even heating up pre-packaged "convenience" food) was just not normal -- it's a rare exception to, well, cooking in your own kitchen-- doesn't everybody? I mean, how difficult is it to learn how to cook rice, potatoes, or chicken?
I've learned to cook and bake from my mother at first, but more so after I was on my own, "self-taught by trial and error". I became a vegetarian early on in college (in the Deep South where most everything was fried in bacon grease) -- so by necessity I had to teach myself, and I became a decent cook along the way.

Cooking for my family is a central part of my life -- I don't at all feel like a slave at the stove (the laundryroom, yes). It really is too bad that feminism cast a negative light on home tasks such as cooking -- NO, I feel proud of feeding my guys good home-cooked meals!

In a wonderful article this week in the New York Times entitled "Out of the Kitchen, Onto the Couch", writer Michael Pollan explores the American public’s growing love of televised cooking shows, even as people lose interest in cooking for themselves. He starts out with a wonderful description of the Julia Child's THE FRENCH CHEF shows he watched along with his mother in the 1960's, who, according to his mother " took the fear out of cooking". Pollan writes:

But here’s what I don’t get: How is it that we are so eager to watch other people browning beef cubes on screen but so much less eager to brown them ourselves? For the rise of Julia Child as a figure of cultural consequence — along with Alice Waters and Mario Batali and Martha Stewart and Emeril Lagasse and whoever is crowned the next Food Network star — has, paradoxically, coincided with the rise of fast food, home-meal replacements and the decline and fall of everyday home cooking.

The Food Network has helped to transform cooking from something you do into something you watch... the Food Network leaves you hungry, a condition its advertisers must love. But in neither case is there much risk that you will get off the couch and actually cook a meal.

They found that when we don’t have to cook meals, we eat more of them: as the amount of time Americans spend cooking has dropped by about half, the number of meals Americans eat in a day has climbed... In fact, the amount of time spent cooking predicts obesity rates more reliably than female participation in the labor force or income.

At the end of his article, Pollen wonders if we can put the genie back in the bottle, i.e. American willing to make cooking part of their daily lives again. But talking to veteran food-marketing researcher, Harry Balzer, he was told "that's not going to happen":

“Why? Because we’re basically cheap and lazy. And besides, the skills are already lost. Who is going to teach the next generation to cook? I don’t see it." But then Balzer says "You want Americans to eat less? I have the diet for you. It’s short, and it’s simple. Here’s my diet plan: Cook it yourself. That’s it. Eat anything you want — just as long as you’re willing to cook it yourself.”

Get the kids involved -- let them cook with you, for you -- it's one of the best skill you can give them: being able to fend for themselves, and feed themselves (not out of a package or drive-up window)! It's easy -- start them with making their own PB&J sandwiches from scratch, with the best ingredients at hand... Before you know it, they'll be baking bread with you, and helping with the berry harvest & canning your own jams (that's what Youngest and I did today!) -- but hey, still working on a local source of peanuts here in AK!

Photo credits:
Iron Chefs by globalpov.com
Pastry by Emilsswisspastry.com
1950's housewife by Getty Images, nymag.com
Julia Child by current.org

Forensic Motherhood, and Black Beans recipe

Envision yourself coming home from an afternoon of shopping (dad gives mom of three kids a well-deserved break), and as mom walks up to her house, she finds it deserted. BUT, there is a trail of blood leading up the stairs, and the front door is wide open. What happened? Who got hurt? Where did everybody go?...
This happened to my mom some 40 years ago -- before the days of cell phones, or, apparently, before the days of pencil of paper. My mother nearly went out of her mind until my dad finally arrived back from the hospital, where my little sister had gotten stitches on her forehead, after having run into my brother on the swing (remember those wooden boards with sharp edges -- this was before someone smart designed the soft butt-hugging type that does not require surgery when you rammed another kid...)

Nothing that scary happened to me, but the other day I got home from work to a rather strange scenario, hubby having taken the kids to their music lessons in town.

Door is wide open...
I walk into the kitchen: there are 4 cereal bowl with the remains of milk and granola. I only have 2 kids living at home, so how is that possible? Easy, teenage son probably ate 3 bowls, and the 4th belongs to his little sister.
I need to get some dinner started, so I turn to the stove. There is a black liquid oozing out from under the stove, and a yellowish-red powder dusting the counters and floor. Several pots and pans are on top of the stove, with various blackish-graying substances on them. Ahhh, now I remember, they had wanted to cook black beans for burritos -- Son had declared that he was tired of PB&J, and wanted to learn how to make burritos, from scratch!
I had soaked some black beans overnight. Instructions were to "cook until soft", mash them with a potato masher for "Refritos", then add spices. Turns out the pot of beans boiled over, explaining the black ooze. There was an attempt made to mash the beans BEFORE they were soft, which caused quite a few chunks of gray-black matter decorating my kitchen. Lastly, Son attempted to grind the spices -- problem was that he opened the lid while the blade was still spinning....

There are days where I would have been mad at the mess, but that day I only chuckled, being rather proud of myself for having figured out what happened. This is as close to CSI (=Crime Scene Investigation, which Germans would call a "Krimi" ) as I'll ever get -- I love watching the TV series -- the scientist in me enjoys a bit of detective work that goes into figuring out the clues left in the evidence...

Ahhh, the joys of forensic motherhood!

Now for how to cook Black Beans (pay attention, Son!)

Soak beans overnight.
Change water.
Boil on LOW until soft (they will be very mushy, and fall apart!)
This will take a LONG time, like, several video games worth.
Keep an eye on the beans -- don't let them boil over, or let them boil dry...


Refritos de Frijoles Negros
(=Refried Black Beans)

cooked beans (make sure not too watery -- drain first, if needed)
oil, onions, garlic
spice mix: cumin, coriander, black pepper, red pepper flakes
salt

Heat oil, cook onions and garlic. Add beans, mashing with a potato masher (or use the bottom of a glass). When nice and mushy, add salt and spices "to taste"
Optional: if you want really spicy MANLY refritos, add chorizo that's been fried really HARD.

Photo credit to www.all-about-forensic-science.com for the blood spatter picture,
and www.guate360.com for the beans picture.

Strawberries -- the Grim Truth

We love strawberries, and it's a rite of spring for our family to treat ourselves to a breakfast of German pancakes topped with strawberries. Our May birthday is celebrated with Swedish "Blotkake" (literally Blood cake) with layers of cake, whipped cream and fresh strawberries.

Today I was listening to a science & technology program on NPR about the heavy use of a soil fumigant (methyl something or other), which is used on something like 80-90% of commercial strawberry farms in the US. I had no idea! I know from my nerdy love of soils how terrible the practice of killing all the soil organisms is. And I immediately realized the need to look more closely at the labels and origins of strawberries I buy -- in the past I've often been sceptical when organic produce costs WAY more (I can see 50%, but balk at anything approaching double the price)-- I'm not exactly made of money and got to watch the bottom line.

I learned on the radio program this afternoon that those big strawberry producers feel they can't get away from fumigating for a number of complicated reasons -- the crop is so high in value yet the risks of failure are high, and they can't get financing/insurance if they don't practice fumigation...
Yet this methyl-fumigate is terrible stuff, and there's a movement to outlaw it in the US -- not only is it terrible stuff for the health of any farm workers who come in contact with it, but it also contributes to the destruction of the ozone hole.
Now I feel guilty -- my love of strawberries is destroying the planet below-ground and in the atmosphere too!
Now some good news: researchers at the University of Sonoma (if I remember correctly) are experimenting with application of ground up mustard seeds as an alternative to fumigation. BRILLIANT -- I just love it! Good old natural remedy -- turns out the mustards not only work as a deterrent to the bad fungi that can hurt the strawberry plants, they also help the good symbiotic bacteria that help the roots. BEAUTIFUL.

So now I'm REALLY looking to the strawberries in my garden this summer, and this week's CSA box, which will have organic (=guiltfree) strawberries.

What to do about "Picky" Eaters?

What, alas, to do about picky eaters?

Interestingly, parents tend to fall into 1 of 2 opposite camps: either they think their kid is the pickiest eater ever to have walked on this earth, or, they don't see their own kid as picky at all, just other people's kids!

I came across an interesting blog discussion recently on "Eating Well" about how to get "veggies down" picky toddlers and kids. Check out the moms discussing how they get their kids eating veggies, including quite a bit of trickery. One of the funnier ones was a mom who swears that if you tell kids a dish is special "only for mom & dad, you kids would not like it", then the kids will REALLY want to try it too. LOL. I also liked what Daytona wrote about her family's experience: "Growing Greener Broods" -- It got me thinking about parents' role in their childrens' eating habits.

Here's some free and unsolicited advise.
My qualification are merely that I'm a mom of 3 children range from 11 to 22, so I've been there done that... Even though I don't have toddlers anymore, and we don't really have any major food "issues" these days, I realize that I still have a huge influence on the two children remaining at home. I hope Eldest will comment on this post!

#1. Don't make eating a battle.
This one sounds simple, but I see food battles between parents and kids all the time. Many kids go through picky stages (most notably during toddlerhood) -- and you and they will get thru -- but please don't set the stage for them to have food issues for life...

#2 Model good eating behavior.
You need to eat your veggies too! Don't snack on empty calories between meals, in the car, etc...

#3. Keep on offering new foods alongside the regulars. Look at the bigger picture -- don't make it about the green beans at tonight's dinner. It's not that important, and they may just be "off" their feed tonight (or this month, or this...?) Keep some perspective: it's o.k. if they don't eat the green beans-- keep calm, and serve another healthy dinner tomorrow.
Variety is a good motto-- just keep on offering lots of choices. Intersperse new foods with their old stand-byes, so you don't fall into a rut of "same old". Kids can only expand their horizons if you offer it to them -- don't give up on them.

However, don't give in with junk food -- you can offer other healthy choices, but not junk foods, esp. not SWEETS!

Most importantly: Remember NOT to make mealtimes into power struggles.
And kids can be Masters at power struggles : then they control you (hee hee!)
If you make a big deal about how they won't get any dessert if they don't eat their green beans, and then later, after a lot of fussing, you give in and let them eat dessert, then the kid has WON. Lesson learned is "they may threaten me with no dessert, but in the end, I do get what I want!"


If they're still really young (toddlers), and they're putting up a real fuss at the dinner table: "Food up, Kid down." In other words, the kid's meal is over (end of discussion)-- they'll get a chance to eat in another hour/couple of hours. No, they won't starve, I promise.

Remember, you (the parent) can only control what goes on the table, but not what goes in the mouth! So don't go there! Choose your battles carefully, and give ultimatum ONLY if you (backed up by your spouse) can be consistent. (HINT: Let natural consequences work, rather than artificial punishments -- going hungry until the next meal is a natural consequence, getting sent to bed early while the other kids get to go play outside is not.)

If they're older, stay positive. "Thanks for trying that new dish. Sorry you didn't like it -- what would you do to make this tastier? If you're still hungry, there are some carrots/ apples..."

It could be that the particular food dislike is one they'll never end up liking (just think, are there foods that you just can't stand? Sauerkraut? Haggis?) Your kid has a right NOT to like a food, and needs to learn to deal with this politely -- teach them to say "No thank you" instead of "Yuck", and if you're lucky, the # of items on the Disliked-foods list will shrink as they get older...

DIET is a four-letter word

The Anchorage Daily News Sunday section had an article today about a local woman who had participated in the TV reality show "World Biggest Loser" -- for non-TV people, like myself who have never seen this show, let me explain: This is a TV show where participants compete for a grand cash price, and subject themselves to a grueling regiment of crash-dieting and exercising in front of TV audiences until they meet their goals (some get "eliminated" along the way). I was dismayed at what this poor woman had gone through, and how she's still struggling with her weight and self-image 2 years later (and a baby) -- it just all sounded so unhealthy, in ways even creepy and sinister!

Americans seem obsessed with dieting to lose weight. Even though 90-95% of all diets fail, that doesn't keep them from trying, dreaming of looking like those models in the magazines.
Most people who diet will gain back the weight they lost, often surpassing it. Then they try another diet & repeat the cycle. This phenomenon of Yo-Yo-dieting is probably is worse than simply staying at the previous weight while reasonably active.

I have to admit right here that I am one of those lucky people who has never counted calories or carbs. I'm certainly not skinny (heavy-boned German with hefty boobs), and would never be picked for a bathing suit commercial, but luckily I've never been HUGE. I credit lucky genes for the largest part, and simply being fairly active. But the middle-age spread is catching up with me, and I could certainly use to shed a few pounds and tighten up the flab around the midriff ... But I'm determined to approach improving my weight&health without crazy dieting schemes.

Obviously being overweight is not healthy -- it increases the risk of heart disease, diabetes, yada-yada-yada. Enough already -- we already KNOW that! But then why can we not manage to keep our bodies healthy?

America is facing a weight/health crisis DESPITE the fact that we've been told for some 35 years that being overweight increases health risks, and that we ought to eat less saturated fats. So we buy products touting health claims of "Low fat", "reduced cholesterol" etc., and are still getting fatter and fatter. What gives?

Seems like we've been replacing saturated fats with the wrong kinds of fats, and we're filling up on empty calories. And our portion sizes (even our plate sizes) are bigger -- we're indeed eating significantly more calories than before we started the "lower fat diet". And we're less active than ever before. No wonder Americans (and many Western countries are heading the same direction) are getting fatter, and so are the kids: Childhood obesity is becoming a serious problem.
There are more and more overweight children, and our society seems not to know how to help them. Just telling the kids to "eat less and exercise more" is not cutting it -- adults are not exactly good role models in that department! How do you expect kids to get off the couch & onto their bikes if the adults drive everywhere in their cars, and think of the world as way too dangerous a place to step outside your front door?

Maybe this TV-watching kid is watching the documentary Supersize Me? Maybe he's already given up? In the kid's defense, genetics do play a role too, and he's probably not exactly inherited skinny genes -- but still, it's so sad to see him embarking so young on a lifetime of health problems!

QUESTION: Do we eat to live, or live to eat?

The problem with our Western diet is that we've lost touch with real food. Our ancestors would barely recognize what's on the shelves of our stores: long lists of ingredients, many of which we can hardly even pronounce. In his book In Defense of Food, Michael Pollan advises us to eat what our ancestors would recognize as food -- that is stay away from highly processed food stuffs, and eat real food, preferably grown locally, without heavy inputs of industrial agriculture (chemicals, fertilizers, etc.) -- his description of what goes on in feedlots might make you want to puke & forgo meat altogether!
I still maintain that humans are omnivores, and eating meat is a natural part of our biology, but we're certainly not meant to eat the huge amounts of animal proteins, or the amounts of refined simple carbohydrates (white flour and sugar) that have become standard in the so-called Western Diet.
Michael Pollan's book is fascinating, and I like his 7 simple words to guide us:
EAT FOOD. NOT TOO MUCH. MOSTLY PLANTS.

Here are two other books I read last year that dealt with some of the more psychological aspects of the problems people have with eating and weight control: Mindless Eating by Brian Wansink, and Intuitive Eating by Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch -- different approaches, but both very valid looks at the WHY: what goes on when we overeat, and how can we change that?
I learned a lot from both of these books. Sometimes we just eat unconsciously, or for emotional reasons. We've learned to ignore clues our own body/mind gives us about hunger or fullness. One interesting experiment that Wansick's team did was the "bottomless" bowl of soup: the bowl was being re-filled from below, and people kept on eating and eating, unaware that they were eating WAY more than usual. The comment when asked how they liked the soup was something like "That soup was really filling" -- yeah, they ate what, 4 or 5 bowls?!? But they thought they were eating their normal amounts!
The principles of eating more intuitively are also very helpful, whether you're just trying to get to a healthier weight and lifestyle, or struggling with major food issues such as eating disorders:
1. Reject the Diet Mentality
2. Honor your Hunger
3. Make Peace with Food
4. Challenge the Food Police
5. Feel your Fullness
6. Discover the Satisfaction Factor
7. Cope with your Emotions without using Food
8. Respect your Body
9. Exercise -- feel the Difference
10. Honor your Health -- Gentle Nutrition

One of the "aha" moments for me was how they explained that denying yourself certain foods (chocolate, for example) will end up making you crave that food, setting yourself up for a failure (in a "weak" moment you "cheat", then end up eating a whole box of chocolates, and feel like a total failure, your image of yourself is that you "failed" to control yourself, spiraling into further depression over food...) Instead, go ahead and give yourself permission -- if there are no "forbidden" foods, then these foods will lose that power over you, and you'll find yourself not craving it... This is such a gentler approach, and I think could really help people who are struggling with unrealistic expectations of diets and body image.

Another book I picked up recently is by Mark Bittman: Food Matters, where he advocates more "conscious eating" by eating less meat, more local produce, and reducing amount of highly-processed food -- for our health, AND for the health of our planet.
He mentions that he lost extra weight and saw a marked improvement in his health just by making these simple changes -- cutting out meat and processed food out of 2 of his 3 daily meals. Bittman writes that for him it worked well to eat "Vegan until 6pm", something it turns out also resonated with my husband, who is happily eating his veggies for lunch these days. I do wish he'd ask some whole wheat grains to that, because he he just gets so darn hungry when he gets home for dinner (I bet he'd do fine with Ramadan, where you have to wait until sundown to eat)! He has replaced his formerly high-carb midnight snack with fruit, a step in the right direction. Poor guy, he just gets so "peckish"...

For myself and my family, I'm just aiming for a greater awareness of healthy eating in our daily lives. Since we started buying our produce in CSA boxes and I started a blog (Borealkitchen) to guide me in cooking with all that produce -- well, I've noticed that my pants are sitting looser on my waist -- darn it, they won't stay up!

I think the biggest factor in eating healthier is that with more vegetables around, I eat less of other foods. I'm realizing just how easy it is to pick up processed foods -- they are everywhere! When I'm in the grocery store I try to make sure I don't shop hungry, and try to stay on the perimeter rather than in the middle isles where all the food comes in boxes. After all my reading I realize that they're full of empty calories ("refined" grains, which means the fiber and kernels are removed -- needing "enrichment" to put the nutrients back in!), and the long shelf-life was "bought" by replacing healthy (unstable) fats with unhealthy (hydrogenated) fats.

Does that mean no more OREOS for the kids' snacks?
I'm not trying out for the Ogre-mom of the Year award, but yes, I buy far less of that stuff , and try to get around to making healthier homemade treats more often instead.
It's not easy to keep our household supplied with "healthy" yet appealing snacks for the ever-hungry hordes that descend on the kitchen every few hours -- but somehow homemade baked goods or bananas with organic peanut butter is winning, and neither kid is starving or complaining too loudly. (And I have to add that both kids are thin as rails -- but so were hubby and I at their ages, the inevitable bulge around the middle did not set in until around 40!)

So I try to shop, cook and feed us healthy meals, keeping an even-keeled perspective (I see little point in getting into a religious fervor over food). I just want to stay healthy, balanced & make peace with food -- it's what keeps us alive and healthy, and we may as well enjoy it too.

Saint Patty, Greens & Omega 3s

Happy Saint Patrick's Day!
Hope you're planning a nice GREEN meal. And I'm not talking about green food coloring in your beer or mashed potatoes, I'm talking about serving and eating more leafy greens.

We KNOW that greens are incredibly good for us, but admit it, most of us don't eat enough greens! Besides the obvious benefits of fibers, vitamins and iron, antitoxins and phytochemicals, there are the Omega-3 fatty acids, which we've been hearing about more and more in recent years. Yet somehow our western (American) diet has largely selected against Omega-3. Why is that?

It wasn't until the 1980's that scientists learned the importance of Omega-3 (If you want to read about why Omega-3 are good for us, while Omega-6 are not, I recommend Susan Allport's book The Queen of Fats: Why Omega-3s Were Removed from the Western Diet and What We can do to Replace them). Scientists think now that maybe what matters most is the ratio of Omega-3's to Omega-6 (in other words, getting enough Omega-3 in relation to Omega-6 may matter more than absolute amounts of Omega-3s).

So where do these Omega-dudes hide?

Our western diet depends heavily on seeds, primarily on wheat, corn and soy. Seeds are full of Omega-6. Where do you get your Omega-3? You guessed it, leafy greens (and the wild ones are especially good sources). Omega-3's are part of the photosynthetic process -- ergo, they hide in greens and algae! And thus they work their way up the food chain: that's one of the reasons that grass-fed beef is better for you than grainfed feedlot beef. We hear alot about how seafood is a good source of Omega-3's also, but really, fish just get theirs from seaweed and algae. Green plants is where it's at! SO to get more Omega-3, cut to the chase and eat more greens -- did I mention that greens were good for you? (This is probably one of the very few things nutritionists really agree on!)

I loved Michael Pollan's book In Defense of Food. Pollan tells of how nutritionism and "Food Science" have messed up repeatedly-- the more they've tried to reduce food into nutrient components, the less healthy our diet has become! They've been telling us for years to eat a lower fat diet, and we've gotten fatter and fatter. For example, first butter was deemed bad, was replaced by margarine and hydrogenated oils, and then it turns out those are worse than the butter! Ooops. More recently nutritionists have discovered the health benefits of Omega-3, yet because Omega-3 is not very stable, plant geneticists have actually been breeding against it (because we wanted food with long shelf-lives)..! OOOOPS again.

My personal pledge is to serve more GREENS. Regardless of what the nutritionists' latest controversies over what nutrient components are good or bad, it is clear that in it's most unprocessed form, plants (esp. greens) are undeniably healthy.

Let there be something green on our plates every day -- make every day St. Patrick's Day!

Spinach to the rescue!!!
Spinach is best fresh -- no doubt about it! After my rant against processed spinach the other day, I feel I need to make amends and extol the many uses of frozen spinach. Face it, we can't always have fresh spinach & other leafy greens on hand. Still, I NEVER use canned spinach (blech!), but I do use frozen spinach, and will even freeze my own -- esp. when I have HUGE quantities from a Costco Warehouse shopping trip and realize I can't cook it all before it starts spoiling. Or when the garden produces copious quantities and I need to harvest it before it bolts!

To freeze spinach, I just steam or blanch it briefly, and stick it in the freezer in ziploc bags, or freeze in small quantities, such as icecube trays.

For something GREEN, here is a small collection of ideas & recipes that make use of generous quantities of frozen spinach (always handy to have in your freezer) -- in other words, these dishes are good places to hide large quantities of the dreaded "Spinat"!

Lasagna, pizza, calzones, quiche
Soups (esp. blended soups which have a greenish color already)
Homemade spinach pasta (yumm!)
Omelettes, "Green Eggs and Ham"
Brownies (Honeypiehorse's trick: just blend the spinach first and replace part of the butter called for, and don't breathe a word! )


Green rice
(this is my own version, there are many)

olive oil
onions, chopped
garlic, minced
greens (spinach, etc) - fresh or frozen & defrosted
fresh herbs: parsley, chives, cilantro, etc
long-grain rice (not the instant stuff!!!)
water or stock (2x quantity of rice used)
salt, pepper
parmesan cheese, grated

Saute the onions. Add garlic, greens. Cook until wilted. Pre-measure the amount of liquid needed for your quantity of rice (2c water for 1 c rice) Transfer to blender together with fresh herbs, using enough of the water or stock to be able to blend well. Return to pan, rinse blender with rest of the liquid. Add rice, cover and and cook on low for about 20 min, or until all the liquid is absorbed. Fluff rice, and add salt, pepper, parmesan as desired.

Easy Baked Fish with spinach topping
Fillets of any mild white fish (such as tilapia)
lemon juice
spinach (fresh or frozen & defrosted)
mayonnaise and/or sour cream
salt, pepper, garlic powder
parmesan cheese

1. Place fish in a baking pan and dribble some lemon juice over it.
2. Mix spinach with all the other topping ingredients, and cover the fish fillets with topping.
3. Sprinkle with grated parmesan cheese
4. Bake at 350 F until fish is cooked (test if flaky with fork) -- 10-20 minutes depending on thickness of fish.

I therefore propose a toast to St. Patty, whom I nominate as the patron saint of green vegetables:
May you bless us with lots of greens in the coming year!

What's a CSA box?

CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture, and is a concept that has been around for a while, but only recently has caught on in the American mainstream. I just found out, interestingly, the idea started in the mid 1960's in Germany and Switzerland, and was based on the economic ideas of Rudolf Steiner, the founder of the Waldorf School education.
The idea is simple: local farmers are supported by people in nearby urban populations -- if enough people get together, they can contract the farmer to keep them supplied with fresh produce throughout the growing season, supporting local sustainable agriculture based on ecologically sound practices.

Originally, most CSAs would work thus: you prepay the farmer (let's say $300), and then all summer long you receive your "share" in weekly produce boxes. Some farms even had the city dwellers come out and help with harvest at the farm every week.

Gradually CSAs became more "user-friendly", and you could choose when the boxes come -- so if you went away on vacation, you didn't end up with produce going to waste. Some now even allow you to choose the contents of the box (hate kohlrabi? then substitute carrots...)

We get out produce from Glacier Valley Farm in the nearby Matanuska-Susitna Valley, and this time of year it's a mixture of organic produce from Alaska and Outside (that's what Alaskans call the rest of the US). Another popular CSA around here is Full Circle Farm which ships its produce from the the Pacific Northwest.

So every week on Wednesdays, we pick up our CSA box. It's a little bit like Christmas: opening the box and finding out what goodies await your culinary experiments this week (but first it's time to hit the recipe books...)!

It's interesting to me how, after having lived all over the world and tasted many cuisines (and I love exotic produce and ethnic foods!), I'm now coming "home" to the recipes of Northern Europe -- heavily reliant on potatoes, apples, carrots, the cabbage family, etc...

What shall we have for supper?

No sooner have I cooked a meal and the fam has devoured it, I find myself scratching my head: what shall I cook for the next meal?
As a mom, I have to think about food a great deal of the time -- I need to procure it, store it, cook it, serve it, clean up after it. Further, my job description includes that it be timely, healthy, tasty, and appeal to the different family members.
Let's meet the players, shall we:

There are picky eaters: "But, MOM! You know I don't like..." That's not much of a problem in my family -- they're pretty good about eating a variety, willing to try new things, and mostly appreciate my cooking. I do occasionally hear "MOM, you're the best cook!" Music to my motherly ears...

There are hungry starving masses, who walk in the door "I'm starving! What can I eat. NOW?!?" They can't possibly wait for dinner...

There are the sceptics: "What's in this -- what are these green/brown/red/purple things?".
Plus, I frequently get asked the question of "What's for dinner?" in the middle of the afternoon, and woe to me if I don't have an answer...

There are the condimenteurs (my own term), who feel everything tastes better if you add salt/sugar/ketchup/peanut butter... For crying out loud, can't you just taste it first without ruining it?...

And last, but not least: "Is that all?" and "What's for dessert?"

So, I've started writing about my family's adventures with food.
When I was in college, I read Francis Moore Lappe's Diet for a Small Planet, and it rang very true for me, and I promptly became a vegetarian -- to save the planet! That lasted less than a decade: when I was pregnant with my first child, I started craving meat, and realized my body needed the protein, iron, etc. I still love vegetarian food, and prefer a diet that's not too centered on meat, but believe that humans are squarely in the omnivore category.
Last year, my eldest daughter (in college), who knows and thinks a great deal about food and is also an excellent cook, suggested I read Michael Pollen's In Defense of Food and Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. Excellent books, very thought-provoking.

So we're trying to eat more local food (we buy a weekly CSA box & farmer's markets), we've always enjoyed Alaska's wild harvest (salmon, blueberries, etc.), plus there's the good old grocery store. I personally don't tend toward extremism, and can't see my family repeating Kingsolver's experiment of eating only local organic food (much as I admire that, it's very difficult here in Alaska) -- but I'm becoming more and more aware of how our food is produced.

Middle child Wolf (high school freshman), was assigned to read Pollen's writing in his science class this week. Bravo to the teacher: what an excellent assignment -- great discussions! Like the rest of our family, this child is always thinking, questioning, wondering.
Yesterday over dinner I witnessed the following exchange with dad:
son: "Are organic vegetables really better for you?"
dad: "Marginally. But organic is better for the planet."
son: "I can see that. Less chemical fertilizers and pesticides, right?"

Alleluja, the next generation is on board! One meal at a time...