Fried Rice

This is so easy to make and pretty darn healthy. I use brown rice which makes it even better for you. I can see why this is a staple in so many other countries. It's also a great way to use up leftovers.

4 cups leftover refrigerated rice
1 diced onion
oil (olive oil or coconut oil)
2 eggs
2-4 tbsp soy sauce to taste
1 tsp paprika
salt
pepper
garlic (1 minced clove or a dash of powder)
leftover veggies (peas, corn, chopped spinach, bell peppers, green beans, mushrooms, etc.)

Saute the cold rice, onion, and veggies in oil. Add soy sauce, salt, pepper, garlic. Push rice mixture to the side and crack eggs into the skillet, blending them as they cook. Serve.

Notes-
In the pictures I used spinach and green beans. This was not a big hit with the kids. They liked it better the next time I made it with carrots and corn. Use whatever sounds good to you. My husband and I really like this new dish.

Chow Mein

I wanted to attempt to make a Panda Express Chow Mein Noodles copycat and although I didn't have all the right ingredients on hand, this turned out so good. My husband was loving it and begged for all the leftovers. My kids loved it and I loved it. Yum. Here's what I came up with.
(Oh, and the pictures are from a few different times that I've made it until I had perfected it.)


1 package soba noodles (these are found in the Asian cooking isle)
1 can mung bean sprouts or 1 1/2 cups fresh mung sprouts
1 cup fresh snow peas
2 cups chopped cabbage (either Napa Cabbage or Bok Choy)
1/2 a diced onion
2 minced garlic cloves

(optional to add sliced mushrooms, diced bell pepper, etc.)

salt, pepper to taste
2-3 tbsp soy sauce (we prefer 2 tbsp)
olive oil

Directions: Saute all the veggies and beans in the oil. Cook the soba noodles in a pot of boiling water according to package directions. Once noodles are done cooking, drain and add to the sauteing veggies. Add seasonings and soy sauce. (Don't add too much salt because the soy sauce will be salty.) Pour more olive oil over the sauteing noodles and veggies. Saute the noodles with the veggies for a few minutes and serve.

Notes:
Not very healthy when it comes to the noodles since I'm yet to find whole grain soba noodles. But with the olive oil, organic high quality soy sauce, and all the veggies, this is pretty good for you! Of course, I haven't been able to find all of these ingredients organic so this is one of those "not eating the way we should be meals" that happens from time to time. You could easily substitute coconut oil for the olive oil which I plan to do next time, making this an even healthier dish. This is going to be one of our new vegetarian meals because it was such a big hit.

I've been making fried rice too and I'll share that recipe soon.


Anyone know where to get whole grain soba noodles or a healthier alternative? I'd love to know!

Why Does Restaurant Food Taste Better?

Have you ever wondered that? I have and so I decided to do a little research, some brain storming, and share my thoughts with you. I'm not talking about McDonald's, I'm talking about your very favorite dish at your very favorite restaurant. You know, my son paid me the biggest compliment at dinner one night awhile back. He said, "Mom, this dinner is so good, it almost taste as good as a restaurant!" Well, I may never achieve restaurant quality but here are my thoughts on it.....

Restaurant food often taste better because:

1. They use a whole lot more butter. Butter is like the king of foods. Think about it. Butter is used in almost every course of your meal....the dinner rolls, sometimes the salad dressing, the main dish, the side dishes, the gravy and sauces, the desserts, and even some drinks (buttered rum anyone?)! Chefs in restaurants don't shy away from using large amounts of the creamy perfection which gives their foods a deep rich flavor that most home cooks would tip over in shock from. Yep, lots of butter.

2. Restaurants use a lot more seasonings. Home cooks often don't know what seasonings to use to compliment a dish let alone how much of it to use. Chef's are trained how to feature one seasoning in a dish to make it memorable. And don't forget salt. If butter is the king of foods, then salt is the queen. Most home cooks shy away from using spices and seasonings in general and usually use little salt for their own health conscience. But restaurant chef's aren't too worried about your health for that one night experience in their restaurant.

3. Perfection. Huh? Well, think about it. Restaurants have worked to create only their very best. They've taken the richest, the savoriest, most amazing dishes they can come up with and they perfect them, create their menu out of them, and create them night after night after night. I'd say that they get pretty darn good at making those same dishes all the time. Home chefs have to work with a much bigger menu...ya, we'd get bored of eating the same 10 things on a regular rotation and to boot, if they were all our richest, most savoriest, incredible meals then we probably wouldn't be eating very healthy. Home chefs don't get the practice of recreating a dish over and over and over again 50 times a night until it's pure perfection. Nor do we usually have all the ingredients on hand that we are supposed to have on hand.

4. Someone else made it. Yep, that alone makes the food taste better to me. If I don't have to make it, I automatically give it 4 stars!

anyone else have any thoughts on it? why do you think restaurant food taste better?

Comments and Challenge

Ladies,

I really appreaciate your comments on the post below! I'm really excited to share more posts about our changes and things we are learning. I have a post for Friday about why restaurant foods taste better than home-cooked sometimes and I'm working on a post about why organic doesn't have to cost you more (and how to make that happen)! I've been able to keep my grocery budget THE SAME! =0) I can't wait to share more with you.

It's exciting to see all the changes people are making to eat better and change our American ways! If you aren't in American you probably aren't facing such a huge challenge with eating healthy...but if you are, I'd be interested in hearing for you too!

So, it's been two weeks since the eat-out-of-your-freezer-and-pantry CHALLENGE! =0) How's it going? I'm happy to say that our freezer is looking about half as full now! Hurray! The pantry looks about the same unfortunately but that's mostly because I buy in bulk. Regardless, my fridge and freezers are slowly being emptied and it's a great feeling! I've only had to run to the store a few times to get fresh items.

The time it takes to switch to eating healthier

A lot of people feel like eating healthier is this huge monstrous mountain ahead of of them to conquer. Well, that's how I felt anyway. Maybe others are less intimidated by it than I was. At first the information overload was enough to do me in and I tried to sort my way through each thought as to what "healthy" is. Can you relate? Well, I want to encourage anyone else out there that feels this task is just too hard to accomplish and anyone that is plain old overwhelmed by it.

My journey to eating healthier began about 6 years ago. Yep, that's how slow this process has been for me. SIX long years and I'm still learning. So, 6 years ago I learned the concept of eating "whole foods". No, not that I only ate foods from the Whole Foods store but I learned what it meant to eat foods in their whole (complete) form. You can read this for a simple explanation of what whole foods are. And so, the journey began.

My biggest challenge was getting my whole family switched over. Switching myself was easy but alas I'm married with children. Thankfully I started this when my children were still very young and yet even then the transition was difficult. My son was 3 years old and was used to guzzling cows milk all day long, eating processed American cheese every day and his snacks were all processed foods that came out of a box in the pantry. Glorious was the day when I got him completely weened off of American cheese! And to think it was my fault to begin with.

You'd think that the kids were the hardest to switch over but no, my husband has proven to be the one most stuck in his eating habit ways. He's a typical guy (ie. is NOT that interested in seeking out the healthiest foods he can eat) and well, his habits are 37 years deep. Patience, patience, patience. I'll have you know that 2 years ago we became a soda free home! Yep, I won't buy it and he now drinks water or 100% organic juice. Now, he does get a soda when he's outside of the home from time to time but hey, I'll take what victory I can claim!

Whole foods naturally led into cooking from scratch more. That seemed to be the next big transformation during the 6 years of changing our family's eating. Cooking from scratch is a big adjustment. It means more time in the kitchen, planning, more time in the kitchen, more measuring, more time in the kitchen, and did I mention more time in the kitchen?

After discovering whole foods and starting to cook from scratch more the next phase happened....organics. I know, I know, what is all the hype about organics already??? If you don't know, you gotta start knowing. For a brief and very under stated explanation of what organic foods are you can read here. But then I'd encourage you to watch Food Inc. and/or The Future of Food.

Organic foods have not been at all hard for the family to switch over. In fact, they usually don't know the difference unless they are pleasantly surprised by how much better the organic foods taste. BUT, it has taken a long time to switch over to shopping for all organics. Again, this has taken patience on my part including diligence and research.

The last phase I went through which was recently was how foods heal. I read this book called Foods That Heal and was quite taken with it. If you like that book, you might like this blog also called Foods That Heal. Shortly after that book, I read this book, Nourishing Traditions, and well, the rest is history.

Now of course, we don't all end up at the same place when we search out healthier eating. This is just where my journey has taken me. The point of this post is that it takes time. If I had tried to make all the changes at once I would have quit in frustration. I just made little changes that seemed doable at the time. I bit off one bite of elephant at a time and am still slowly making my way through all the changes I'd like to implement into our family's normal eating habits. It's good to look back though and see some of the major victories, well, and even some of the small ones too. Six years and running. I do feel that I've reached a huge milestone recently....we are about 90% of the way switched over to healthier eating. If you had told me it would take 6 years I don't think I would have hung in there.

So, hang in there and if you are feeling overwhelmed by it, take it one step (one change) at a time, do what you can, and once you've gotten adjusted to that one change, then tackle another....you'll get there eventually and it's well worth the work, the time, the diligence, and the health of it!

Anyone else feel overwhelmed by the journey? How long has it taken you or is taking you so far?

Cast Iron

As I continue on this path to more natural living and cooking, I decided it was time to dig out my used-once-about-ten-years-ago cast iron skillets from the garage. They had to be scrubbed, spider webs removed, and re-seasoned.

Seasoning your cast iron:
Coat the pans completely with shortening. You can season just the cooking surface but I like to do the entire pan to help prevent rusting. Place in 250 degree oven for 2 hours. Put a cookie sheet under them to catch drips. Let them cool and then wipe them down with a lint free towel and store till ready to use.

It helps to cook greasy things in them the first several times to build up a nice black seasoning on them so that other items won't stick. After each use, wash with warm water but no soap. Soap will remove the seasoning. Dry immediately to prevent rusting. Then I place on my stove and brush it with olive oil. You can put it away after that.

How's the challenge going?

How is the eating-out-of-your-freezer-and-pantry-challenge going? Funny, I feel like I'm barely making a dent! I might have to carry this out for longer than 2 weeks....so far we've been able to eat up several things though and many of them were not-so-healthy items that I had bought long ago and now feel guilty eating so they would just sit there in the freezer never getting used. Now that I'm trying to eat out of the freezer we are slowly eating up all those things and it's nice to have them out of there finally. I've had to be creative about ways to use them in moderation and work them into our menu. But I can't stand being wasteful so I wanted to be frugal and use them. It feels great to get the out of the freezer and be done with buying unhealthy things!

How is the challenge going for you if you are taking the challenge?

Homemade Potato Salad

I made this up and it's soooooooooooooooo good. I think someone was asking for a recipe earlier this summer so I apologize for it being past the summer season but it's also a great dish for football season! =0) I wanted to create a potato salad that tasted like my Great-Aunt June's like I remember as a small child and watching her make it in the kitchen of her enormous house with an elevator. I think I successfully mastered it!

8 peeled and cubed yukon gold potatoes
8 hard boiled eggs
1/2 a diced onion
3 diced celery stalks
2 diced whole kosher dill pickles
2 cans sliced olives
1 cup mayo plus more till moist
heavy squirt of mustard (about 3 tbsp)
a douse of the pickle juice (secret ingredient!)
salt and pepper to taste (about 2 tsp salt and 1/2 tsp pepper)

Boil the potatoes just till tender. Yukons are the easiest to digest but they also are a very buttery potato (making them a great choice for potato salad) so they can fall apart easily if cooked too long. Drain and run cold water over them till cooled completely. Refridgerate till chilled through. Peel and chop hard boiled eggs (be sure they are chilled ahead of time as well). Mix all the ingredients together.

Links

I've added some new links on my page under the "great links" section. I'm often asked about resources for special things and I want to share them with all of you. Be sure to check them out.

Some of the new ones are:

Tropical Traditions (organic coconut oil products-I've recently added coconut oil to my pantry and my recipes and my husband and I can't seem to get enough of it! They also carry organic coconut body products)

Organic Food Store Locator (I told you about this one earlier! Great page if you are new to shopping for organics)

Vita Cost (great place to buy discounted organic/natural products through mail order)

Vanilla Products USA (vanilla beans in bulk-While I don't see that these are organic on their main website their ebay store does have them in organic at an incredible price. I have seen organic vanilla beans at Costco but they cost much more.) Check out their ebay site here.

Organized Home (great website for home management including a blog)

updating recipes

On my journey to eat healthier I often revamp my recipes as I learn more. Some recipes I've made and finally taken pictures of. So here is a list of some of those changes.

Macaroni and Cheese (added picture)
French Toast Bake (added pictures)
Broccoli Salad (new picture)
Yogurt (changed recipe to be sweetened naturally)
Coconut Rice (added shredded coconut to the recipe)
Spanish Rice (changed recipe)

Garden Fresh Tomatoes

I wish I had planted about 10 tomato plants or maybe even more. These were so good and when it came to making pasta sauce I could have used a ton more tomatoes to supply us with pasta sauce till next season. We also cut these up for salads but would eat them as we were cutting them. There is nothing like a garden fresh tomato! It doesn't even taste like a store bought tomato.These are our Early Girl tomatoes. For some reason the bees didn't like our heirloom Mr. Stripey plant and refused to pollinate it. I even tried to manually pollinate the plant but it didn't work. We were so disappointed but maybe next time.

Some ideas for using Kale

Here's a good post about some ways to use Kale as a pesto. Check it out.

Christmas in September?

Yep, if you plan on making Christmas gifts homemade, now is the time to start thinking about getting started on those projects. Check my previous Christmas Craft post for tons of ideas! And don't forget this great gift especially with fall approaching....

anyone else have links to great homemade Christmas gift ideas?

watch next week for a recipe and info on seasoning cast iron!

Challenge

I'm challenging myself to shop out of my own freezer and pantry for meals over the next two weeks. I've got a new Home Management folder put together (it was time to resurrect the old thing) and in it I have a Meal Planning tab. This works because while we are showing our house for sale I don't want menu plans stuck on my fridge.

So, notebook in hand, I went to my deep freeze and listed meal ideas that I could make. Then I went to my kitchen freezer and found a few more ideas. Then I looked in the fridge and pantry for side dish ideas and lunch ideas. Here's hoping I can avoid shopping for more food (other than fresh produce and milk) for the next two weeks. I'm excited to see how much we can eat out of our deep freeze. Our deep freeze needs to be defrosted and I need to do that before cooler weather sets in!

Anyone else want to take the challenge????

Using Radish

A friend and I were talking the other day about ways we can use radishes. She threw out a few ideas and I decided I would challenge myself to come up with some more ways to use radishes in our diet. Not only are they healthy (lots of vit. C) they are easy to grow during the spring and fall.....

whole dipped in your favorite dip
in coleslaw
in green salad
in three bean salad
in potato salad
in pasta salad
in texas caviar salad
in soups
blended in dip
in rice salad
on sandwiches
grilled radishes
as a soup (using the tops even!)
in asian lettuce wraps
in crab salad
in chicken salad sandwiches
in tuna salad sandwich
in egg salad sandwich
steamed as a side dish
served mixed with other veggies like green beans
in cucumber or tomato (quinoa) salads

I can't wait to try some of these.

Anyone else have ideas or recipes they love using radishes?????

Where to buy organic?

This is a very helpful post about where you can get organic and natural foods! If you are at a loss for where to begin looking, besides the organic section of where you already shop, do consider this post. I was also amazed to see how many products you can get through amazon.com. I had no idea!

Thanks Heavenly Homemaker for sharing this post with links!

Costco Finds

Now, I didn't buy all of this in one trip nor did I buy all of it. Some things are just stuff that catches my eye and I thought you might like to know...like the canning books for example. They looked awesome but I'm not canning for now but I know some of you are.

Organic Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Organic Sugar (evaporated cane juice)

Organic Spinach Artichoke Alfredo (yum!)

Environment Friendly Dish Soap by Kirkland (this is what I use now)

Environment Friendly Dishwasher Detergent by Kirkland (jury is still out...I like it but it clumps in the box because there are no anti-caking agents in it) I wish they'd make a liquid version.

Little Girl Dresses (always a deal at $12-$18 each)

Elizabeth Gaskell DVD box set for $29! Score!

Organic Strawberry Jelly

Organic Peaches

Organic Quinoa

Organic Animal Crackers

Organic Annie's Bunny Grams and Cheddar Bunny snack packs

Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving

The Complete Book of Small-Batch Preserving

William Sonoma Eat Well

William Sonoma Essentials in Asian Cooking

Stackable Glass Bowl Storage Containers with lids (I've been looking at glass containers for quite some time now and the trouble with them is that they don't stack! Until I found these today and hey, they stack! Not only that, but you get more for HALF the price of the rectangular/square set that Costco carries.)

Classic books for kids....you get a set of 4 for $5.49!!! The print size is exceptional and they even have a few tiny pictures here and there...something my kids love. This will save me some trips to the library when it snows!

The Future of Food

Here's another must see. This is another documentary about food in America. Only one word comes to mind....SCARY! This film is by far much more boring compared to Food Inc. Food Inc. was done in a more entertaining way as far as films go but this film has a lot more information in it about GMOs (genetically modified organisms). If you don't know what GMOs are, this film is for you. The fact that GMOs in High Fructose Syrup are known to cause tumors, birth defects, and allergic reactions among a long list of other problems, it's no wonder our nation is having a health crisis. In addition to that, the political side of this conspiracy is shocking. The hype about helping starving nations when in reality the same people are the ones not allowing other countries to use their "patented seed" is just about as hypocritical as it gets. Also, why is it that we think in our minds that if poison kills a bug, and if the person spraying the poison has to be covered in a hazmat suit, that we can spray it on our food and eat it?!?!?!? Are we that brainwashed? I have been. Clearly brainwashed.

Okay, now I'll try to calm down. I'm getting carried away. I know I risk losing some readers now that I'm becoming a food Nazi. But seriously people....if only everyone could grasp what is happening.

Okay, back to the film...it's called The Future of Food and you can watch it free from the comfort of your computer on Hulu. Just click here. Thanks, Katey, for telling me that it was on Hulu.

SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL FARMER!
BUY ORGANIC!
DEMAND ORGANIC!
when you can, VOTE AGAINST GMOs and the patenting of life!

EDUCATE yourself about the food crisis!