A FRIDGE FULL OF FOOD...

Doctor's Kitchen Monday: A New Year with Home-made Granola

It's a new year and although I did lose 15 lbs. last year it feels a hollow victory.  Does it really count if I lost and gained and lost and gained the same 10 lbs over and over and over again, barely inching my way down the scale throughout the year?  Maybe so but I really had higher hopes for the beginning of '08.  Sigh.  But such is life and there's no going back, only going forward.

The two things I'm really trying to tackle this month are the all important B and B's: Breakfast and Beverages. 

Let's start with soda.  I go up and down with my consumption but it's a constant battle against the addictiveness of Coke. Just love the stuff. If I have the choice between Pepsi and water, I'll choose the water, but if Coke is the choice, I'll drink it. The weird thing is I drink more of it at home than at work.  I'd think that would be the opposite but at work I'm moving around so much that I get dehydrated, know it, and crave water.  At home, nothing like an ice cold Coke. Right?  Okay, so I'm a product of effective advertising.

To fight my addiciton I've limited myself to an 8 oz serving a day and turned my attention to water, iced herbal tea, and Crystal Lite when I really need something flavored.  In the meantime I printed out this article and pasted in to the shelf above my desk and will read it every day and even change it out for articles in the same vein to keep myself reminded of just how healthy soda is. Not.

Take a look at this HEALTH BOLT: WHAT HAPPENS TO YOUR BODY EVERY TIME YOU DRINK A SODA --  and we wonder why diabetes is so rampant in our culture. Armed with that bit of depression I'm drinking lots of iced herbal tea today with lots of water tonight at work.

Moving on to breakfast I thought  long and hard.  One of the mistakes I've made in past January gung-ho moments is to think that I'm suddenly going to change everything about myself in one fell swoop.  From past experience I think I can safely say that's not going to happen so instead I think I'll try to work with my natural inclinations.  For breakfast, I like carbs mostly.  I can do eggs but in my least healthy moments I'm more of a biscuits & gravy and hashbrowns kind of girl.  Well those are out, obviously, but what I did come up with was granola.  I like cereal but it usually leaves me starving by lunchtime, which is no surprise since most commercial cereals are little more than sugar held together by refined flour.

I decided to make my own granola, which I happen to love. It's hearty, delicious, and if I make my own I can control the ingredients 1) to shape it to my tastes or whims of the week, and 2) which means I can control the sugar.  That's a win-win.

Doctor's Kitchen Monday: Salad Dressings

(Great photo but I can't claim it.  For more salad ideas, see this and more at www.saladaday.org )

Salad dressings are my personal poison, along with Coca-cola. Fat and sugar, always my frenemies. I could eat salad three meals a day if only I could find dressings that taste like home-made rich, fatty, tongue-pleasing bleu cheese without calorie counts in ten digits.  Auntie Miranda and my friend, Ashley, have been helping me on this quest so I will gladly plagiarize their experimentations.  Okay, okay. I want to sound like I'm being evil but, really, they gave me permission.

Click on the link below for low cal/low fat salad dressings: two versions of Poppyseed and a Blueberry vinaigrette..

Diet update:  I've now lost 2.5% of my body weight so I'm 1/4 to my minimum goal of losing 10% of my body weight before Halloween.  The 10% goal is based on studies showing that for people with a significant amount of weight to lose, even 10% reduction will bring positive effects to health such as reducing blood pressure. 

So after I got back on the eating healthy bandwagon, I've done a little better about not drinking soda at work and not eating carrot cake from the cafeteria every time I have a difficult patient.

I'm getting more exercise too.  My friend Barb, from work, and I are going to water aerobics  The hilarious part is--we're the YOUNGEST people there!  But it really is a great workout for my knee and we're doing well.  We use the heaviest water weights for the arms workout and I can feel it the next day. We also actually DO the routines instead of just standing in the water gabbing like a lot of people around us. Not that I'm judging, I'm just saying Barb and I are working the routines.  We went two days last week. I also went to an hour belly dancing class one day which is like an hour ab workout.  It's harder than I thought it would be.  We were all sweating at the end so it was cardio as well.  I felt good about it.  Plus, I've been wearing a pedometer to work and I walked a total of 13 miles in three shifts and I did compressions at a code, trading out with Brian, for almost 40 minutes.  If you don't think that's a workout, you should be inside my chest, back, and arm muscles afterwards!  So to recap that's 3 exercise classes, 13 miles walked, and 20 minutes of compressions.  Not too bad.

Next week my goal is to go to water aerobics twice, go to bellydancing class once, and bike at least once, on top of the walking during work.  I'm trying to start small, do things I like, and not beat myself up if I don't accomplish everything I'd love, in my head, to do.  That goes for food and exercise, and doubly for the rest of the my life as well.

Doctor's Kitchen Monday: Humor & Update

From www.everydaypeoplecartoons.com

I'm down 1.8% of my body weight since starting what I now think of as the "Ashley Diet" meaning the diet I'm on with co-workers, put together by Ashley. I'm following the Omega Diet, concentrating on good fats, complex carbs, lots of fresh food.  We're making a push through the end of summer up until Halloween when we see who wins the money we've all chipped in.

Doctor's Kitchen Monday: 16 Pictures Speak Louder than a Thousand Words

Time Magazine in partnership with CNN has posted a photo essay called:

What the World Eats 

Everybody needs to look at this.  I found it very compelling.  One of the things I noticed right off was something we already knew but this really underlines the fact:  The more modern the country the more boxed/bottled/canned/processed foods there were and the more fast food containers on the table. The less modern the country, the more vegetables and whole grains there are on the table.  I was also struck by the differences in the amount of food and it doesn't always correspond with the number of people in the family.

Click HERE for the link to "What the World Eats".

This is an example of a one of the families in the essay from California. Sure looks pretty typically American, as in mine and my friends' tables,  to me.  But there were also a lot of boxes, bottles, and cans on the tables of the families from Great Britain, Germany, and Italy.  Very interesting. Less bottles/boxes/cans on the tables of the folks from Egypt, Chad, Bhutan, for example.

At the end of that photo essay you can connect to another photo essay called "What Makes You Eat More Food" which is also a good reminder of how much our senses of sight, smell, and time influence our eating patterns.

Click HERE for that direct link to "What Makes You Eat More Food".

And what am I eating right now this morning for breakfast as I type this entry?

Shredded wheat cereal out of a box with 1% milk and a spoon of white granulated sugar.  And a 12 oz can of Coke.

Could be worse.  Could also be better.  The photo essays made me more aware of my choice. Too bad I didn't read the essay before I put the sugar on my cereal and popped the top on that can. I might have chosen differently.

The Biggest Loser--the Work Version Update:

I've currently lost .7 % of my body weight.  Remember my goal is at least 10% by Halloween. I hate that it's not a round 1% but .7% still translates into a loss.  Hey, maybe I should drop those Cokes for breakfast, duh. :-)  Click HERE for the original post about my work buddies and our diet contest.

Doctor's Kitchen Monday: The Mediterranean or Omega Diet

Fresh Cherry/Strawberry bread with low fat Cardomom/Honey Cream Cheese

At work, Ashley has gotten about a dozen of us together to play The Biggest Loser-The Work Version where everyone is measured by percent body weight lost, minimum 10%, and the reward is not only looser jeans but everyone's throwing in $1/week. The contest runs from yesterday through Halloween, 18 weeks.  Nice time frame to really accomplish some health changes and a nice little pot of gold at the end of the rainbow for someone.  We're focusing on the 10% since, being in the medical field, we're all aware of the studies that have shown that for folks who have weight to lose, even a 10% change can reap medical benefits in lowered blood pressure, lowered cholesterol, etc. 

I'm not going on any weird diet, just going to refine what I'm doing now, cut out the junk, and get back into a solid exercise plan.  For years, since Gene's heart attack, I've focused on excising transfats from our diet and focused on more veggies and complex carbs, but we've gotten lax.  The truth is the biggest bulk of eating right is about what you allow yourself to buy at the grocery and how many times you take the time to cook even when it's easier to run through a drive through.  I've gotten bad about being lazy with cooking.  I tend to forget that simple can be better for you, and as much or less trouble than getting in the car to pick-up take-out.

The basic rules of the Mediterranean, or Omega Diet**, are mostly what we already know:

• Eat foods rich in Omega-3 Fatty acids such as fatty fish (salmon, tuna, trout, mackerel), walnuts, canola oil, flaxseeds, and green leafy vegetables.
• Use monounsaturated oils such as olive and canola oil, expeller pressed (not heat processed).
• Eat seven or more fruit and vegetable servings every day.
• Eat more vegetable proteins: beans, peas, and nuts.
• Choose lean meats and low-fat dairy items over high fat meat and full fat dairy products.
• Avoid transfats:  basically anything in a box at the grocery, from the bakery, or is ordered at a drive-thru window.

**From The Omega Diet by Dr. Artemis Simopoulos and Jo Robinson.

Getting back into the Mediterranean routine, I purchased expeller-pressed canola and walnut oils at The Cheddar BLOCK on Saturday to make salad dressings (no way to get that many veggie servings in without making more salad meals), and I've stocked our crisper with veggies and berries, and have refilled the "fruit bowl" with apples, peaches, plums for the moment.

Last night we had steamed cod (not fatty fish but still, fish) and salads for dinner.  As a side at lunch the other day I made fresh cherry/strawberry bread with low-fat cardamom/honey cream cheese, a nice way to combine a whole grain with a fruit serving.  I think the couple of years I was in school, I just got out of the habit of thinking fresh and common sense wholesome to the point where it became more of a treat than a way of eating generally most of the time.  After school, I just didn't get myself back into the habit of making better choices but this is an excellent chance to recommit to both cooking more with our health foremost in mind and getting back into a better exercise frame of mind too. 

At work, we all get exercise, I have learned that by being off with my knee the last couple of months and how easy it was to put on ten pounds from the lack of exercise. When I first left school, I wore a pedometer for about a month at the hospital and we average about five miles a day on our feet.  But it's not the same as that 30 minute walk around the track and getting some resistance work in.  For me, because of my knee I'll have to go a little more slowly with the cardio but I'm even more motivated to getting back to strengthening the muscles around my knees, and my back, all for the sake of staying healthy on the job and not being out with another injury.

Losing a chunk of weight and winning that almost $200 bucks would be the cherry (pun intended) on top.

Doctor's Kitchen Monday: Lemon Chicken Scallopini Redux

My favorite dish in the whole world is Lemon Chicken Scallopini.  Everybody has a favorite and that's mine.  I've always been more of a salty/savory kind of snacker and lemon chicken scallopini fulfills all of my taste favorites: salty, savory, and tangy.

I love the way pounding the chicken makes it so tender, almost not meat-like. It loses some of that stringy, chewy, hardness that I hate about eating animal flesh whether it's steak, poultry, or fish.  Actually, to be honest, I tolerate beef (triglyceride gasp!) and fish better than the texture of chicken or turkey, unless the poultry filets are white and pounded thin.  Then, they melt in my mouth and I can plow through an full serving with no problem. Prepared any other way, I have to force myself to eat meat. I usually cheat and snack on protein jello, soup, bars, and shakes from Dr. Brenda's Carriage Park supplies or GNC.

This sauce is my all time favorite. I love the savory down-home goodness of the chicken stock mixed with the tartness of the lemon, the saltiness of the capers, and the muskiness of the 'shrooms.  Most chicken scallopini recipes also add bacon. Sometimes I add that but sometimes I skip it because the bacon can be the one traditional ingredient that, for me, throws the balance of the dish over into "too salty".  I like the earthiness of the bacon but the salt adds up even if you're using low sodium chicken stock so I can live without it or with very little. I know I'm going all Un-Emeril when I say that but this is the one dish that, in my opinion, can be undone by bacon specifically because of the saltiness.

I'll eat this sauce on almost anything. Feel free to think dirty on that one because I really love the simplicity of this sauce.  In the picture, I also fried the last bit of green cauliflower I had left from Aunt Miranda's produce jaunt last week.  Not only did it taste magnificent, it brought back great memories of all the lunches Aunt Miranda and I shared at Marketplace Cafe on National that is now the second Garbo's Pizzaria.  They served long fat wedges of fried cauliflower in this sauce and it was to die for. I don't know about Aunt Miranda but I remember nothing else on that menu EXCEPT the fried cauliflower appetizer.  Luckily, Gene hates cauliflower, no matter the color, and I got all three pieces.  That's okay. I traded him half of my chicken.  It was worth it.

Capers, a Mediterranean flower bud, high in Vitamin A and Omega-3 Fatty Acids, is my spotlight this week for Weekly Herb Blogging. Created by Kalyn of Salt Lake City's Kalyn's Kitchen, WHB is hosted this week by Astrid of Paulchen's Food Blog.  Check in with her late in the week for the round-up of heraliciousness.

Doctor's Kitchen Monday: Look Ma! The Cauliflower's Changin' Colors!

Aunt Miranda sent a bag of goodies over the other day from her favorite produce department.  It's always fun when she does that (thank you, Auntie Miranda!) because it gives me new fun veggies to play with.  I'd heard of these but never actually had any in my hands.

That got me thinking about cauliflower. I love it: raw, cooked, pureed (the fake mashed potatoes), fried with lemon sauce (super yum).  My husband hates it.  The smell alone drives him away.  And I don't blame him.  Some people can get past it, some can't. Personally, I love cooked cauliflower but I've never been able to get past the smell of turnips cooking.  To each his own.

In any color, cauliflower is very good for you.  More so than you might think. For example, 1 cup of raw cauliflower gives you the recommended daily intake of Vitamin C, a powerful antioxidant.  On that basis alone, cauliflower is on the hit parade of "good for you" vegetables and is my addition this week to Cate at Sweetnick's Antioxidant Rich Foods/5-A-Day weekly event.  Check out Cate's site for more ARF foods.

Doctor's Kitchen Monday: Celiac Disease vs. Gluten Allergy vs. Gluten Intolerance

   I'm going to be real honest here. I started researching this topic for my own curiosity. I started writing it hoping it would be as interesting to you as it was to me.  But somewhere along the line,  at about the 2,000 word mark, I realized that this was more than a simple blog post. I'm a freelance writer and this is an article so I'm not going to post all 3,000 words this article is turning into, complete with references.  Instead I'm going to market the article but I'm going to share with you guys right now the personal stuff and the heads up on the basic differences.  When I sell it, I'll let you know and maybe even reprint it on the site but until then I really can't print the whole thing here because then it would be considered already published.

     Is it just me or are there times when certain names, products, places, or ideas that you’ve never heard of in your life (you think) suddenly pop up on your radar and suddenly you see them everywhere?  I’m that way with celiac disease. I’d heard of it before but not paid much attention until lately.  For the first time I had two patients right before I took medical leave for my knee with celiac disease. Then a friend of mine was diagnosed by her massage therapist.  A couple of years ago both my sister and I were tested for a barrage of allergies by an M.D. Allergy specialist and we both take allergy shots.  I have no allergies specifically to any foods, mine are all things like grass, dust, mold, etc. My sister is allergic to just about every pollen and mold known to man, plus wheat, corn, tomatoes, and a few other foods I don’t remember.  Corn. Boy, isn’t she screwed with all the high fructose corn syrup in every box, bottle, and sack on the shelves of the grocery? 

     In the last month or so I’ve noticed a few gluten-free blogs on the net. To be honest, I’d seen those blogs before but I’d never paid attention because I’m not celiac, gluten allergic or intolerant, so I just didn’t pay that much attention.  Let’s be honest. We’re all naval gazers. We only really pay attention to what suddenly becomes important to us or that we have to deal with.  As a respiratory therapist, I don’t have to deal with food issues in the way of feeding patients but there are a few heart and lung meds that are inappropriate for patients with peanut or iodine allergies, so I do tend to look at the chart to see if there are any med or food allergies, etc.

     Let me state from the beginning here that my whole mission in this post is to share information. I’m not advocating a gluten-free diet, nor am I dismissing its use by anyone not officially diagnosed with celiac disease or gluten allergies. So use the information and anecdotes in whatever way they work for you.

Doctor's Kitchen Monday: Can Diet Control Asthma?

Asthma, hyper-reactive airway disease, is the narrowing of airways and inflammation of airway tissues, usually caused by triggers which provoke the chain-like asthma reaction. The most common allergens, or triggers, can be external common allergens like pollen and dust but there are some people who are triggered or at least minimally bothered by certain foods.  Food triggers for asthmatics can be the sulfites in beer, wine, and cider, some food colorings, molds in cheese, lactose in dairy, or allergy to eggs, seafood, wheat gluten, soy products, or nuts.  An allergy specialist, as in real medical doctor not chiropractor or herbalist, can perform skin tests to find specific food allergies. Allergies are unique to the individual both in type and sensitivity to the allergen so testing is useful for both pinpointing the trigger and knowing the level of sensitivity.

But food can fight food.  There are foods that we all should be eating, asthmatic or not, that help keep the body tuned well.

Doctor's Kitchen Monday: Mechanically Pressed vs. Chemically Extracted Cooking Oils

In the comment section of my post on “Herbalicious” where I made my own infused oils, I was asked what exactly “expeller pressed” meant.

Expeller pressed designates an extraction method.  “Cold pressed” should mean the same thing but since “cold pressed” has no legal definition, manufacturers can use it misleadingly.  Actually so can the term expeller pressed since the manufacturer can still expose the oil to high heats, or hydrogenation, but I feel comfortable as long as I stick with certain brands I trust like Spectrum.

Expeller pressed refers to a mechanical rather than chemical extraction of oil from the seeds, or olive flesh, in the case of olive oil.  Expeller pressed is literally a pressing and centrifuging of the material to form oil.  Some heat is still applied but not at the same high temperatures as in chemical extraction. In chemical extraction, high heat sources are used along with chemical reactions to extract the oil.

Hydrogenation, the result of  the high heat manufacturing process, increases shelf life and makes oils resistant to higher cooking temperatures.  The process literally adds hydrogen atoms to the ends of the fatty acid chains which makes them saturated.  So even though the oil may be vegetable oil instead of animal fat, it is now saturated with hydrogen. Saturated fat has been shown to increase cholesterol and be a contributing factor to heart disease.