Tag Archives: coconut oil

Hot green nourishing soup

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I don’t know about you, but after the excesses of holiday eating, I’m so ready for something simple and nourishing.

I was inspired by a recent segment on The Splendid Table podcast about basic green soup.

I also am a big fan of The Soup Peddler‘s (colorful Austin vendor of soups, juices, smoothies, and more) green detox broth.

Here’s my mashup, made in an Instant Pot using an immersion blender. I now have some good simple eating for the week and some to put in the freezer.

You can easily make this vegan or Paleo using your own adaptations. Recipes are for inspiration!

Ingredients:

  • 2 tablespoons of ghee, bacon grease, coconut oil, or olive oil
  • 2 large yellow onions, peeled and sliced
  • 1 teaspoon sea salt
  • black pepper to taste (optional)
  • 3 cups water, vegetable broth, or chicken broth
  • 1/4 cup Arborio rice (improves texture after blending)
  • 16 cups of leafy greens, herbs, broccoli, and zucchini (whatever is green and in season), coarsely chopped
  • 4 cups water, vegetable broth, or chicken broth
  • a pinch of cayenne
  • 1 tablespoon lemon juice
  • any other seasonings desired
  • olive oil to garnish

Steps:

  1. Set Instant Pot to saute and add fat, onions, salt, and pepper.
  2. Stir occasionally while cooking for 5 minutes, lid off.
  3. Stir, put the lid on, seal, and pressure cook for 20 minutes. Release pressure and remove lid. Onions should have a nice caramel color.
  4. Stir in 3 cups water or broth and 1/4 cup Arborio rice. Put the lid on, seal, and pressure cook for 1 minute. Release pressure manually and remove lid.
  5. Stir in the green veggies and add 4 more cups water or broth to Instant Pot. Pressure cook for 4 minutes. Release pressure and remove lid.
  6. Use an immersion blender in the pot, blending until contents are liquified.
  7. Add cayenne and lemon juice to taste. Adjust seasonings as desired. Garnish with olive oil.

Quick sweet dessert with raw cacao

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Having given up sugar (well, almost), there are those times when I need to satisfy a craving for something powerfully tasty and sweet. Usually it’s post-dinner that I get that feeling that a little something sweet would be satisfying. And my favorite sweets are those that contain chocolate.

So once every couple of weeks when that craving hits, I add these ingredients (all organic if available):

  • raw cacao
  • coconut oil
  • maple syrup

into a small bowl, stirring to mix. Continue reading →

Juicing with watermelon

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This summer,  I’ve had a blast making juices with watermelon as the main ingredient. Seedless watermelons are so easy to work with, abundant, and inexpensive. You start with the sweetness of the watermelon and add layers of flavor — sour, hot, herbal, fragrant, smoked, savory, and/or salty elements — to that yumminess.

Screen Shot 2017-07-01 at 2.57.45 PM.pngAlthough I make a lot of juices that are all veggies (green) or veggies plus one fruit (usually brown!), for some reason it seemed important to keep this juice red in color, so I didn’t add kale, spinach, or parsley, which I’m sure would have made the juice more nutritious, if less pretty to look at.

I had fun combining watermelon with other flavors. I don’t measure, so measurements aren’t included. Make watermelon the most abundant ingredient, because it’s where most of the juice comes from. After that, use your tastebuds and common sense! Continue reading →

My version of bulletproof tea, an excellent morning drink

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You may have heard of Bulletproof Coffee. It even has its own listing on Wikipedia: Bulletproof Coffee! It’s a brand created by the man who blogs at Bulletproof Exec, who adds a proprietary “brain octane” medium-chain triglyceride oil to it.

The term is also used generically to refer to high-quality coffee blended with high-quality butter or ghee. The inspiration is butter tea, a traditional energy-giving drink in the Himalayan region that uses black tea, yak butter, hot water, and salt (using those pink Himalayan salt crystals, methinks).

I realized a few years ago that – after drinking coffee for my whole adult life – that I didn’t even enjoy the taste, always doctoring it with cream and sugar (waaaaay back before I went dairy- and sugar-free). I started drinking it for the stimulation of the caffeine when I was a young college student, and it became a habit.

Even freshly ground, organic coffee beans just didn’t and still don’t taste good to me. Too acidic and too much caffeine. Smells good, though.

Then I discovered green tea. I enjoy the taste, the lower level of caffeine, the health benefits, and the way my stomach feels. So it was natural to experiment and come up with my own version of “bulletproof tea”.

Screen Shot 2015-06-10 at 10.43.04 AMEquipment:
Have a mug with lid and a built-in infuser ready (or mug plus strainer, whatever you’ve got).

Ingredients:
green tea
pu-erh tea
yerba maté
coconut oil or grass-fed ghee
very hot water
lemon juice
stevia to taste (optional)
salt to taste (optional) Continue reading →

Morning green drink nourishes, improves health and energy, staves off hunger pangs

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These days I’m doing Functional Movement System training 5 days a week and doing 15-20 hours of massage per week. Just had my 62nd birthday, and I’m feeling pretty darn good! Illness, including even seasonal allergies, seems to be avoiding me.

To keep my energy levels high and to feel great, I’m making a green drink each morning. Here’s what I put in it*:

  • IMG_4171A small handful of berries. I used blueberries today. They contribute to brain health.
  • Another fruit or combination, like apple, banana, or pineapple. I find green drinks most palatable when just mildly sweet. Avocado is good, too.
  • Greens. I add a big handful of power greens (chard, kale, mizuna, and arugula), enough to cover a dinner plate well. They add vitamins and minerals and fiber and other healthy benefits.
  • A chunk of ginger root the size of the end of my thumb, for digestive health.
  • Same size chunk of turmeric root, an anti-inflammatory.
  • A bit of raw, unfiltered apple cider vinegar, up to a tablespoon, for alkalinity, nutrients, and to keep candida levels down (if I haven’t already drunk it in a glass of water).
  • 3 tablespoons of coconut oil for energy.
  • A half scoop of whey powder for protein. (I use a half scoop because I am small.)
  • 12-14 ounces of filtered water.

Continue reading →