Eden's Table

 
 
I've been experimenting with pita bread recipes the past two days. It was a request from my husband along with hummus and fresh veggies. It's an easy, portable, and healthy lunch for him. I'm lucky to have a wonderful health concious guy who loves trying out new recipes and watching cooking shows with me. Anyway, the goal is to do away with white flour all together and just use whole grains, preferably so I tried two different recipes. One soaking the flour and the other just using it straight from my grain grinder. I liked the soaked version better although it takes 2 days to prepare. If you don't have the time, here is another great recipe. They both turned out wonderfully.
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   I like to crunch and carrots are fine up to a point, but I like a good carb crunch. So I tried a new recipe for crackers today.  Wonderfully tasty Flaxseed-and-Onion Crackers. The family loves them and they pair nicely with cheese. My only problem with crackers is the time it takes to make them. It probably took a good 45 minutes for a batch which lasts about 2 seconds in this house. The most time consuming part is rolling them out, so a double or triple batch would take forever to do. I still have to figure this out, because crackers can be so versatile. There are hundreds of variations and they make great snacks. These are filled with good stuff, too:  flaxseeds, parsley, onion and whole grain flour. Yum. Enjoy.
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My husband and I have been tossing around ideas for bettering our health for about a month now. It all stems from what we want our lives to look like in 5 years. We've set pretty rigorous financial goals and likewise, want to push ourselves to eat better as well.
   We watched the documentary "No Impact Man" and it got us thinking. What if we bought most of our food local this next year? There would be a few things we would buy in bulk like grains and beans, but we could buy produce from our local farmer's market from April to November. We could also buy lamb, beef, chicken, and eggs.  
   What if we only bought food in it's original form, or one step away (like oil)? So basically, no packaged foods. No cereals, chips, crackers, sugar, cheese, white flour, etc. More fresh vegetables, fruits, grains, nuts, beans, grains, nuts and honey. Basically, more homemade.
   It's a challenge.
   I love making things from scratch, but it's been a challenge as of late. Homeschooling four little ones keeps me busy. There are things I will have to learn. I have to have cheese and butter. I have been buying my milk at a local dairy and making my own yogurt with it, but cheese is a whole new ball game.
   So here is my proposal. I am going to try to make one new recipe a day. My goal is to learn how to cook the healthiest foods I can for my family without sacrificing taste. My list of requirements for recipes are long. Hopefully, at one point, I won't even need recipes.  Those are my hopes at least. We'll see how this pans out. 
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It's been awhile 10/11/2011
 
Hello again! It's been quite some time since I last even logged in on this blog. One more baby has joined this family and our second year of homeschooling is well on its way. I've also become quite lazy with meals and eating these last five months. I'm so tired by the end of the day, that I just don't feel like cooking. Our checkbook has numerous restaurant debits on it and we're feeling a bit sluggish so here we go again!
I will mention that one of my favorite "finds" these last few months has been Azure Standard. They're a coop out of Oregon that you can get natural and organic foods from. Their prices are wonderful. We've been enjoying homemade applesauce made from organic apples that cost 50 cents a pound! Unbelievable. I have cherries in my freezer from when they were in season as well as mangos and peaches.
If you've never been involved in a coop before it's quite simple. You sign up, make an order and then meet the truck at the drop time and pick it up. You can call Azure and find out more details. It's a good, solid company and I've been really happy with all I have ordered. Just a good, inexpensive way of eating all natural and organic.
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This Week's Menu 03/06/2011
 
 Monday:
Breakfast: Cereal, milk, fresh fruit
Lunch: Beans and Rice, citrus fruit
Dinner: Cauliflower Soup with vegan Caesar Salad
Snack: Hummus with carrots and celery

Tuesday:
Breakfast: Homemade granola with homemade plain yogurt 
Lunch: Peanut Butter and Jelly, Veggies and hummus
Dinner: Italian Lentil Stew, Fresh Bread, Salad
Snack: apple slices with peanut butter, chopped walnuts, ground flax, 
    and shaved dark chocolate

Wednesday:
Breakfast: "Free-Form Almond Griddle Cakes" with fresh fruit and eggs
Lunch: Leftover Soup, Cheese sandwiches and fresh fruit
Dinner: Sweet Potato Hash and Sesame Crusted Tilapia
Snack: Peanut Butter Kisses

Thursday:
Breakfast: Oatmeal with bananas, walnuts, & ground flax and hemp seeds
Lunch: Beans & Rice, citrus fruit
Dinner: Leek and Mushroom Croquettes with Broccoli Soup
Snack: Popeye Granola Bars

Friday:
Breakfast: Granola & plain yogurt
Lunch: Peanut Butter and Jelly, veggies and dip
Dinner: Bible study potluck night
Snack: Apple chips and nuts

Saturday:
Breakfast: Whole Wheat cinnamon rolls, eggs, and veggie sausage with fresh fruit
Lunch: Leftovers from the week
Dinner: Frozen homemade beef and veggie pocket sandwiches, salad
Snack: Nuts and veggies (with hummus if there is any leftover)

This is all going to be tweeked as the week progresses. This is my starting point. At one point peanut butter and jelly sandwiches will be jacked to maximum nutritional content as will other recipes, but
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Hello again! 03/06/2011
 
   Well, it's been awhile but I'm excited to start writing again. The past seven months have been quite busy on the home front with two moves and another baby on the way. We've not eaten as well as we had before and have felt the effects of it. This has spurred my husband and me to start eating as well as we can again.
   As I plan our family's weekly menu, I will post it here. If the meals turn out well, I'll post the recipes and start a page for weekly menu plans for you to use. It's all trial and error right now.
   My goal is to have 4 weekly menus for Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall. We're big into eating locally, eating fresh, and making things from scratch, so choose what works for you and hopefully you'll be able to improve your family's health as well.
   I really am in love with plants. Growing them, eating them, and healing my family with them, so expect some tidbits on gardening and herbs as well.
  I hope this site helps you improve the health of you and your family!
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It's been 20 days since my last post. I've been so busy with traveling, family illness (darn food poisonings and summer colds) and preparing to teach my oldest daughter kindergarten in 3 weeks! But I haven't stopped reading and learning more about nutrition (how could I, I love it).
   I found a website that I've been reading through and enjoying. It's put out by Dr. Mercola and contains so much information. I've learned about nutritional typing, what my type is, and how to eat specifically for my type. It's really interesting and I'd encourage everyone to take the test and learn more about it. Now, I will put out a disclaimer, you don't have to believe or follow EVERYTHING you read. I was starting to follow my "diet" perfectly and noticed I was really getting stressed trying to monitor everything. Now, I have taken the main points of it and have applied it and am enjoying more energy (it's only been a week) without the stress.
  Check the site out when you have time and see what your nutritional type is!
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  I really liked iced coffee frappaccino type drinks. Well, here's my own version with added protein:
1 cup brewed coffee
1/2 scoop vanilla whey protein powder (all natural if possible)
3 tablespoons nonfat dry milk
3 tablespoons pure maple syrup
1 cup ice

Put all ingredients in a blender and puree.
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Blogging 07/06/2010
 
   Um, so I'm not very good at blogging. If you couldn't already tell. I find I really don't have time for it. So, my goals for this site are changing. Blogging will become less as I substitute the time I spend thinking of things to blog about to actually doing research and adding the results to the site.
   Basically, I'm studying herbs right now and working towards rearranging my family's diet. All my findings, whether remedies or recipes, will be posted as I get them. This is going to be my online "health book".  
   I just went through a bout of diarrhea with my children. So, I did a little research and you can find it here under "home remedies".
   My goal for the blog is to post on new findings that I think are interesting and to let you know when I add something to this site. I hope this site becomes a treasure chest of information that you can use in your home! Enjoy!
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My Fast 06/27/2010
 
   Well, I did fast, but it wasn't like I thought it'd be. I thought I'd just fast from sugar and then go into an all vegetable fast, but I found that I do better without eating, period. So Wednesday I just drank lemon water all day. Was I hungry, you bet, but by the end of the day, I felt wonderful. My mind had cleared up and I had more energy than I've had for weeks. Another plus was that I haven't been craving sweets as much and my appetite has been less. I'll only eat one serving of something instead of two (or in the case of cookies, 3 or 4). My energy level has stayed high since Wednesday and I feel like this should be a regular thing for me.
   There are so many different types of fasts but the main things is to give up something. Whether it be food, or TV, or internet, or something else. Whatever the case may be, fasts are good to put into practice. Why? Because fasting from food is really healthy for your digestive system, it gives it a rest and therefore, your system can focus on "spring cleaning" the rest of your body. I won't go into details here, but there are countless books and websites devoted to this. Fasting is certainly good for your health, but the main thing it does is build self-discipline. Self-discipline takes training. It is not something we determine we want and "BAM" it's there. It takes practice.
   Why would I even talk about self-discipline on a nutrition website. Because, when it comes to eating well, you will need self-discipline. There are so many things in the grocery stores today that are not good for you and you need to be able to walk by those things and pick the nutritious foods. You also need to be able to discipline yourself when you're eating out, traveling, etc. This is not to say that you can't have treats. Believe me, I have treats, lots of them, too many of them. It comes to where I draw the line, what I want my health to look like, and how I want to feel during the day.

   It's the foundation of a healthy diet. How is your self-discipline? My recommendation is to try a fast. It doesn't have to be a major fast, just a tiny one. But remember, please don't just go off my recommendations, consult your doctor before doing anything out of the ordinary, just to be safe.
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