Saturday, November 24, 2012

I am so Thankful this Season!



Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! I hope Thursday was a wonderful day and that the rest of your holiday season is blessed! I am writing this at 0515 because I cannot stay in the bed any longer. Why is it that on workdays, I drag out at 0430 with the alarm and wish I could stay in bed but on off days I am up at 0400?

Today, I am going to try and put a dent in my Christmas gift making. I have almost finished the family calendar, I have one of two books written for the grandkids and ready to go to the publisher, but the majority of the gifts are just ideas in my head at this point.

I have never been this far behind at Christmas before. I cannot seem to get anything done because I am either in the hospital or too exhausted mentally from being at the hospital. I am thinking that it is time for a change. Everyday that I wake up, I realize that life is too short to be this stressed. I am planning my escape!!!! More details on that topic later.

This year, I made my Thanksgiving dishes gluten and cow dairy free!!! I modified existing recipes and my family loved them. In fact, except for Adrienne and Whitney, no one knew that they were not the original recipes!

While I was cooking for Thanksgiving, however, I encountered a dilemma. Have any of you southern ladies ever thought about how many recipes that are handed down from our mothers and grandmothers contain condensed soups? What is a casserole without cream of some kind of soup?  Well, have any of you ever read the ingredients in a can of condensed soup? It contains wheat and MSG!!!! Needless to say, I won’t ever be using them again! But what, am I going to do?  Some of the recipes are so good and bring back memories of my childhood.  So I researched and here is what I found!!! I am including the link to the blog along with the recipe. Thanks to Jill who put this on her blog!


Soup or Sauce [S.O.S.] Mix
Ingredients
¾  cup cornstarch
1/4  cup instant chicken bouillon (regular or low sodium)

2 Tbsp dried onion flakes
2 tsp Italian seasoning (optional)
Directions 
Combine all ingredients in a recloseable plastic bag, mixing well.
 Equal to 9 (10.5 oz) cans of cream soup. To use: combine 1/3 cup mix to 1 ¼ cups water and cook on stovetop or in microwave until thick then use in your recipe.

When I discovered this I was ecstatic but then I realized that I couldn’t have the non-fat dry milk. So, I searched and found a solution. I used :




I found this is in the Asian grocery store. The results are great and it tastes really good.
Let me know what you think! Talk to you soon!


Sunday, November 18, 2012

A Foodie in the Jungle!




Good morning everyone! I hope ya’ll are having a great day! I am having an amazing weekend! We are in Cincinnati celebrating our 5th wedding anniversary and the wedding of our friends Carrie and Chad!

We drove up on Friday and the ride was spectacular. There is nothing more beautiful than Kentucky in the fall. We arrived in Cincinnati around 3pm and stopped at Skyline for Chili! Then we checked into the hotel.

I have always liked Cincinnati. For those of you who have never been, it is a beautiful city with lots to do. Friday evening, we decided to go to Trader Joe’s. I know, I know, we have Trader Joe’s in Nashville but due to Nashville’s laws preventing the sale of wine and liquor in the same store as beer, we are unable to buy “2 Buck Chuck” in Nashville. For those of you unfamiliar with Trader Joe’s, “2 Buck Chuck” is the store brand wine. It is an exceptionally good wine and originally cost $2 per bottle. It is now $3.79 but still an exceptional value. Whenever we are in a new city, we go by and stock up on 2Buck Chuck!

Now, the best part of the evening!!!! We went to Jungle Jims! This is an International Market in Cincinnati! It was beyond cool! The store sells anything and everything that you could imagine. There is an international section where the aisles are twice the length of Kroger aisles and they are labeled by country. Plus the frozen food section is twice the size of Kroger’s. But that is just the beginning!!!! There is a regular grocery store, a seafood market, a butcher shop, a bakery, a deli, a liquor store, a cigar shop, a candy store, a gourmet section with cooking utensils and implements, and an amazing produce section with fruits and vegetables that I have never seen or heard of! My favorite sections though were the cheese shop and the natural food section.

The cheese shop is made up of 8-10 areas with cheeses divided not by country but by ingredients and/or type. There was a whole dairy case of goat and sheep cheese! There was also a gourmet butter bar!

The natural food selection was unbelievable. There were multiple selections of every food group imaginable! There was even a gluten free bread selection. Most stores in Nashville have one or 2 different loaves of gluten free bread. Jungle Jims had a selection of loaf breads, French baguettes, deli breads, sub rolls, bread sticks and homemade cupcakes, cookies and brownies!

We were there for 2 hours and did not see a fraction of the selection. The store is so large that there is a map and the ceiling is painted different colors to correspond with the map to keep people from getting lost. At the check out, I asked the cashier how big the store was and was told that it is 250,000 square feet. To put that into perspective, a regular Wal-Mart is 97,000 square feet. 


On Saturday we went to the Cincinnati Museum. It is located in the beautiful art deco Union Terminal Building. We spent the majority of the day looking at the exhibits and watching a great movie on the building of the Canadian Railroad across the Rockies.






 For lunch we tried Gold Star Chili because a trip to Cincinnati is not complete without comparing the chili, am I right? For those of you who have been to Cincinnati, I am interested in which chili you prefer!

Last night we went to the reception for Chad and Carrie! What a great time. Too much food and good times and the band was great! They came up from Nashville. They are called Rubiks Groove. Check them out on You tube!




e!


Talk to you soon!

Saturday, November 10, 2012

Learning to cook healthy with Vanessa!


Thursday I went to Health4Life Center to a cooking class. It was great!  Q used a Thanksgiving dinner decorating theme. There were appetizers and wine. What a great time!

Vanessa demonstrated her amazing cooking skills and used her infinite nutritional knowledge to prepare a wonderful meal and explained the reasoning behind her use of certain spices and products.


She cooked an entire meal for 10 people in the oven in 35 minutes and prepared a scrumptious dessert. The meal consisted of Oven Baked Chicken with Vegetables, Oven Roasted Red Potatoes, Roasted Asparagus with Garlic and Pine Nuts, Spinach Salad with Candied Pecans, and Toasted Coconut Ice Cream with Chocolate Syrup!


The meal was delicious and the best part was there was nothing to clean up! Vanessa cooked everything in parchment lined foil pouches.  After serving, the foil goes in the recycling and the plates and utensils into the dishwasher.

Vanessa teaching the class





The beautifully decorated room!

Q and her decorating flair!

The lovely and beautiful Q!


My secret to having a great dinner every night is to prep ahead. I have been doing this for years and it really works. I wash and cut all of my vegetables when I bring them home from the store and place everything in Ziploc bags. I often will go ahead and place the meal in foil or in the crock-pot and leave in the refrigerator until I am ready to cook. I am very glad that I developed this habit years ago in order to prepare healthy meals for my girls. Now with my new food allergies, I am thankful for this habit.

One thing that I want to stress is the importance of using parchment paper to separate your food from the aluminum foil. Aluminum is a heavy metal and it is absorbed into the body. This is not something that we want in our bodies! Parchment lined aluminum foil is available or you can just place a sheet of parchment paper in the foil and place the vegetables on top.


Sunday, November 4, 2012

Shopping with Vanessa!


Hello everyone! What a CRAZY week!!! Between work and the upcoming holidays there are just not enough hours in the day! Would you believe that I had my first CHRISTMAS party this week? How crazy is that? I will talk more about that later.

I went shopping with Vanessa this week. I have never had so much fun at the grocery store before! We spent almost 3 hours in Whole Foods. OK, before you decide to tune out because you either don’t have a Whole Foods or don’t like Whole Foods prices, let me explain. You DO NOT have to shop at Whole Foods to eat gluten free! Vanessa and I went there because it is close to us.

Vanessa knows that my biggest fear is not giving up bread but giving up dairy. I do not drink milk but I am addicted to cheeses. I love all cheeses! Anything ooey, gooey, and melted! So we start at the cheese counter. She has promised to convince me that I am not going to be deprived. Here is where Whole Foods comes in handy. We had a cheese tasting! I tasted many different varieties of goat and sheep cheese. Now I admit, I am familiar with goat cheese. I have to be honest I am not a big fan. I enjoy goat cheese with fruit and small amounts in salads and omelets but the “twang” is a little overwhelming. However, blue cheese made from goat milk is amazing!  And I have never had anything as amazing as sheep milk cheese! Sheep milk cheese is very common in Europe and all over the world. It is very good for you and after reading about it I feel that it is healthier. I am including a brief overview on sheep cheese for those of you who are interested!

Sheep cheese is smooth and mild tasting. One type called Mancheggo is reminiscent of cheddar.  The Pecorino cheese tastes like Parmesan/Romano!  Vanessa assured me that these could be used to substitute for cow’s cheese in all of my recipes.

Next we toured the store! Vanessa taught me how to tell if produce is truly organic, how to read labels and find substitutes for many gluten-containing products. She introduced me to gluten free bread and pasta!!! Her knowledge is astounding! As we are going through the store, people stop to listen and to follow us around. People stop and ask questions. The woman has an amazing knowledge base! I wish that everyone could learn from Vanessa! If any of you ever get the chance, I would recommend her for nutritional counseling!

Now, about that Christmas party. We had a great time! We went to an Italian restaurant called Buca Di Beppo and I stayed gluten and dairy free!!! Believe it or not, it was easy! I skipped the bread, which is less and less appealing these days (I really didn’t miss the bread, it was the garlic and butter that was tempting). Since garlic and butter aren’t restricted, I quickly got past the craving! The salad was great! For dinner I had the Saltimbocca which is a grilled chicken breast with prosciutto in a lemon butter sauce with capers. I had green beans and garlic mashed potatoes on the side. I truly did not miss the heavy pasta and cheese dishes. Thanks to my friend Holly (the events manager at Buca) for planning such a great party and for having a gluten free menu!