Simply 'Naners©

This isn't so much a review as it is a rave of the use of bananas that has become a hit in this household. Our 14mo old son devours bananas, which we refer to often as 'naners, having at least one pretty much everyday. It dawned on me when he was approximately 7mo old, that, when I was in college, my friends and I would freeze very ripe bananas and 'cream' them in one of those mini-prep food processors, effectively making banana ice cream with none of the fat or the huge calorie load. As the summer temps here begin to creep into the mid-90s and our desire to not give our kids loads of refined sugars often found in 'treats', we began freezing the leftover bananas whenever our son didn't binge on 2-3 bananas and instead settled for just one. Tonight, I discovered what I've longed for ... variety. My pantry gave me the most luxurious ice cream ever:

1.5 bananas, frozen
1.5-2TUnsweetened Dutch cocoa powder
1t (Really) Raw Honey

Using handblender or food processor, cream until smooth. Serve. Consume.

The addition of high quality organic cocoa powder created a euphoric experience. Not really a chocolate fan (*omg*), I do get cravings every now and then. But in the summers here, I just can't really stomach the 85% dark chocolate I get. Plus, who needs all the extra stuff they toss into those bars. The honey added just nice smooth sweetness that went well with the already sweet bananas.

So, if you're in the mood for decadent chocolate ice cream and find you have neither the calorie allowance nor the time nor the money to buy ice cream, get some bananas ($0.79/lb for organic here), some cocoa and honey and have a good ol' time. Enjoy!

The Liquid Dinner

I'm sure most of you reading this have come across some sort of liquid diet to help "shed those X number of pounds overnight". Well of course this works, since you're not really nourishing your body, you're starving it and filling up on dense calories and preservatives. You could just as easily eat the same amount of calories from a fast food chain and lose weight. Well, in theory ... besides, that's a topic for another blog post (think: desperate times lead to desperation stop at Carl's Jr. for Hawaiian Teriyaki Chicken Burger). But recently, out of sheer laziness and curiosity, I took a look in the fridge and said to myself, "what can I make outta this stuff?" This is not really an unusual approach for me in general but at that moment we were out of our staple foods. With an infant/toddler, he gets first dibs on the most nutritious foods and we're left with whatever is left after that. You can imagine how thrilled the dogs are when the kid tosses his food overboard and they commence circling his highchair like sharks waiting for another bucket of chum. So what was available to me?

Kefir, Raw Milk, Cream top Yoghurt, Berries, Bananas (both frozen and fresh), Lemonade, Apples, Oranges, Celery, a couple of Carrots, Swiss Chard, dried out/limp Beets, and Cucumber, Peanut Butter, Dog Food, Mayo, Ketchup, Mustard. Maybe some other stuff, but you get the idea.

How am I going to make a meal out of this for two adults?! Well, I could offer up the Pedigree, but would I give my husband the "Senior" Formula with salmon in it, keeping the Crunchy Bits for myself, or should I just stay away from the four-legged fur-babies' food? Well, a little more creativity set in with the help of a look into the cabinet with all the supplements and realizing we'd just bought this new fish oil the day before. Plus, I'd get to use the hand blender and all it's nifty accessories... This was the first present my husband ever got me and it was an enormous hit with my mother who told the story to everyone who'd listen. 

What resulted was an interesting smoothie that has now turned into a nightly ritual for me and the significant other. At first I believed that the next-day effects were simply coincidence, but after over a week of this and with two people experiencing the same or similar results, I do believe I've stumbled upon a really great recipe. It's not intended as a weight loss smoothie, but has turned into something that effectively replaces a meal and reduces food intake throughout the day as well. And my guess is that it does this because it's effectively a complete meal. What, do you ask, is this wonder smoothie made out of? (NB: If you steal this recipe and make money off of it, you owe me some royalties. And I don't mean a few pennies here and there, I mean 20% of your take.)

Kefir (plain), yoghurt, bananas, berries, ORAC greens powder, fish oil. Place into blender, go *bzzzzsh* by pushing the button, and, voila, you have your complete meal. 

Incredibly simple, huh? 

Let's analyze, shortly and sweetly, why this is so great for you:

Kefir: milk protein, calcium, Vit D, amino acids (like tryptophan) and probiotics

Yoghurt: live cultures, Vit D, calcium, milk protein, fats

Bananas: fiber, potassium, Vitamins/Minerals, sugars

Berries: antioxidant Vitamins, sugars

ORAC greens (http://bit.ly/aaq5Aa): wow, I don't think I can list all the reasons this is good; check out the link

Fish oil: Vit D, Omega fatty acids

Ok, but what does all that mean? Well, protein is important of all muscular functions whether you are a body builder, baby factory or just a sedentary video gamer. Vitamin D (a hormone actually) is all over the news lately for all sorts of positive effects on bone health and cardiovascular function, notably. The same goes for calcium, but this also is essential for proper nervous system function. Those wee little neurons of yours need Ca2+ in order to release those transmitters which are predominantly what make you function. You know that tryptophan is needed to synthesize those mood-stabilizing neurotransmitters? Ain't it neat how milk/dairy can give you all that wrapped up in a nice, creamy white package? Anyhow, fiber flushes out toxins and keeps this flowing. Potassium, another essential mineral for proper brain and muscle function. Antioxidants keep those free radicals at bay by scavenging and sequestering them. Omega fatty acid help with everything, heart, brain, blood vessels, etc. And face it, you cannot live without fats and sugars. It's just important to get the best sugars and best fats, not cut out either completely. Actually, go ahead and cut out ALL refined sugars and white flour, but leave the fruit/vegetable sugars and whole wheat flour stuff. 

I haven't yet calculated the specific calories, but I imagine that loosely following this recipe/quantities might yield a 200-400cal drink:

1/4c kefir

1/4c yoghurt

1/2 banana (frozen makes thicker, fresh makes banana-ier)

4-6 (black)berries

1 tsp ORAC greens (recommended daily dose)

1 tsp fish oil (also the recommended dose)

(And this evening we tried: fresh coconut and coconut water ... the flesh made a gritty drink, and the water, surprisingly, didn't add much flavor at all. But both had additional nutrients)

Now think about this... If you ate your normal caloric breakfast, snack, lunch, snack and ate (drank) this for dinner (or any other daily meal), how many calories are you shaving off? You only need to cut 100cal/day to see some weight come off after a week and evidence suggests that it is your weekly caloric  intake, not daily, that contributes to weight loss. If you've ever tried to lose some weight, you surely have experienced that intense craving for "something" a few days into your adventure. Your brain knows you are starving and eliminating some critical element to its survival, so you give in and have what? A snickers. Or an ice cream. Or a piece of cheesecake. 

What has fascinated me with this smoothie is how satisfied I feel. All night, all the next day. Even my husband says the same thing. And it leaves us both the opportunity to splurge if our impulses dictate. As I've said, I'm not on any quest for health or weight loss, though surely I should be. My mother died a few years ago of a preventable cancer - the health insurance matter is another blog post, nay, rant - but I strongly believe that had this sort of drink been a routine part of her day, that she would have developed the sort of anti-cancer fighting ability that might have kept her alive. My goal these days is to make myself healthy day in and day out, not by drastic measures like crash diets or commercial pre-packaged shitty food full of preservatives, but rather make one effective lifestyle change after another, when the time comes for that change. I've managed to kick two bad habits, and now it's time to tackle a third. By sheer coincidence, because my fridge was void of our normal (healthy but high calorie, easily large portioned) goods. And I do this freely, because it is time ... for my son and all our future kids and grandkids. 

Free trial of Acacia Foods products

A few weeks ago, a friend sent me a box full of mason jars carefully wrapped in bubble wrap. As I carefully unwrapped each mini-package, my urge to dabble in new recipes or recreate traditional cooking became overwhelming. My friend, a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, was using me as a tester for her friend's new food company. Well, I was certainly game! Easter was approaching and some of these goodies could be used to reinvent our annual tradition of having lamb for Easter dinner. Included in the box were the following from Acacia Foods:

Salsa
Strawberry-Margarita Jam
Caribbean Spice Rub
Tangylicious BBQ Sauce

We had in our freezer a stash of ribs that we'd been itching to cook for a while. Now, finally, we had a good reason to barbecue the two racks. And the leg of lamb. And all the vegetables we'd just picked up from our local CSA. Yes, that's right, our Easter dinner was turning in to a large breakfast-lunch-dinner feast for two and a half plus two dogs.

One rack of ribs was rubbed with the spice rub while the hickory wood chips heated up in the grill. The other rack was left alone to serve as the control group. (Yes, that's why this blog address is ScienceChef.blogspot.com ... I'm a scientist by day, chef by night and on weekends.) The leg of lamb was rubbed with home-grown rosemary while potatoes boiled in the stock pot. As everything was coming together, I raided the refrigerator for any BBQ-able vegetables, including onions, zucchini, corn, tomatoes, and bell peppers. The vegetables were lightly coated in grapeseed oil and sprinkled with a bit of coarse salt.

As soon as the grill was hot enough, the leg of lamb was set on the top shelf and the two racks on the bottom shelf. This proved to be a potential mistake, as the grill was likely too hot for the spice rubbed rack that ended up charring, whereas the chunky leg of lamb ended up being raw despite having reached the internal temperature of 140F.

Scrapping off some of the charring, the rubbed rack was still edible though the Caribbean spices didn't really come through. The 'control' rack was pretty juicy but unfortunately quite fatty. This rack gave us the chance to try out the Tangylicious BBQ sauce. This is quite delicious and I appreciated that it was not as volatiley sweet as conventional BBQ sauces commonly found at grocery stores. My husband has had his share of St. Louis BBQ having grown up just a couple of hours outside of the Midwest BBQ Capital. Even he was delighted by the fresh, homemade taste of this BBQ sauce. Lastly, the lamb was great, even if it was a bit bloody by the bone. The aroma of rosemary permeated through most of the meat and the impromptu wet rub I made once the leg was on the grill was a perfect match to the tenderness of the lamb. (The sauce consisted of dijon mustard, vinegar, tarragon, salt & pepper. Maybe some other stuff, but since it was impromptu, as with most of my cooking, I don't remember every little detail. I know, I should keep a lab notebook just for the cooking I do.)

In addition to the delectable vegetables that complimented the meat wonderfully, we had a bag of  organic yellow corn chips that we broke open to try the salsa because, well, why not. The salsa is very fresh, unlike its mass-produced, store-bought counterparts. It was a lightly roasted tomato flavor as well as a more subtle spiced flavor that lingers just long enough after the last bite. While I'm sure there is some garlic in this recipe (yes, I lost the little pamphlet my friend included in the package), it is not in the slightest overwhelming or socially grotesque. There is nothing worse than being at a crowded party and having that yucky taste of garlic or its relative, the onion, in your mouth. Well, maybe there are worse things, but that's definitely in my Top 10. Any how, this salsa is sure to be a crowd pleaser.

Well, Easter was coming to an end, we had our fill of meat and vegetables and the dogs were busy burying the bones somewhere in the backyard followed by  lying down on the cool cement to commence with the post-prandial coma. The next day, I'd have to go to work and leave my fellow foodies at home. But what about the jam?!

To the rescue: Easter Monday! I still would have to go to work, but why not make breakfast a bit more festive? So we broke out the baguette from the freezer (yep, another bargain from the whole food nutrition store bought on sale and stored for later use), the homemade butter, goat milk, CSA strawberries and the Strawberry Margarita Jam. Yet another winner, lightly sweetened, tangy, tart and refreshing! I'm pretty strict when it comes to giving my young son sugar-laden, processed foods, but am a bit more lenient when 1) food is made fresh, 2) the sugar isn't an overwhelming component of the flavor, and 3) the main ingredient actually comes through, provided the main ingredient isn't sugar, HFCS or CS. Since his newest food craze is Australian Weet-Bix, I put a bit of the jam on one of the biscuits and he went bananas! All-around this jam made us all very happy, whether it was on a a baguette with a bit of butter or a lightly toasted piece of toast  to munch on during the drive to work. Even as I write this, my sympathetic nervous system is activating my salivary glands. *Nom nom nom nom*

All in all, the products from Acacia Foods I had the opportunity to try were delicious and I highly recommend anyone who can get some of their goods make the investment. At this time, I have no idea how much any single treat costs ($6 range is the word), but the prices would certainly reflect the quality, passion and creativity put in to creating these items. To me, these are important aspects to high quality foods and I am willing to pay premiums for anyone who can bottle them successfully!

I look forward to trying more of the products. Hopefully the small start up company develops a user-friendly, easy to find website for online ordering. When it does, I'll let all ya'll know.