Food For Thought: Calling all sweet tooths – There are some new sweeteners in town!
Some time ago I wrote a post about sweeteners. More specifically, which sweeteners are terrible (aspartame and agave nectar) and which aren’t so terrible (stevia and xylitol). Since then, a couple of other sweeteners have appeared on the scene and even though I think we should all be training our tastebuds to need less sweet, […]
Come and get some cumin!
Ground cumin comes from cumin seeds. Its plant is related to parsley, dill, and caraway. You can buy cumin in seed form or ground into a powder. Cumin has been used for more than 5000 years and not just as a spice. the Egyptians used it to flavor their food, yes, but they also used […]
Dinner Diva: Sizzling tips for searing meat
Cooking meat well is something that takes practice. There’s a knack for getting that perfect golden color on a chicken breast and making those dark grill marks appear on a steak. While a nice color on a piece of meat looks nice, more importantly, that color basically translates to flavor. A good sear is required […]
Tip, Trick & a Recipe: Whet your appetite for water chestnuts
If you’ve ever sat down to a feast of Chinese food, you’ve likely encountered a water chestnut or two. These crunchy, juicy morsels are used very commonly in Chinese cooking-more for their bite than for their flavor because on their own, they really don’t have much of a taste at all. So what are water […]
Food For Thought: Feel fine with Iodine
Iodine has come up from time to time in articles I’ve shared here, and today I’m going to really dig into why we need it. Now, as far as minerals go, iodine isn’t the most popular kid on the bus, but that doesn’t mean it’s not essential for our bodies to function properly. We need […]
Healthy Foods: Book Review for The Blood Sugar Solution Cookbook by Mark Hyman, MD
In his book, The Blood Sugar Solution, Dr. Hyman adeptly laid out the reasoning (and the science) behind the “why” of balancing insulin levels to get to your ultimate goal weight and to achieve optimum health. Dr. Hyman believes one of the root causes of chronic disease is poor nutrition, I highly concur. But it […]
Tip, Trick & a Recipe: Dandelion Greens…they’re dandy!
Most of us are familiar with the common yellow weed that marks the onset of spring in many parts of the country. Dandelion greens are the enemy to gardeners everywhere, but these flower bed nuisances are actually real nutritional superstars. Dandelion greens are very high in vitamins A, B, C, and D. They are rich […]
Quinoa – what’s the scoop?
Everyone is so wild over quinoa (pronounced keen-wah) these days that you’d think it had just been invented. But this ancient grain (which is actually a seed, though it’s treated as a grain) has been around for thousands of years. Grown in the mountain regions of South America, quinoa has been a staple there for […]
Food For Thought: The great grains debate
Whole grains, organic grains, gluten-free grains . . . there’s so much talk about grains these days and whether they’re good for you or not. I’m definitely in the camp of “grains are not good for you” when it comes to grains of all kinds. (Note: quinoa is not a grain-it’s a seed and there’s […]