The Snacking Box

I have talked about the success of our "snacking table" several times on this blog. This is my lazy version. We haven't had time to put fresh fruits, veggies, and other snacks out so I have a created a quick, easy "snacking box" for the kids. If they are hungry between meals, they go here or they can always eat any fruit we have on the counter as well.

This week: organic brown rice cakes, Lara bars, sprouted almonds, dried seaweed snacks, raisins, banana leathers, and snap pea chips. It gets the job done and keeps tummies full while I'm running around!

Grandma's Pasta Gravy!

I have slowly been adding more meat and dairy into our diets. I am not a big meat eater- never have been. I just don't care for it, so I tend to not cook a lot of it. My kids don't do well with dairy from cows either, and Brad has his whole allergy issues. Plus, I have done too much reading about what happens to our food before it hits our tables, especially in the animal products realm, that it has been a slow adjustment for me to bring these into the home. So needless to say, our menus have been strictly limited. However, I have started to transition from the extremist view of complete abstinence from certain foods to one of an informed consumer. I have found some great local farms that sell organic, free-range, grass-fed meats that I feel good about supporting. I also buy my kids goat products which tend to be healthier not only because they are easier to digest, but because they don't contain the hormones, antibiotics, etc. that a lot of dairy products from cows contain. So, we still eat mostly a plant-based diet, but have our animal products in moderation throughout the week. The meat or dairy tend to be the side dish of most meals we make...we follow Dr. T. Colin Campbell's rule from his great nutritional study, "The China Study," which says that 90% of our diet should come from plants, 10% from animals. Anyway, the kids are doing great with the changes, and we've made some very yummy recipes lately! It feels liberating. :)

Here is my grandma's recipe for pasta gravy. You can make this without the meat or with some kind of meat substitute, but we made it with the organic ground beef from New Frontiers health food store.

Ingredients:

3 lbs ground beef

2-4 chopped garlic cloves

1 large red onion

2 large cans of tomato puree

1 large can of Italian seasoned chopped tomatoes

2 small cans of tomato sauce

Seasonings to taste: LOTS of garlic powder, onion powder, Italian seasonings, oregano, and parsley

Directions:

Saute onions and garlic in olive oil in a small pan.

Cook meat or meat substitute, if using, and drain.

Combine the onions and garlic with the meat and all the rest of the ingredients.

Cook over low heat for several hours or put in a slow cooker for the day.

Pour over noodles, grilled or fried eggplant, use in lasagna, etc.

We poured it over fried eggplant and served it with garlic bread and salad- so good!

This recipe made enough for 2 meals (for the whole family), and we had three jars on top of that left over! We store our pasta sauce in mason jars in the freezer for up to 6 months.

My Weekly Menu

It occurred to me that it would fun to occasionally post my weekly menu plan- just to give you an insight as to what we are eating. Today Savanna and I spent about 3 hours in the kitchen preparing foods for the week. I will try to post the recipes in the next few days, but in the meantime here is what we made today, and what we will be serving the rest of the week! (We learned many of these from our recent trip to the Raw Spirit Festival in Santa Barbara.)

Today we made Banana Quinoa Muffins, "Ranch" Dressing (cashew/avocado based), Buckwheat Crispies cereal with Hazelnut milk, Pistachio-Lime Hummus, Cashew Mock Chicken Salad, and Sun dried Tomatoes!

Banana Quinoa Muffins

Cashew "Mock Chicken" Salad

Cashew "Ranch"

Buckwheat Crispies with Hazelnut Milk

Marinated tomatoes (they will go into the dehydrator tomorrow and voila! Sun dried Tomatoes- Mmmm!)

As for the rest of the week, besides the above, we will make:

Monday: Nori Rolls filled with avocado, cucumber, cauliflower rice, and sprouts with Tamari dipping sauce

Tuesday: Spring Rolls filled with shredded carrot, jicama, sprouts, and sun dried tomatoes with a Chinese dipping sauce

Wednesday: Whole Wheat Blueberry pancakes and fruit salad

Thursday: Veggie burgers wrapped in lettuce leaves

Friday: Veggie sandwiches and salad

In addition to this we've been making some killer Green Smoothies lately. James and I started a 30 day green smoothie challenge 4 days ago. We are each going to drink a quart (32 oz) of green smoothie daily for one month- good stuff!

Welcome!

We are happy to welcome you all to our dinner table (or breakfast table, or lunch table or snack...yeah, we're ALWAYS eating around here)!

I am excited to share some our recipes and menu ideas. Let me begin with a little disclaimer...we eat a little different than most folks. We have some health, allergy, and moral issues we are sorting out, which has led to great knowledge and creativity in the planning of our meals... you'll see what I mean when I start posting. :) We mostly eat a plant-based diet, and try to incorporate as many fresh fruits and veggies as possible. What does this mean, you ask? To answer simply, we tend to follow a whole foods diet, eating mostly fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, beans, and whole grains as the majority of our diet (with some other "food groups" thrown in moderately- we are only human!). It's tastier than it sounds, I promise!

What is a whole food diet? It's basically eating food the way that God intended- in its natural, unprocessed, unrefined, state. Eat a potato, instead of a bag of fried potato chips. Eat fruit instead of bottled juices filled with syrups and sugars. Just eat REAL food...and the fresher the better!

Please, let me know what you think!!

Holli and Family