real food

CrunchyPoodleMama

Hmm... that's disappointing that Fallon pushes one food (coconut oil) as the "be all, end all" in her other book. Thanks for the heads-up. I'm with Iza... I take everything with a grain of unrefined Celtic sea salt! Iza, what was the name of the Yahoo group? I might be interested in checking it out (but appreciate the heads-up that they seem to be closed-minded if you dare question the great Sally! ).

I'm with you guys on sweeteners. Claire, I see your point about using white sugar in certain desserts where you don't want a sweetener's flavor to be overpowering... I guess since my cancer diagnosis those things don't appeal to me as much. That crumble topping idea sounds delicious!! Yum yum yum!!

And yep, nothing beats pasture-raised -- for chicken, beef, eggs, butter, or anything else. And just thing, as much as it tastes better, it's that much more nutritious as well!! I am seriously addicted to my pastured eggs... they are so good I could have them at every meal!

3monstmama

Nan

Thanks for the agave article---very interesting and helpful.  I am very conscious of sugar, fructose, high fructose corn syrup and the like because of the links between that and type 2 diabetes and the fact that Asians have a higher tendancy to type 2 diabetes at lower weights.  My monsters are all Asian Americans so I feel it is even more important to steer them to the "good" stuff and teach them what will literally kill them.

Like Runswithscissors, our family does not use a lot of sugar.  I've worked hard so that my kids don't get a "jones" for it.  My husband, however, is a bit of a lost cause.  He grew up on the super sugary breakfast cereals and more often than not craves sugar.  He has been known to sneak that nasty processed breakfast sugar into our house for secret midnight pig-outs and puts sugar on top of my healthy granola [and not a little bit either!]. He likes the taste of reeses and all the "bad" chocolate.  The best he has been able to do is drop the sugar from his coffee but that took years of me asking if he wanted "coffee with his sugar."  I hold him out as a example of what happens if you consume too much sugar in your youth and so far, its working.

Claire in Seattle, I get my pastured chickens from the Stokesberrys at the U-District market.  So very yummy ---worth every penny.

RunswithScissors

Every spring I promise myself that I will try dandelion salad with hot bacon dressing...

and every year I don't notice the dandelions until I see the flowers - which is too late - because by then the greens are very bitter.

But this year- I remember! I went out and checked on them today - here in the Northeast it's still too early- but you southies might be able to  catch some.

althea

I've never tried dandelion salad.  I found a youtube from susun weed demonstrating how to use the flower for vinegar though.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nau4j3v879s

Claire_in_Seattle

Dear Run.....

If you blanche the dandelions, it removes a lot of the bitterness.  That way, you can even eat ones with flowers.  (Just remove the flowers.)  Mine were from a shady spot, so I had lots of leaves to remove.

Then boiled potato and onions in addition to the bacon.  Learned this year that avocado is a wonderful addition.

The other free spring "vegetable", believe it or not, is nettles.  Make sure you use GLOVES to pick.  I bought, as don't know any nettle patches, and don't have the right gloves.  Cook as spinach.  Believe it or not, similar to spinach, but nuttier and even better tasting.  (Make sure you boil these guys and then drain as removes the sting.  REALLY!)

Most people don't mind if you remove their dandelions or nettles so you really can take the best ones.

apple

re sweeteners.. it's easy to grow stevia and the plant is appearing in nurseries.. you can also order the seeds and start it.  It's fairly hardy.. I've never killed a plant.

nice soil, moderate sun.. you pick the tips so that it will bush and branch, air dry the leaves and sprinkle.

http://www.stevia.net/growingstevia.htm

6 plants were more than enough for me and took up about 8 square feet.  I didn't follow the growing directions, bought the plants in a nursery and they turned out fine.

RunswithScissors

How do you use the stevia in a recipe?

genmail2000

There is no such thing as humanely killed animal in any case. Our great grand parents did not live that long and the cancer they had was mostly undiagnosed and in any case untreated. Other causes took their lives before cancer did. Turning vegan is extremely good for health. Or atleast limit the consumption of meat.

turmeric-cancer.com

CrunchyPoodleMama

There is no such thing as humanely killed animal in any case.

Okay, here we go. Are you one of the vegans who wants to ban animals viciously ripping each other to shreds in the wild? How do you suggest preventing them from doing it? I am a big-time animal lover... it hurts me to see even a racoon dead on the side of the road. But I would rather they have a painless end of life (after a happy life living the way they were meant to live) than be ripped limb from limb and eaten alive by a coyote or other animal.

Our great grand parents did not live that long and the cancer they had was mostly undiagnosed and in any case untreated.

That is a myth. The reason that the average life expectancy has gone up is that infant mortality has gone down. People are NOT living much longer now if at all than our great-grandparents. My ancestors lived into their 90's and 100's (one lived to be 107), except for my great-great-grandmother who died at 25 of thyphoid fever. I guess it's possible that some of them had cancer just raging away in their 90's... but I tend to doubt it.

Turning vegan is extremely good for health. Or atleast limit the consumption of meat.

I can buy the second part of this, but not the "turning vegan is extremely good for health" part. I no longer believe that. There are MANY vegans who develop cancer. One woman I know has been a raw vegan for years (and not a "junk food vegan" either) before developing a particularly insidious form of colon cancer.

Veganism cannot provide crucial nutrients like B12, nor does it provide the most nutrient-dense food in some cases. This thread is for those of us who have chosen REAL FOOD as part of our treatment. I have not met too many vegans who don't eat any fake food... many of them rely on soy-heavy diets that include fake meats etc. I contend that a small amount of grass-fed beef is 100 better for you than TVP-laden fake meat and that pastured butter is much better for you than soy/hydrogenated vegetable "spread." But if you'd like an in-depth debate on that, you might want to start a separate thread on it.

Oh geez... I just noticed the link in this person's signature. I can't believe I just wasted my time arguing with a spammer.

3monstmama

Hey Crunchy, okay it was a spammer but you did have a nice logical arguement....and for the record, my grandmother, who didn't believe a meal without meat was a meal, lived to 94 and was independant to the bitter end. . . .and my great grandmother lived to 96. The one thing that was different between their meals and ours was more of their lives were spent eatting food that was organic and not factory farmed AND they got way more exercise than the average American of this generation.

dinner tonight in our household was a roasted free range, organic chicken, rubbed with garlic and a bit of sea salt and butter [400 for  1+ hours] with roasted parsnips, carrots and potatoes and slow cooked raab with garlic and red pepper.

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

CrunchyPoodleMama

Mmm, 3monst, that sounds delish and VERY healthy!! and I agree re: our ancestors getting more exercise (and sunshine - vitamin D) and not having all the chemicals in everything. They were still growing food for taste, not shelf life, back then.

cary1

Because of my job (think lots and lots of heavy lifting) I just happened to see an advance copy of what seems like a great book for this general topic, The New Whole Foods Encyclopedia (Penguin) by Rebecca Wood. It isn't a new book, but it is fully revised for the first time since 1999. The back says it has more than 200 new entries. Breast cancer is in the index, as are many other conditions, parts of the body, etc. along with all the entries on fruits, vegetables, grain, and herbs, and home remedies. I note that Wood praises soy, but sees its potential for harm for us ER positive types, and she notes other phytoestrogens etc. She has a "Be Mindful" section in many entries. The book's list price is $20 but I see Amazon has it for much less.Just FYI. The author seems to have an orientation toward Chinese medicine so the foods are often described as hot/cold, yin/yang, Republican/Democrat.....kidding.