hurry-nights

Even though I cook from scratch, even though I don't buy ready-made meals, I still need to build conveniences and short cuts into my meal planning routines.  And there are definitely those hurry-nights when there isn't much time.  So I have come up with my own "fast foods."  What they really are are building blocks for meals. For one I precook legumes (beans and chickpeas), which I buy in bulk from the food coop, in a large pot and freeze in portion sizes in baggies.  I can take them out in the morning and use them that night to add to a salad or soup, or to use as a side dish.  The advantage to canned legumes is that they are without preservatives or salt.

Frozen organic vegetables are another convenience food.  I usually have spinach, corn, peas and string beans in my freezer.  I can make a spinach pie on the spur of the moment or creamed spinach as a side dish, corn and peas (mixed or alone) can be thrown into a quick soup, into a frittata (together with little potato cubes perhaps), or served as a vegetable.  The thin frozen French style string beans make for a very elegant side dish in a pinch  or when I'm out of fresh vegetables.

Cooking a large pot of stew, chili or soup when you have time, then freezing some in small portions, makes for fast food on a day you don't have time to cook (I just need to remember to thaw it in time).

Some cheeses freeze well.  I keep cheddar, mozzarella and feta cheese in my freezer for impromptu meal making.  There are so many quick uses for grated cheddar, and it makes vegetables under the broiler taste great (think broccoli, potatoes, cauliflower).  The feta is for a quick spinach pie, or if you like a Greek Salad in the summer, and the mozzarella is for homemade pizza or inside an oven baked polenta.

A quick, simple and really satisfying (and gourmet) dinner-in-a-hurry (although I like to savor this one with a glass of red) is a cheese spread with baguette and some freshly cut up fruit (pears, grapes, also the little Persian cucumbers) - literally an instant meal if you have purchased the cheese a few days earlier.

Spaghetti sauce, homemade or store bought, is my next convenience food, which I use as a base for homemade pizza (you can premake pizza dough and freeze it, or buy it ready, or make "instant pizza" on a tortilla or even an English Muffin), and of course a quick pasta dish (throw in some capers and black olives for a super easy Puttanesca sauce).

And my parents freeze their leftovers in small containers, then do a "tapas night" with a table full of small dishes when they don't have time to cook.

That hurry-nights have to mean take-out pizza or Chinese is a myth.  By the time I order pizza or Chinese and pick it up I have already made one of my fast foods (and they are cheaper and healthier for sure).

right or wrong?

We easily tend to judge something as right or wrong - after all we live in a dualistic world and can't avoid seeing our existence through juxtapositions.  Good and bad, black and white, cold and warm.  It seems only natural to take sides, argue, condemn, judge, and feel bad when someone doesn't share our opinion.  But it helps to see the other person's perspective to understand how silly some arguments are, and how what we thought was "wrong" ends up being "right" from a different viewpoint. Let me put that into perspective.  A few years ago my sister and I had a discussion  over towel drying logistics - this was before I stopped using my clothes dryer.  I argued that dryer dried towels felt so good because they were soft, which conveyed to me the feeling of "freshly washed."  On the contrary, my sister, who doesn't have a dryer, said (most Europeans actually don't).  Her scratchy and stiff line dried towels give her that feeling of "freshly laundered," she explained, because soft towels leave the impression that they have been used and need to be washed.   Ok, point well taken. A few years later, when energy costs went through the roof, I woke up and stopped using my drier in favor of drying racks (air and sunshine are for free, electricity is not) - and lo and behold, my attitude changed 180^o and I found myself adopting her position.

Wars are fought over such "rights" and "wrongs."  We know the familiar arguments over toothpaste tube rolling up, or not, and how to insert the toilet paper roll into the holder, with the paper down the front or the back.  Try putting yourself in the other shoes next time you are ready to judge a person for their nose ring, their opinion, their hair color (blue anyone?), or their religion.

Happy Earth Day

Today, I am wishing you a "happy" Earth Day with the caveat that our worldwide window to tackle climate change is beginning to close.  A few days ago I read something about 15 years.  If we don't achieve a definite downward curve on carbon emissions within that time frame our lives will change drastically, and not for the better. We can't keep shrugging our shoulders and putting the onus on "the government," because "the government" gets its nudge from all of us.   Things change when true pressure is exerted on "the government" from all of us.  Change comes from within, moves from the bottom up and out, and government is a reflection of us.

Why am I saying all of this?  Because the onus for drastic change is on each one of us! Now!  Don't throw your arms up in despair at the enormity of our challenges.  Instead, make a conscious effort to embrace what needs to be done by fully accepting our environmental calamity and committing to make a difference.

So, what can you do?  Here are lots of ideas, and the more of them you incorporate into your life the better for all of us.

Recycle and compost your kitchen scraps, plant a garden, buy an energy efficient vehicle (or at least consolidate your trips, or car pool), insulate your home to the max. and consider installing new tight windows, read all you can about climate change and the environment in general, buy local,  bring your own bags to the supermarket (no more plastic bags!  there is a plastic swirl in the Pacific Ocean the size of Texas!!! and plastic does not, I repeat, does not disintegrate in hundreds and hundreds of years),  drink well water and forego buying water in plastic bottles (and who knows what leaches into that water from the plastic anyhow),  read all you can about industrial food production, then make a drastic change in where and what you buy to feed your family,  install solar panels on your home (30% incentive state tax credit until 2015), consider a geothermal heating/air-conditioning system  (after tax credits, cost is similar to a conventional system and you'll be off fossil fuels), switch your electric supplier to one who provides 100% electric from renewable sources, eat less meat (it's better for you anyways), spread the word to other people and inspire them to make a difference, most of all - inform yourself and become aware.

Don't be surprised that none of this is for free. However, you have a choice of making these investments now on your own terms (consider them an insurance premium for environmental health), or shortly being forced by environmental circumstances into a very ugly reality that money and technology will no longer be able to improve.

If you love your planet make it a happy Earth Day by making a difference for yourself and your children and grand-children.

April showers bring May flowers

The grass "popped" and went green from one day to the next this past week-end when the weather suddenly turned warm.  This is when I truly know that spring has sprung.   A warm rain was falling outside.  The next day it snowed and night time temperatures dropped to winter levels.  Now it is pleasant again.  That's April. Spring is about a fresh start, a bit like New Year's, but tied to nature, as opposed to a man-made calendar.  The cycle begins anew.  As a matter-of-fact, when I was little in Germany the school year used to begin in the spring with Easter.  In April the grays and browns of winter slowly give way to spots of color - a bit of tender green here, a white Snowdrop or yellow Narcissus there.  Still timid, but so refreshing.  I open the windows to let the crisp outside air in, so nice after the warm dry indoor winter air.  I look forward to yellow forsythia and soon the pink of luscious magnolia and whites of the fruit trees.  The bolder colors come later, I have to be patient.

The never ending cycle starts again - how reassuring in a chaotic world.  Happy Spring!  Happy Renewal!  Happy Easter!

eat less meat!

How preposterous of me to tell you so?  Not.  Surprisingly, this is a huge environmental issue that goes way beyond the potentially ethical question of killing (they call it harvesting now, to make it sound more harmless) a living being and eating it. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a vegetarian.  However, in the Western industrialized world meat consumption has skyrocketed from eating meat once a week or so to just under 200lbs/person/year in the US since the advent of cheap meat!  This enormous meat consumption in combination with the rise in world population and the increasing numbers of people able to afford the cheap meat has become a recipe for disaster.

The environmental calamity arises from "cheap" and "too much."  Why?  Because the CAFOs (concentrated animal feeding operations) that these poor animals are raised in are among the biggest greenhouse gas emitters on this planet - generating about 18% (!!!) of greenhouse gases.  In addition, the huge amounts of animal waste leach antibiotics into our ground water.  And to top it off, the conditions under which these sorry souls are being raised, then killed and processed are so horrendous that it is literally unbelievable (read Jonathan Safran Foer because you must know).

There is nothing necessarily wrong with eating meat per se.  As a matter of fact, especially during childhood and adolescence animal protein helps to grow the brain.   But like with anything balance is the key and industrialized nations have become meat addicted.   Food researcher and author Marion Nestlé has advocated eating meat in condiment quantities.

How can we help?  First and foremost by resisting to buy cheap supermarket meat, which comes from CAFOs.  Instead, buy your meat at or from a local farm where the animals have been raised sustainably.  Yes, it will cost more.  But we ought to consume much less of it!

It's in the quality, not the quantity.

You may also want to revisit a series of three posts on meat eating.

do not ask your children

“Do not ask your children

to strive for extraordinary lives.

Such striving may seem admirable,

but it is the way of foolishness.

Help them instead to find the wonder

and the marvel of an ordinary life.

Show them the joy of tasting

tomatoes, apples and pears.

Show them how to cry

when pets and people die.

Show them the infinite pleasure

in the touch of a hand.

And make the ordinary come alive for them.

The extraordinary will take care of itself.”

                                                                                    William Martin

treat yourself

It's not always about money or what money can buy.  Sure, that luxury spa day makes you feel pampered.  But it also costs a ton of money and that's not what this  is about.  It's about spending quality quiet time with yourself.   And you can do that in many forms and most of them cost nothing. Yesterday I went to yoga, slow yoga to be exact (not that high-energy type of yoga, that's not me, and it's not quiet time).  At night, while I cook dinner, I often have a glass of wine while chopping and sautéing.  It makes my cooking experience more enjoyable.  Or how about a bubble bath before going to bed or out to dinner?  Or 10 minutes of meditation (you can find guided meditations online if you don't trust yourself to stay focused, check out the Chopra Center's free guided meditations).   Spending time watering my indoor plants is kind of a meditative quiet time for me, and I love to discover new air roots and flower spikes emerging from my orchids.

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As a matter-of-fact, I enjoy writing this blog post right now.  So in a way I am treating myself.  So what is something you will be doing for yourself?  And about that glass of wine - be sure to drink it out of a beautiful glass.

more focus, less effort

In yoga we learn to listen in on our body and feel it, to hold a posture for several breaths, and breathe into the muscles that are being worked.   While yoga builds strength over time it is not about straining to push ourselves to the limit, but rather about finding that perfect balance between ease and effort. The best thing I recently became aware of was my yoga teacher's suggestion to notice those particular muscles that do the work during a specific asana or posture, and then to relax all the other muscles that are not involved (especially the facial muscles, which are usually not involved, yet tense up with all the other muscles).  This takes a conscious effort because we tend to tense all the muscles indiscriminately.   But it is quite a revelation to be able to let go of the strain in most of your body and then precisely concentrate on where the effort actually needs to happen.  Instead of being all over the place it takes a lot less effort. 

More focus, less effort - and not only in yoga.