Chanukah is all about the oil. You light it! You eat it! .... and 8 days later you are guaranteed to gain weight. It is interesting how we Jews have decided to celebrate the miracle of Chanukah. Of course, being Jews, it is all about the food... not the decor so much.... not the gift-giving so much... At least not when I was growing up. Every Jewish child I knew wished for a Christmas tree, good songs, and really good gifts.
I am not complaining though! It was part of our heritage. Although, if you go into Bed, Bath and Beyond in Miami, there is a whole section on Chanukah wreaths, lights, blow-ups for your front lawn.. except, so as not to get it confused with Christmas, it is all in blue and white. If you go into Crate & Barrel in New York, you can by Chanukah decorations like menorahs and dreidls instead of balls to hang from the "Chanukah bush".
Okay, back to the food, after all, it is my heritage. Latkes by far heads the list of traditional dishes. My Mom made them from a mix. I used to do the same. Now creative cooks grate potatoes into long strips and fry them of course with the traditional egg, flour, salt and pepper. Numerous modern recipes call for the addition of ingredients such as onions and carrots. It initially came from Russia or the Ukraine. However, I just learned from Wikipedia that there is a Polish variety topped with meat sauce, pork crisps or goulash, as well as sour cream and apple sauce. Who would have thunk? Definitely, not Jewish. Then there is a Czech version that was similar to the Jewish version but most importantly added garlic and marjoram. Sounds okay to me but that same potato dough is also used as a coating to a fried pork chop. Aha! there lies the difference.
So, I wanted to find out where the fried donuts came from. I never had them as a kid and neither did my husband. So I checked that out too. And I found out that foods either had to be fried in oil, or made with cheese. The cheese thing is something else I had never heard about. And I never found out where the jelly doughnut tradition came from. The cheesy foods tradition is based on a story from the Book of Judith. An Assyrian warrior besieged a town where Judith lived. Judith entered the Assyrian camp and gave the warrior salty cheese to make him thirsty, and wine to make him drunk. After he became intoxocated, she seized his sword and beheaded him, bringing the head back to her village in a basket. The next morning when the Assyrian troops found the headless body of their leader, they fled in terror. In honour of Judith's victorious and brave use of cheese, we incorporate the food into our Chanukah menus. A gruesome story to celebrate with cheese.
I am surprised we could do anything after consuming oily foods, salty cheese and wine. It tastes good but what a cholesterol bomb. I think we go into a lethargic stupor and go to bed.
If you are not Jewish don't think you get off so easy. If you like potato chips and consume them regularly you are in for long-term weight gain. It is the number one culprit. When was the last time you ate potato chips or looked for an alternative in the snack aisle? It is a massive runway of salty, processed crunchery. Potato chips are nothing more than thinly-cut, deep-fried potatoes with added salt. Surely, the healthier versions are better for you, right? Not so much. Granted Baked Lays will save you 8 grams of fat and 40 calories, but the added sugar, corn sugar, and soy lecithin to enhance their taste but... but even the no fat, but Olestra, the fat substitute used in many low and non-fat snack products, has been shown to promote weight gain. An animal study last year showed rats ate more of their regular food, which led them to gain more weight and body fat than rats fed regular high-fat potato chips.
I am not exactly a maven on food yet but here is my advice. Enjoy the eight days of Chanukah. Home-made latkes and doughnuts may still have an advantage over anything processed but on the other side of the coin, fried is lethal. So, take it all in moderation and enjoy the holidays and when it is all over don't go for a bag of potato chips.
Thursday, 13 December 2012
Friday, 19 October 2012
Bummed and Not Blogging
Well, it is good to know that I am not the only one who is fed up with Weight Watchers. I finally quit. I would get up early on Saturday morning following my family Friday night dinner and weigh-in. Since I weigh myself every day, I knew that Saturday's were practically the highest weight of the week. I would wait in line a half an hour because they didn't get enough members to hire two people to weigh everyone in. The good thing was the little booklets they gave you. The bad thing was the instructor gave zero motivation and flipped the flip-chart they gave her asking for everyone else's opinion. In a year and a half I was never asked once to look at my food log. I was up a pound and down a pound and virtually stayed within the same 20-25 lb. loss I had in the first few months. Then the New Year came around and every woman was cut down from 29 to 26 points. Obviously they weren't meeting with the success they had hoped. The crappy, fake sugar products increased on tables and many would walk out with boxes of the 3-point packages of junk food. When you are only on 26 points, the snacking sure eats into that.
I am somewhat relieved today to see I am not the only one that has felt this way. The New York Times reported on trouble brewing at Weight Watchers' meetings. Unhappy members were grumbling about slow weight loss on Weight Watchers latest PointsPlus plan. Some flat out said the program's "magic" had disappeared.
The article in another magazine asked a panel of members who were successful for their tips for losing weight. There were a couple I found interesting. One was make carbs work by pairing them with proteins... like fruit with almonds or eggs with whole grain toast. This woman initially gained on PointsPlus then used the combo trick to triple weight loss.
Another woman said make "zero" points count. for example, WW doesn't limit zero-cal drinks, but they are not all equal. Diet drinks make you crave junk.
I am a believer in shocking your metabolism and one panel member agrees. Just scrimping every single day, the scale was not her friend. She hit on a much better strategy: Saving extra points or calories, say 500 calories or so, for a big weekend indulgence and lose faster than with non-stop deprivation.... Oh, by the way, "non-stop deprivation" would never be WW words and neither would "diet". These were stupid head games.... Don't deprive yourself. Give me a break! On 26 points you were majorly depriving yourself. Anyway, the scientific explanation: Keeping calories at a continuous low brings on psychological cravings and slows metabolism. By contrast, Cornell University researchers found that a splurge revs metabolism by about 14%.
The whole Weight Watchers thing is just a blueprint. It gets you going in the right direction, but you have to adapt it to what works best for your body. Once you know the program, quit. It is just a waste of time and money after that. I am bummed no more and back to blogging.
I am somewhat relieved today to see I am not the only one that has felt this way. The New York Times reported on trouble brewing at Weight Watchers' meetings. Unhappy members were grumbling about slow weight loss on Weight Watchers latest PointsPlus plan. Some flat out said the program's "magic" had disappeared.
The article in another magazine asked a panel of members who were successful for their tips for losing weight. There were a couple I found interesting. One was make carbs work by pairing them with proteins... like fruit with almonds or eggs with whole grain toast. This woman initially gained on PointsPlus then used the combo trick to triple weight loss.
Another woman said make "zero" points count. for example, WW doesn't limit zero-cal drinks, but they are not all equal. Diet drinks make you crave junk.
I am a believer in shocking your metabolism and one panel member agrees. Just scrimping every single day, the scale was not her friend. She hit on a much better strategy: Saving extra points or calories, say 500 calories or so, for a big weekend indulgence and lose faster than with non-stop deprivation.... Oh, by the way, "non-stop deprivation" would never be WW words and neither would "diet". These were stupid head games.... Don't deprive yourself. Give me a break! On 26 points you were majorly depriving yourself. Anyway, the scientific explanation: Keeping calories at a continuous low brings on psychological cravings and slows metabolism. By contrast, Cornell University researchers found that a splurge revs metabolism by about 14%.
The whole Weight Watchers thing is just a blueprint. It gets you going in the right direction, but you have to adapt it to what works best for your body. Once you know the program, quit. It is just a waste of time and money after that. I am bummed no more and back to blogging.
Friday, 31 August 2012
TAKING THE "HAPPY" OUT OF EATING OR DRINKING
Oh, my God! Sometimes it is better not to know what you are eating. Prevention magazine came out with an article entitled "7 Grossest Things in your Food". I am thinking what's left and who can you trust?
Do you eat in the movie theatre? I haven't eaten there for a long-while ever since they futzed around with the popcorn and made it smell gross. I remember going into the theatre and the wafting of real butter drew me toward the concessions. Then butter became bad or expensive or something else and they replaced it with the new improved stuff that smells like bad chemicals. So now, if you think to yourself, well screw the popcorn, I will take something from behind the glass case....DON'T! According to Prevention magazine nearly everything there is steeped in beetle juice. I know, you are probably thinking, what.... how can that be? Well the hard, shiny shells on candies are often made from shellac, a resin secreted in the lac bug... the same stuff you use in varnishes and sealants... It is also on coffee beans, apples and other fruits and vegetables. So you think, you beat that one out by going organic? Not so... these waxes can be hard to remove so you will need to scrub. YUCK!
So you are feeling so sick by now you are reaching for the chicken soup. Bad news about that too. The chicken may be sicker than your are. Researchers from John Hopkins University tested bird feathers and found a laundry list of feed additives, including banned antibiotics, antidepressants, allergy medications, arsenic, the active ingredient in Benadryl, caffeine and other prescription and over-the-counter drugs. No wonder people have so many allergies. Allergies were things nobody ever heard of when I was growing up. For this you can go organic. Organic regulations forbid the stuff aforementioned. Who needs Prozac in your poultry.
Are you bothered by the fact that there is sheep oil in your chewing gum? I am not so much as I am about shellacking fruits, veggies and candies or Prozac in my poultry. It doesn't really burst my bubble. I will still chew it despite the lanolin from the sheep's wool. It is labelled in the ingredients as "gum base". Sorry I am not going vegan on my gum.
How about wood pulp in your cereal? Well, it is plant-based, I guess instead of chemically produced. Cellulose is usually made from nontoxic wood pulp or cotton and this cheap filler is stuffed into shredded cheese, salad dressings, and ice cream to thicken it without adding calories or fat. Cellulose is fibrous, which is why it appears in so many high-fibre "healthy" snacks and breakfast cereals... and it's even in organic products according to the Wall Street Journal. How do you avoid it, if it bothers you... well steer clear of terms like microcrystalline cellulose, cellulose gel, cellulose gum and carboxymethyl cellulose.
Religious Jews know about this one. There are cow enzymes in your cheese called rennet and so when they check out cheese they look for no rennet. Unfortunately, sometimes it is listed merely as "enzymes". Sneaky of them. So what is cow enzyme or rennet? It is extracted from the fourth stomach of newborn calves. Rennet is used as a cheese curdler, sometimes in tandem with another enzyme called pepsin, which is extracted from stomach glands of hogs.
Are you sick to your stomach yet? Well how about duck feathers in your dough? It's in bagels, cookie dough, bread, pies and more. How to avoid it? It might not be on ingredient labels, so you'll have to check with the manufacturer to find out if they use L-cysteine. You can also avoid it by eating products that are Kosher or gluten-free, or by baking your own bread.
Last but not least, are you a beer drinker? Because if you are, if you knew there were fish bladders in your beers, would it drain the "happy" out of happy hour? It is widely used in beer brewing process called isinglass, which is made from swim bladders of fish. It allows for a much clearer brew. I don't know if my friends in the beer business can advise me any further on that one. I don't think they would want their clientele to go to vegan beer.
Do you eat in the movie theatre? I haven't eaten there for a long-while ever since they futzed around with the popcorn and made it smell gross. I remember going into the theatre and the wafting of real butter drew me toward the concessions. Then butter became bad or expensive or something else and they replaced it with the new improved stuff that smells like bad chemicals. So now, if you think to yourself, well screw the popcorn, I will take something from behind the glass case....DON'T! According to Prevention magazine nearly everything there is steeped in beetle juice. I know, you are probably thinking, what.... how can that be? Well the hard, shiny shells on candies are often made from shellac, a resin secreted in the lac bug... the same stuff you use in varnishes and sealants... It is also on coffee beans, apples and other fruits and vegetables. So you think, you beat that one out by going organic? Not so... these waxes can be hard to remove so you will need to scrub. YUCK!
So you are feeling so sick by now you are reaching for the chicken soup. Bad news about that too. The chicken may be sicker than your are. Researchers from John Hopkins University tested bird feathers and found a laundry list of feed additives, including banned antibiotics, antidepressants, allergy medications, arsenic, the active ingredient in Benadryl, caffeine and other prescription and over-the-counter drugs. No wonder people have so many allergies. Allergies were things nobody ever heard of when I was growing up. For this you can go organic. Organic regulations forbid the stuff aforementioned. Who needs Prozac in your poultry.
Are you bothered by the fact that there is sheep oil in your chewing gum? I am not so much as I am about shellacking fruits, veggies and candies or Prozac in my poultry. It doesn't really burst my bubble. I will still chew it despite the lanolin from the sheep's wool. It is labelled in the ingredients as "gum base". Sorry I am not going vegan on my gum.
How about wood pulp in your cereal? Well, it is plant-based, I guess instead of chemically produced. Cellulose is usually made from nontoxic wood pulp or cotton and this cheap filler is stuffed into shredded cheese, salad dressings, and ice cream to thicken it without adding calories or fat. Cellulose is fibrous, which is why it appears in so many high-fibre "healthy" snacks and breakfast cereals... and it's even in organic products according to the Wall Street Journal. How do you avoid it, if it bothers you... well steer clear of terms like microcrystalline cellulose, cellulose gel, cellulose gum and carboxymethyl cellulose.
Religious Jews know about this one. There are cow enzymes in your cheese called rennet and so when they check out cheese they look for no rennet. Unfortunately, sometimes it is listed merely as "enzymes". Sneaky of them. So what is cow enzyme or rennet? It is extracted from the fourth stomach of newborn calves. Rennet is used as a cheese curdler, sometimes in tandem with another enzyme called pepsin, which is extracted from stomach glands of hogs.
Are you sick to your stomach yet? Well how about duck feathers in your dough? It's in bagels, cookie dough, bread, pies and more. How to avoid it? It might not be on ingredient labels, so you'll have to check with the manufacturer to find out if they use L-cysteine. You can also avoid it by eating products that are Kosher or gluten-free, or by baking your own bread.
Last but not least, are you a beer drinker? Because if you are, if you knew there were fish bladders in your beers, would it drain the "happy" out of happy hour? It is widely used in beer brewing process called isinglass, which is made from swim bladders of fish. It allows for a much clearer brew. I don't know if my friends in the beer business can advise me any further on that one. I don't think they would want their clientele to go to vegan beer.
Saturday, 25 August 2012
OVERLY EFFICIENT
It isn't even 11 o'clock on a Saturday morning. I have already fed the cats and got ready to go to Weight Watchers. I checked in there and listened to the lecture. I then put gas in the car, went grocery shopping, went to The Second Cup for my latte and had the car washed. The next thing was to come home to my gym and do at least 15 minutes on the elliptical before I put my bum in the seat. After all, that is my worst habit... sitting on my butt.
A big, broad grin erupted when I went to my home gym only to find out all the equipment had been moved aside since the drywall on the ceiling was just reinstalled. So here I am back on my butt in front of the computer where I like to be. But today's lecture at Weight Watchers was somewhat enlightening. My weight is up and down and generally overall the same is it was last December.
Small changes... that's what it is all about! Last week, I cut from a medium iced latte at The Second Cup to a small and with all my transgressions I still lost .8 lb. Well it is better than gaining.
So this week it is "on my feet". Paul, my husband tells me he intentionally parks a few blocks away so he can walk because he knows it is good for him. And certainly, everyone knows he is the busiest person alive. I might be running second place to him. I can squeeze in more in a day than most people I know. I put in about 3 hours a week out of the house exercising at a gym. But I park the closest I can to the grocery store. I will sit at a party if there is a seat handy, rather than stand. I was amazed to know how many more calories are burnt just from standing. No wonder I have a big butt, apart from the genetics.
This instructor today at Weight Watchers was an old-time one from 30 years ago. She spent more time being motivational with a great sense of humour than picking everyone's brain about what they did and how they intend to make things better. The flip chart started off with "Be less efficient". That was one of my first smiles of the day. What they really meant was use your time more wisely. I am probably one of the most efficient people I know and nary a day passes without some telling me so and commenting how do I do it all. Little do they know that I also spend too much time on Pinterest on the computer as well as Scrabble. That time could be spent better on getting off my butt a little more often.
I have to design a desk escape. And when I am not at my desk, I am at the kitchen table with my ipad and I even take it to the family room when I watch TV multitasking on the ipad at the same time.
This instructor believes that multi-tasking is the bane to our existence and not a very good thing after all. On some days, I'll look at the clock, shocked to see how long I haven't moved from my chair.
I have a pedometer but use it only once in a while. I guess it is time to clip it on and go. Please be seated when I tell you the average person sits for nine hours a day. Sounds like me. I hear myself saying "Hey, you in the chair! Get moving!". It turns out that all that chair time isn't good for your health or your weight loss - even if you exercise consistently. So if I or you make a little more time and space in our day to get up an move, we will be doing our bodies a big favour.
About being less efficient. I don't think that will happen. It took me years to be this efficient. I am not going backwards. However, I sort of know what is meant. They really mean make multiple trips and use few labour-saving devices. Heck! I have the car loaded with bottled water waiting for my husband to come home to take it out of the car. Nah, that part isn't going to change. I probably won't modify my work space... but I could get up an stand more or move more. If I rethink my social outings, it won't be to go bowling instead of a cocktail party. It might be consciously choosing to stand more. And, do I need to drive everywhere? The answer is yes, definitely for errands. It is all about small changes so when the exercise room is back in usable order, I will go directly to my elliptical when I get in rather than sitting at my computer somewhere in the house.
A big, broad grin erupted when I went to my home gym only to find out all the equipment had been moved aside since the drywall on the ceiling was just reinstalled. So here I am back on my butt in front of the computer where I like to be. But today's lecture at Weight Watchers was somewhat enlightening. My weight is up and down and generally overall the same is it was last December.
Small changes... that's what it is all about! Last week, I cut from a medium iced latte at The Second Cup to a small and with all my transgressions I still lost .8 lb. Well it is better than gaining.
So this week it is "on my feet". Paul, my husband tells me he intentionally parks a few blocks away so he can walk because he knows it is good for him. And certainly, everyone knows he is the busiest person alive. I might be running second place to him. I can squeeze in more in a day than most people I know. I put in about 3 hours a week out of the house exercising at a gym. But I park the closest I can to the grocery store. I will sit at a party if there is a seat handy, rather than stand. I was amazed to know how many more calories are burnt just from standing. No wonder I have a big butt, apart from the genetics.
This instructor today at Weight Watchers was an old-time one from 30 years ago. She spent more time being motivational with a great sense of humour than picking everyone's brain about what they did and how they intend to make things better. The flip chart started off with "Be less efficient". That was one of my first smiles of the day. What they really meant was use your time more wisely. I am probably one of the most efficient people I know and nary a day passes without some telling me so and commenting how do I do it all. Little do they know that I also spend too much time on Pinterest on the computer as well as Scrabble. That time could be spent better on getting off my butt a little more often.
I have to design a desk escape. And when I am not at my desk, I am at the kitchen table with my ipad and I even take it to the family room when I watch TV multitasking on the ipad at the same time.
This instructor believes that multi-tasking is the bane to our existence and not a very good thing after all. On some days, I'll look at the clock, shocked to see how long I haven't moved from my chair.
I have a pedometer but use it only once in a while. I guess it is time to clip it on and go. Please be seated when I tell you the average person sits for nine hours a day. Sounds like me. I hear myself saying "Hey, you in the chair! Get moving!". It turns out that all that chair time isn't good for your health or your weight loss - even if you exercise consistently. So if I or you make a little more time and space in our day to get up an move, we will be doing our bodies a big favour.
About being less efficient. I don't think that will happen. It took me years to be this efficient. I am not going backwards. However, I sort of know what is meant. They really mean make multiple trips and use few labour-saving devices. Heck! I have the car loaded with bottled water waiting for my husband to come home to take it out of the car. Nah, that part isn't going to change. I probably won't modify my work space... but I could get up an stand more or move more. If I rethink my social outings, it won't be to go bowling instead of a cocktail party. It might be consciously choosing to stand more. And, do I need to drive everywhere? The answer is yes, definitely for errands. It is all about small changes so when the exercise room is back in usable order, I will go directly to my elliptical when I get in rather than sitting at my computer somewhere in the house.
Tuesday, 21 August 2012
WHAT IS LURKING IN YOUR NATURAL FOODS
I used to be able to navigate a grocery store in short order. Now, it is put the glasses on and read the labels or make sure you buy the same brands all the time.
It is that time of year when I traditionally make honey cakes. Although, it isn't a dieter's delight, it is a ritual I do for Rosh Hashana with my famous honey cake. You can't imagine how surprised I was to read the bad news about honey. Apparently it isn't always natural. That is, unless like me, you buy Billy Bee or Bee Maid honey, made in Canada where the only ingredient is honey. But apparently not in the US. I have often found the same thing there when buying peanut butter. They have all gone through various levels of processing and it is hard to know how much just from looking at the labels. According to research done by Food Safety News, most store-bought honey isn't technically honey at all, because virtually all of the natural pollen has been filtered out. Their suggestion is to head to a farmer's market, where you can buy it raw from the local beekeepers. For me, I am cool with the Canadian manufacturers where the bottle reads "all natural honey" and it is the only ingredient.
Now, how many fitness instructors, gyms, weight loss coaches and generally those that profess healthy diets, promote you to eat granola bars? I am not that much of a purist to have never eaten them but they are very heavy on the calorie side and I am not sure what the benefit is over eating a beautiful 70% dark chocolate bar. If you really want a granola bar, make it yourself. The rest are garbage... even if they sell it in a health food store. While many granola bar brands have removed high-fructose corn syrup from their products in response to consumer concern, a laundry list of other less-than-natural ingredients remain, including processed sweeteners such as corn syrup, fructose, and invert sugar, and the vague "natural flavours" ... an umbrella term for flavours derived from natural sources, but which are often processed in a lab like artificial flavours. There there is cellulose, and ingredient made from nontoxic wood pulp or cotton that is added to up the fibre content. Nah, forget the granola bars... and stick to a handful or almonds or a banana.
Now onto non-dairy and soy cheeses. These aren't things I eat but I have friends that are either lactose intolerant or kosher, or both. But "natural" cheese substitutes often contain added colours and flavours to make them more like cheese. One of the common ingredients is Carrageenan, a processed carbohydrate that may upset some people's stomachs. Additionally, soy is one of the most commonly genetically modified crops around, roughly 94% of the soy grown in the U.S. is genetically modified. So if you're wary of frankenfoods, make sure you are buying organic. If you want to read more on genetically modified foods and why they are suspect, read Foods as Nature Made Them.
And lastly for today, how about the flavoured waters and sports drinks that people are touting as a healthy way to top off your workout? This week at Weight Watchers, it was quoted that 20% of daily calorie intake on an average comes from beverages. A bottled beverage "naturally sweetened" has some barely pronounceable ingredients like erythretrol and crystalline fructose. Take a glass of water instead and squeeze a natural lemon or lime into it.
So I am still eating Canadian honey, but not granola bars, non-dairy or soy cheeses or flavoured sports drinks. There is a lot of good stuff out there if you purchase from the perimeter of the grocery store.
It is that time of year when I traditionally make honey cakes. Although, it isn't a dieter's delight, it is a ritual I do for Rosh Hashana with my famous honey cake. You can't imagine how surprised I was to read the bad news about honey. Apparently it isn't always natural. That is, unless like me, you buy Billy Bee or Bee Maid honey, made in Canada where the only ingredient is honey. But apparently not in the US. I have often found the same thing there when buying peanut butter. They have all gone through various levels of processing and it is hard to know how much just from looking at the labels. According to research done by Food Safety News, most store-bought honey isn't technically honey at all, because virtually all of the natural pollen has been filtered out. Their suggestion is to head to a farmer's market, where you can buy it raw from the local beekeepers. For me, I am cool with the Canadian manufacturers where the bottle reads "all natural honey" and it is the only ingredient.
Now, how many fitness instructors, gyms, weight loss coaches and generally those that profess healthy diets, promote you to eat granola bars? I am not that much of a purist to have never eaten them but they are very heavy on the calorie side and I am not sure what the benefit is over eating a beautiful 70% dark chocolate bar. If you really want a granola bar, make it yourself. The rest are garbage... even if they sell it in a health food store. While many granola bar brands have removed high-fructose corn syrup from their products in response to consumer concern, a laundry list of other less-than-natural ingredients remain, including processed sweeteners such as corn syrup, fructose, and invert sugar, and the vague "natural flavours" ... an umbrella term for flavours derived from natural sources, but which are often processed in a lab like artificial flavours. There there is cellulose, and ingredient made from nontoxic wood pulp or cotton that is added to up the fibre content. Nah, forget the granola bars... and stick to a handful or almonds or a banana.
Now onto non-dairy and soy cheeses. These aren't things I eat but I have friends that are either lactose intolerant or kosher, or both. But "natural" cheese substitutes often contain added colours and flavours to make them more like cheese. One of the common ingredients is Carrageenan, a processed carbohydrate that may upset some people's stomachs. Additionally, soy is one of the most commonly genetically modified crops around, roughly 94% of the soy grown in the U.S. is genetically modified. So if you're wary of frankenfoods, make sure you are buying organic. If you want to read more on genetically modified foods and why they are suspect, read Foods as Nature Made Them.
And lastly for today, how about the flavoured waters and sports drinks that people are touting as a healthy way to top off your workout? This week at Weight Watchers, it was quoted that 20% of daily calorie intake on an average comes from beverages. A bottled beverage "naturally sweetened" has some barely pronounceable ingredients like erythretrol and crystalline fructose. Take a glass of water instead and squeeze a natural lemon or lime into it.
So I am still eating Canadian honey, but not granola bars, non-dairy or soy cheeses or flavoured sports drinks. There is a lot of good stuff out there if you purchase from the perimeter of the grocery store.
Tuesday, 14 August 2012
FROM CHEAP TO DELIGHTFULLY CHEERFUL
I never had a sangria I really liked. It was watered down cheap wine and it tasted crappy. To prove my point, I checked it out and found out the truth about "traditional sangria" in Spanish bars and restaurants. It is a tourist thing. They are the only ones drinking it and it probably goes for any Spanish bar at home too. To the Spanish, sangria is a party drink and there is only one reason... to get you drunk cheaply. There is generally no magical recipe to make sangria. You take the cheapest red wine you can get, the cheapest brandy, whiskey, anything will do and the cheapest fruit that you have lying about ... stuff that is too mushy to eat. It is tastes gross, which it usually will, so they add something to take the taste away like sugar and cinnamon.
The standard ingredients are a cheap bottle of red wine, a similar quantity of 7up, Sprite or other sparkling lemon drink, a glass of liquor like brandy, whiskey or cointreau, a peach, apple and an orange, some lemon and cinnamon.
It is no wonder I don't like it. Don't like cheap wine or 7up. As a matter of fact, I am a purist with gin and vodka. Now if we are talking rum, the best is 10X Cane rum, like they use in good mojitos in Miami. And I actually don't mind a rum punch in the islands providing it has bite to it. I have a tendency to like everything in excess. I like strong espresso and if I am having chocolate milk, I want a lot of chocolate. So I know it doesn't bode well for diets but if you are going to do it, then do it the right way.
So, I am taking a bit of a twist on a sangria from "the shiksah that works in the kitchen" as she calls herself, from Zabar's Kosher Restaurant in New York. She has a cool Rosh Hashana Sangria that might taste okay with a little bit of Ginafication. This is untried but I am sure it will work. and.... I don't care if they think that anything expensive would be a waste. That's not my mantra. So let's be adventurous and include this in your first Rosh Hashana recipe of the season.
ROSH HASHANA SANGRIA
Ingredients and my modus operendi
1/2 cup honey and 1/2 cup water over medium heat until dissolved (this is your honey simple syrup)
Soak pomegranate seeds from one pomegranate, 1 apple thinly sliced, 10 oz. of seedless grapes in brandy overnight.
For presentation reasons, you should strain the day-old fruit before preparing the sangria and add fresh fruit shortly before serving
On the day of, a couple of hours before serving pour a whole bottle of syrah or shiraz wine in a pitcher. Add 1 cup of grape juice, 1/2 cup brandy and 1/2 cup of triple sec and honey simple syrup into the pitcher (forget the fizzy or lemony crap)
Add the ice and fresh apples and grapes. Refrigerate for a couple of hours.
Serve while listening to flamenco artists... There is no science to making sangria... just what tastes best. If it is worth your time and effort, don't cheap out. TV chefs never recommend you use cheap wine in cooking and I agree. Also, what's with adding the pop? Yuck!
The standard ingredients are a cheap bottle of red wine, a similar quantity of 7up, Sprite or other sparkling lemon drink, a glass of liquor like brandy, whiskey or cointreau, a peach, apple and an orange, some lemon and cinnamon.
It is no wonder I don't like it. Don't like cheap wine or 7up. As a matter of fact, I am a purist with gin and vodka. Now if we are talking rum, the best is 10X Cane rum, like they use in good mojitos in Miami. And I actually don't mind a rum punch in the islands providing it has bite to it. I have a tendency to like everything in excess. I like strong espresso and if I am having chocolate milk, I want a lot of chocolate. So I know it doesn't bode well for diets but if you are going to do it, then do it the right way.
So, I am taking a bit of a twist on a sangria from "the shiksah that works in the kitchen" as she calls herself, from Zabar's Kosher Restaurant in New York. She has a cool Rosh Hashana Sangria that might taste okay with a little bit of Ginafication. This is untried but I am sure it will work. and.... I don't care if they think that anything expensive would be a waste. That's not my mantra. So let's be adventurous and include this in your first Rosh Hashana recipe of the season.
ROSH HASHANA SANGRIA
Ingredients and my modus operendi
1/2 cup honey and 1/2 cup water over medium heat until dissolved (this is your honey simple syrup)
Soak pomegranate seeds from one pomegranate, 1 apple thinly sliced, 10 oz. of seedless grapes in brandy overnight.
For presentation reasons, you should strain the day-old fruit before preparing the sangria and add fresh fruit shortly before serving
On the day of, a couple of hours before serving pour a whole bottle of syrah or shiraz wine in a pitcher. Add 1 cup of grape juice, 1/2 cup brandy and 1/2 cup of triple sec and honey simple syrup into the pitcher (forget the fizzy or lemony crap)
Add the ice and fresh apples and grapes. Refrigerate for a couple of hours.
Serve while listening to flamenco artists... There is no science to making sangria... just what tastes best. If it is worth your time and effort, don't cheap out. TV chefs never recommend you use cheap wine in cooking and I agree. Also, what's with adding the pop? Yuck!
Monday, 13 August 2012
Dying to be Red
It is like, "What is black and white and read (red) all over?" Well, we all know that is a newspaper. What is a deeply dyed layer cake called "Red Velvet" and why do people think it is heavenly? I don't really have the answer to that one although I think it is a real riddle.
I have tasted it once or twice but was more blown away by the deep red colour and turned off by the chemical dyes that made it that way. To me it was just a chocolate cake with red dye in it. Now, to all those Red Velvet lovers, don't get your shirt in a knot. It is just my opinion.
My friend, David, asked me to write a blog about Red Velvet Cake. At the time, I told him I didn't know a lot about it. I had had cupcakes that were Red Velvet from EAT MY WORDS and I watched a TV food show like Paula Deen making it. Sure it was tasty but what is the red dye? How good is that to eat? We are forever told that red dye # something was carcinogenic. Even when I see cakes where the icing is too brightly coloured, I immediately think of carcinogens.
Now, David loves chocolate cake but hates Red Velvet Cake. I was thinking what was the difference with the exception of the horrific bright red dye. Maybe it is the cream cheese frosting that David doesn't like. After all, he doesn't like carrot cake and that has cream cheese frosting. Well it appears that most of the recipes floating around now aren't really the original Red Velvet Cake. The cream cheese frosting is a contemporary twist to it. Traditional and true Southerners don't like it either. The original cake was very dense as well like a carrot cake.
The original frosting on RVC is an odd old frosting that uses a cooked base of flour and milk beaten with butter and sugar, sometimes called "gravy icing". The cream cheese frosting came from the movie Steel Magnolias in about 1989. And when carrot cake became a favourite in the US, the cream cheese frosting spread into use for other cakes as well. Since it's in common use now, they have seemed to have forgotten the original.
Now, I have read so much about it, I think I am going to throw up. There was one response on a blog that had this X-rated visual symbolism... Cutting (with a long, pointy, phallic symbol) a big triangle (delta of Venus) into the virginal, white, fluffy exterior (like a bridal gown!) "exposing" all that shocking, secret, hidden cherry-red sensuousness on in the inside. Now, David, read this one to your wife. Then, he goes on to say, just like in real life, when you finally DO IT.... consume IT... it is a BIG LET DOWN.... So, in boring old reality red velvet cake tastes BLAH. His guess is that RVC was invented during the Great Depression when quality ingredients were too expensive for most folks.
Like other people, I don't really get RVC. Does the colouring add anything to the taste? And if you didn't have red colouring on hand, why not substitute blue or purple? It would really taste the same since food colouring doesn't taste like anything.
Red Velvet Cake is arguably the hottest cake flavour out there and yet I haven't read a helluva lot of people that actually like it. So David, you are not alone. Stick to your chocolate cake. I still think there are more people that prefer that to Red Velvet Cake. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, no chocolate cake for Gina. I am on "shutdown" as my son, Rob says. Too many calories that I just don't need.
I have tasted it once or twice but was more blown away by the deep red colour and turned off by the chemical dyes that made it that way. To me it was just a chocolate cake with red dye in it. Now, to all those Red Velvet lovers, don't get your shirt in a knot. It is just my opinion.
My friend, David, asked me to write a blog about Red Velvet Cake. At the time, I told him I didn't know a lot about it. I had had cupcakes that were Red Velvet from EAT MY WORDS and I watched a TV food show like Paula Deen making it. Sure it was tasty but what is the red dye? How good is that to eat? We are forever told that red dye # something was carcinogenic. Even when I see cakes where the icing is too brightly coloured, I immediately think of carcinogens.
Now, David loves chocolate cake but hates Red Velvet Cake. I was thinking what was the difference with the exception of the horrific bright red dye. Maybe it is the cream cheese frosting that David doesn't like. After all, he doesn't like carrot cake and that has cream cheese frosting. Well it appears that most of the recipes floating around now aren't really the original Red Velvet Cake. The cream cheese frosting is a contemporary twist to it. Traditional and true Southerners don't like it either. The original cake was very dense as well like a carrot cake.
The original frosting on RVC is an odd old frosting that uses a cooked base of flour and milk beaten with butter and sugar, sometimes called "gravy icing". The cream cheese frosting came from the movie Steel Magnolias in about 1989. And when carrot cake became a favourite in the US, the cream cheese frosting spread into use for other cakes as well. Since it's in common use now, they have seemed to have forgotten the original.
Now, I have read so much about it, I think I am going to throw up. There was one response on a blog that had this X-rated visual symbolism... Cutting (with a long, pointy, phallic symbol) a big triangle (delta of Venus) into the virginal, white, fluffy exterior (like a bridal gown!) "exposing" all that shocking, secret, hidden cherry-red sensuousness on in the inside. Now, David, read this one to your wife. Then, he goes on to say, just like in real life, when you finally DO IT.... consume IT... it is a BIG LET DOWN.... So, in boring old reality red velvet cake tastes BLAH. His guess is that RVC was invented during the Great Depression when quality ingredients were too expensive for most folks.
Like other people, I don't really get RVC. Does the colouring add anything to the taste? And if you didn't have red colouring on hand, why not substitute blue or purple? It would really taste the same since food colouring doesn't taste like anything.
Red Velvet Cake is arguably the hottest cake flavour out there and yet I haven't read a helluva lot of people that actually like it. So David, you are not alone. Stick to your chocolate cake. I still think there are more people that prefer that to Red Velvet Cake. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, no chocolate cake for Gina. I am on "shutdown" as my son, Rob says. Too many calories that I just don't need.
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