Spring Greens

Spring has finally sprung and I've been loving spending my days with the earth under my feet and soil under my fingernails. I am so blessed that I get to spend time reaching across garden beds, tucking tender transplants into the ground, and helping students spread tiny seeds along furrows in the soil. Life is crazy and that's how I like it. We rush to get things planted between the spring rains and wait in eager expectation for the bounty to come. Fruit trees are blooming and spring dandelions and wild onions are prolific. As I wait for my kale to blow me away I dig up dandelions and combine them in a pot for a delightful spring soup.


Amanda's Spring Bounty Soup

First saute:

• One small onion
• Handful of wild onion greens
• Two overwintered carrots from the garden
• Three stalks celery

Then throw into the saute:

• Large amount of fresh young dandelion greens

To the saute add:

• Four cups homemade chicken stock
• One medium potato, chopped

Bring to a boil and allow to simmer until potato and carrots are soft. Then I pureed the soup although you could leave it whole if that is more desirable to look at. Then I added to the puree:

• 1/2 cup cream
• 1/2 cup plain yogurt
• Generous amount of granulated garlic
• About one tablespoon Dijon or spicy mustard
• Salt and pepper
• Splash of lemon juice

Then I was afraid nobody else would like my soup so I added a nice drizzle of honey to the pot. 

If you might be super apprehensive about the bitterness of dandelion greens which can happen if they're not young enough, I would suggest blanching your greens before using to remove some of the possible bitterness. The soup that I made has a distinctive dandelion flavor but it's not too bitter.

Quite delightful, delicious and nutritious!

Did you know that dandelion greens are a great spring detox food? Go pick some and if you don't have time to make your own soup consider sauteing them and adding to your morning eggs! It's spring folks, go outside!

Fall Delight: Beet Pumpkin Soup

Today I was inspired by the baggies of pureed beets and pumpkin hanging out in the fridge. Earlier last week  a delightful beet chocolate cake was created from the beet puree but another collection was found this week in the fridge ready for use. In an attempt to make a tasty satisfying soup with the beets I decided a sweet addition of pumpkin could have great potential. I love using what I find on hand to create healthful easy dishes!

Beet Pumpkin Soup
1 T. Coconut oil
1/2 large onion
2 cloves garlic
Splash of white wine
2 cups chicken stock
1 cup apple cider
2 cups pumpkin
2 cups beet puree
Salt & Pepper to taste
Sprinkle of cinnamon, ginger, cloves
Plain yogurt or sour cream for serving

Into the dutch oven I sauteed the onion in coconut oil adding garlic after onion is softened. I used a splash of wine to deglaze the pan and then added the chicken stock and apple cider. The apple cider was another item I found in the fridge that needed to be used. Otherwise you could just use more stock or water. I added the beets and pumpkin and cooked just until heated. Then I pureed most of the mixture in a blender. You could also leave it chunky if you would prefer. Add spices to your liking and serve with a large dollop of plain yogurt or sour cream on top.

Additionally, if you don't happen to have beet puree in your fridge I might recommend roasting them whole or chopped in the oven at about 400 until tender before adding them to the soup. Roasting beets and pumpkin before cooking brings out a natural sweetness not found when simply boiling .

This makes a great fall soup utilizing some essential fall produce items. Beets and pumpkin both contain many healthful nutrients, antioxidants, vitamins & minerals and generally cleanse the body. Consider taking an adventure in the soup department this fall. You really can't go wrong with things in a pot!

Super Stew

I was super excited to try my very first package of grass-fed beef sausage. It went into this amazing pot of Sweet Potato Lentil Stew. 

Start with one onion and 1 lb sausage. Brown.

Add one small can mushrooms and one large sweet potato.

  

Add a can of crushed tomatoes and 1 cup lentils to the mix.
Add about 8 cups of chicken/veggie broth to the pot. Bring to a boil.
Then simmer for 15 minutes until lentils are cooked and potatoes tender.
Don't forget 2t. cumin, 1t. paprika, 1/2t. garlic pwd, 1/2t. pepper,
1/2t. chili pwd & 1/2t. rosemary

Add about 3 cups of chopped kale or other green and let sit for 5 min.

Lookin' good!

Oh so tasty on this cold winter day!

Stockpile Soup

I often tell my mother that she really should stop buying groceries and eat some of the stockpile of food that exists in this house. There is so much food in this house, I will always come here if there is a natural disaster, because this house will be thriving. Last night I made a lovely soup using many of the stockpiled essentials.

Here it is:

• Every great soup starts out with sauteed onion. 
• Added some frozen green bell peppers and two pieces of sausage link. 
• Then into the pot went two quarts of homemade stock. One of them being a turkey stock and one veggie.
• Next added two small sweet potatoes.
• Added about 1.5 cups of regular brown lentils.
• Let that simmer for a bit and added cauliflower and red cabbage as well as several garlic cloves.
• It needed some more liquid so I added a pint of homemade tomato sauce + small can of tomato paste 
• Added about a pint more of water.
• Some spices are necessary: plenty of paprika, chili powder, cumin, ground red pepper, salt & pepper

Pretty delicious! You can do it too! What's in your kitchen that needs to be used? Throw it together for a soup masterpiece. What has been your favorite soup creation?

Accountability

Tonight I had my very first health coaching session. In cased you missed the memo, I decided to enroll in the health coach certification program from the Institute of Integrative Nutrition. This is a year long program and will involve an overview of over 100 different health theories. Additionally, I will learn how to set up my own health coaching practice and from there the possibilities are endless. More to come about this specific program and what I'm learning in the near future. 

For tonight though, I had my first health coaching session via telephone with Debbie, whom resides in Connecticut. She did a health history with me which is the first step in a health coaching consultation. This involved asking me numerous questions regarding my health, family history, and personal satisfaction. It's kinda intense, but definitely a necessary first step. I definitely should have known this was coming, however, I was still speechless when she asked what goals I would like to set before our next session. Here's my honest reply, I suck at making goals. I'm not sure how I became this way, because I really do remember being that person in high school that had it all figured out. I loved writing goals. Now, they terrify me. I suppose this is a fear of failure for me. If I never put it into writing, then I can't possibly fail. Right? However, I need goals, I know I need something to work toward.

So here we go. My goals before my next session in January include: 

1. Write my intentions for the program and make my big announcement to the world, aka, all my contacts about what I am studying and plan to gain from the program. (This is something that is intended to gain support from my personal contacts and let people know just exactly what I am doing.) 
2. Keep a food journal for at least one week. (I've tried this before and always quit. However, I need to be more aware of exactly what I am putting in my body.)

I know that I really need this accountability and I'm excited to see how I can equip myself with the tools to help others make healthy lifestyle choices. I've got to start with myself, so here we go.

One of the questions during the health history was what do you typically eat for breakfast, lunch, dinner. My breakfast response was very easy because I generally always eat oatmeal however, my response for lunch and dinner was a bit difficult. I mentioned that I make a lot of soup and eat it for long periods of time. In honor of that response, I whipped up another batch of random soup.

Tonight's delight: Curried Red Lentil Soup

Containing: Onion, carrots, red bell pepper, garlic, red lentils, swiss chard, chicken broth, mixed curry spice blend, lemon juice, S&P

Wouldn't you know after I took several bites, I realized I had added a bit much of the cayenne pepper and added a bit of plain yogurt to cool it down a bit. I ate it with sourdough masa crackers. Pretty delish and perfect on this cool evening!

Color the Potluck

It is certainly my job to bring health and color to any potluck that I attend. All people that know me well know how to find what I bring. Does it look colorful and is it healthful and nutritious? Now I don't claim to always bring healthy things, however, more often than not I do feel the need to bring something healthy. It's not that I don't enjoy a really great unhealthy treat but I just feel like it's my role as a nutrition educator and a health coach student to bring something with life, color, and nutrition to the table. 

Today for our church potluck I chose this wonderful collection of bell peppers. Super simple this is simply a nice combination of red, yellow, green, and chocolate bell peppers mixed together with a red onion, lemon juice, olive oil, and fresh parsley. Sprinkled with salt it was a refreshing healthy salad. The peppers were the end of the season fresh peppers from a KC market and a KC friend's garden. Perfect. 

This would be the soup I made last night for our KSU football watch party. It was a nice combination of all things random in my fridge that needed to be used, a mix of chili and taco soup. You'll find plenty of onion and bell peppers in this one along with corn, tomatoes, V8 juice, a few okra, carrots, can of chili beans, and a healthy serving of bulgar. My friend Amos remarked, "This is good, but it would be better with meat." Silly meat eaters just can't get over having something without meat.  I thought it was tasty after I added a healthy amount of chili powder, taco seasoning, paprika, cumin, and red pepper.

Supper Club

I hosted my first Supper Club gathering this week. It was a lot of fun and a really great way to join with other lovely single ladies for a delightful dinner. I decided that a supper club would be a great way to cook great food and enjoy it with others so I invited several ladies that I know enjoy great food and would enjoy meeting some new people.

We enjoyed a lovely fall minestrone. Courtesy of Alice Waters, The Art of Simple Food.

Sauteed onions, celery, carrots, garlic

Swiss Chard fresh from the garden

Added butternut squash, water and simmered

White Northern beans & pasta

Grand Finale!

Roasted Veggie Soup

I made a super easy, scrumptious, nutritient dense soup recently. This is a roasted vegetable soup made from:

• 2 medium end of the season fresh organic tomatoes
• 2 small fingerling eggplant
• 1 large red bell pepper
• 1 medium onion
• 3 cloves garlic

Roast all these major ingredients on a pan in the oven at 400 degrees for about 30 minutes. Until they are soft and nicely roasted. Slap into a saucepan and add enough water to make it soup-like. I used an immersion blender to blend it up or you could just mash the produce until desired consistency. Add desired herbs, I used fresh basil and dried oregano with some salt and pepper. Sprinkle a bit of cheese on top too if you like. It was delicious and super healthful!

Magical Turnip Soup

• Turnip - I used about 8 medium to small
• Onion - 1 medium
• Carrot - 1 large
• Sweet potato - 1 small
• Delicata squash - 1/2 cup smashed- this can be left out, I used up some that I had thawed in the fridge
• Chicken stock - roughly 4 cups
• White apple wine - 1/2 cup- once again, apple wine not necessary, just what I found in the fridge
• Curry powder - 1 heaping teaspoon
• Mustard seed - generous sprinkle
• Black pepper - 1/2 teaspoon
• Salt - to taste

I chopped the turnip, onion, carrot, and sweet potato and sauteed for about 5 minutes. Then I added the spices for another couple of minutes. Added the squash mash that I had hanging out in the fridge along with the wine and stock. Bring to a boil and then simmer for 30 minutes or so covered. Here you can either eat it chunky style or go ahead and blend for a pureed soup. I prefer the pureed version so all the flavors are mingled. This also allowed me to feed it to my father without him freaking out too much about eating turnips and sweet potatoes. I added a dollop of plain yogurt while serving for a delightful magical soup!

This soup is magical because not only is it virtually fat free and full of healthful vegetables, but it contains curry. Curry, according to this not-so-scientific article, helps as an anti-aging agent, fights Alzheimer's, cancer protection, and arthritis treatment. Sounds pretty magical to me! 

Snow Day!

Recently as I was looking back through my blog posts I noticed that a lot, probably the majority of my titles end in an exclamation point. I thought, "Really, am I that excited all the time?" Well this time the excitement is definitely necessary because we got the first real snow storm of the year and it finally feels like winter in Kansas. After I spent all day in the bake lab on Sunday I drove home to the beginning of the the snow fall. When I woke up Monday morning there was a fabulous blanket of snow and it kept coming. I think we have maybe 6 inches of snow out there? Anyway, Monday was a fabulous snow day and I had the amazing opportunity to enjoy it. I whipped out the camera and attempted to figure out features on the thing. Note to self, consider reading the manual and learning more about cameras. Anyway I hope you enjoy my experience of the first great snow day of the year!

The magical outdoor furnace that keeps us warm!

To finish off every great snow day one needs a giant pot of hearty soup! Take that single digits. I have soybean, green split pea, ham, onion, tomato, bell pepper, nutrient rich goodness!