Into the light

Freshman Fifteen

I'm taking over the Bachelor Nutrition Series. Yes, Eric is a bachelor. But he's always someone's bachelor; as such, he's carefully tended and well fed. The Simple Nutrition Series (its new name) should be geared toward those who know something about the body and, as such, desire nutritious fare but who, for whatever reason, find themselves independent, and culinarily challenged for a spell.
 
Proper equipment, fresh ingredients, adaptable recipes, sufficient time and talent -- all components of good nutrition -- are in short supply when one finds herself alone, on a big college campus, in a dorm room, hungry for both food and companionship. Yes, the hot pot is small consolation, and stands in the way of starvation. But wouldn't it be great if a moveable feast was a genuine possibility? If the way to the heart is truly through the stomach, shouldn't a girl come prepared for the journey?

My lovely Julia graduated from Cheyenne Mountain High School this weekend. [Slight brag fest: Cheyenne is a Blue Ribbon School -- one of only 33 in the nation -- selected from a pool of 28,000 public and private high schools!] While Julia was voted Most Likely to Win the Nobel Prize for Literature, and Best Sense of Humor -- both make me so happy! -- she did not win the Next Rachael Ray title. So begins my Fifteen Freshman Recipes Cookbook.

Freshman Fifteen #1 -- Tortilla pizzas
I will not sing the praises of the lard/bleached-flour combo known as the tortilla. Pure dreck if you ask me. But, in a pinch, it can be the foundation for a nutritious gourmet pizza.

The PRESTO Pizzazz Pizza Oven is a stand-alone device that can cook a fresh or frozen pizza in minutes. We experimented with it tonight and discovered a few nutritious alternatives to Totino's, using flour tortillas as our crust.

I placed the following items along the counter:
marinara sauce
olive oil
chopped fresh garlic
chopped fresh cilantro
chopped fresh basil
chopped fresh spinach
black beans
sliced black olives
turkey pepperoni
sliced roma tomatoes
sliced green pepper
sliced green onions
pineapple tidbits
shredded cheddar
shredded mozzarella
shredded swiss

We used the above ingredients in various tasty combinations and had a really lovely time of it.

A few combinations we discovered:
-black beans, tomatoes, cilantro, green onions, cheddar
-olive oil, spinach, garlic, basil, swiss
-marinara, pepperoni, pineapple, black olives, mozzarella

Each pizza took about six minutes, was chock full of fresh ingredients, and ended up crisp and delicious. Not exactly haute cuisine, but definitely a step up from the Top Ramen of my era!

Yerba Maté is for lovers

A few years ago, I went with a friend to a little restaurant in Manitou called The Maté Factor. I ordered maté which, it turned out, was tea. Very dark and bitter tea.

On my recent trip to Argentina, I discovered that this very same maté is consumed by nearly everyone, every day, throughout the entire day. However, it is never drunk during mealtimes, isn’t sold at restaurants, and is never — or very rarely — offered to tourists.

Instead of a teapot, Argentinian maté is usually made in a decorative gourd with three legs attached to the bottom to prevent tipping. The tea is drunk using a pretty silver straw called a bombilla, which has a strainer inside to filter the loose leaves. When more than one person is present, the maté is passed back and forth and everyone uses the same bombilla.

Watching the maté ritual reminded me of watching people pass a joint at a rock concert. Similarly, there's paraphernalia associated with the tradition, like a metal thermos of hot water and a small backpack for tea leaves and other necessaries.

I was warned early on that, while unlikely, an invitation to maté should be taken seriously. Being asked to share maté is apparently a precursor to going steady or a first kiss or something. So if you’re interested, by all means sip!

Intelligent design

Can you figure out what this is? Look closely and think, think, think. This particular item has been singled out of thousands of similar items for Best Design honors.

Check out my other blog, Culture Chakra, for more juicy tidbits.

The Cancer Cartel at work again

I don’t know how many of you are women’s basketball fans, but just in case you missed last weekend’s action, most of the top-ranked college teams played their games bedecked from head to toe in pink uniforms, compliments of Nike. The Think Pink initiative is a global, unified effort of the Women’s Basketball Coaches Association (WBCA) to raise breast cancer awareness on the court, across campuses, in communities and beyond. More than 800 universities participated in some capacity in the event which happened to coincide with ESPN’s ‘February Frenzy’ of games. Fans of the game were encouraged to don pink in support of the cause.

Now, I don’t know if you’ve seen a typical women’s basketball fan, but I can assure you that pink is not her favorite color. However, like the rest of us, she’s always willing to do her part in the fight against breast cancer.

During last week’s action, in addition to the play-by-play reminder of breast cancer, fans were repeatedly encouraged to give generously to the Kay Yow/WBCA Cancer Fund. We were told that we must band together to stop this ruthless killer of women. Yes, we surely surely must.

My question is why didn’t Nike just write a big check to the fund and be done with it? We could’ve actually WATCHED the Rutgers-Tennessee game, a rematch of last year’s NCAA final; the fund would have its money; more “research” could be done; big Pharma and their minion-surgeons could have their pin money; big Food could keep fucking with the food supply so that these fundraisers will always be necessary. And Nike will be at the ready to supply gear for each of them, swoosh color negotiable.

Even more importantly, more women would be convinced to cough up money for an annual mammogram, more biopsies of benign tissue would be done and, in the process, even more of them would get cancer from the large, very unnatural and unhealthy, doses of radiation they regularly receive. I mean, let’s forget that one of the world’s foremost authorities on radiation, John W. Gofman, (MD, PhD, Professor Emeritus of Molecular Biology at UC-Berkeley–no hack, this guy), estimates that 75% of breast cancer cases could be prevented by avoiding exposure to the ionizing radiation of mammography and x-rays. I'm sure the number would be even higher if our mainstream healthcare professionals knew anything about health.

The Think Pink campaign sounds like a win-win for everyone. Except, of course, the women who are supposedly benefiting by thinking pink.




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