Beans and Cabbage (Dark Days 4)

I am way behind on Dark Days!  The detox is kind of hard to locally source, so I'm trying to think of things to "localize" wherever I can.  This week's local meal was beans & cabbage from Super Natural Every Day.  I've made and posted this before, but not with local sources.  The cabbage and potatoes came from last month's Princeton farmers' market, the shallots from my CSA, and the Jacob's cattle beans (first used in another Dark Days meal) from Cayuga Pure Organics in New York state.  The beans were much better suited for this than for what I previously used them.  They go from undercooked to exploded in a matter of minutes, so they were still all broken up, but it worked out fine for this dish.  Lesson learned, local is not always going to be better quality, and you have to make that decision for yourself.  I don't anticipate buying that type of bean from that source again in the future, though they may have just been a little bit older.

2012 Whole Living Healthy Detox: Week 1

I'm doing the 2012 Whole Living Action Plan, which is kind of a healthy 3-week detox.  This first week, I ate only fruits, veggies, nuts, and plant based oils.  It was hard at times, because I was seriously craving sweets from the holiday season, but we made it through the cravings and I even dropped a pound or two of unwanted weight!  We cut this week short to 5 days instead of 7 because we have another family Christmas gathering to attend and we wanted to have more options than just the veggie tray.  I'll write more about week 2 next week.  I've been too busy during the week to post, so while I'm doing this detox, I'll do a summary at the end of the week.  Hopefully when I'm done I'll be craving nutritious foods instead of all the sugar I've been craving.

Here are some of the foods I've eaten this week...

Fruit Salad Smoothie - from the Vitamix cookbook, which came with my Christmas gift :) and this was the first smoothie I tried with the Vitamix.  It was delicious.  It had a bunch of different fruits along with carrot and cucumber.

Berry Delicious Smoothie - also from the Vitamix cookbook, some pineapple and berries, including cranberries, which provided a really nice flavor.  I plan to make this again this week.

Orange-Berry Smoothie - This one was pretty good, kind of tangy from all the orange juice. I would make it again.

Beet and Carrot Smoothie - This was my least favorite. I couldn't even force myself to eat it. I don't like beets, so I thought this would make them easier for me to stomach so that I could get all their nutrients without the flavor and texture I don't like, but the beet overpowered the smoothie and the ginger didn't help either.

Carrot, Mango, and Herb Smoothie - I'm drinking this one right now and it's one of my favorites from the week, probably because it doesn't have any veggies in it... just carrot juice, orange juice, mango chunks, and mint.  I put about half the amount of mint in because it can be overpowering, and I just get a slight refreshing coolness from it.

Kale Slaw with Red Cabbage and Carrots - I had this for lunch a few times, and I really liked the tangy dressing and the crunchy pepita seeds and the hemp seeds were good too.  I liked the refreshing bite of parsley though toward the end of the week I got lazy and it was just kale, cabbage, the nuts, and dressing.

Steamed Broccoli and Squash with Tahini Dressing - We had this for dinner one night and it was one of our least favorites of the week.  The broccoli with the tahini sauce was the best part.  I definitely wouldn't make this one again.

Roasted Peppers, Cauliflower, and Almonds - This one was pretty good.  I liked the roasted peppers and the saltiness from the kalamata olives.  One thing I would do differently is to make a better dressing, since this one was mainly just lemon and oil.  This would also be really good with feta.  Boy do I miss cheese.

I've already started week 2, and I've moved on to making mostly my own recipes either improvised or from other sources.  One in particular deserves its own post, and if time allows, I will share it this week.

Oatcakes

I finally got around to making the Oatcakes from Super Natural Every Day.  Ken wanted a muffin to bring to a work holiday celebration breakfast potluck thing.  I was looking for something that I had all the ingredients to make (and that I would want to eat) and settled on these.  With all the butter in them, of course they were delicious, they were chewy and hearty, like eating a really sweet bowl of oatmeal.  I want to try making these again, but I intend to health them up a little to make them a more appropriate breakfast option.

Starting tomorrow, January 2nd, I'm going to try the Whole Living Magazine's 21-day (or 28-day if you're feeling ambitious) detox plan.  So I will be posting mostly about that, and I won't get to try too many of the recipes I've been flagging lately - but I know it's only a temporary thing, and I think it will make me feel a lot better after all the sugar and junk I've been eating lately.