How to Experience Body Euphoria

Have you ever heard of the condition "body dysmorphia"? Wikipedia describes it like this: "Body dysmorphic disorder (BDD), sometimes referred to as body dysmorphia or dysmorphic syndrome, is a (psychological) somatoform disorder in which the affected person is excessively concerned about and preoccupied by a perceived defect in his or her physical features (body image). The sufferer may complain of several specific features or a single feature, or a vague feature or general appearance, causing psychological distress that impairs occupational and/or social functioning, sometimes to the point of severe depression and anxiety, development of other anxiety disorders, social withdrawal or complete social isolation, and more."

Yesterday on the blog Medicinal Marzipan, a blog about body image and unconditional self love, there was a guest posting entitled "Creating Bonds Around Self-Love Instead of Negative Self Talk" by Emilie Littlehales, of the blog I Came to Run and the Embrace: Me Project.

In it she makes an observation that is so true, so powerful, I just had to share it here: "From an early age, we [women] learn to dislike our bodies. There are a variety of factors that play a role in this, but we have to be careful not to underestimate the degree to which our interactions with other girls and women influence us in this regard. Sooner or later, negative body image becomes a common feeling over which we learn to bond, and a sisterhood that centers on sharing our thoughts on how much we dislike parts of physical selves develops. It’s a disturbing phenomenon when you take a step back to look at it: you can’t walk into a room one day and declare how good you feel about your thighs, doing so might result in you being the victim of silent, seething resentment. But say that you feel fat or disgusting, and you will find that the entire room knows exactly how you feel."

What Emilie is describing is pervasive in our society today. Just the other day a friend came up to me and asked me for advice on how to get in shape. I asked her what her current fitness program was and she said she was working out every day . . . every day! . . . doing the Insanity videos in her basement.

I said, "That's amazing! So what is it that you would like to improve upon?"

And she said, "Well, I'd like to lose ten pounds" and I was thinking "If you lose ten pounds you might need to be hospitalized." I told her flat out that she was suffering from Body Dysmorphia but she didn't seem to care. It's just like Emilie described. We are conditioned to hate our bodies when there is nothing wrong with them. We feel that we must vocalize this dissatisfaction or we won't be accepted into the club.

So afterwards, my husband, who was also present at the conversation, came up with a new condition that we are calling "Body Euphoria."

Here's our definition: It is the state of mind that you are in after treating yourself well for an extended period of time. Conditions include (1) participation in moderate exercise that you truly enjoy, (2) eating  nutritious, unprocessed, plant strong food and (3) achieving your happy weight, where even though your body has no resemblance to a model in a magazine and never will, you are thrilled with how you look, and more importantly, how you feel.

That's the state I am in today. Body Euphoria. Strong, balanced, healthy. Sure, I don't look like any model, but I'll take it! And I want to share it with you.

What is your current state of mind?

Do you think you can let go of your own negative self talk?

What do you hope to achieve?

Tips from Teri The Vitamix Lady, Part I, Fresh Fruit Smoothies

Are you a regular smoothie maker? Do you own a VitaMix or other high speed blender?

My friends and I were fortunate enough to be invited over to Kim's house (there she is below), for, amongst other things, a special demonstration of food preparation with the VitaMix. It was so much fun and I learned so much, so of course, I want to share it with you. Thanks Kim and Teri!

I'm going to start out with smoothie tips.

Tip #1: Put the ice in last. Putting it in first is a surefire way to wear out your blender.

Tip #2: Along the same lines as tip #1, load your blender from soft to hard: soft ingredients at the bottom up to harder ingredients at the top.

Tip #3: Leave the seeds in and the stems on. Ex. Strawberry stems and carrot stems, cantaloupe seeds, grape seeds (think resveratrol), the pith and seeds of an orange, pineapple cores (okay, that's not a seed or stem, but you get the picture--lots and lots of fiber). We throw out a lot of the nutrition in our food that in a blender becomes indistinguishable!

Tip #4: But not the seeds of an apple . . . they contain arsenic!

Tip #5: Even the little nub end of the banana--it contains the seeds of the banana, and thus the most nutrition!

Tip #6: A straight up fruit smoothie? No greens? No flaxseed? I wouldn't drink this for breakfast everyday, but all of that fruit together, plus some ice, makes a really wonderful, refreshing dessert smoothie that your whole family will love. I could totally see serving this to guests at a brunch and really wowing them. Today we had it as an afternoon snack. YUM!

Oh how I heart you VitaMix!

Did you know that you could put all of that stuff into your smoothies?

OPR: White Bean and Mango Burritos

What is "OPR" you wonder? Well, it stands for "other people's recipes." I'm not much of a chef, if you haven't noticed, but what I am a master at is scouring the world for Plant Strong, Nutritarian recipes and then making and eating them. After I take some photographs that is!

Here's a new favorite that I discovered: White Bean and Mango Burritos from The Real Meal Today blog. They could not have been any easier or any more delicious! If you are craving Mexican food, give these a try. Go here to check out the original recipe, which would have been so spicy I'm not sure that I could have eaten them. I made a few modifications to the heat, to the proportions and also by adding lettuce. Spinach or any other green would work well too!

Here's my version:

White Bean and Mango Burritos

serves 4

2 15 ounce cans cannellini beans, rinsed and drained 

1 large ripe mango, peeled and diced (about 1 1/2 cups of diced mango)
1cup chopped cilantro
1/4 tsp Cayenne powder (less or more to personal preference!)
1 1/2 Tbsp nutritional yeast
1 1/2 Tbsp cumin
1 1/2 tsp garlic powder
6 medium whole wheat tortillas( as healthy as you can get them)
2 cups chopped lettuce

Combine all ingredients except the tortillas in a large bowl, mix by hand until incorporated. Using a handheld immersion blender, puree about 1/4 of the mixture right in the bowl with all of the ingredients. Remix everything. This will give the mixture a more solid feel and pieces of beans will not be falling out when you bite or cut it.

Soften the tortillas by putting over an open flame on you're stove, over a grill or in the microwave for a few seconds. This will make them easier to roll and move without cracking. Place 1/2 cup chopped lettuce and 1/2 cup of the bean mixture at the bottom of the tortilla, roll over forward 1 turn, fold sides in and then continue to roll to the end.

Optional: place on sheet tray and bake for 10-15 min at 325 degrees.

How do you get your Mexican Food fix?

Did You Win a Copy of Unprocessed by Chef A.j.?

If you were the 28th person to leave a comment to my blog posting on Thursday, April 21st, you did! Winner was chosen at random using the random number generator at random.org.



That would be you, Kat, from Kat's Health Corner! Congratulations and thank you to everyone who so generously shared your experiences on your Plant Strong journeys.

Now Kat, please send me your address so that I can ship you your book! wendysolganik@yahoo.com

My sympathies to those of you that really, really want Chef A.j.'s book but didn't win. You'll have to do what I did and buy it from amazon.com! I promise you, if you make the recipes from Chef A.j.'s book, you will wow any non-believers (ie junk food nomming carnivores)!




Do you like blogger giveaways? What would you get really excited about if you had a chance at winning it (besides the obvious lottery that is)?

Superheroes of the Healthy Vegan Movement to be on the Dr. Oz Show Tomorrow



Forks Over Knives  will be featured on The Dr. Oz show on Wednesday, April 27. Colin Campbell, Ph.D., Caldwell Esselstyn, M.D., Neal Barnard, M.D., Rip Esselstyn, and Lee Fulkerson appear to discuss the film and its topics.

Visit the Dr. Oz Listings Page for a schedule of cities, stations and times. http://www.doctoroz.com/find-station You can bet I'll be setting my DVR tonight!

Ani Phyo's Fresh Mango Cobbler

If you haven't entered my blogger giveaway to win a a copy of Chef A.j.'s book, Unprocessed, it's not too late. If you haven't read the responses, I highly recommend that too. Very inspiring stuff in there!

The long Cleveland winter is officially over! It's almost May, so I think it's safe to assume it won't snow again. It's almost 70 degrees and the sun is shining. My windows are wide open as I type this and as warm  wind blows through my living room. I'm grateful and happy that Spring is here.

I'm also grateful that my family and I were invited over to a friend's house for brunch yesterday. When I asked what I could bring, the host requested a dessert. "Perfect," I thought, "perfect for a girl without a kitchen! I can bring a raw vegan dessert."

Are you familiar with the craze that is raw vegan desserts? I was first exposed to the concept when I met Toby, a woman who was eating exclusively raw. She served me a raw vegan key lime pie and it was extraordinary, along with everything else she made. I toyed with the idea of going raw for a few weeks, mostly because of the lure of eating a lot of very sweet, very rich desserts. You see, one of the promises of "going raw" is that dessert is practically a daily indulgence.

"Enjoy live-food desserts without guilt or worry! By eating live-food desserts in this section, you might actually lose weight!"
Bull s#!t.

That was a quote from raw food guru and multi cookbook author Ani Phyo. But I won't hold it against her. I have to take responsibility for being an idiot. In the time that I spent being "raw" I think I gained ten pounds. "Lose weight" my a$$!

My recommendation? When you do decide to indulge in a dessert, go raw. No question. Raw desserts are basically composed of three things: fruit, nuts and dates. So at least you are getting some vitamins and minerals with your sugar. But don't be fooled, these treats should be the exception, not the rule, of a healthy diet.

So when it came time to have some fun making a dessert, I went right to Ani. I've got a copy of one of her cookbooks, Ani's Raw Food Kitchen. In it she raves about her Fresh Mango Cobbler. And I have to agree, it ranks up there with the best desserts ever. It could go head to head in a competition with Jane Esselstyn's Incredible Unnamed Dessert (which was actually inspired by a Chef A.j. recipe called "Chocolate Fundue"). During the pre-brunch taste test, everyone in my family loved it.

Click here for Ani Phyo's Fresh Mango Cobbler recipe.

Even the incredibly picky Maya!

I thought it would be nice to present the Fresh Mango Cobbler in a trifle bowl. So pretty!

Want to experiment with an Apple Cobbler version of this? Check out Chefjellynow's Raw Apple Crumble.  I'm definitely making that one the next time I'm asked to bring a dessert. His blog, The Real Meal Today, is very new. Let's give this Nutritarian Chef at Whole Foods the Healthy Girl's Kitchen warm welcome (and by that, I mean check out his blog and leave a comment)!

Have you caught wind of the raw vegan dessert craze? Are you/were you sucked in by it's allure like I was?

And They Said I Wouldn't Cook: Toaster Oven Socca

Thank you to everone who has already entered my blogger giveaway to win a copy of Chef A.j.'s book, Unprocessed. The responses are downright inspiring and it's not too late to enter if you haven't done so yet.

Prior to becoming a Nutritarian, a lot of people have legitimate concerns about whether or not this is a doable lifestyle for them. Unfortunately, as a society, we have become overly reliant on cheap, easy "food" that has little to no nutritional value. It's pretty obvious when considering this way of life that your habits in the kitchen department are going to have to change pretty entirely. Some people have even vocalized that they just don't know where to begin or even how to prepare healthy real food given their schedule and lifestyle. But I am here to say that you must make the choice. It's cook or get cooked, by disease that is. Either you take responsibility for your health or you don't. It's that simple.

Before I began kitchen renovations, my contractor, Dan Dureiko, said I wouldn't cook once our renovation was underway.

My friend, Brian Green, asked, "Do you know about the hidden cost of kitchen renovations?"

"No," I replied, shaking in my high healed, black suede, slouchy boots. This is already way over budget.

"Eating out in restaurants," he laughed.

"I'll show them all," I thought. Plus, there's pretty much no where to go out to eat when you are working hard to be an oil free, plant strong, Nutritarian Vegan.

My back's against the wall.

So I'm cooking, without a kitchen. A stew in my crock pot, quinoa salad in my rice cooker, I've even placed an order for a pressure cooker from amazon.com. I'm not letting a little thing like this

slow me down for a minute! If I can manage to get healthy real food on my table every day without a real kitchen, I won't accept any one's excuses!

This morning I was exploring the message boards on Dr. Fuhrman's Member Center for the first time ever, after participating in a webinar last last night where I learned how to navigate the monster, I came upon a thread about "Socca." It's a little like a bread, a little like a pancake. I've been seeing bloggers talk about it on and off for over a year now, so I was curious when I discovered that it was being referenced amongst Nutritarians. I quickly figured out that I could adapt it for my toaster oven so my 6 year old and I decided to go for it.

I'm pretty sure it was popularized by Michelle and Lori, the Pure2Raw twins over at http://www.pure2raw.com/. Here are two links that are worth exploring if you are so inclined:
All about Socca http://www.pure2raw.com/socca-tribute/
The Socca Videos http://www.pure2raw.com/2011/03/finally-our-first-socca-video/

Of course Maya wanted to start with their Chocolate Socca (sans the cardamom, she's just 6).

I decided to spray my pans with coconut oil spray instead of using the 3 Tbsp of coconut oil that The Twins call for. As you can see from the pictures below, it worked just beautifully without all of that oil.

I divided the batter into 2 9" round cake pans. Perfect size for my toaster oven! Here it is after baking for 20 minutes.

They popped out easily, just like the twins said they would!

Drizzled with maple syrup. My kids took one bite and they were done. I'm pretty sure they were expecting a sweet pancake, but they are more like a moist, dense bread and there is no sweetness except for the topping that you use. Next time I am going to try the straight up plain variety. Making the socca was so fast and easy with the detailed descriptions from The Twins, thanks Pure2Raw!

Have you ever made Socca? What were your results?

Blogger Giveaway! Unprocessed by Chef A.j. and a few F.A.Q.s Answered



Today's super duper awesome giveaway is a copy of Unprocessed, complements of no-oil vegan chef extraordinaire, Chef A.j.

Thanks Chef A.j. for making this possible!

In order to enter to win the prize, you must be an e-mail subscriber or RSS feed subscriber to Healthy Girl's Kitchen (if you aren't already, you can do that over there on the left margin of the blog) AND you must answer the questions at the bottom of this posting. Winner will be chosen from valid entries and will be selected at random. Contest will close on Wednesday, April 27th at 5 pm EST and winner will be announced on Thursday, April 28th no later than 9 am EST.

I also want to thank Alipet813 for inspiring the contest question. In a comment made to Part II of my Dr. Neal Barnard Lecture blog posting, Alipet813 asked me the following questions:

"Were you a big meat eater before? I grew up on a farm and I am big on meat. However, the more I read the more I know I need to cut it way back. How do I do that without feeling deprived? I would love your advice. Your recipes are always wonderful."

Well, Alipet, you caught me! I have to admit it, I was never a big meat eater. In fact, I was vegetarian for an entire decade. Once I found out how animals were treated on factory farms, I stopped eating their flesh almost immediately, but still ate all forms of dairy and eggs. And it wasn't hard for me to do because I have never been a craver of any form of meat.

Now before you tune out what I have to say, I want you to know that my personal challenge when it comes to healthy eating is staying away from dessert. Now if you want to know how I went from a daily sweet eater into a rarely eat sweets eater, see this post and this post. I promise you, if you want to eliminate meat from your diet, you will be able to, but it does take PATIENCE and PERSISTENCE. And even then, it doesn't mean that you will NEVER eat meat again for the rest of your life. You may choose to eat it on occasion. But it will never again have the hold on you that it does now. If I could conquer sugar, I believe anyone can conquer any food "addiction."

"Sometimes my busy schedule and the fact that I am new to changing my eating habits means I don't have a lot of the ingredients on hand and makes it a bit expensive or overwhelming. However, I am definitely using your tips for new veggie based meal ideas."

Stick with it! The more you cook from the plant strong, unprocessed cookbooks and blogs, the easier and easier it becomes. There are MANY times now where I will see a recipe and already have all of the ingredients on hand. This will happen for you too. It just occurs naturally. You will begin to gravitate towards recipes that have the flavor profiles that you love and you will start to see those flavor profiles reoccurring in many author's recipes. I for one really like chickpeas and sweet potatoes and I can't begin to tell you how many different dishes I have made combining the two ingredients from so many different bloggers and cookbook authors.

A good thing to get into the habit of doing is substituting ingredients in a recipe for what you have on hand. For example, if a recipe calls for fresh lime juice and all you have are fresh lemons, well, just go ahead and juice those. Currants called for in a salad and you don't stock 'em in your pantry? Put raisins in the dish. You get the picture. The more you cook this way, the easier and easier it gets.

I have been asked to do a post on what I keep in my pantry and it might be a great time to do that. I would also like to blog about the staples that I keep in my fridge and freezer.

"One more question...did you cut out oil? I am confused about this part of the healthy eating beliefs. I would love more info on that or a link to somewhere in your blog that you may have already discussed it."

Yes, approximately one year ago I basically cut out most oil from my diet. I say "most" because I continue to eat in restaurants 5 days a week for lunch and about once a week for dinner. All restaurants use oil and salt. I have never heard of an oil free restaurant. I also continue to eat hummus--of all brands and varieties--not just the tahini free ones (tahini is a ground sesame seed butter and is almost 100% fat). I am just not ready for that level of commitment. Occasionally I will have a cheese substitute from the company Daiya which is just oil disguised as cheese. I try to stay away from Earth Balance (although I do let one of my kids eat it as a transition food) because it too is just 100% oil that is being sold to the consumer as a health food. Shame on them.

I no longer cook at all with oil, but will occasionally spray a cookie sheet with cooking spray if I think something is going to stick. I also make a lot of my own oil free salad dressings in my VitaMix blender.

It is very easy to transition away from oil. You can saute in broth, water or juice very easily. Read about it here and here. For salad dressings, just do a search for no oil salad dressing on this blog or even on google and you will find a lot of ideas.

I do eat avocados, nuts and seeds, but I do try hard to eat these things in moderation. They are extremely high in calories, but at least they are loaded with nutrition. Processed oil--which includes extra virgin olive oil and canola oil--is not a health food. To borrow a phrase from Rip Esselstyn, "Olive oil is the triumph of marketing over science." For more on the subject, pick up a copy of Dr. Esselstyn's book Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease or if you are lucky enough to see him speak in person, grab the chance. It was hearing Dr. Esselstyn speak that convinced me to go vegan almost entirely and also to eliminate oil from my diet, again, almost entirely. If I had any symptoms of heart disease I would eliminate oil totally and entirely.
So here it is folks, the questions that you must answer to enter the blogger giveaway . . .
Are you cutting meat and dairy, oil or processed foods out of your diet? If so, which ones?  And how difficult is this for you (scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being really, really hard)? Do you have ideas on how to cut out meat, dairy, oil or processed food without feeling deprived?

Dr. Neal Barnard Comes to Cleveland, Part II and a Chef A.j. Inspired Quinoa Salad

Here I am at work today, enjoying my variation on Chef A.j.'s Quinoa Salad with Pistachios and Currants, for BREAKFAST. Not my usual fare, but sometimes I just can't eat the same green smoothie again.

I'm still thinking about some of the things I learned at Dr. Barnard's lecture on Tuesday evening.  Here are a few more of the highlights:

1) Even non vegans should be taking a B12 supplement, especially after age 50. There just isn't enough of it in any food for anyone to get enough of it, whether they eat cow or not.

2) Why a low fat diet works so well for weight loss. There are two components to the lean vegan effect. First, because a low fat vegan diet is so high in fiber (plant roughage, fruit and beans), your appetite never gets out of control and you are so much less likely to overeat, a.k.a. "Volumetrics." I have found this to be miraculously true. And second, the thermic effect of food is at work. Also termed "the after meal calorie burn," the following is an explanation of this mechanism:

"Contrary to many popular diet books, Dr. Barnard says: 'Insulin is your best friend when it is working properly.' What’s more, 'Carbohydrates are not the enemy,' says Dr. Barnard. 'They are, in fact, our natural energy source.' Insulin, made by a gene on chromosome 11, can stimulate calorie burn. The problem is it can also shut down fat burn. The trick of is finding a proper balance between the two functions. Again, according to Dr. Barnard, the key is the type of food you eat.

The job of insulin is to push the proteins and sugars we eat into our cells to build body parts and provide fuel (glycogen) for our movements. 'Insulin travels to your muscles, liver, and fat tissues, where it pushes proteins and sugars into your cells,' says Dr. Barnard. 'As it does so, it temporarily shuts down your fat burning machinery,' he adds. That makes sense, of course, because there’s no need to burn fat when food is being pushed into the cells.

Happily, the building process inside the cells speeds up the metabolism and burns calories. '[It’s] is a big job, causing your cells to actually release calories in the form of heat,' says Dr. Barnard. This after-meal metabolism boost is called the thermic effect of food (TEF). 'It’s a nice way to burn calories,' says Barnard. 'All you do is eat, and your body does the rest. These calories are gone forever – they never even get a chance to turn into fat.'

The foods with the biggest TEF are those containing plenty of complex carbohydrates or a mixture of carbs and protein. 'For example, broccoli and other vegetables are about 50 percent complex carbs and 40 percent protein, a mix for a good burn,' says Dr. Barnard. 'On the other hand, butter, chicken grease, and [egg yoke] are just fat, and deliver a much poorer burn.' Again, plant foods win out over animal foods.

Under normal circumstances, the interruption in fat burning is brief. A problem arises if you become flabby and out of shape, however, because your insulin doesn’t work as well. The extra fat on your body requires more insulin and your calorie-burning system becomes sluggish. 'The body produces more and more insulin, and it shuts off fat burning more effectively than it should,' says Dr. Barnard.

You’re insulin also works overtime if you snack constantly. An endless stream of junk food never gives your insulin a chance to rest. 'If you have a constant supply of snacks, your body has no need to use its fat, and insulin keeps your fat-burning processes slower than they would normally be,' Dr. Barnard writes.

A lack of fiber is also a problem. 'Normally, fiber – plant roughage – helps keep insulin levels in check by slowing the release of sugars from the food you eat,' Dr. Barnard counsels.

To keep your after-meal calorie burn up and minimize fat-burn stoppage Dr. Barnard suggests a diet high in healthy carbohydrates and fiber, and low in fat." http://www.cbass.com/FatGenes.htm

3) It's never too late to undo the damage done by years of poor eating. Have you ever cut your finger? Did it heal? Of course it did! The same goes for your internal parts . . .the human body will heal if given a chance!

Dr. Barnard would love this quinoa salad that I'm eating as I type this. I threw it together last night and didn't have all of the ingredients that Chef A.j. called for, but it was outstanding nonetheless!

Simple Quinoa Salad with Currants and Pistachios
based on a recipe from Unprocessed by Chef A.j.

8 cups cooked quinoa
3/4 cup fresh lemon juice (the juice of 3 lemons)
3/4 cup pistachios
1 cup currants
1 cup finely chopped parsley
salt and pepper to taste

Combine ingredients in a large bowl and toss. Enjoy!



Dr. Neal Barnard is Adorable, I Mean, Comes to Cleveland, Part I

Last night I had the privilege of attending a lecture at John Carroll University. Sponsored by Whole Foods Markets, the speaker was Dr. Neal Barnard, President of the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (http://www.pcrm.org/). In case you don't know him, he is one of the leaders in the fight against the obesity epidemic and guess what? His views are right in line with Dr. Esselstyn, Dr. Fuhrman and Dr. McDougall, ie he recommends a low fat vegan diet as a healthy long term solution to our national weight and disease problem.

If you live in Cleveland and are interested in participating in a 21 Day Weight Loss Kickstart, which is based off of Dr. Barnard's new book by the same name, there is one starting on Monday at Whole Foods!

Monday, April 25th - Monday, May 16th
Dr. Neal Barnard's 21-Day Weight Loss Kickstart Immersion
7:00 p.m. (optional walk at 6:30) Free

Fresh off Dr. Barnard's Cleveland visit, Whole Foods Market Cedar Center is offering a 21 Day Weight Loss Kickstart Immersion program, based on Dr. Barnard's recent book, conducted by our healthy eating specialist Ellen Darby. Immersions are conducted as a group with support, tips, and advice from Ellen. Four scheduled meet-ups will include educational and inspirational topics. This can be a great way to start a life-changing journey to improve your health! Sign up at the Health Starts Here Hub area (behind the bananas) on a form provided, or email ellen.darby@wholefoods.com to get registered!

I'm ashamed to say that I own a copy of Dr. Barnard's low fat vegan cookbook and I haven't had the time to explore anything in it yet! With the explosion of publishing of healthy vegan cookbooks of late, I've got my hands full! But seeing him live and in person last night will surely be the thing to get me to start testing his recipes and telling you about them.

Dr. Neal Barnard at John Carroll University 4/19/11

He's really, really funny.

It's a little hard to tell from this photo, but here is an example of a couple who participated in one of Dr. Barnard's test groups. Hillary and Bruce went from looking puffy and unfortunately very average (this is the sad state here in the US) to appearing lean and gorgeous. Their transformation was astounding. 

Dr. Barnard really geared his talk towards people who know nothing about the possibilities of a low fat vegan diet. He had some great advice for people just beginning to consider this way of eating. Clearly, Dr. Barnard knows that this diet seems radical to many people and that even the thought of making changes like this can be overwhelming enough that many people check out immediately.

His advice? Divide your "plate" or diet into four equal pieces. He calls it "The Power Plate."

Consume vegetables, fruits, beans and legumes in roughly the same volume and eat fats (nuts, seeds, oils, avocado) sparingly.

How does a newbie go about making the switch without hitting the off button?

Step one, explore the possibilities. Do you like pancakes made with eggs and white flour cooked in butter in the morning? Try a whole grain vegan pancake recipe and skip the butter. Write down what you normally eat and take the time to find low fat vegan recipes for the same or similar foods.

Step two, do a three week (21 day) test drive. Forget about what is going to happen twenty years or even one year from now. Don't think about growing a long hippie beard or wearing tie dye t-shirts! Just commit for 21 days. You will feel so differently after that period and you can make a decision whether or not to continue with a low fat vegan diet at that time. You do not need to look at this as forever or never! Chances are extremely high that you will lose weight and feel so much energy that something inside of you will shift, at least toward eating a lot more beans, vegetables, fruits and grains that even if you don't choose to become a Vegan you will fundamentally change the way you view food and nourish your body.

And lastly, as an option, certainly not a must do, use transition foods to get you through in the beginning. Basically, transition foods are fake meat products that are made from grains and highly processed to resemble animal protein. There are a lot on the market now--from sausage substitutes to "chicken" nuggets, "hot dogs," "hamburgers," and "cold cuts." It's not the preferred way of eating, but certainly purchase these products if it is the make or break thing from getting you to give low fat vegan a try!

Chefs Nichole and Eric from Whole Foods gave a speedy cooking demo of three Dr. Barnard recipes.

Low fat vegan cooking can be fast, easy and delicious!

Stay tuned for Part II of Dr. Barnard's lecture which I will post tomorrow.

Warning-Do Not Open Unless You Want to Subject Yourself to Kitchen Renovation Update #1

I know that most of my beloved readers cannot give a rat's arse about what is going on in my home these days, but for the few of you that are curious (Hi Mom, Dad and Caroline!) I am going to be providing some progress reports along the way through photographs.

This was my kitchen (sans refrigerator and hardware--they had already been removed on Friday) yesterday morning:

Entering my kitchen yesterday afternoon . . .

What a difference a day makes!

Vegan Myths Debunked . . . Enjoy!

This puts a BIG smile on my face. Hope you enjoy it too!



And in more news from the plant based diet front, the UN is now saying that humans can and must reduce their consumption of animal products in order to stop global climate change. Read all about it here.

Gary Taubes, Mark Bittman and The New York Times Really Have a lot to Teach Us About Food

Just a few diddies to keep your healthy eating inspiration level high . . .

For those of you who haven't caught wind on the stir that The New York Times is causing about sugar, you can catch up by reading Is Sugar Toxic? by Gary Taubes. I don't know where your head is at, but I am trying very hard to keep my sugar consumption as low as possible these days and reading articles like this one make it a lot easier for me to turn down the sweet stuff.

A few days ago I was just kicking back and I decided to see what I could find to watch on TED that might be interesting. This lecture that I found by Mark Bittman, the extraordinary food writer, also from The New York Times, moved me. There were tears in my eyes. I hope you will take the time to watch. The future depends on it.


Did you watch the video? Please chime in if you did! What emotions did you experience while watching this?

Thoughts on Pigging Out at Dante, a Trendy (not Vegan) Restaurant



Last night I went out for a lavish dinner for my brother-in-law's 40th birthday (Happy Birthday Rob!). I'd been looking forward to the experience for months, but not because of what I might eat. In actuality, it was all about Rob's birthday, a night off from parenting and what I was going to wear, in no particular order. We don't get babysitters too often, and when we do, we always go to the movies. So when I know months ahead of time that we are going out on a Saturday night to a hip neighborhood in Cleveland (yes, we do have those) you can bet I'm going to look forward to it.

But last night surpassed my expectations by 100 miles.

The restaurant, Dante, brainchild of chef and musician Dante Boccuzzi, was chosen by my brother-in-law Rob and his wife Kathy (biggest carnivore I know, hands down) as apparently this is the spot that you can find them on many a Saturday night. I thought about doing the "call-ahead" move and letting the kitchen know that a Vegan (not that I even qualify, but it's easier than explaining the whole Nutritarian thing over the phone) was coming, but I didn't want to be a bother. Something inside my head was saying, "Leave it alone, if you tell them that a Vegan is coming they will probably put pig fat in your food just to spite you."

I even glanced at the menu before we left, but I must have been extremely distracted because I didn't take note of what was on there. I think I had made up my mind that I was going to beg the waitstaff for a huge salad ("Really, more lettuce, please. Yes, a giant bowl, as big as you've got, please").

You can imagine my surprise when I looked at the menu and there were two salads labeled as Vegan, one soup and one entire entree! This was going to be more fun than I imagined.

I'm not going to go into gory detail about the food that I ate (which involved the best hearts of palm that I ever tasted and a banana butternut squash soup-yum!), except to say that it was absolutely delicious and creative and that dessert did involve a lot of sugar and dairy (hey, I'm NOT a saint). What I do want to tell you about is what transpired after dinner. Before we went in the restaurant's basement and my sister-in-law Janet kicked Chef Dante's ass at two games of Millipede, that classic 80s video game (very, very impressive Janet!).

We were sipping coffee, it was getting late, and who happened to stop by our table? Dante himself. Incredibly warm and personable, I think he spent time talking to all eleven of us at the table, individually. Jim, my other bro-in-law, mentioned to him that I write a food blog so the conversation naturally went in that direction.

I thanked him profusely for having Vegan options on the menu and asked him about the demand for them. He replied that it was very strong. I asked about the possibility of having greens (kale, collard, swiss chard, spinach, etc.) on the menu as a standard selection and I could tell that he'd never considered it before but would after our conversation. I told him that greens were becoming more and more of many peoples' everyday diet, that he could have a constant rotation of them on the menu. I explained that they were the single most nutritious food known to man. But then it hit me, as fun and cool and hip as these restaurants are, they are in the business of nourishing people's minds, not their bodies. I asked him if he had ever read The China Study and guess what . . . he had never heard of it.

I really liked him anyway.

I didn't even bother to mention the no oil thing. I didn't want to scare the pants off him.

So I know that even though our Nutritarian movement is gaining momentum, we're just at the beginning. I invite Chef Dante Boccuzzi, his wife and four kids to come to my house for a home cooked Nutriatarian meal, sans oil. On his one day off, of course. We've got kids of the same ages and he seemed super nice. I don't have a vintage Ms. Pacman or Millipede, but I think I can convince him that there is a place on his menu for greens, everyday.



Last Licks . . . Mama Pea's Mmmm Sauce and Roasted Sweet Potato Rings

The day is dangerously close when life as I know it will come to an end. Tomorrow my contractor is setting up a makeshift kitchen in my living room where I will be attempting to "cook" for the next 12 weeks (I'm NOT complaining!). If I make it through I will be blessed with the kitchen of my dreams (big smile and nervous laughter). It's either the best decision I have ever made or the stupidest financial risk. Time will tell. And I don't want to live a life that ends in regret.

You'd think that I would be spending my last few days with a full kitchen preparing elaborate vegan soups and casseroles that I could freeze and that would help get us through the duration. But if you guessed I was doing that, you'd be way wrong. It's more like I'm paralyzed with fear. I'm avoiding life like the plague--hardly blogging, e-mails piling up, watching far too much reality TV. Hey, even I get (mildly!) depressed.

I first saw today's recipe this morning when I was going through a few days worth of old e-mails. That's generally how I decide what's for dinner--some interesting recipe magically lands in my in box and today this was it. I noticed that Mama Peas' Mmmm Sauce called for 1/4 cup of canola oil so I asked Mama Pea what I should do if I didn't want to use any oil. Nice girl that she is, she almost immediately suggested avocado. I happened to have one that I needed to use up, so I substituted 1/2 of an avocado for the oil.

I whipped up the batch of Mmmm Sauce when I got home from work and tossed it into a big salad . . . it was just okay. Then I dipped a roasted sweet potato ring (my new go to side dish for weeknights) and it was magic! The sauce actually reminded me of one of my all time favorite recipes. It was Gena at Choosing Raw's Raw Curried Cashew Spread that made me sure I could go vegan and never look back.

If you haven't made Roasted Sweet Potato rings, here's how to do it: Preheat your oven to 425 degrees. Line baking sheets with aluminum foil and spray lightly with cooking spray. Carefully cut sweet potatoes into 1/4" slices and lay on baking sheet in a single layer. Place tray in oven and bake for 20 minutes. Remove from oven and flip rings. Place trays back in oven, but rotate oven placement of trays top to bottom. Bake for an additional 20 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool for a few minutes before serving as is or with your favorite dipping sauce.

For another extraordinary use of Roasted Sweet Potato Rings, don't forget to give Chef A.j.'s Sweet Potato Nachos a try. Yum!

What risks have you taken lately? Is there anything that you want to do but are on the fence about?

Chickpea Zucchini Piccata

Thanks to my friend Liz, who has been an avid reader, commenter and general inspiration here on HGK since the beginning. Last week she mentioned to me that she and her husband were really enjoying the Chickpea Picatta recipe from Appetite for Reduction. So when it came time for me to focus (have you noticed how unfocused I have been lately? Three sick kids and a kitchen renovation project will sure take your mind off of cooking!) on testing a new recipe, it was the first thing that came to mind. I love lemons and capers, so thanks Liz, for another great suggestion! 

Served over arugula, as Ms. Moskowitz recommended, it was sooooo lemony and divine! For my 11 year old, I plated it up with some brown rice. Ms. Moskowitz also suggests mashed potatoes, but I didn't have the wherewith all for that tonight. The only thing I would do differently when I make this again is to add even more vegetables--perhaps an 8 ounce package of sliced mushrooms added at the same time that I add the chopped zucchini . . .

Chickpea Zucchini Piccata

serves 8

based on a recipe from Isa Moskowitz's Appetite for Reduction

Printable Recipe

2 cups thinly sliced Shallots

12 Garlic Cloves, diced
4 tbsp Bread Crumbs
4 cups Vegetable Broth (low Sodium)
2/3 cup Sherry Cooking Wine
Black Pepper
3 medium green zucchini, chopped medium
3 16 oz cans Garbanzo Beans-rinsed and drained
1/2 cup Capers
6 tbsp Lemon Juice, Freshly Squeezed
8 cups Arugula, Raw

Preheat a large heavy bottomed pan over medium. Pour in a few Tbsp of the veggie broth to just cover the bottom of the pan. As soon as the broth is bubbling, add the shallots and garlic. Saute the shallots and garlic for about 5 minutes, until golden, adding a bit more broth if the mixture gets too dry. Add the breadcrumbs and toast them by stirring constantly for about 2 minutes. They should turn a few shades darker.

Add the rest of the vegetable broth and wine, salt, black pepper and thyme. Turn up heat and bring to a rolling boil and let the sauce reduce by 1/2, it should take about 7 minutes.

Add chopped zucchini and cook until zucchini just starts to turn from white to translucent. Add the chickpeas and capers to heat through, about 3 minutes. Add the lemon and turn off the heat. Taste and add salt if desired.

If serving with mashed potatoes or cooked brown rice, place the arugula in a wide bowl. Place mashed potatoes on top, and ladle picatta over the potatoes. The arugula will wilt and it will be lovely. If you are serving solo, just pour right over the arugula.

What have you been busy with lately? I'm not kidding, I would love to hear about it!!!

Chef A.j.'s Sweet Potato Nachos

Sorry about this photograph! My camera's battery died and my husband took this photo with his phone (thanks R!). What a buzz kill!

This is the third of three recipes that Chef A.j. mentioned I should give a try. For the toppings, I used whatever I happened to have in the kitchen (heavy on the romaine lettuce) and I was extremely pleased with the results. I could easily see this dish becoming a staple in my everyday kitchen because of it's ease and the response I got from my daughter and husband. I highly recommend giving Chef A.j.'s Sweet Potato Nachos recipe a try.

Now I can't wait for Chef A.j. to give me another assignment and tell me the next 3 recipes to make from her cookbook Unprocessed. Everything I have made from this book so far has been superb. What a way to go!

Chef A.j.'s Sweet Potato Nachos

Printable Recipe
1 sweet potato per person (If you use organic sweet potatoes there is no need to peel.)
plus any or all of the following:
Non-fat refried beans
shredded lettuce
corn
chopped tomato
cilantro
chopped onion
olives
jalapeno peppers
or anything you would normally enjoy on your nachos

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Cut sweet potato in uniform slices, approximately 1/4" thick. Place slices on Silpat or nonstick baking sheet (I lined cookie sheets with aluminum foil and lightly sprayed it with PAM). Sprinkle with smoked paprika. Bake for 20 minutes, flip over and bake for another 10-15 minutes until done. These are the "chip" part of your nachos.

Place several sweet potato chips on a plate and fully load them with the remainder of the ingredients. Chef A.j. recommends creating a nacho bar and letting your family or your guests build their own nachos.

Mama Pea's Spicy African Peanut Stew and a Fabulous Dr. Fuhrman No Oil Salad Dressing

Today I want to talk about something really simple. Great food. I've got reviews of two delicious plant-strong recipes for you.

First up is a recipe by Sarah Matheny from her blog Peas and Thank You. There I was, chillaxin' on my couch this weekend, perusing the internet, when I stumbled upon this recipe. The planets all aligned and I saw that not only were the ingredients right up my flavor alley, but I had EVERY one of them in my pantry. How is that for awesome! You can get the recipe here for Spicy African Peanut Stew.

Here it is before undergoing crock pot magic. Red lentils, canned chickpeas, carrots, coconut milk, vegetable broth, peanut butter, diced tomatoes, Indian spices, garlic, ginger--of course I doubled the batch!

Try serving this stew over a big bed of fresh spinach leaves, some steaming hot brown rice, then topped with the stew. Incredible!

This morning I was itching to try a new salad dressing without oil and guess what showed up in my e-mail inbox? Today's recipe of the day from Dr. Fuhrman's member center just happened to be for a salad dressing and the ingredients seemed appealing to me. I was right, this one's a real keeper. But if you are not a fan of raw garlic, you might want to leave that out!

Leftover Spicy African Peanut Stew served with a salad dressed with Almond Balsamic Vinaigrette.

Dr. Fuhrman's Almond Balsamic Vinaigrette

Serves: 6

Printable Version

1/2 cup water
1/3 cup roasted garlic rice vinegar (I used plain rice vinegar)
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
1/4 cup raw almonds or 1/8 cup raw almond butter
1/4 cup raisins
4 cloves garlic, pressed (I used 3)
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1/2 teaspoon dried basil
1/2 teaspoon onion powder

Blend all ingredients in a food processor or high powered blender.

Did you catch Addicted to Food last night on OWN? What did you think?

Getting to The Point of No Return and My New Chai Green Smoothie

Thank you to everyone that volunteered to save my butt during my kitchen renovation! I will be contacting you all personally by e-mail within the next two weeks.

Today I want to talk to you about something that is really coming into focus for me at this point in my journey: the amount of fruit in my diet and how it is affecting my weight.

At PEERtrainer (http://www.peertrainer.com/) they have a program called The Point of No Return. I'm not here to sell you on a program (although it is worth WHATEVER nominal amount they are charging for it).  I mention this now because the concept is extremely important in getting you to and keeping you at your happy weight.

So what is "the point of no return"?

For me, it is the state of mind and body where maintaining a healthy weight is not confusing, mysterious, difficult or scary. For those of you who have dieted and failed time and time again, I think you know what I am talking about. You might have an enormous amount of fear and uncertainty regarding your physical and emotional health.

I know that I did. So when I came upon PEERtrainer, their method really spoke to me. They focus a lot on a concept called "diet fusion," which in essence means that it is up to each and every one of us to find our own individual way of eating that gets us to our own Point of No Return. For me, it is a no-added fat Vegan diet free of most processed foods. For you, well, only you can find that magic combination.

Which brings me to the point of all of this: Finding your way takes TIME. I have been laser focused on getting to my point of no return for almost two years. And I am slowly getting there. But I am getting there. It takes an enormous amount of trial and error.

For example, one of my trials along the way was The Raw Food Diet. I was introduced to it, thought it sounded intriguing (who wouldn't want to eat all of those yummy looking desserts every day?), read up on it and started preparing interesting raw food dishes and desserts right away. At the time, I didn't really quite get that the heavy reliance of many raw recipes on highly caloric ingredients like nuts, oils and dried fruit would not be offset by the also heavy reliance on raw vegetables. So I dove right in and failed. I think I gained ten pounds pretty quickly.

But that was party of my journey, my own personal trip to my point of no return. I can't have any regrets because I learned so much from the experience. For one, raw desserts rock! And if and when I do indulge, I want it to be a raw concoction. I feel that I am getting maximum nutrition as well as flavor from a raw dessert, even if the calorie count is through the roof. Sometimes I am just going to indulge. Secondly, there would have been a "right" way for me to go raw, and that would have been without the oils and nuts. But thinking of an uncooked diet without those things left me less than excited, so I returned to a balance of raw and cooked food, and I'm content with that today.

Another one of my experiments, which has lasted far longer than my raw experiment, and continues to this day, has been drinking a green smoothie for breakfast almost every morning. My first green smoothies consisted mainly of a lot of fruit with a handful of fresh or frozen spinach and some flax or chia seed. Somewhere along the way, I experimented with adding more green things (and even carrots) but the fruit component remained high. Lately, and this is the key to what this is all about, I am working on using as little fruit as possible in my morning smoothie.

For example, take a look at my original Chai Green Smoothie. Two dates and one large banana made that smoothie pretty high in sugar, probably more than the entire daily recommended amount of sugar. And lately, my food choices have been heavily influenced by ideas about sugar that are continually coming into my awareness. It started back in December with this article from Disease Proof on the ill effects of sugar. Then  Debby the Healthy Librarian hit me with Dr. Lustig's video Sugar: The Bitter Truth. Soon after, Chef A.j. was mentioning on Facebook that if she had written her cookbook today, she would have done it differently, based on her new level of awareness regarding sugar, dessert and the health value of smoothies.

I started logging my food in gory detail on My Fitness Pal, a calorie/nutrition tracking application and website. I was looking for information on how much fiber I was consuming everyday, but I learned something far more valuable. I am consuming far too much SUGAR every day (and it wasn't from Twinkies!). So when PEERtrainer did a blog posting all about fruit in the diet (and sadly, fruit is very high in sugar) all of my confusion went away and I knew that limiting my fruit every day was getting me very close to my Point of No Return.

Ahhhhhh, progress.

New Chai Green Smoothie

serves 1

1 1/4 cups unsweetened almond milk

1 Tbsp ground flaxseed

1 small frozen banana, broken into chunks

1 large pitted date

big handful rough chopped celery

big handful fresh parsley

giant handful fresh spinach leaves

1 tsp chai spice blend

7 ice cubes

Place all ingredients in a high powered blender and blend until smooth.

Granted, this is still not a low sugar smoothie! But remember, it's progress, not perfection. I'm working on it! And I can tell you that watching the amount of fruit I eat each day over the past month has resulted in significant weight loss, so I think I'm really onto something that will really help me in the long run.

What new information have you learned that really helped you to progress to another level with your weight loss/maintenance efforts?

Healthy Girl is Getting a New Kitchen

Yes, folks, that is my big news. After twenty years of dreaming, hoping, praying and well, working very hard, we are taking the plunge and renovating our kitchen. Actually a guy named Dan Dureiko is renovating our kitchen and he's standing here right now, waiting for the next payment (just kidding). He's fantastic. Organized and anal, just like I like it.

 If you are interested in what my dream kitchen looks like (and I don't expect you to!) check out the kitchen that is inspiring my vision. It's the first of the two kitchens in the article. We are breaking down walls and combining the space of my current kitchen and dining room into one large kitchen. You cannot even believe how excited I am. I'm serious when I tell you that I have been waiting for this moment for 20 years.

So what does that mean for Healthy Girl's Kitchen, the blog? Never one to waste an opportunity, I have some interesting things cooking up for us!

I may be quieter here than usual, but I plan on blogging for the next 14 weeks about the following:

(1) How to remain plant strong even when traditional cooking methods are not an option. Look for more raw recipes and crock pot cooking. No oven or range for a while. My Vitamix might be begging me for mercy. I'm actually kind of excited about the challenge. I can be funny like that. But it gives me something new to think about, and I like that.

(2) Healthy weight loss/maintenance--what's working, what's not working. Not from a recipe perspective but from a "what I'm doing now that's working" perspective.

(3) I'll be seeking out help from other bloggers. I will be doing a series of guest blog posts on the topic of All-time Favorite No-added Fat Plant-Strong Recipes (now isn't that a mouthful). If you are a blogger and you are reading this right now, I am asking you, no begging you, to be a contributor to this series. I NEED HELP! Please comment below or contact me at wendysolganik@yahoo.com right now and let me know that you are interested. I'll be looking for one of your killer go-to recipes to feature here on HGK. If you don't have a blog but are inspired by my plight, please let me know. I would be thrilled to feature anyone's all time favs!

And after that, watch out! I will be so pent up with the need to cook that who knows what will happen.

Will you be a contributor to my All-time Favorite No-added Fat Plant-Strong Recipe series?

Is anyone interested in seeing before/during/after photos of our renovation? I wouldn't go overboard, just a little updating along the way. Believe me, this is not a kitchen renovation blog!