Foods Long Life

You can make homemade sushi with just about anything! A great dairy and gluten free meal. Follow Foods For Long Life on Facebook and Pinterest . What a month! It's been a crazy busy month here on our farm. First we harvested 5 tons of Pinot Noir, then a little Sauvignon blanc for my private stash. We've also been harvesting lots of veggies, putting in a Zen garden, getting ready to paint the outside of our house, and enjoying visits from our son and daughter-in-law (Vaughn and Karina), as well as our daughter and her fiancé (Linda and Jim), and our nephew Cody. Later today, we look forward to a visit from my cousin Lisa and her husband Rob. On top of it all, I broke my toe last Thursday so I guess I'm going to slow down a bit whether I want to or not! Part of our Pinot Noir harvest Poblano Peppers With the end of summer come lots of peppers. One of our most delicious and prolific is the poblano pepper so today we're going to mix two of our favorite cuisines - Mexican a...

Beat the heat with this cucumber salad. Follow Foods For Long Life on Facebook and Pinterest . We've had record breaking heat this last week. Sebastopol topped its record with 111 degrees. So needless to say, we've been eating a lot of raw foods and foods that are cooling. Cucumbers are very hydrating and I just happen to have a cucumber plant that is presenting me with 2 enormous and perfect cucumbers a day!  Here's a quick salad that we made for lunch yesterday. It also uses our garden cherry tomatoes. With protein-packed garbanzo beans and good fats from the avocado, this is a perfectly balanced vegan and gluten-free meal for two hungry people or a side dish for 4 to 6.              *                         *                          * Cucumber Salad with Garbanzos and Cherry Tomatoes Vegan, Dairy and Glu...

White beans with olives, artichokes, peppers, and avocado. Follow Foods For Long Life on Facebook and Pinterest . Easy to make in your Instant Pot It's easy to open a can of beans but it's not all that hard to make them from dried beans in your Instant Pot. Here's a simple recipe that's perfect for summer since it can be served warm, at room temperature, or even chilled. Bring to a pot luck, serve as an antipasto when entertaining company, or make it a meal on a bed of greens.  To Salt or Not to Salt A while back I read a post on Serious Eats about whether or not you should salt your beans when soaking and when cooking. You should read the entire article to appreciate the testing but their results were:   "For the best, creamiest, most flavorful beans, season your bean-soaking water with one tablespoon of kosher salt per quart (about 15 grams per liter), rinse the beans with fresh water before cooking, then add a pinch of salt to the cooking water as ...

Sliced or smushed, avocado is a healthy and popular topping. Follow Foods For Long Life on Facebook and Pinterest . A Popular Menu Item It's seems that whenever I try a new popular restaurant, avocado toast is on the menu. I'm not sure how or when this dish became so popular, but it seems to have really taken off. And why wouldn't it - avocados are one of America's favorite foods. Their consumption has quadrupled since 2000 and by 2015, the consumption of Hass avocados surpassed 2 billion pounds! I eat avocados every day in some form or another. Although many people worry about avocado's fat content, they shouldn't. Their combination of "good fats"  (phytosterols, polyhydroxylated fatty alcohols, and oleic acid), give avocados their anti-inflammatory properties. Inflammation is the root of many diseases such as cancer, arthritis, heart disease, Alzheimers, and other degenerative disorders.  In addition to reducing inflammation, they help us absorb car...

This rich and delicious smoothie blends green veggies and fruits with healthy fats. Follow Foods For Long Life on Facebook and Pinterest . Green Smoothie This is one of the tastiest green smoothies I've ever made. It was inspired by the Green Machine that I had at VegeNation in Las Vegas last month. I started with their main ingredients of kale, parsley, cucumber, avocado and grapes, and added some healthy fats to provide omega-3 and omega-6, monosaturated fats, as well as medium chain triglycerides. Do Not Fear Fat! Fats are critical to your diet. For one, they help you absorb fat-soluble vitamins. A recent  study showed that "the presence of fat in a meal with which a vitamin D-3 supplement is taken significantly enhances absorption of the supplement." That study showed an average increase of 32% absorption. Other fat-soluble vitamins, such as A, K and E, also benefit from the presence of fat in the diet. Fat also improves carotenoid absorption and improves the conver...

Even in winter, we should consume some amount of raw food. Follow Foods For Long Life on Facebook and Pinterest . Raw Food in the Winter In the winter we crave hot soup, warm muffins, and cooked meals in general. I admit I have been favoring steel cut oatmeal over cold smoothies in the morning and soups over salads lately. But it's very important to include some raw foods in your diet no matter what season we are in. In my book, Health Begins in the Kitchen: Delicious and Easy Vegan Recipes and Seasonal Food Plan , I discuss how those amounts vary with each season. And what better way to add a little raw food in your winter diet than to eat a lovely raw kale salad with seasonal fruit such as satsuma oranges. My Seasonal Food Plan discusses how the amount of raw food consumed should vary throughout the year.  *                           *                   ...

Roasted asparagus topped with chopped veggies and seeds. Follow Foods For Long Life on Pinterest and Facebook . Preview my eBook, Health Begins in the Kitchen . Asparagus for Lunch? Doug and I ate an entire bunch of asparagus yesterday for lunch. Once those tender roasted spears came out of the oven, we decided to make a meal out of them. Besides, you can't just let these jewels sit around since they are more perishable than most other vegetables. Feed your Microbes Too! I'm sure you all know how very important microbes are for our health . Well these little guys have to eat too. They depend on "prebiotics" which are supplied by the compound "inulin." This carbohydrate makes it all the way through to our large intestine where it becomes an important food source for our intestinal bacteria such as Bifidobacteria and Lactobacilli. Asparagus is a very good source of inulin.          *                   ...