Pat Eby; a Food Writer Skinnies Up

Sweet Honey! The Skinny on Beekeeping

            

                                                Beekeeper's suit, veil and gloves, well-worn. On display

                                                at the EMBA beekeeping workshop. February, 2012

Ever wonder how you might harvest hyper-local honey? Set up two hives in your backyard and join the beekeepers.

My writing work takes me interesting places, like to the Eastern Missouri Beekeepers Association workshop for beekeepers in and around St. Louis.Check out tips for keeping hives and recipes  for breads made with honey.  Take a look at  my online feature, photos and tips, in Feast Magazine. 

Mangos for Breakfast

Lush, silky and sweet mangoes partner perfectly with tart yogurt to wake up a winter-weary breakfast. Top with  a single green grape to make it look pretty.  Add a brown rice cake smeared  with a tablespoon of peanut butter, then dot with raisins and you’ve got breakfast. Serve everything on beautiful dishes and enjoy.   

 Note: Layer diced mango and yogurt. Begin with half of the yogurt, top with half of the  diced mango and repeat. Use a clear, small dish to  see the layers. (1/2 cup diced mango and 1/2 cup fat-free plain yogurt}

We eat with our eyes first. Make sure your food looks as good as it tastes. Use pretty dishes. Goodwill, thrift shops and estate sales are great places to pick up the odd, just-right and beautiful dish. For hand-painted plates like this one, shoose foods that won't make utensil scrapes. Hand wash them, too. 

 

Hummus, Skinny Style

Try lemony smooth hummus with just a bit of olive oil and no tahini, a paste made from ground sesame seeds. Oil and tahini kick-up the fat and calorie count in traditional hummus. Good for you still, but the lightened up version helps keep pounds coming off. Pan-roasted garlic, lots of lemon juice, lemon zest and icy cold water to help the garbanzo beans purée to a velvety smoothness.

Garbanzos, also called chickpeas, provide the base for a classic hummus. Soak and cook dried garbanzos, or use canned garbanzos for a quick snack. Be sure to drain and rinse all canned beans before using them. I like the S&W and Goya brands of garbanzos for their flavor, smooth texture and consistent quality. Some brands stayed gritty after lengthy processing. Taste varied widely between brands as well.

You can make hummus from cannellini beans as well. The dip finishes smoother than garbanzos with a milder flavor. It’s especially good with bits of sun-dried tomatoes and toasted pine nuts mixed in.

My friend Ann tipped me off to skillet roasted garlic, a no-fat technique outlined by Rick Bayless. Visit his website to learn this technique. The mellow roasted garlic flavors without the harsh note raw garlic imparts.

The idea to use water to thin out the dip comes from The America’s Test Kitchen Healthy Family Cookbook. Icy-cold water worked best for me. If you like a buttery hummus with tahini try the Test Kitchen’s recipe for hummus.

Eat this spread on low-fat baked lavash, flat breads or with raw veggie dippers. Spread it on bread for sandwiches in place of mayonnaise. Top toasted bagels with hummus, too. Serve with olives, roasted garlic and homemade pickles as accents

 

Lemony Light Hummus

Yield: 4 to 6  servings

 

6 large cloves skillet-roasted garlic

1 15-ounce can garbanzo beans, drained and rinsed

1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons ice-cold water

1/4 cup freshly squeeze lemon juice (about 2 large lemons)

zest of one lemon

2 teaspoons olive oil (see note)

1/4 teaspoon ground cumin

Cayenne pepper to taste

Salt to taste

Toasted black sesame seeds, optional

 

1. Separate 4 cloves from a head of garlic. Rub gently to remove excess skin, but do not peel the papery skin off each clove. Place cloves in a small skillet and roast over medium low heat, stirring occasionally until the cloves are soft, 10 to 15 minutes. The skin may blacken in small spots. Remove to a small dish. Peel when cooled and chop in rough pieces.
2. Process drained and rinsed beans, ice water, lemon juice, zest, olive oil, cumin, cayenne pepper, ¼ teaspoon salt and garlic pieces in a food processor until smooth and creamy. Plan on 2 to 3 minutes for this step. Use a pulse action. Scrape down as needed.
3. Mound the hummus in a bowl, cover and refrigerate. Taste. Add more salt if needed, keeping in mind the saltiness of flatbreads, crackers and veggies. Sprinkle with toasted black sesame seeds if desired.
4. Refrigerate. Eat within 5 days.

Note: a lemon olive oil adds another layer of lemon flavor

 

Variations: 

Roasted Red Pepper Hummus: Reduce the lemon juice to 2 tablespoons. Don’t add the zest. Add 1/2 cup roasted red peppers to the ingredients list and process everything together.

Spinach-Artichoke Hummus: After you process the basic hummus, stir in 1/2 cup frozen spinach, defrosted and well-drained, plus 2 water-packed artichoke hearts, chopped fine. Eliminate the cayenne pepper and add 1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes. 

 

 

“Of Course I Can”

In honor of President’s Day, Dover Publications sent me copyright-free images with patriotic themes via email. When I clicked this image from 1944, I remembered my mother and grandmother telling me about ration coupons and Victory Gardens during World War II. They had experienced food scarcity during the worst of the depression as well. We post-war kids landed squarely in the clean-plate club growing up.  Food wasn’t wasted in either woman’s household.

Scarcity and hunger haven’t been part of my reality. Each day as I incorporate dietary changes to improve my health, I remind myself hunger pangs are a signal to eat. I’ve been ‘food secure’ most of my life. I usually have the economic resources to buy, store, and cook food for my meals each month.

My freelance lifestyle doesn’t provide a predictable pattern of income, however, so I’ve learned to stock the pantry and the freezer in flush times so I can eat well through lean times. Even so, I wasn’t prepared for the worldwide economic collapse that began in 2008.

When the free market pitch and yaw sank stocks and devalued real estate assets, my anxieties kicked in like a Missouri mule. I looked for a full-time or a regular part-time job, treading the waters with similarly unemployed and underemployed professionals at weekly networking meetings. Involuntarily sidelined, unable to meet financial obligations without regular paychecks, some professionals I met faced food insecurity for the first time in their lives. I did as well.

Because I write about how people relate to each other and to community through food, I sensed a story about how folks coped might work. I researched the cause and effect of lost jobs on household food purchases and eating patterns. The statistics sobered me.

In 2009, one person in eight used the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, to buy food. Food stamps. You needn’t be dead broke or dirt poor to qualify, but seeking assistance to feed their families stunned the professionals I met.

Most had been on the giving end, donating to food pantries, to United Way, to favorite charities. Three years later, most of the professionals I stayed in touch with still don’t have full employment. Every family had changed their lifestyle to fit down-sized budgets.   

Sometimes, real hunger stalks families who visit food pantries and rely on SNAP benefits  to put food on the table. Homeless people know hunger as they parade from shelters and soup kitchen to revival meetings, free restaurants,  and lunch wagons distributing sandwiches just to get enough food for the day. 

I think about real hunger when I imagine the healthy foods I eat aren’t enough. I have enough. More than enough. I’ve learned what I hunger for rich foods won’t satisfy. 

When I pass up extra helpings, chocolate cake or wickedly rich ice cream, I’ll remember my health and have no regrets. I’ll think of the truly hungry people among us when I need a bit of perspective.

 

 

 

No More Gummy Brown Rice. Honest. Bake It.

Brown rice and white rice both weigh in at 200 calories per cup, but the sturdy bran coating on brown rice packs a walloping 4 grams of fiber compared to 1 gram of fiber per cup in white rice. Why do you care? Brown rice keeps you feeling fuller longer, plus its lower glycemic load means less crashes, too. Blood sugar stays steadier.

But cooking brown rice takes an hour or more. It’s practically a commitment. My efforts tended to cook unevenly with some grains underdone and others overdone. In theory, I liked brown rice. In reality, I hated the gummy overcooked mess I made each time I tried steaming it stovetop.

Enter The America’s Test Kitchen Healthy Family Cookbook and its simple recipe for baked brown rice. What a difference. No more gummy brown rice. I’ve converted. 

Once the rice is cooled, I pack it in portions from half a cup to one and a half cups. Some go in the freezer. Throughout the week, I’ll mix rice with beans and vegetables for a quick lunch, or enjoy a bowl with berries and milk for breakfast. Pre-measured portions keep me from mindlessly munching a tasty favorite. 

 

Easy and Basic. Baked Brown Rice

Adapted from The America’s Test Kitchen Healthy Family Cookbook

Yield: 5 servings (3/4 cup each) 

The Test Kitchen healthy cookbook recipe is for a more savory rice baked with sautéed with onions and chicken broth. Enjoy this basic version as a breakfast cereal, added to soups, or baked in casseroles both savory and sweet. Baking produces an evenly cooked, fluffy brown rice.

1 Tablespoon olive oil

1/2 teaspoon salt

3-1/4 cups water

1-1/2 cups long grain brown rice, rinsed and drained (see note)

• Adjust an oven rack to the middle position. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. 
• Heat olive oil in a Dutch oven until the oil just shimmers. Add salt and water. Stir. Bring to a full boil.
• Remove from heat. Stir in brown rice. Cover and bake until rice is tender, from 60 to 70 minutes.
• Remove the pot from the oven, uncover and fluff rice with a fork. Lay a clean folded dishtowel across the top of the pot. Replace the cover and let stand 10 minutes. The towel absorbs excess moisture to produce fluffier rice.
• Fluff rice with a fork. Serve, or store in the refrigerator for later use.

Note: Rice should be rinsed under cold running water to remove excess starch. The swish helps keep rice from turning into a sticky, gummy mess. Place your pre-measured rice in a fine strainer and rinse, turning the rice lightly with your hands. Place the strainer over a bowl to drain. 

 

On Track: Keep a Food Diary Every Day

Track the bits and bites, record each fruit, list every vegetable, all condiments and dressings. Catalogue food preparation, cooking methods, amounts of each and don’t forget the extras. Write birthday cake into the day’s food intake in detail. What flavor, how about frosting, any fillings and how much you ate. End piece or center cut, too.

Dieters who keep food diaries are  likely to lose more weight and keep it off than those who don't. Food diaries take time and effort, but the results make the trouble worthwhile. 

All that scrupulosity sounds daunting, but when you start a new eating regimen, everything’s difficult. Persist. New online food diaries and phone apps make counting easy and almost fun. You don’t need anything more than a cheap notebook and a pen if computers and smart phones aren’t your thing. I use both. 

I keep a notepad in my purse and one on my kitchen table to write down foods as I eat them. Later, I enter my food at My Fitness Pal, an online resource for fit and fat alike. I enter my exercise, press the buttons and the computer screen gives me calories and nutritional analysis for the day.

The USDA has a diary called food tracker  plus tools to calculate BMI and a dandy diagram of the new 'My Plate' guidelines for healthy eating. My phone only calls and texts, but friends who’ve put food diary apps on their smart phones love them.   

 

Here’s five good reasons to keep a food diary:

• Bites, tastes, licks and other mindless eating habits grab your attention
  • One tasting bit averages 25 calories
  • Don’t forget the handful of raisins, the saltine cracker, the cookie, etc.
• Pigging out isn’t nearly as much fun when you write everything down
  • Writing raises awareness of what, how much, and when we eat
• Calories count and portion size matters
  • When you have a solid calorie count for each day you can gauge your weight loss – or plateau – more accurately and make changes
  • Recording portion sizes helps dieters gauge serving size – and calories -- more accurately 
• Flag emotional eating situations, trigger foods and diet land mines
  • Once you recognize a visit to Aunt Lucy entails an emergency stop at Dunkin’ Donuts, you can take steps to have nutritious post-visit car snacks on hand. Or call Auntie on the phone.
• Chart new healthy eating habits and see your nutrition overview at a glance
  • Fewer sweets, more fruit. Less meat, more vegetables. Follow new eating habits that produce weight loss.
  • Check not only your calories, but fats, carbohydrates and proteins as well

 

 

Oatmeal, Elvis-Style

Oatmeal, butter-melting hot, brown sugar sweet, loaded with raisins and walnuts, topped with creamy whole milk. That's the oatmeal of snowy days during my grade-school years. Mom cooked rolled oats enough to feed seven children plus two parents. Sometimes, I'd stir the pot while she set the table. When the oats thickened and bubbled, she'd dish up bowls for each of us.

Today, oatmeal's a breakfast staple at my house several mornings a week, fall through spring. Steel cut oats and rolled oats both find space in my cabinet. I cook steel cut oats in quantity, then microwave single bowls throughout the week, but rolled oats cook up so quickly I make them one breakfast at a time.

Much as I adore butter and cream, I use them very sparingly. Ditto for dried fruits and nuts, so my toppings of choice for morning oatmeal changed. Blueberries, raspberries and chopped apples top my list today. Sometimes I'll swirl in water-packed Morello cherries. crushed pineapple or homemade cranberry sauce.  I hadn't tried bananas, seeing them as more of a cold ceral fruit, but I discovered they make a dandy topping for hot oats. 

Oatmeal, dusted with 1/4 teaspoon of cinnamon-sugar, topped  with half a small banana, sliced. Drizzle a tablespoon of good honey over all and dig in. With the creamy bananas, I don't splash on my usual half-cup of skim milk. Serve this with a hearty multi-grain bread, toasted and slathered with a modest tablespoon of peanut butter. Put on your favorite Elvis tunes and rock out with this breakfast fit for the King,  just right for healthy eating.

Just Right, A Little Pudgy, Overweight or Obese?

If you’re reading this blog, you’re probably concerned about your weight. You’re not alone. In the United States, 33.9-percent adults over the age of 20 are obese. That's one in three. Overweight adults make up an additional 34.4-percent of us. Children aren’t exempt. Ten percent of children aged two to five, 19.6-percent of six to eleven year olds, and 18.1-percent of teens are obese, as cited in FatStats from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Pretty scary statistics.    

Perhaps you’ve decided to ditch excess pounds, or your doctor may have suggested you should lose weight. Where do you rank on the fit-to-fat scale? Here’s how to find out.

Get to know your BMI, or body mass index. The National Institutes of Health released new guidelines for what’s normal, overweight or obese in 1998 based on the Body Mass Index. The BMI describes your weight-to-height ratio to accurately gauge the percentage of fat to muscle in your body. Normal weight people have a BMI under 24.9. If your BMI is 24 to 29.9, you’re overweight. A BMI of 30 or above indicates obesity. 

Here’s the formula for calculating your BMI. You’ll need to get your accurate height and weight. Your weight x 740, divided by (height x height in inches) gives you your BMI.

Mine was nearly 40 when I made significant changes to my diet June 16, 2011. By mid-January, 2012, I’d lost 48 pounds and whittled my BMI down to 32. Still obese, but I’m headed in the right direction.  

My decision to diet, exercise and lose weight wasn’t considered and researched, so I learned on the fly as I cut back sugars, refined flour, fats and meat. I switched to whole grains and fat-free dairy. Beans are a staple of my diet now.

Even though I think about food most days because of my job, I wasn’t up to speed on healthy eating, or on fat measurement tools like BMI. It’s a good way to track your progress.

So, get out the calculator and figure your BMI. Easier still, go online to these sites and the on-site calculator will figure your BMI in a trice. Poke around each site for more tools, online food diaries and success stories.

United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) BMI calculator

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) online BMI calculator

My Fitness Pal online BMI Calculator

 

Yogurt Cheese, a Fat Free Cream-y Spread

It's so cold this weekend, I pulled out the snowman for this photo of yogurt cheese . Brrrr.

Non-fat cream cheese just doesn’t cut it for me. Neither does non-fat mayonnaise. I’ve replaced mayo with creamy no-fat dressings for apple and potato salads. I use hummus on sandwiches in place of mayo. No-fat cottage cheese and fat-free yogurt suit me fine, but the cream cheese is a non-starter at my table. I miss a schmeer on my bagels.

My friend Terry, who scrupulously eats fat-free every day, explained that fat-free versions of familiar foods are different than full-fat foods. He doesn’t expect the same tastes, textures or mouth feel of non-fat cheeses, dressings and mayo. ‘Embrace the otherness of fat-free cream cheese,’ I repeated to myself,  but I couldn’t get past the slick feel and bland taste.

To sustain my bagel-and-a-schmeer habit, I made fat-free yogurt cheese. Tart, thick and creamy, it’s easy to make, easy to love and easy on the waistline. It’s more than just a topping for bagels, however.

Serve it middle-Eastern style with warm pita wedges, cracked olives, a squeeze of lemon juice and a light drizzle of olive oil. Blend a bit of honey, marmalade or preserves in for a sweet toast topper. Spread two thin slices of pumpernickel bread with yogurt cheese, add a chiffonade of fresh basil, thin slices of cukes, red bell pepper, carrots and celery for a delicious veggie sandwich. Stir in fresh or dried herbs for a savory cheese. For more ideas, slide on over to this pdf on the Dannon yogurt site. Yummy ideas.

 

Yogurt Cheese

Yield: ½ cup yogurt cheese

1 cup fat-free yogurt, regular or Greek style (see note)

pinch of kosher salt, (optional) 

• Line a sieve or strainer with a large coffee filter or two layers of cheesecloth. Place inside a deep bowl.
• Stir salt into the yogurt and spoon mixture into the lined strainer. Make sure there’s an inch of so of space between the bottom of the strainer and the catch bowl. Cover with plastic wrap. Refrigerate.
• After an hour or two, remove strainer and collect or discard the whey in the bottom of the catch bowl. You can add the whey to smoothies or use in cooking. Cover with wrap and refrigerate overnight, 10 to twelve12 hours.
• Peel off the filter or cheesecloth and shape the cheese into a ball or log. Pour off the whey. Refrigerate both whey and cheese. The cheese keeps well for a week.

Note: Use yogurt without preservatives or gelatin. You can make larger quantities of cheese using more yogurt. Because more whey collects, you may need to hang the cheese to drip. Check out this post at ‘A Couple Cooks.’  See what other good, healthy things this couple cooks up while you're visiting. I also enjoyed Mark Bittman's simple and straightforward method in the New York Times.

 

 

 

One Cup of Tea

 

It’s late. Dinner’s been over for hours. You’ve had a healthy snack, but your mouth still longs for something. Here’s a thought. Try a cup of tea. Not only do you get no calories with lots of flavor, brewing a nice cup of tea requires process and ritual.

Don’t rush this through the microwave. Fill a tea kettle and put it on to boil. Find a favorite mug or cup and saucer. Choose a tea. Pack loose teas in a tea ball, or in a handy T-Sac. A nice mug of tea can short-circuit the urge to engage in mindless eating.

To make things easy, keep a selection of tea packets in a pretty glass dish or clear canister on the kitchen counter. Boxes of tea out of sight in a cabinet won’t give a visual cue to think teas as often. Loose teas should be kept in airtight, solid canisters to preserve freshness, but you may want to fill a small glass container with loose teas. It’s that now-you-see-it clue again. Make sure the cover fits tight.

Flavors abound in today’s tea market. Caffeinated, de-caffeinated or herbal, the choice is yours. You don’t need to live in a city big enough for a tea shop to get good teas, either. Most supermarkets carry a respectable selection. The internet offers endless choices, but if you’re lucky enough to have a tea shop in your town, plan a visit. Be warned. The selection can be dizzying.

In St. Louis, visit the Traveling Tea shop in historic Benton Park. Pick up a box of 100 T-sacs, a unique tea bag you fill with loose tea. Of course, teas and T-Sacs can be purchased online, too. Try Stash teas from Classical Coffee, an online coffee and tea vendor, based in St. Louis. Search out the tea shops in your hometown for a little field trip to see, smell and taste the teas.

Another  advantage of tea-sipping is that it slows me down enough to engage in creative distractions, another alternative to thoughtless food consumption. Here’s my list. Listen to a favorite cd, pull out the bead box and make a pair of earrings, put together a jigsaw puzzle, read an amusing book, like a mystery. 

To drink in the world of teas through mystery books, pick up the Tea Shop Mysteries by Laura Childs. Sleuth Theodosia Browning, owner of the Indigo Tea Shop in historic Charleston, South Carolina, serves up teas, scones and cakes. Along the way she uncovers murderers, fiendish plots and mayhem a-plenty. If you’re the sort who likes to read books in order, start with Death by Darjeeling, the first in the tea shop series. The author includes tea history, trivia and lots of recipes in each book.

If you’re a committed coffee drinker, read Sandy Murphy’s post for King’s River Life pairing coffees with mystery books. Be warned, one of her selections focuses on a chocolatier turned sleuth, so chocolate’s mentioned. Be strong. 

Note:  the lead illustration for this post, by Ann Paidrick, was created using Adobe Illustrator, a vector drawing program. View more examples of her vector-generated photo realistic images and illustrations here.