Politically Incorrect Nutrition – a review

The world of food and nutrition gets more confusing every day. One day a food, or a drink for that matter, is praised as the answer to more prayers than we might count, and the next it’s being demonized by the media. It can be hard to keep up and you may just wish you could bury your head in the sand and be done with it.

If you’re looking for a new viewpoint on what’s safe and what is not safe to put in your body, you need look no further than the book Politically Incorrect Nutrition

Michael Barbee has written a great book covering both food and modern practices, some of which are supposed to be safe and even good for you, and some considered anathema. It’s a great introduction to a lot of the principles found within traditional foods and in a much easier form to digest, at only 165 pages.

Among the topics covered:
*Microwaves may not be as innocuous as they seem, as they do not heat food in the same way as a direct source of heat would. Foods developed carcinogens and the bioavailability of nutrients decreased;
*While green tea is full of antioxidants, it is also packed with a cocktail of industrial chemicals, including pesticides;
*Aspartame is another carcinogen which continues to get sold as a sugar alternative. (I do remember hearing about this long before I started eating tradition foods and it floors me that it’s still available on the shelves and so heavily promoted);
*Instead of prventing cavities, water fluoridation can make teeth worse;
*Soy is far from the healthy food it has been sold as;
*Cholesterol and eggs are not the enemy of good health;
*How one can become malnourished on a vegetarian diet;
*and more! I am not about to spoil the whole book by listing everything. Go out and buy it, or check it out from your local library.

For the scientifically minded or skeptics in the audience, Barbee very thoroughly documents every chapter with extensive footnotes, citing well-respected scientific journals in his research. His writing is also very clear and to the point. Each chapter also concludes with tips on either integrating or eliminating the chapter topic into/from your diet. He provides a great deal of food for thought, along with resources to explore topics further.

This is a great book for a lot of different people. For the experienced traditional foodie, you get talking points and perhaps something you didn’t know about before (for example, I was unaware of the issue with green tea). For someone just getting started, its size making the book very portable and not intimidating in its length. For the skeptic, you get information and respected sources as backup.

This is definitely a great addition to any real food library!

Have you read any good books recently relating to traditional food?

Come join the fun on Facebook and follow me on Twitter!

I’m sharing this post at Monday Mania.

Sewing with a plan

Soli here. As part of my frugality, simpler living, and reclaiming domesticity desires, I am going to be featuring some more posts this year to potentially assist all of us in incorporating these ideals into our life. Noel is a long-time internet friend who periodically talks about making up new clothing for herself, and I thought it would be fun to share her philosophy on crafting a wardrobe.

Is Sewing with a Plan Frugal?

Back in 2008, I was in desperate need of some clothes that fit well, were in coordinating colors and were of a style that fit my general lifestyle. Oh, and I didn’t have much money. Keep that in mind. It becomes important later on.

I read an article called “Sewing with a Plan” from Australian Stitches. It explained that one could create an excellent wardrobe for oneself in three stages.

Stage One

2 pairs of pants
2 skirts, one solid, one print
6 tops, matching and coordinating
1 jacket

I never do anything right, so I adapted it to my own needs, and did make a wardrobe of which I was very fond. It took me from home office to classroom to vacations with absolutely no problem. I have added some capsules to my original SWAP wardrobe, though I didn’t quite following the rules according to the Australian Stitches article for the next stages of the SWAP. What I did do was add a few pieces to expand the wardrobe I’d already made to suit myself while keeping to the spirit and intent of Sewing with a Plan – make sure your wardrobe coordinates! If you have a well thought-out wardrobe that coordinates well, you don’t have to own as many garments to have a variety of looks.

Okay, so back to frugality…

The average American consumer unit spends close to $2000 a year on clothes. Since the average consumer unit is 2.5 people, let’s say that the average person spends $800/year on clothes. Friends, I haven’t spent that much in nearly four years, and that SWAP I was running on about was why. I sewed myself that initial stage of the SWAP for about $150. Yep, I got 27 different looks for $150, and can pack for a week’s vacation in a carry-on. Since then, I have spent another $350 on sewing materials — both to add to the SWAP and make some incidentals like polar fleece pajamas. This is some blissfully warm loungewear that lets me turn the thermostat waaayyy down and still be able to sit still and write in comfort. I still wear everything I made in 2008, so I’m getting plenty of wear out of the clothes I made. That’s important to frugality as well. Making a new wardrobe every year might be cheaper than buying one each year, but it’s still not frugal.

Even though common wisdom says that sewing is a frugal way to clothe oneself, like most common wisdom, there are some hidden catches to it. You can go overboard in several areas.

Let’s start with the sewing machine. For good basic sewing, you don’t need a computerized deal with lots of fancy stitches. You want something that has a basic stitch, can reverse stitch, and can do a zig-zag stitch. Boom, you’re all good. You can find what you need at a yard sale or thrift store without too much issue. Those top of the line jobs (barring the really good industrials) are highly overrated for basic clothing. I use the same basic student machine I was given for my 24th birthday nearly 20 years ago. It has served me well through everything from making a set of cloth napkins to Elizabethan corsets.

Your next possible pitfall is fabric. It is far too easy to go overboard with fabric. You’ll hear a great deal about people who sew having a large stash of fabric. Friends, this isn’t frugal! If you’re trying to be frugal, buy fabric to the project, and make sure your project fits your overall plan! Yes, I know that silk looks lovely and feels wonderful. And oh! that shiny brocade would make an amazing jacket. Be strong. Have a plan. If you do not intend to sew it up within the month and have a niche in your wardrobe where it will fit with more than three garments, resist, resist, resist.

However, even standard garment fabric can be prohibitively expensive. I do something that a lot of garment makers don’t and many would shriek at. I usually use quilting fabric to make my clothes. Quilting fabric is cheap, woven cotton is totally easy to work and care for (barring the fact you do have to iron your clothes), and if you know how to make garments fit well (more on that later), no-one ever knows that you’re using something so inexpensive. Before you say that one can’t do that living in a cold climate, I’ll point out that I live in Northern New England and do not exactly overheat my home. A couple of pairs of good, thin long underwear (I wear microfiber instead of silk) works wonders for keeping warm. I also knit, so I do have a collection of warm sweaters and wool socks, also made inexpensively and in my wardrobe’s palette.

The last pitfall is skills, and that takes some time. If you’re going to try to save money by sewing, you need to learn to do a little pattern drafting and fitting garments to you. What makes sewing truly frugal is about how you can have custom clothing really inexpensively. Thing is, tailors charge what they do because it does take time to learn the skills. An out of the packet pattern will not fit you all that well – any more than Ready to Wear really does. It can’t. Bodies have too much variation. But if you learn a few tricks with darts, adjusting crotch fit in pants and other techniques, you’ll be able to make a long-lasting garment that will be far superior to anything you’ll find in a store. It’s bad fit that screams cheap. Well-fitting, well-tailored clothing looks elegant even if you only spent $10 to make the garment. Your local library is probably loaded with books on sewing and fit. Check ‘em out.

Frugality in clothing revolves, like every other sort of frugality, in a sort of principles-based living. To be frugal, it’s important to know what you want, what you need and have a plan for filling those needs without being wasteful. That’s going to be very dependent on your lifestyle. Wool pants that need to be dry cleaned aren’t in the least frugal if you’re a homesteader who grows most of her own food and need garments that can stand up under garden work. They’re a considerably more sensible choice to the person with the desk job in a cold office where clothes don’t get dirty as often. When you start thinking about sewing as a way to get a frugal wardrobe, think carefully about how you live before you dive in and start making clothes.

Noel Lynne Figart is a nerd whose friends live primarily in the computer. When not sewing her own wardrobe or teaching people how to use computers, she can be found shoot off at the mouth about politics, relationships, cooking and knitting at Noel Figart.com.

Come join the fun on Facebook and follow me on Twitter!

I’m sharing this post at Monday Mania, Traditional Tuesday, Real Food Wednesday, Frugal Days Sustainable Ways, Simple Lives Thursday, Fight Back Friday, and Fresh Bites Friday.

As seen on the internet and weekend food plans January 13, 2012

This week it’s the I’m taking a little vacation and going to Boston for the weekend edition! Hopefully my plans will indeed include a good dose of seafood with friends. Ideally it will be lobster because one of my friends (hi Tamara!) said I should eat some for her. That’s not a task I can easily turn down! Hopefully it won’t break the bank either.

So since I am not going to be home, my food plans are going to revolve around finding good, nourishing food to eat which will not break the bank, while enjoying the company of friends I don’t get to see very often.

So, on to some links!

First item: if you think the general shift to “healthy eating” isn’t having any major impact, think again. Hostess, maker of such wonders of industrial food as Wonder bread and Twinkies, has filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Never fear if you still like their products: Twinkies have something of an indefinite shelf life.

Lisa at Real Food Digest has posted what is perhaps the easiest sauerkraut recipe ever. If you have never tried traditional sauerkraut, you’re missing out on a treat. That stuff you got in a little plastic dish in elementary school has nothing on the real deal.

Speaking of cultured food, my friend Jessica of Delicious Obsessions has apparently declared 2012 to be the year of probiotic foods. Her series, 52 weeks of bad-a$$ bacteria kicked off this week with lacto-fermented garlic. This is something I have wanted to make for a while but I haven’t seen any good garlic bulbs yet.

Sometimes simple recipes are the best ones. Diane from A Little Bit of Spain in Iowa shares roast chicken with root vegetables.

It’s Girl Scout Cookie season, but do you really want to eat them? Nourishing Our Children has an excellent post up about these cookies, along with the original recipe. If you haven’t seen the post yet, check it out!

This post from Boing Boing caught my attention. I had my tonsils out when I was 10 because I always had sore throats. But after the removal, I still had problems. Here’s an interesting post with potential links between tonsillectomies and contracting polio. It may be coincidence, it may not. But keep in mind that all the systems of the body are tied together.

Are you still considering new year’s resolutions? Do you want to exercise more? There’s a kettelbell challenge starting up soon with Cheeseslave. Further, Grass-Fed Girl and Divine Health have some good tips on exercising. Remember not to overdo things at first!

What are you all planning for this weekend? Have you been reading anything interesting?

Come join the fun on Facebook and follow me on Twitter!

How to get whey

Source. Used under Creative Commons license.
Little Miss Muffet
sat on her tuffet
eating her curds and whey.

Be honest, when you were a kid, how many of you know what curds and whey actually were? Odds are that in the US, you grew up with milk which would never separate. Milk which had been heat treated and homogenized so the cream no longer raised to the surface. When milk like that goes bad, you can’t do anything with it other than toss it out. When fresh, raw milk starts to sour, you can still use it! The solids can be made into a nice cream cheese dip. The whey itself can be used for a variety of things, which you can see over here at The Prairie Homestead. I tend to use it for soaking grains and sometimes in my fermented veggies. When I was eating legumes more often I would soak them with whey as well. The soaking process breaks down anti-nutrients present in the grains and beans, making the good stuff in these foods more accessible to the gut.

Whey is in fact good for you, and is nothing like the powdered junk you find in “health” food stores. No wonder why Little Miss Muffet could run so quickly. It has some interesting history too:
Whey is the tart, golden liquid known to the Greek doctors of antiquity as “healing water.” In fact, Hippocrates and Galen, two founding fathers of medicine, frequently recommended whey to their patients. Whey from fully fermented milk no longer contains lactose, and with its dose of probiotic organisms will help maintain a synergistic balance of the inner ecosystem and encourage repair of gut dysbiosis. Whey also contains a fair number of minerals, particularly potassium, and a notable amount of vitamins, especially B2. Source

Yes raw milk is more expensive than the pasteurized sort, but it certainly has a longer life for uses.

How to Get Whey

Ingredients:
Raw milk

Equipment:
A jar with a cover
White dish towel
Sieve
Bowl
Twine

Directions:

1. Leave milk out to sour and separate. Tip: Don’t do what I used to do and leave it in the original container. It’s going to be hard to get the solids through that little opening.

2. When the milk has become solid, or you see the clear liquid at the bottom, it’s time to strain. Line the sieve with the towel, set it on the edge of the bowl, and pour the contents of the jar.

3. Once the majority of the whey has dripped out, tie up the towel and hang it to get the rest of the whey out. This will take a few hours. Usually I let it hang overnight.

4. Put the whey in a jar to store it in the fridge. Date the jar so you don’t forget when it went in the fridge. This whey lasts up to six months. You can also freeze it, as Prairie Homestead points out.

5. If you want to use the cream cheese (I admit I rarely do), scoop it out of the towel and put in a jar and refrigerate. This is good for about a week.

That’s it! Being able to do this will be a help with making some of the cultured recipes listed in the book Nourishing Traditions.

Come join the fun on Facebook and follow me on Twitter!

I’m sharing this post at Homestead Barn Hop, Monday Mania, Traditional Tuesday, Real Food Wednesday, Frugal Days, Sustainable Ways, Simple Lives Thursday, Fresh Bites Friday, Fight Back Friday, and Sunday School.

This post was featured in the Sunday School Blog Carnival!

As seen on the internet January 6, 2012: the I found new blogs to read edition

Reading is my number one leisure activity. If I have five minutes free, I’ll probably find something to read. Being able to read a lot of blogs feels like a huge privilege now that I have my time back. Plus I don’t feel guilty if I don’t keep up daily; I know I will read everything much sooner. With my new-found freedom, I have added a host of new blogs to my reader.

First item, Sasquatch and the Scientician are continuing with their food experiments. I want to try a dragonfruit. Now.

Several of the blogs I read have been discovered from suggestions on Facebook. Fan pages do pay off. I can’t tell you much about these yet due to not enough reading, but they certainly look good.

Stacy Makes Cents, which I am hoping will help in my current quest toward frugality.

Yolks, kefir, and gristle is a blog I’ve been seeing around Real Food Wednesday for a while and thought it was one of the most clever blog names I’ve seen. She does some good posts too.

Whole new mom blogs about real food and cooking for people with many health issues while also eating very nutritious food. YES it CAN be done, and she can serve as inspiration.

Another great Facebook find I am enjoying is Grass fed girl who lives her primal/paleo diet and regularly consumes offal. Awesome!

Are you a raw milk lover? Do you read The Bovine? This is a blog devoted to raw milk and has been following the case of Michael Schmidt, a Canadian dairy farmer championing raw milk. Last year he fasted for over a month in protest of the Canadian government’s ban on raw milk for sale.

Kendahl at OIur Nourishing Roots has been doing an interesting series of posts about making basic traditional foods and is now gearing up for a GAPS diet intro challenge.

Want to see some pretty pictures? Go look at Neohomesteading for photos to rival ones at Nourished Kitchen. I found Cory (or she found me) through Twitter and we have had a few amusing conversations through there. All I have to say is chicken lobster.

Crunchy Betty‘s tag line should be reason enough to read her blog: you have food on your face. I love this take on beauty!

Last. but definitely not least is Holistic Kid, who also does Chinese medicine in addition to real food. How awesome is that?

Actually, the newest blog is The Liberated Kitchen which is going into my blog reader to check out right now.

Have you picked up any new blogs recently?

Come join the fun on Facebook and follow me on Twitter!

I believe in resolutions. Realistic resolutions at that.

source

Welcome to 2012! I keep thinking that I am living in the future. Of course the future is now the present and it quickly goes meta from there and that’s not why you are here now, is it?

With a new year comes new possibilities, a desire to change and make things better in your life. The key to making these changes stick, at least for me, are twofold:
1. I have to want the changes
2. I can’t think about them only in December and January
Makes sense doesn’t it? If the only time you think about such changes in a relatively small window in the year and spend the rest of the year continuing your status quo, what’s the whole point?

I’ve been able to make a lot of changes in my life over the years. Even before finding traditional foods, I cut a lot of modern industrialized foods out of my diet, in 2010 I quit caffeine (but I do occasionally drink coffee and caffeinated tea, still doesn’t affect me much in terms of “pepping me up”), and over the course of three years I managed to reverse my spotty academic record and get a master’s degree with a VERY high GPA. Over the years I have learned a lot of skills to help me change habits and thoughts for the better. But changing those habits is not the point of this post. I can offer advice if you would like such though, ask me in comments.

What I am here to talk about is what I have planned for this coming year. There is a lot I want to accomplish this year, some of it in my hands, some of it… well not so much. It’s just a matter of me doing my best in everything as well as not beating myself up when I don’t manage to do everything.

So what kind of resolutions DO I have in mind for the coming year related to traditional food?

1. GET FRUGAL!
I’m sure a lot of you say this every year. I admit, I have not for a while because with everything else in my life, it wasn’t as much of an option. Now that I have the time again I can think about these things. My reasons for re-embracing frugality are probably ones which will not surprise you.
Money doesn’t spend as it did a while ago. Real food costs a bit more and takes planning, so I want my money to get the best food possible. I also want my money to do as much as possible, which will take more physical effort on my part.
I do have some debt now, which includes paying back my mother. She helped me some with my tuition over the last few years with the clause that I pay her back. That’s less money I have to work with.
I really want to move. Normally I don’t talk about my living set-up much, but here goes. I do live with my mother. I also pay to live here, do a good portion of work around the house, and pay for a lot of food. For many years I did this because I simply could not afford to support myself in this area without incurring a significant portion of debt. At the point when I would have been able to have a no-frills life on my salary, I started school, and opted for a steady home life during that time. Now that I have the degree, my eye is more firmly cast upon my big desire: moving to California. Saving money will help a lot and continue to prepare me for that shift in life.
Now that you all know WHY I want to be frugal, here is how I intend to accomplish it this year.
a. There will be less going out to eat this year and ordering takeaway. Since I am not trying to do 20 things each night, cooking is going to be a lot easier to fit in. I also need to work on cooking and planning more meals for myself. That has been why I call out.
b. Use more of what I have on hand to eat. This means having more to cook around (especially vegetables!) and quick protein sources.
c. Meal Plan. By planning out what to eat once a week, it will be easier to figure out what to buy and how much to keep around. Something my mom and I both want to do is also cut down on the meals which are just cut of meat and vegetable side. (She does a low carb diet so stretchers like grains, rice, and legumes are out for her) Besides, that gets boring! The plan also includes making at least one meal a week which is either egg or cheese based. Hopefully Emily at Holistic Kid will be a help on this front.
c1. Cook different things! This evening I made some New Year’s collards. The recipe I used was one from the Joy of Cooking, using bacon and bacon grease. It was amazing! Here is your motivation to comb through my collection of cookbooks!
c2. When putting away leftovers in the fridge, label them. Otherwise it’s too easy to forget what’s on hand.
d. Make more lacto-fermented and cultured foods. This was one of the first changed I made when starting traditional foods. It helped to find the brand Real Pickles at the health food shop because I was nervous about trying to make then myself. But they cost between 7 and 9 dollars per PINT jar. I can make twice that amount for about half the cost. Plus I do my best to eat them with every meal, so not making them myself racks up quite a bill quickly.
e. Build up my skills for self-sufficiency. True, what I have mentioned here already covers this topic, along with other skills I have accumulated over the years. As I get older, it seems more pressing though. While I am not a doomsday sort of person, I don’t believe our current food system is very sustainable and it behooves us to learn more of how to do a lot of food preparation for ourselves.

If you are looking to get more frugal with your life, check out the 23 Day Frugal Living Challenge at Frugally Sustainable. It starts this Friday, so you still have time to sign up!

If you are trying to convert your kitchen to a traditional foods kitchen, you must check out the beginner videos from the Weston A. Price Foundation.

2. Clean out my stuff!
It’s the moving plan. I don’t want to have to move things I no longer need or use. There is clothing which no longer fits me, media I no longer need, and tchotckes taking up space. Some of those items can be unloaded for money as well, which will help with the debt.
Wardeh from GNOWFLGLINS mentioned Home Storage Solutions 101 as a potential source for getting organized in the coming year. They also deliver tips on how to get rid of things you no longer need.

3. Get moving again!
I have my regular walk to work getting to and from the bus, and I have a morning yoga practice, but aside from that, I’ve been very lax in getting any other exercise in. The first step on this journey has already been taken: I am back to bouncing on a rebounder and practicing belly dance. One of my Yule gifts was a gift certificate to my trainer’s new gym, which is in walking distance of my house. I would LOVE to add some regular strength training again. Perhaps I can get get back to using my Wii for its original purpose of Wii Fit and Wii Active, and not as a Netflix delivery system.

I also have goals specifically related to the blog.
1. Get I Believe in Butter on its own server. One of my closest friends does blog design (among a host of other things) so I am planning to hire her. (Er, and if she reads this she now knows my potential plan.)

2. Monetize! I want to make at least enough to cover the cost of design and hosting. I even have an idea for an ebook but that’s going to take a while.

3. Post at least twice a week, every week.

4. Figure out how to make Feedburner work properly.

5. Continue to do and educate myself so I have more to post.

6. I have no sense of scale so I have no idea what numbers to set for myself for fans, subscribers, etc. I can admit it! So maybe the last one is to figure out the marketing angle.
Actually, scratch that. I do have two figured I would like to reach. First I want to double my Facebook fan number by my birthday at the end of July. Currently the number stands at 773. When I turn 38 I want 1,500 fans. Second, I want to regularly have my daily hits number in the 100s. This is going to take a lot of work and some good posting, but I do believe strongly that I can do this.

7. Remember not to let this take over my life since I am still working full time and want to have a social life again.

What are you all resolving to do this year?

Come join the fun on Facebook and follow me on Twitter!

I’m sharing this post at Monday Mania, the Nourishing New Year’s Resolution Carnival, Traditional Tuesday, Real Food Wednesday, Simple Lives Thursday, Fresh Bites Friday, Fight Back Friday, and Sunday School.

Note: I do not receive any commission from any link posted in this post. They are all of my own desire to share.

What has been and what may come: most popular posts of 2011

Do you like the tree in my house this year? There are more ornaments than tree space in the house, so each year I find a different theme for the decoration. This year I did hearts and bells.

I’m enjoying the time off from work, and especially enjoying the idea that I will NOT be snowed in at any point during this break from work. Nothing feels so good as the lack of obligation hanging over me and the freedom to do whatever I want. It’s also time to look back on the year and start thinking about what 2012 might bring.

Before we get there though, would you be curious to see my most popular posts from the year?

10. 2011 Gift Challenge: The Clock is Ticking Edition.
The final installment in my personal gift challenge, to make more gifts instead of relying on buying things. In the end I wasn’t able to finish everything, and I was buying things anyway. However, the experience of making things and digging up ideas to make was very inspirational. I’ll be doing it again next year.

9. Healthy is in the eye of the beholder.
Amazing that two of my most popular posts are just from this month. Maybe I need to do more blogging breaks to increase my numbers? This was an examination of a list of foods considered by one group to be “healthy,” and yet lacking in a lot of what traditional diets would consider good for you. It also sums up why I don’t like using the term “healthy” and prefer nutritious.

8. Stocking a medicine cabinet.
Remedies I like to keep on hand to handle health issues which come up for me regularly.

7. Growing vegetables can be a one-way ticket to jail.
The story of a woman in Michigan who was growing vegetables in order to save money, and instead got threatened with legal action. Food sovereignty at work.

6. What exactly IS traditional food?
As it says, a breakdown of what makes diets tradition. It’s not so much the food itself but qualities about the foods.

5. Primal living.
A guest post by my friend Dana who has done a great deal of benefit to her health by switching over to a primal diet.

4. Pytt i Panna
And here we start a key to my success in posting this year. Pytt i panna is very basic Swedish ham hash, which I eat a lot after Christmas. It’s a great way to use up all that leftover ham.

3. How to make gravlax.
Probably one of the better known Swedish dishes out there. Curing food is an excellent method of preservation and it also tastes amazing!

2. Grain-free Swedish pancakes
I suppose that for next year I should make more Swedish foods and write up the recipes in English! This one is not the typical formula for the pancakes, but Sweden has caught the low(er) carb craze. They are not quite the same as the traditional wheat ones but if you are avoiding grain for whatever reason this is a great option.

1. Basic domestic skills everyone should know
Who would have thought that a little list I whipped up at the end of my final class would turn into my most popular post off the year? One of my plans/hopes for 2012 is to expand this list into more of a how-to guide. Some things are easy to convey in text (like recipe instructions) where others (changing a tire perhaps) would take hands on experience. This also means I may be taking in some classes so I can at least say I know how to do all of these things.

Incidentally, two posts not on the list which I really enjoyed doing were Can living in a city kill you? and A slice of life: my best friend and Eddie Vedder.

I wish you all a fun, relaxing week, and will see you again in the new year!

Come join the fun on Facebook and follow me on Twitter!

I’m sharing this post at Monday Mania, Traditional Tuesday, Real Food Wednesday, Simple Lives Thursday, and Fresh Bites Friday.

As seen on the internet and weekend food plans December 23, 2011

Let me tell you what the best part of being done with my graduate work is.
It’s being able to read anything I want, whenever I want, without a cloud of obligation hanging over my head. For the last few years any time I would do something fun for myself, there was a little nagging voice reminding me of what I could or should be doing at that time instead. Maybe this is what causes so much of the stress for people in graduate studies. It’s not the workload itself, but the feeling that I should somehow work on it all the time.

So to celebrate, I am catching up on a lot of online reading and even adding new blogs to read. If you have anything related to real food or domesticity from an unconventional source, leave a comment!

A sampling of what I’ve been reading this week, and there are indeed many of them:

Just out this morning, Kelly presents up with the words of Chris Kerston from Chaffin Family Farms about why quality olive oil matters, and what you’re really going to find on the shelves in the supermarket.
Consider this if you think olive oil is a must have: it’s a food trend, and recent. Before the 1980s, the people most likely to have olive oil in their kitchen were people who were actually from the Mediterranean. People from Spain, Italy, Greece, etc. It was a part of their food culture, plain and simple. I’m not trying to discourage anyone from keeping olive oil in their kitchen, just trying to bring in some perspective. There’s a huge Italian population where I live still, so olive oil wasn’t all that strange to me.

Body Ecology presents very good tips for eating better during these holidays.

Something I love about being in the real food community is that I periodically learn of new methods of healing. Health, Home, and Happiness is the latest place where I’ve seen talk of using clay. Have any of you done this? I wonder if I should look into it for general knowledge.

It’s not uncommon for people to filter their water. Considering the amount of chemicals which end up in municipal supplies this is not a bad idea at all. (Incidentally, if you think bottled water will help in this, it won’t. Many are bottled from the same sources as peoples’ taps.) Food Renegade points out that unfiltered bathing water is also not good for you since things like chlorine can permeate the skin and kill off the good bacteria in the body.

Sasquatch and the Scientician is the brainchild of a friend of mine (she’s the Scientician), and the url should tell you everything. “We Will Eat It.” There is only one post so far, but when you start a blog of eating off with the world’s most notorious fruit, you’re in for something good.

Melissa over at Cellulite Investigation gives an update on her continuing personal work to detox from excessive fluoride. Her works is inspirational for anyone who’s trying to clear up chronic health issues.

Speaking of olive oil, Jill from Farm Food Blog has taken then plunge into making cured olives at home. If you’re an olive lover, this is a must read and certainly something to consider.

Last week I mentioned Nourishing Our Children’s post about chemicals in candles. This week AnnMarie lists some other options for candles which are much safer for your home environment.

My doppleganger, ButterBeliever, talks about an antioxidant local to her in Hawai’i.

I think Frugally Sustainable has morphed into one of my favorite blogs. Frugal, traditional foods and green living? That’s what I want! This week she has a tutorial for making horehound lozenges for coughs. Last month I had an allergy explosion (my one remaining chronic issue) which also led into a lot of coughing. One morning I got so fed up I decided to look for lozenges at the market by the bus stop. When I saw the ingredient list, I ran out fast. Soy and high fructose corn syrup. Are you KIDDING me? I want to feel BETTER!
I do have a homemade cough remedy I like to use, and picked up some slippery elm lozenges to help then. Next year I will be making my own lozenges too. You never know when you might need them.

Finally, Jessica from Delicious Obsessions posted one of the best videos I have seen in a long time. I know I want a dog someday. Now I think I want goats too.

Weekend food plans? Well, tomorrow night is Christmas, which means I need to be around the kitchen a lot preparing a variety of pork products. If I get a chance I will do photo documentation and share here next week. Whethere you celebrate Yule, Christmas, Hannukah, Kwanzaa, or even nothing, I wish you a wonderful and peaceful weekend.

The ultimate low carb, grain free canape

The holiday celebrations are fast approaching. In the next week people will be celebrating Hannukah, Christmas, Yule, Winter Solstice, and other end of year festivities. This means food, food, food galore! If you’re on a specialized diet, however, this could present some big problems. If you’re low carb, all those crackers and breads which seem to spontaneously reproduce are off your list. And if you’re on a gut healing diet like GAPS or Body Ecology, your choices are even slimmer.

There are options which you can bring to eat for yourself and share. Considering how busy these days in December can get, you may not have time to make up a batch of grain free crackers. Or maybe you don’t want to bring another standard vegetable plate. But you still want to enjoy some of those lovely hors d’oeuvres without making a mess of your fingers.

How is this for a solution?

Photo by Chez Loulou, used under Creative Commons

ENDIVE!

Endive is a leafy vegetable available in heads, like lettuce. It has a light yet slightly sharp taste which gives a nice kick to whatever you pair it with. It has next to no simple or complex carbohydrates and has a notable amount of potassium, vitamin A, and vitamin K. Endive also looks very elegant when spread out on a platter, and is very easy to prepare.

To prepare endive:
Peel leaves off the head and arrange on a platter. If you’re using them to serve another food, place a small amount of food in the base.

How easy is that?

Whatever you might be celebrating in the next two weeks, I wish you a happy and safe time. Be well and happy eating!

Thank you to the woman in the Body Ecology Facebook community (whose name I have forgotten) for this great suggestion.

Come join the fun on Facebook and follow me on Twitter!

I’m sharing this post at Monday Mania, Traditional Tuesday, Real Food Wednesday, Frugal Days Sustainable Ways, Simple Lives Thursday, Fresh Bites Friday, and Fight Back Friday.

As seen on the internet and weekend food plans December 16, 2011

Since I don’t get to post as much as I’d like to here on the blog, I wind up sharing a lot over on Facebook. Not everyone is on FB and even there I don’t get to share everything, so I am going to start doing roundups like this in order to share my finds further.

First is a WWII posted I came across on Flickr.

source

Isn’t that awesome? Overcooking takes the nutrients out of your food, so this is still good advice.

Now on to some links!
Have you ever wondered about Sally Fallon Morrell’s (the founder of the Weston A. Price Foundation and modern mother of traditional foods) home life? Does she really have time to make all those nutrient dense foods she promotes? Yes she does, and then some! Jill from Farm Food Blog took a trip to Sally’s farm this past weekend and posted a LOT of photos and information. Here you can see the property (and what adorable pigs!), here facilities for milking and keeping the fresh raw milk clean, and the cheese making facilities.
Anyone around the northeast who wants to make a visit? I’ll gladly go along for the ride!

Speaking of farms, have you been hearing about the recent farm bill? Maybe you’re not sure what exactly is going on with this bill. Jessica from Delicious Obsessions shares material on the bill and ways you can contribute your voice.

The Nourishing our Children project now has a blog. NOC is dedicated to teaching people about real, traditional food, and how to make kids healthier with it. The post I have linked is information Sandrine shared on Facebook this week regarding candles. If you’re thinking of buying some as a gift, you definitely want to take a look. Conventional candles are a source of indoor air pollution if they’re made of paraffin. Instead of grabbing some candles from a big box store, perhaps look for beeswax or soy candles.

I haven’t had kids yet, but I hope to. In the meantime I keep learning more and more about options for pregnancy and childbirth. Sarah from Healthy Home Economist wrote about her experiences with delayed labor and how she got help with acupuncture. I have to say this sounds like a much less stressful option than getting shot up with medication to force open the womb.
If you’re feeling daring (and not at work) perhaps you’d be willing to consider hearing about giving birth as a pleasurable experience. HellaDelicious shared a story about women having, shall we say, a high level of pleasure during childbirth. It’s not for everyone and not everyone will experience it, but it might help shift our cultural perception of childbirth from one of agony to one of joy.

Are you still looking for ideas of homemade gifts for the upcoming holidays? Food Renegade has some ideas here, and so does Frugally Sustainable. FS is a newer blog and a treasure trove of information and ideas.

What’s happening in the kitchen this weekend?

These are simply aspirations. They might not happen for real. I’m going to try.

If the chocolate I ordered comes in by Saturday, I will be making Jenn’s truffles and peppermint patties, to be gifts for a few people. At the last I can get the other needed ingredients (like spices) and make coconut butter for the patties.
My mom also got a selection of oranges from a friend of hers. Since she doesn’t eat a lot of sugar now and I forget when fruit is in the house, I gotta use up that lovely citrus before it rots. Therefore I am going to try making the orange marmalade recipe in Nourishing Traditions.

What do you all have planned for the weekend?

Come join the fun on Facebook and follow me on Twitter!