Food

[babayaga67]

I cook. A lot.

I don't usually do any actual cooking for lunch, but I do make breakfast and dinner dang near every day. Lunches are usually sandwiches or leftovers that I reheat (not that we have leftovers anymore, but that's another story). Not to blow my own whistle too much, but I am a pretty good cook. I am a decent baker too, but I don't have much time for that anymore :(

Some of my houses favorite dishes are my chicken enchiladas, spinach enchiladas, jambalaya, spinach feta burgers, brie hashbrown casserole, pizza (I make my own dough), and my 'mac and cheese.' I have several other foods that I regularly make as well, but I am trying to perfect each dish before I experiment with a new one.

My husband used to tell me that he liked vegetarian foods, and I thought that it was because he was a cheapskate. No. I have to use super lean beef and really dilute it with vegetables or else it upsets his stomach. He DOES NOT LIKE chicken. Pork is too chewy. Bison is "funky." Bacon is good to give him, but it's bacon, of course it's delicious. Salmon and shrimp are good, but get pretty expensive when you live in the middle of the continent. Alligator and crawdads are good, but I can't find those at all in the small town grocery store. Vegetarian foods it is.

In the vegetable category I have to be careful too. Nobody likes beets, carrots, eggplants, or a few other things. I love spinach, so if you are going to eat in my house, you are going to get spinach. About a month and a half ago I started adding in carrots to everything. I use baby food because I am lazy and don't want to puree them myself twice a day. Carrots are important for ones diet, but I just couldn't cut them up small enough by hand that they could get past unnoticed, so baby food jars it is.

I have been sneaking carrots into everything from brownies to pancakes to rice to mac 'n cheese to cheesy biscuits to guacamole. I was secretly dosing everyone with carrots every single day for about two weeks before I told anyone anything.

They were pretty upset. "That's like feeding cow to a vegetarian! You can't do that!" was my husbands response. :)

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[charelan]

I want to eat at your house!! Spinach is basically my favourite food and all of those dishes sound AMAZING!!

[babayaga67]

@charelan Thank you. Everyone likes eating at my house.

I also make a breakfast plate and desert goodies every week for my trash man. I give my doctor's offices muffins and/or cookies every time I go in for an appointment. I love baking, but I make so much sometimes, and I don't want my family to get super fat from junk food, so I find people to give the stuff to.

[WhiteWolf]

Those recipes sound amazing! The brie hashbrown casserole sounds really good! I'm tempted to ask you if I may have the recipe for that!

[babayaga67]

@WhiteWolf Sure! I am copying the recipe from one of my Sandra Lee cookbooks for you and anyone else who is interested:

   Non-stick cooking spray

 2 Tablespoons butter

1  Package (8 ounces) sliced mushrooms

1  Can condensed cream of mushroom soup

1/2 Cup melted butter

1 1/2 Teaspoons kosher salt

1/2 Teaspoon ground black pepper

1  Cup yellow onion, chopped

2  Containers (5 ounces each) brie cheese, rind removed, chopped

1  Bag (30 ounce) country style hash browns, thawed

10 Ounce spinach, chopped

 

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 Celsius I think). Spray 9x13 baking pan with cooking spray.

2. In a medium skillet, over medium high heat, melt 2 tablespoons butter. Add mushrooms and cook 6 to 8 minutes, or until tender. Transfer to a large bowl.

3. To mushrooms add soup, butter, salt, pepper, onions, spinach and brie cheese: Mix well. Add hash browns: Pour into baking pan.

4. Bake for 35 minutes, or until golden brown and cheese has melted. If top has not browned after 40 minutes, turn broiler to high and cook until top is brown, about 3 to 4 minutes.

 

The original recipe does not have spinach, but it is so good with the spinach that I had to share it like this. Sorry for my tweaking of a perfectly good recipe.

[life_eclectic]

That's funny about the carrots. I don't see why they should care if they couldn't even taste the carrots in the first place. Anyway, that's cool you like to cook a lot. All that food sounds yummy. I am pretty good at cooking chicken, spaghetti with sauce and that's about it. I make soups and stews, but that's just putting a lot of stuff in a pot and adding some spices, not too much to it, though it is tasty. My sister makes a lot of baked goods like peanut butter pie, bread pudding and chocolate chip cookies =)

[jellysundae]

On 20/06/2017 at 7:48 PM, babayaga67 said:

I have been sneaking carrots into everything from brownies to pancakes to rice to mac 'n cheese to cheesy biscuits to guacamole. I was secretly dosing everyone with carrots every single day for about two weeks before I told anyone anything.

They were pretty upset. "That's like feeding cow to a vegetarian! You can't do that!" was my husbands response. :)

Gotta give him credit for wit there, lol. xD

2 hours ago, life_eclectic said:

That's funny about the carrots. I don't see why they should care if they couldn't even taste the carrots in the first place

There speaks the voice of reason, lol. BUT, reason just doesn't come into it when it's people fighting against eating their veg.

I LOVE veg, I eat a mainly vegetarian diet, admittedly for financial and health reasons rather than food preferences, I...hmm, actually, might be more accurate to say I don't eat a lot of meat rather than I'm mainly veggie. I buy turkey thigh mince, and chicken thighs if they're on offer, and this rather nice Polish smoked chicken sausage is nearly always in my fridge, plus I eat salmon, but I rarely buy anything red-meaty.

I was told I had high cholesterol, which was insane considering my veg, beans and wholegrain-heavy diet, but there you go, high cholesterol regardless, so I cut out the red meat. This was mainly salami and chorizo, I bought these because I'm poor and they're good value for money for the amount of flavour you get, they render out free flavourful fat to cook themselves in, and they last a long time so an all-round win for me, but out they went! Next time they checked my cholesterol it was "borderline" rather than high, so yay, my sacrifice is doing some good.

I love spinach, I tried growing it in seed trays in my kitchen window this year, but it clearly wasn't impressed, sickly weedy plants that started trying to flower when they were just 2 inches high, so no money-saving for me there! Seems herbs are the only thing that really work well indoors. *sows a bunch of parsley seeds*

[Angeló]

im actually eating peas n carrots right now . with rice . yum 

but im not a big fan of spinach . i can eat it for courtesy's sake though

[jellysundae]

I've currently got cooking something that's mainly following this recipe, lol.

Slow Cooker Lentil Chili with Black Beans, Pumpkin, and Kale

Because of my brain issues I need something as a guideline; I'll often then go and change it pretty completely, but I generally can't manage at all without a written recipe as a starting point.

Added a load of mushrooms to this or I'll forget about them and they'll go manky, different beans, and no kale (not got any). Sweet potato diced pretty small rather than tinned pumpkin, as that doesn't exist in this country, also some celery that was going limp and some of this seasoning. Google translates Przyprawa Do Miesa Mielonego as "spice for minced matter"...yum? I like the Prymat seasonings, they're less than half the price of any UK brands.

It's looking pretty through the lid there, hopefully it'll taste good. Even more hopefully, if it does taste good I'll be able to remember what I did!

[acmerasta]

11 hours ago, jellysundae said:

There speaks the voice of reason, lol. BUT, reason just doesn't come into it when it's people fighting against eating their veg.

I LOVE veg, I eat a mainly vegetarian diet, admittedly for financial and health reasons rather than food preferences, I...hmm, actually, might be more accurate to say I don't eat a lot of meat rather than I'm mainly veggie. I buy turkey thigh mince, and chicken thighs if they're on offer, and this rather nice Polish smoked chicken sausage is nearly always in my fridge, plus I eat salmon, but I rarely buy anything red-meaty.

I was told I had high cholesterol, which was insane considering my veg, beans and wholegrain-heavy diet, but there you go, high cholesterol regardless, so I cut out the red meat. This was mainly salami and chorizo, I bought these because I'm poor and they're good value for money for the amount of flavour you get, they render out free flavourful fat to cook themselves in, and they last a long time so an all-round win for me, but out they went! Next time they checked my cholesterol it was "borderline" rather than high, so yay, my sacrifice is doing some good.

I love spinach, I tried growing it in seed trays in my kitchen window this year, but it clearly wasn't impressed, sickly weedy plants that started trying to flower when they were just 2 inches high, so no money-saving for me there! Seems herbs are the only thing that really work well indoors. *sows a bunch of parsley seeds*

Jelly, has any of your doctors ever investigated to see if you are one of those people that manufacture cholesterol in your body? Or rather, have naturally higher cholesterol regardless of diet and exercise? and if its the LDL or HDL? And have they checked your arteries? I ask because I know someone who frustrated herself for years trying to get hers down after doctors repeatedly told her it was high only to learn eventually that she just naturally manufactures it and once its not the bad stuff (LDL) she's good. Now she has a nice balanced diet, a lot less frustration and she enjoys eating again. 

[jellysundae]

13 minutes ago, acmerasta said:

Jelly, has any of your doctors ever investigated to see if you are one of those people that manufacture cholesterol in your body? Or rather, have naturally higher cholesterol regardless of diet and exercise? and if its the LDL or HDL? And have they checked your arteries? I ask because I know someone who frustrated herself for years trying to get hers down after doctors repeatedly told her it was high only to learn eventually that she just naturally manufactures it and once its not the bad stuff (LDL) she's good. Now she has a nice balanced diet, a lot less frustration and she enjoys eating again. 

There's not been any kind of anything, lol. I have to get my bloods done every 3 months because of the treatment that I'm on for my MS, the cholesterol was checked initially simply because I was mid-40s and it had never been checked before. I didn't know it was being checked until they called me to tell me it was high, lol.

I suspect it may be naturally high because both my mum and dad have the same issue, but when I mentioned that to the doc he didn't seem keen on that idea. *shrugs*

Me cutting those processed piggy products out of my diet made it drop from 7.2 to 6.3 in a year though, so it will be interesting to see what it is next time they check it!

I don't know if those numbers mean a thing to you as different countries use totally different methods, lol. I have this scrap of paper that the guy who did my bloods in December wrote out for me. He just wrote down everything on the screen so he clearly doesn't understand the figures either. So I'll just write them down here, along with the definitions from the heartuk.org site:

 

LDL = 3.8 -  this is the amount of LDL-cholesterol), ideally it should be 3 mmol/L* or less

Chol/HDL ratio = 3.2 - This is the TC figure divided by the HDL-C figure. A ratio above 6 is considered high risk - the lower this figure is the better.

Triglyceride = 1.2 - this represent your body's ability to clear fat from the blood after a meal.  Ideally it should be less than 2mmol/L* on a fasting sample (I've not giving a fasting sample)

HDL = 2 - the amount of good cholesterol, ideally it should be over 1mmol/L* (men) and over 1.2mmol/L* (women).

Non HDL cholesterol = 4.3 - this is your total cholesterol minus your HDL-cholesterol (good cholesterol) and is the sum all the  "bad" cholesterols added together (including LDL cholesterol) - ideally it should be 4mmol/L* or less

Cholesterol level = 6.3 - this is the total amount of cholesterol in your blood.  Ideally it should be 5 mmol/L* or less

 

So overall it doesn't seem like I'm about to drop dead, particularly as it's dropped from the previous check, I'm confident that when it's tested again it'll have dropped further. (eats some more salmon )

[acmerasta]

We use the same terms here... but yeah the tech seems clueless too lol. I can maybe ask my friend once I remember... but if they really want to investigate you'll have to do the fasting test etc and a scan of your arteries. When my friend finally had a doctor pay her proper attention, they found her arteries were clean. For her age (she's over 60) it was surprising, according to the doctor. They observed her diet and she runs like a beast... she does 10 km every morning and gets up at 4:00 am to do it too!  Like I can only aspire to be as healthy as her when I get to her age! At any rate, it's a work in progress... Stay as healthy as you can and try not to sweat the small stuff since stress kills too! 

[jellysundae]

Yeah stress is my enemy, that causes relapses in my MS so I avoid it all costs!

I think it will be when I next get my bloods done; in September, when they'll check my cholesterol again, I'm hoping for 5.4 next time, continuing the current pattern!

Your friend sounds amazing, good for her! My mum's 64 and full of aches and pains, she regrets giving up running once she left school...

[acmerasta]

After a knee injury I do hydrofit. It's less stress on your joints. The doctor also suggested cycling instead of bone jarring running/jogging. Thinking of getting myself a bicycle for Christmas 

[jellysundae]

13 hours ago, acmerasta said:

After a knee injury I do hydrofit. It's less stress on your joints. The doctor also suggested cycling instead of bone jarring running/jogging. Thinking of getting myself a bicycle for Christmas 

Yeah running's super-bad for the knees!

I've just bought a hula-hoop...I rocked at that as a kid, I bet we all did. I can't do it AT. ALL. now of course, but I'm hoping I'll work at it.

It may well be the worse thing EVER for a person with compromised balance to try and do, but no-one ever accused me of being sensible.

Get that bike! Enjoyable exercise plus FREE transportation, WIN! What makes you unsure about getting one?

 

In other news, I made some flapjacks with oil yesterday - by flapjacks I mean the oaty bar things, not pancakes - I have this bit of scribble on a post-it stuck to the side of the fridge that just says:

honey   1c   1/2c  1/4c

   oil     1c   1/2c  1/4c

oats  2.5-3c  1.5c  3/4c

160°C  20 mins

Highly informative, right? lol. But I made them ages ago using the smallest quantities and cooked it in the glass lid of a small Pyrex dish, didn't add anything else to them just to see if they worked. It made 4 nice-sized pieces and turned out pretty good. Recently I spent absolutely ages hunting the net trying to find the site I'd got the recipe from, only to THEN find this post-it stuck on the fridge...isn't it "awesome" when you forget how you on a previous day did something to help future you out. Like when you buy something when it's on offer because you'll need some more soon, only to then find you already had 2 more sat in the back of the cupboard...

But I digress (big surprise there, right? *cough*)

Flapjacks this time - vegetable oil rather than olive oil, teaspoon of cinnamon, heaped tbsp of ground flaxseed, unmeasured amount of pumpkin seeds and walnuts (enough to cover the base of the dish lid I was going to cook the flapjacks in) toasted to fragrant deliciousness, about 6 or 7 dates chopped up, and 4 squares of v.dark (85% cocoa) chocolate cut into chunks, tsp of vanilla extract and a pinch o' salt.

Realised this wasn't going to fit in the dish lid so put it in silicon muffin cases instead and got 7 2cm deep portions out of it. Gave them 15 minutes and called it good.

 

ACTUALLY LET THEM COOL BEFORE EATING ONE! Seriously, do I get a medal for that or something? I feel I totally should.

 

They turned out pretty darn good, I will make them again and add more STUFF...toasted sesame seeds? Yes, I think so. Might as well add some sunflower seeds to the toasty goodness too while I'm at it. Also, more cinnamon, because...why does that even need explaining?

For someone who's brain issues make cooking a struggle, a recipe like this is a game-changer; instead of requiring faffing about melting fat and sugar and syrup together, it simply needs mixing, that I can manage on just about any day. So that's one less barrier between me and having a healthy homemade snack readily available.

Now the burning question is...do I take the 4 I have left over to my mum's tomorrow for she, my sister and her BF to try, or do I eat them myself.

[acmerasta]

55 minutes ago, jellysundae said:

Get that bike! Enjoyable exercise plus FREE transportation, WIN! What makes you unsure about getting one?

I never learnt to ride a bike properly as a kid. I got one for Christmas when I was 6 or 7 and my dad decided the best way for me to learn to ride was for him to get on my kiddy bike and ride it first... he broke the training wheels. he and his friend decided that I didn't need those so instead of repairing them, they took them off. Suffice to say, when it was time for me to ride the bike, he wasn't around to help me balance and I fell off a lot. Mom got worried since the training wheels were off and the breaks needed adjusting... I was pretty much traumatized at the end of it and never really learnt. So now I'm worried if I spend all that cash on an adult bike, sans training wheels, if I'll be able to finish figuring it out and enjoy cycling like I really want to.... or if I'll fall off, hurt my already damaged knees and lose my front teeth lol. The things your parents do to you sometimes...

Your oat and seed flap jacks sound yummy!

[jellysundae]

1 hour ago, acmerasta said:

The things your parents do to you sometimes...

Haha yeah...it's like some kind of life hazing!

I learnt to ride on another girl's bike that had stabilisers, I only ever had one bike myself, I think I got that when I was about 9 and once I grew out of it I never got another one.

Do you have any sympathetic friends with bikes, and a nice grassy area nearby where you can all relive your youth by them helping you to master two wheels?

 

I told my mum now that I'm bringing some flapjacks over tomorrow, so I CAN'T give in and eat all the others now.

[acmerasta]

I wish there was a class I could sign up for lol. But yeah I have friends with grassy lawns and friends with bicycles... dunno if the twain shall meet! I'll make up my mind soon I think and figure it out... or just stick to jumping around in the pool and the stationary bike at the gym.

 

When you carry the flapjacks over, have one with your mum 

[jellysundae]

9 hours ago, acmerasta said:

I wish there was a class I could sign up for lol. But yeah I have friends with grassy lawns and friends with bicycles... dunno if the twain shall meet! I'll make up my mind soon I think and figure it out... or just stick to jumping around in the pool and the stationary bike at the gym.

 

When you carry the flapjacks over, have one with your mum 

Hmm...you know, you might find that because your body's used to general bicycliness from using a stationary one, that you're closer to be proficient on an actual bike than you think, you never know! Hopefully a situation does arise where you can find out safely and comfortably.

 

Well with the flapjacks...because it's gonna be me, mum, sis and her bf, I'm taking four, so I do get to have another one, lol.

[WhiteWolf]

On 6/24/2017 at 11:40 AM, acmerasta said:

I never learnt to ride a bike properly as a kid. I got one for Christmas when I was 6 or 7 and my dad decided the best way for me to learn to ride was for him to get on my kiddy bike and ride it first... he broke the training wheels. he and his friend decided that I didn't need those so instead of repairing them, they took them off. Suffice to say, when it was time for me to ride the bike, he wasn't around to help me balance and I fell off a lot. Mom got worried since the training wheels were off and the breaks needed adjusting... I was pretty much traumatized at the end of it and never really learnt. So now I'm worried if I spend all that cash on an adult bike, sans training wheels, if I'll be able to finish figuring it out and enjoy cycling like I really want to.... or if I'll fall off, hurt my already damaged knees and lose my front teeth lol. The things your parents do to you sometimes...

Your oat and seed flap jacks sound yummy!

If you're not that confident about being on a regular bike, may I suggest an adult trike?  I have one (mainly because my balance stinks), and I love it.

[acmerasta]

3 hours ago, WhiteWolf said:

If you're not that confident about being on a regular bike, may I suggest an adult trike?  I have one (mainly because my balance stinks), and I love it.

Thanks for the suggestion!! never even thought of that. I'll do some research!

[jellysundae]

I LOVE adult trikes, they are so cool-looking, plus practical because they can have a big basket on the back that will hold a lot of shopping.

Possibly something you could find nice and cheap on somewhere like Craigslist?

[babayaga67]

@jellysundae Have you thought about adding chia seeds? They have almost no flavor, so it won't mess anything up, and they are packed full of good ole omega-3's to help keep brains from rotting as fast (I would say brain development, but I think that most of the people on these forums are a bit past that point. We are just trying to slow down the melting from everything that happens when you get to the real world).

I also really like Wheat Germ. It's a bit of a nutty taste, and I add it to my smoothies and cereal on a regular basis.

Good job on using 85% cocoa! I have trouble finding anything higher than 75%. I have a few heart-smart style cookbooks, and more than one mentions that people who eat about one ounce of 70% or higher cocoa every day have lower LDL levels than people who eat milk chocolate or no chocolate.

Scientific proof that everyone should eat chocolate every day :)

[jellysundae]

18 minutes ago, babayaga67 said:

@jellysundae Have you thought about adding chia seeds? They have almost no flavor, so it won't mess anything up, and they are packed full of good ole omega-3's to help keep brains from rotting as fast (I would say brain development, but I think that most of the people on these forums are a bit past that point. We are just trying to slow down the melting from everything that happens when you get to the real world).

I also really like Wheat Germ. It's a bit of a nutty taste, and I add it to my smoothies and cereal on a regular basis.

Good job on using 85% cocoa! I have trouble finding anything higher than 75%. I have a few heart-smart style cookbooks, and more than one mentions that people who eat about one ounce of 70% or higher cocoa every day have lower LDL levels than people who eat milk chocolate or no chocolate.

Scientific proof that everyone should eat chocolate every day :)

I bought some chia seeds once from Amazon, they never arrived >_< I completely forgot I'd bought them until weeks later too, lol. They're so expensive though that I've not attempted to buy any more since, but I will again at some point because that kind of thing is right up my street. My version of the wheatgerm is adding extra oat bran to my breakfast porridge, as well as pumpkin seeds and walnuts and cinnamon, and dates for sweetness (plus ground flaxseed if I remember, but I haven't for ages, oops) so I attack the cholesterol every breakfast-time, yup!

Lately I've been making it savoury instead, with a serving of home-cooked pinto beans and their pot liquor plus some thyme and sage added, and half a tsp of Marmite, a delicious yeast extract that's got loads of B vits. Opinion on Marmite is SO polarised, it makes for fun conversation, lol, some people hate it so much that it HURTS xD! I totally love it though, and I'd rather put that in my brekkie than salt.

I'm really enjoying the dark chocolate, I'm definitely going to buy more. I wonder, considering that I have MS and have significant cognitive problems - do you think I could get dark choccy on prescription?

[WhiteWolf]

20 hours ago, jellysundae said:

I LOVE adult trikes, they are so cool-looking, plus practical because they can have a big basket on the back that will hold a lot of shopping.

Possibly something you could find nice and cheap on somewhere like Craigslist?

My trike has a basket, and I can get a couple bags of groceries in it. i also have the classic bike bell on one side. Mine is a beautiful metallic blue. As soon as it stops raining, I'm going to check the tires, and go for a ride.