Sensational oatless oatmeal smoothie

Good morning to you! There are so many theories about breakfast. Some people say that breakfast is the most important meal of the day, so it should also be the most substantial. Others prefer to skip breakfast altogether and have a large lunch instead. Some are sold for the much-beloved bacon and eggs. Others prefer yogurt and fruit. For convenience and time, we sometimes even reach for those microwaveable oatmeal packets. What's the best breakfast then?

To me, the best meal is one that gives you the best balance between stomach satisfaction and energy contribution. Too much protein invariably makes me lethargic and slow, feeling starved for a nap, and right after I just woke up! Now that just annoys me. Starches have the same effect. I am really not one to go to Waffle House for breakfast, if you ever pictured me this way.

So, the perfect breakfast for me involves fruit. They're light, full of natural sugars and promote your body's natural cleansing process. If you can tolerate yogurt you can have it with your fruit, and so much the better for you. But choose a yogurt loaded with probiotics, like kefir. And skip any fruity variety with added sugar. You just shoot yourself in the foot with that.

For those of us less lactose-tolerant though, there is still hope. Garden of Life makes a terrific protein powder that's dairy-, gluten-, sugar-, soy- and bad stuff-free, and it's also raw. I add this to my breakfasts whenever I've an active day ahead of me. We do need protein in our lives, but it doesn't necessarily have to come from animals. Without further ado, I present to you my favorite breakfast: a smoothie that tastes just like oatmeal, but made entirely out of fruit and raw protein powder.

Oatless oatmeal smoothie
~ serves 2

1 large Granny Smith apple, quartered
2 kiwi, peeled and halved
1 pear, quartered
1-inch piece ginger root, chopped
juice of 1/2 lime
2 dashes cinnamon
1 dash cardamom (optional)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup almond milk
2 Tbsp flax seed (or flax meal)
1 heaping scoop Garden of Life Raw Protein (or another non-dairy protein powder)

Blend everything with a powerful blender (get a Vitamix, for heaven's sake). Enjoy!

2-minute superhealthy avocado soup

The cold came over the city overnight, it felt. One day I stepped outside and it was in the thirties. It's getting harder to peel my eyes open every morning, and prepare to jump on my two-wheeled horse to step into the ear-numbing, face-biting air. Even though I look forward to the snowy outdoors and to Christmas, I find myself terribly nostalgic for summer. Besides, I'm not prepared to switch to my fluffy wardrobe just yet! At least one thing about this transition has me excited though: hot soups. I'm very enthusiastic about attempting lots and lots of soup recipes this coming winter. Something about a steamy bowl of vegetable potion is so comforting, and it always makes me think of home.

As a last homage to summer, here is a soup that's become one of my staples for anti-inflammatory action. This is served at room temperature - it's probably the last recipe of non-hot soup I'm trying this year. I've noticed that many of the foods I eat (and love) cause inflammation in my body. Normally I would just say so what, I'm not going to give up bread and cheese just for the whims of my cells. Except, I have noticed that some foods make my face swollen. Yes, seriously. And I'm not talking about a little "nobody will notice" kind of swollen, I'm talking about froglike, puffy eyes like I'm sick and haven't slept well in weeks. Spicy foods, bread and salt are some of my most uglyfying foods. 

Nobody likes to look Humpty Dumpty-faced, so - enter anti-inflammatory soup. Avocado in particular has many, many nutritional benefits, and one of them is its anti-inflammatory effect. There is an endless list of anti-inflammatory things you can eat for this purpose. But unless you make a habit of targeting those foods specifically, and avoiding the foods that have the opposite effect, you won't see much results because they will cancel each other out. This soup however is definitely a start in the right direction. It's also raw, healthy, quite tasty and of course, beautifying. Make this in a Vitamix or the blender of your choice.

Anti-inflammatory avocado soup

~ serves 2

1 large avocado or 2 small

1 bunch cilantro or parsley (cilantro is better)

2 cups sunflower sprouts, spinach or other wholesome leafy greens

1 cup chopped green onions

2 cups (16 oz) coconut water

juice from 1 lime

Throw everything into the blender and blend away! Serve immediately. Don't store this soup to eat later, because avocado becomes oxidized in time and the soup will not only taste funny, it also will have lost much of its healthy enzymes.

By the way: the site nutritiondata.self.com includes the inflammation factor (IF) for most food items. A negative IF is inflammatory, and the higher the number the stronger the effect (just out of curiosity, look up "bagel"). A positive IF means the food has anti-inflammatory effects, and the higher the IF the more anti-inflammatory the food is. Try to eat more of the foods with high positive IFs, such as avocado, papaya, ginger or turmeric.

Recipe adapted from The Facelift Diet.

Blood orange, roasted beet and fennel salad

Normally, this wouldn't be exactly my type of recipe. A couple oranges, beets and a fennel bulb later, Whole Foods is thirty bucks richer and I am having second thoughts. But wait! If you care about flavors at all, if you are an aspiring cook or have ever had dreams of learning the synergy of spices, you owe it to yourself to make this. 

As I partook of a slice of roasted beet soaked in citrus juices, a glossy sliver of fennel loosely embracing it, the shocking gestalt of flavors made my skin tingle. I started waltzing through the kitchen, with my lips shimmering of olive oil and a piece of cilantro hanging ungracefully at the corner of my mouth, and forgot myself. I left the mixture to marinate for a few hours, until dinner. The flavors decided to socialize inside the bowl, and by the time we sat down to eat properly the salad had become so ridiculously tasty that we couldn't stop making yummy noises throughout the meal, interrupting rather anticlimactically the gangster movie we were watching.

Did you ever think to pair beets with oranges? I didn't. This makes me braver to try even edgier combinations.

This salad is not only delicious, it's also absurdly beautiful. Look at the oranges sitting nonchalantly in the bowl, so effortlessly sexy.

Blood orange, roasted beet and fennel salad

~ serves 4

4 medium red beets, cut into slices 1/4 inch thick
2 blood oranges
2 navel oranges
1 Tbsp fresh lemon juice
1 Tbsp fresh lime juice
1/2 medium fennel bulb, thinly sliced crosswise
1/4 onion, thinly sliced
olive oil, for drizzling
salt and pepper, to taste
1/2 cup fresh cilantro, chopped

In a heat-proof dish, toss the beets with olive oil, salt and pepper. Bake at 400° in a toaster-oven or regular oven for about 20 minutes. Halfway through, pull the dish out and mix through.

Meanwhile, using a sharp knife, cut the oranges into thin slices, and try to cut them uniformly for extra prettiness. Place them in a bowl, add lemon juice and lime juice.

Let the beets cool, then add to the bowl with the oranges. Add the sliced fennel and onion. Drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle cilantro on top. Mix gently and let salad stand for at least 20 minutes, allowing the flavors to meld.

Recipe adapted from Bon Appetit.

Hungry-vore

So finally, I did it. I changed the title of the blog. "East of Eden" had a special significance for me, both because I'm a John Steinbeck fan and also because I've always wanted to live in California and never quite got there. I drool at the thought of beachy expanses with beachcombers and hardcore surfers, of the wine country, of winding roads hugging grassy mountains, suspended precariously above the great blue. And a touring bike with saddlebags, carrying beef jerky, bananas and a blanket, the perfect companions to any outing on two wheels. My notion of this Eden conveniently omits such facts as infuriating traffic or the dismissive hubris of the locals. That is not the California I have in my mind, not the Eden I pine for. With most things we look forward to, they are so much more idyllic in memory than in reality.

One day I got a bit tired of this bittersweet crap. California is hardly the divine poetry I make it to be, a fact hard-learned earlier this year as, day after miserable day, I tried to make my way from one point of LA to another among an ocean of sluggish, furious Californian cars. Nor is Cannery Row Steinbeck's inspirational oasis anymore, its once quaint and peaceful streets having been replaced with gaudy shops, loud booths and bright lights. As the writer's name is advertised at each corner as some sort of haute couture brand, he is no doubt wincing at all of this and rolling in his grave. Salinas, too, where Steinbeck grew up, is a godforsaken ghost town of former farmers turned receptionists at Motel 6. Not a happy story.

So, with the betrayal of the "California dream" I became increasingly disenchanted with the title, East of Eden. "Hungryvore" came up one day as I was trying to describe my eating preferences in a conversation with friends. I'm no carnivore, or vegetarian, or vegan, or raw foodist. So what are you, they asked impatiently. Ah, people's need to peg you! What I am is not picky. I'll eat whatever there is, and having grown up in a part of the world where food was once scarce and choices lacking, I now consider myself lucky to have access to so many ingredients, to have so much information about nutrition and to benefit from such a wealth of options when it comes to preparing meals. I'm like a kid in a candy store - how could I not hurry to sample, taste, combine and experiment?

In some other countries, where it's a struggle to find quality ingredients, where food is not properly labeled, and where no one's heard of "antioxidants" or "omega-3 fatty acids," people eat because they're hungry. When you're hungry, you don't count carbs and protein. Finding out whether something is "ethically sourced" or "non-GMO" is decidedly a first world problem. When one is hungry, their main concern is to eat something that's satisfying, and if it happens to be healthy too, so much the better. On this side of the Globe, however, we are lucky. We have so much to choose from. Cuisines from around the world. Health food stores at every corner. So many rare, exotic grains and produce! The organic movement. There is no excuse, I think, for someone living in the States and making decent money, to not eat healthy things.

This past week's theme has been experimenting with the Vitamix. I can't get enough of this contraption. I made three spreads, and while I had high hopes for all of them, I was not exactly floored by any. My favorite, however, was Kim Snyder's Beauty Nut Pate. I can imagine making this again, albeit with small amendments. I had it for lunch three days in a row with some celery sticks and red pepper slices. It was very satisfying, even for a greedy stomach like mine. Just make sure you use unsalted pumpkin seeds. I made that mistake and it turned out a tad too salty for my taste - OK, a LOT saltier than my taste. I felt my head had turned into a ticking sodium bomb after a few bites. So - just make sure they're unsalted.

Beauty nut pate
~ serves 10

1 medium zucchini (organic please)
3 inches ginger root, chopped
garlic, 1 large clove
1/4 cup onion, chopped
1 1/2 cups pumpkin seeds (pepitas) unsalted!
1/2 cup sunflower seeds
1 cup almonds
1/2 cup nama shoyu (unpasteurized soy sauce) or just plain old soy sauce
2 Tbsp lemon juice
1/2 tsp Cayenne pepper

Blend away in a Vitamix or high-speed blender until smooth. In the absence of such fancy equipment, grind your nuts in a coffee grinder or similar device and then use a regular blender to blend the whole thing together.

This will keep in the fridge for about a week. Try to trick your friends into tasting it, because they'll love it and then they'll have all kinds of admiration for you because you eat such healthy stuff.

Recipe adapted from Kimberly Snyder.

Pango Smoothie demonstrates: sugar is evil, but not indispensable

I've been dragging myself this week through a lethargy borne of changes. Since I got a respectable job and am no longer making my own schedule, my eating routine has been completely thrown for a loop. Tuesday I even had a bacon burrito from Golden Pride, of frustration, even though with every bite I mentally whipped myself for straying so egregiously from the Beauty Detox way. I know, very bad. So now again I must pause and reconsider. What are my priorities? How much time can I devote to cooking? What do I really want entering my stomach?

I've developed a special preference for fruit in smoothies as part of my project to manage my time more effectively. After creating a spreadsheet of the activities that make up my day, I've concluded that a significant portion of my day is spent chewing. True story. Chewing a large salad takes approximately 18.4 minutes, while chewing a large bowl of fruit takes up to 16.8 minutes. Not to mention lunch, that is where the real bottleneck is! The Glowing Green Smoothie, on the other hand, takes 2.9 minutes to ingest, and that's if it's half-frozen.

So I've decided to allow myself to regress digestively and eat most of my food mashed, in baby-food form. This not only saves time, but also makes for delicious meals, as you will soon see. When you eat blended foods, you've already partially broken down the food, so your stomach has to put less effort into processing it, which means energy saved to be used by your body in some other way. According to Kim's book, our bodies can use up to 80% of our whole supply of energy for digestion. Isn't that crazy? No wonder most of us crave for a nap after lunch. 

There's only so far that this blendophilia can reach. I'm not going to go and blend bread or meat or some insane thing like that, although if I do ever decide to make the steak milkshake I've heard about I'll let you know. There are foods that don't lend themselves to blending, and we wouldn't want them to either. I love the texture of halva, for instance. I would never blend that. But fruit - anytime. And because I've lived in Georgia, and I often get hopelessly nostalgic after the sweet, juicy Georgia peaches, this is my favorite breakfast snack at the moment.

Pango Smoothie

~ serves 1

1 organic ripe peach, halved and cored

3/4 cup mango chunks (frozen) or flesh from 1/2 large mango

2 dates or 1 Tbsp coconut nectar or honey

1 cup ice cubes

1/2 cup water

Blend everything with a hand blender, regular blender or a Vitamix for about 1 minute.

Recipe adapted from Whole Foods Recipes from Vitamix.

Note: If you manage to make this smoothie even more heavenly, tell me how!

Quick no-bake chocolate ginger cake

Do you remember going to birthday parties when you were young? The thrill of that morning, the arrival at your friend's house, when all the other kids would flock to greet you and would then take you by the hand and carry you away from your parents, who'd be wandering off with the other parents toward another corner of the house where there'd be chatting and martini glasses, while you'd be off to much more exciting water balloons and running games. And then, as the party drew to an end, everyone would turn a bit lethargic and gloomy, and the games would be lessened by a note of sadness because it would soon be time to go. But fortunately, there was always cake to cheer everyone up. And it always did, because despite all its offences to do with calories and sugar and cholesterol and food coloring and whatnot, cake has an irresistible lure of instant gratification. Were those birthdays any different for you?

The other day I made a cake that I'm planning to make again on my birthday. It really was that good. This is one of Kim Snyder's recipes, but I don't have a food processor so I tweaked the recipe a bit to work for me. I especially love the concept of making a raw cake, because this also means: no flour! What? Cake without flour's blasphemy, you're thinking. Well, not exactly. This particular recipe uses almonds and walnuts as a base and coconut nectar to hold the whole thing together. Ah, and avocado to make the frosting! I'd like to have a slice of this every day for the rest of my life, please.

Raw chocolate ginger cake

~ serves 6

1 cup almonds

3/4 cup walnuts

1/4 cup raw cacao (actual cacao powder, not hot chocolate mix or some other sugary powder)

1/4 tsp sea salt

2 tsp grated ginger root

3 Tbsp coconut nectar (or thick maple syrup; don't use agave)

5 Medjool dates, pitted and minced

1/8 cup coconut oil

1 tsp vanilla

Frosting:

1 small avocado, scooped out

3 Medjool dates, pitted and chopped

2 Tbsp raw cacao

1/4 cup coconut nectar (or maple syrup)

Before we begin: this is not a pretty process, especially if you don't have the right tools. You need muscle and it will get messy. If you feel like giving up, you just have to tell yourself that it will all be worth it. Because it will.

I used a coffee grinder to process the almonds and walnuts in batches until they resembled small bread crumbs. If you don't have a grinder, you can also smash the nuts with a mortar and pestel until you get them really small. It's hard work, I know, but remember: it'll be worth it. 

Now put the nuts in a bowl and add the salt, ginger, dates, vanilla and coconut nectar or maple syrup. You are going to put your hands in there and knead the whole thing. Be careful, it's sticky! My dough was a tad too dry, so I added 1/8 cup coconut oil to moisten it. If yours is moist enough, you can skip the coconut oil. Knead until the dough is homogeneous.

Then take a 1 quart glass pan (it's important that you choose a glass pan because the dough won't stick to it) and press the dough firmly into it. You don't have to bake the cake. The coconut nectar and oil will keep it all together.

For the frosting, blend together the avocado flesh, dates, cacao and coconut nectar. This will be a softer mixture, so you'll be able to use a hand blender. Make sure it's smooth, and then spread the frosting evenly on top of the cake. Cover and chill for at least an hour before serving. 

To serve, use a sharp knife to cut triangular (or rectangular, depending on the shape of your pan) slices. And don't worry, if you pressed it well the cake is pretty sturdy so the slices won't break apart when you take them out.

Note: the original recipe uses a food processor. If you have one, use that recipe instead. 

A post-gluten-free week

A lot of New Mexicans spend their Sundays at the mall. That's why it's hard to get a table at the Barnes and Noble Cafe. This is where the husbands sit while the wives, all done up, are oohing and aahing over this or that cute top, which they will continue to do throughout the afternoon. You can also find UNM students at the Barnes and Noble Cafe. Too poor to buy the books, they get a cup of coffee and browse the materials for free. Not a bad deal. In fact, most days I do the same. I am still a college student at heart.

Today started with a matin sauna session, where a couple of Spanish-speaking guys were talking far more than they were sweating. Since you can't do anything else in the sauna except stare at other less-clothed people, which nobody likes to do, I usually try to use the opportunity to meditate. Fifteen minutes to think about nothing but my breath. Since my chatty company of two banished any trace of peace I might have had coming my way, the whole experience left me rather peeved. So, this coffee I'm sipping at the Barnes and Noble Cafe better be conducive to meditation.

The post-gluten-free week was not as flamboyant as you might think. I made no pastries, no extravagant cakes, and aside from my signature whole wheat-sesame seed bread the only true brag-worthy thing was the goat cheese pizza with whole wheat crust - my best yet! So here they are, the week's best in pictures:

Last Sunday's breakfast was supposed to celebrate the end of gluten deprivation, but...

somehow it ended up being gluten-free too. Bacon and over-easy eggs and a salad of lettuce, tomatoes and cucumbers on the side.

Monday, fajitas! We made this with deeply-marinated chicken, yellow peppers, onions and a side of brown rice. By the way, did you know that out of green, yellow and red bell peppers, the yellow ones have the most Vitamin C? Who knew.

This is my world-renowned whole wheat-sesame seed bread, toasted, with butter and rose jam. Yes, jam made out of rose petals! A fitting mid-afternoon pick-me-up.

 Wednesday's salad was so beautiful I had a hard time eating it. Tomatoes, cucumbers, red bell peppers, radishes, kale, green olives and goat cheese, with some olive oil sprinkled on top for glossy effect.

This smoothie is not for the faint of heart. Banana, raspberries, mango chunks (all frozen) plus raw protein powder and cocoa. Fruity, chocolatey and nutty all at once.

This West-African soup is a gem I found in The Soup Bible. It's made with sweet potatoes, chickpeas, tomatoes, onions, raisins and spinach. I drowned a big spoon of Israeli couscous in it and it really came together.

I sense you're not completely convinced of how wonderful this soup was, so here is another portrait. This soup grew on me with every bowl, I swear.

Pizza with whole wheat crust, goat cheese (instead of mozzarella), prosciutto, mushrooms and New Mexico's finest green chile. The bread maker helped me make the dough for the crust, which is half-white wheat and half-whole wheat. The cheddar goat cheese didn't melt as nicely as mozzarella would have, so next time I'll make sure to have some of that on hand. Overall, a winner. It baked in the oven for 25 minutes for extra crispiness.

Gluten-free week - day 2

Yesterday Albuquerque was erased with a giant eraser of wind and dust. Winds over 50 mph snapped trees and caused all kinds of havoc in the city on an otherwise peaceful Sunday. Friends on the West side said they couldn't even see us down here in the valley. It was like we didn't exist. And I'll have to confess, a bleak desolation grabs hold of me when I look out of my window and don't see the Sandia crest looming in the distance. The air was turbid and opaque and there were no more mountains. It was as if I was living in the plains again. Perhaps you know this, but after being around mountains for so long, flatness is decidedly tedious. I became immediately claustrophobic.

And so it was that I spent the better part of my Sunday in the kitchen, concocting new gluten-free ideas. I, just like many of you, am a creature of habit, and I especially enjoy getting into wholesome habits. Preparing my own food is one of those habits. And, much like everybody else, I don't have a lot of time to spare. So generally speaking, the meals I prepare are nutritious but necessarily quick to make. Any recipe that's over 20 minutes in prep time makes me lose my interest.

Now, if usually I'm not keen on spending a whole lot of time cooking, this Sunday was definitely an exception. And I wouldn't even recommend making the baked fries I spent over an hour making and another half an hour cleaning up after (yes, really), if they weren't really, really, unequivocally delicious. So yes, make this - if and only if you have lots of time on your hands and don't mind spending two hours making something that you'll gobble up in ten minutes. Otherwise, go with salads and fruit, throw in some nuts or cheese, you can't go wrong with that.

For brunch: over-easy eggs, cornflakes with kefir and apples with almond butter. This is the new-American breakfast, by the way, I'm starting a thing.

Have I mentioned how brilliant apples with almond butter are?

For dinner, salad from baby bok choy, tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, olives and crumbled goat cheese.

These baked fries took a lot of muscle to make - not to mention they stuck to the pan, bastards - but they really were high on the scale of awesomeness, especially dipped in sour cream. They are supposed to be like Arby's fries only, you know, the version without all the poisons.

Recipe for irresistible fries from here.