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!

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!

Beautifying, glowing and going green, all the way

Last week I was talking about embarking on a new diet plan. Not a diet, but a solution! Sounds promising, right? Short story about how I got here: a couple of weeks ago I picked up a copy of Elle magazine from the Sacramento airport before boarding a plane back to Albuquerque. "We tested them all!," a title on the cover announced. "3 diets that really work." I flipped to the article out of sheer curiosity. Let's see what crazy things people are doing these days to lose weight, I thought. The first diet on the list was the Beauty Detox Solution, a nutritional plan created by Kimberly Snyder, a Certified Nutritionist whose knowledge and talent are touted by the creme de la creme of celebrities. Drew Barrymore and Fergie swear by her advice, the article said. So I rubbed my chin in deep thought. I was intrigued, not because the plan was recommended for weight-loss, but due to the favorable review by the Elle staffers: "I love that the focus isn't on counting calories or losing weight but on achieving glowing skin, shiny hair, and healthy digestion." Healthy digestion, eh? Gotta check this out.

So I remembered the name and the book, and a week later I picked up The Beauty Detox Solution from Barnes & Noble. It was their last copy, so I took this as a good sign - it must be popular. I read the book within a couple of days. It's not a heavy read, especially because Kim has a friendly instructive style and explains things very, very thoroughly. Her explanations also make sense, even if one is ignorant of the science behind them. 

For instance, one of the basic rules of the Solution is that fruit must be eaten only on an empty stomach. This was a blow for me, because I often have some fruit for dessert, instead of some starchy pastry or some sugary pudding. I thought this was the right way! But here's why it's not: fruits, according to Kim, are one of the most cleanse-promoting and nutrient-rich foods there are. But fruits also spoil at high temperatures and start to ferment. If we eat fruit after a substantial meal, we are queuing them up to be digested last, after the protein and starches from our main meal have been processed, which could take many hours. The chewed-up fruit will stand in line to be processed by the stomach at the 98.6 degrees inside our bodies. Now, that is a really high temperature to be keeping food. Not only will the fruit lose some of its nutrients while it's standing in line in there, but it will also start to poison our bodies as it starts to ferment. So that is why fruit should only be eaten on an empty stomach, and never after a meal.

Halfway through the book I started to really like Kim. And I decided that I would try to live the Beauty Detox way. It felt right. It also felt like a challenge, and I am always game for those. Unfortunately, in my pantry there are still items that Kim would disapprove of (mostly gluten flours - the Beauty Detox recommends gluten-free), and even though the book advises me to ruthlessly discard anything in my kitchen that's not a beautifying food (let's call these ugly foods), I am not one to throw away food. So little by little, I will try to phase them out by working them into my recipes in small quantities. This past week, for instance, I made a cranberry-banana cake with wheat germ that I didn't even get to take a photo of - it disappeared almost immediately it was so good! 

Here are some highlights of the week, in the spirit of Beauty Detox. Some of the recipes below are from Kim's blog.

This is the Glowing Green Smoothie, Kim's signature beauty drink. I watched Vince Vaughn talking about it on Letterman and then Dr. Oz drinking it on national television, so you understand how I absolutely had to make myself one. What is this concoction that famous people are praising? Well, it's definitely tasty, positively green and pretty filling. I am going to try to have this for breakfast every day for the next week. Stay tuned for reviews!

Ah, millet. The book recommends millet as a wheat substitute. To be honest, I'd never tried millet before. It looks a lot like white quinoa, but it has a softer texture. If you boil it enough and add lots of liquid, you get something that looks and tastes like mashed potatoes. This salad is Kim's recipe and contains olives, tomatoes, green onions, parsley (yet, this reminds me of Tabbouleh quite a bit!) and a delicious tart dressing. Very filling!

Home-made protein bars! Seriously awesome. Also one of Kim's recipes, these are creamy bars made of blended cashews with lime juice and other goodies. You get 10 grams of protein from just one of these small bars! If you like, you can substitute some other nuts for cashews. In fact, I just soaked some Brazil nuts to try a variation of the recipe. The process? 5 minutes to prep and blend, then freeze for 4 hours and ready. Mmmmmm!

Creamy cauliflower bisque - definitely in my Top 10 for soups! And although a blended soup with cauliflower and potatoes has a strong potential to be rather bland, the thyme and cayenne pepper in this one give it unsuspected, satisfying flavors.

cauliflower, 2 small heads or 1 humongous head, cut into florets

potatoes, 10 small (red) or 4 large (russet)

1/2 large onion

1 quart (32 oz) vegetable broth

1 cup evaporated milk (regular 2% milk or half and half will work too)

2 Tbsp butter

garlic, 2 large cloves, chopped

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp black pepper

1/8 tsp cayenne pepper (ground)

1/2 tsp thyme (ground)

parsley, cilantro or green onions for garnish

cheese for garnish (I passed on this, because the Beauty Detox denounces dairy, but if you really like cheese go for raw goat's milk Cheddar)

For slow cooker: layer cauliflower, potatoes, onion, garlic, cayenne pepper and thyme in slow cooker. Pour in vegetable broth and add a little water to cover. Cover and cook on low for 8 hours or on high for 4 hours.

Blend the soup with a hand blender or regular blender, until almost smooth (I like chunks). Return soup to slow cooker. Add milk, butter, salt and black pepper and stir well. Cover and cook for 30 minutes on high.

If you don't have a slow cooker, just follow the directions and simmer the soup in a large pot, covered, for about 2 hours on low heat.

To serve, garnish with shredded cheese and the greens of your choice.

Recipe adapted from The Soup Bible.

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 5

Thursday for me is the godforsaken day of the week when I realize the week is almost over and I'm nowhere near reaching my goals. So I invariably panic, which translates into less time to write and less time to, well, cook. I usually get my wits together by Friday, so I am planning great feasts for tomorrow, and maybe even cookies for Saturday. For now, we still have oodles of soup and no one has so far honored the dinner invitation, so we are stoically doing most of the work...

The morning started well with a smoothie made of 1 banana, half a mango, 1/4 cup of blueberries, 1/4 cup of walnuts and 1/2 cup of rice milk. Especially when I'm rushed, I much prefer to drink my meal rather than chew it - right?

Come on, one more for the soup! This one's a classic already.

Lasagna with brown rice pasta and accompanied by a nice red Malbec. To be perfectly honest, by the time the lasagna was ready I was famished and even as I struggled to click the shutter for this photo I was positively drooling. So this isn't exactly an accurate rendition of an otherwise excellent dish. I'll try to do a better job next time.

Recipe for ginger-orange carrot soup and lasagna with brown rice pasta.