Category Archives: additive-free food

Whole Food Plant-Based Recipes with no additives

2013, The Obesity Epidemic and Plant-Based Nutrition

“This is another fine mess that you’ve gotten us into, Stanley.”

In case you were culturally deprived when you were young, that quote is a rather famous accusation voiced frequently by Ollie in the Laurel and Hardy comedies. About the only thing that I never heard Oliver Hardy blame Stan Laurel for in those movies was his weight. Obesity was not viewed as a national health crisis in the twenties thirties and forties, hunger was closer to home for a lot of our population.

The weighty have always been among us. They have never been as dominant in numbers as they are today. Along with the new fat epidemic comes symptoms of ill health that worry us (a lot) when we exhibit them. Added to that are diseases like cancer, heart disease and diabetes; all common problems related to the obesity. (more…)

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Vegetarian Thai Green Curry

Here is another family favorite that you can do in a big hurry if you have some rice lying around.

We are big fans of Thai food. Over the years, however, we had pretty much cut it out of our diet. Mainly because creating the curry paste is a pain – lots of herbs and spices we don’t use that often. And because most of the restaurant and prepared foods have fish or shrimp paste in them. I am actually more opposed to taste of the fish/shrimp than to the idea that it is animal products. But that is a personal problem.

Then I discovered the happy fact that Thai Kitchen has a couple of pastes without the fish or shrimp included. There have both green and red curry pastes and a yummy peanut satay sauce. So, armed with a jar of green curry sauce, I was ready to conquer the world. (more…)

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Vegetarian Boston Baked Beans

bostonbakedbeansOur long warm fall has turned into a long (or so it seems) cold winter. Not a lot of rain, snow or cloudy skies, but still very cold. At least for me!

After holiday excesses we spent most of last week juicing and drinking smoothies to try and detox a little. After a week of that I was really ready for some bulky, tasty and very hot food. Baked beans seemed like just the thing. Threw a batch together and stuck them in the oven. (more…)

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Low-Fat Vegan Pot Pie

Pot pie is one of the great American comfort foods. I start craving it when the weather turns cold and I want something warm and hearty. I almost never make it because it is a pain in the neck to make.

One sticky point is the crust. If you want a gluten-free crust you either have to pay about six bucks for a prepared one or make it yourself. If you don’t care about the gluten you can use a cheaper prepared crust. Making crust takes time but then, I’m not wild about prepared crusts since they are full of weird preservatives. If you use those prepared crusts, then you still have to fit it into those little pie pans which is time consuming and messy. The biggest problem is that no matter how you buy, make or use it, this kind of crust is loaded with fat. (more…)

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The Year of Being Vegan: 2012 Lessons Learned Part 4

I have always been a plant-based eater; a vegetarian. Over the last year David and I decided to become vegans. It has been an incredible learning experience! Between now and the end of the years I will share some of the things I learned.

Advanced Label Reading

I was shocked at the things that end up in “healthy” vegan foods. I guess this is really an expansion on unhealthy vegan diet choices.

I started reading labels many years ago when I quit sugar. Over the years I had gotten a little sloppy about really reading labels. I would check for sugar content and if there wasn’t any that seemed good enough. When David discovered that he was wildly reactive to MSG in all it’s forms, I started examining labels again and was shocked at all the forms of MSG that end up in our foods. Follow through on the two MSG links in this paragraph to get more info. (more…)

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The Year of Being Vegan: 2012 Lessons Learned Part 3

I have always been a plant-based eater; a vegetarian. Over the last year David and I decided to become vegans. It has been an incredible learning experience! Between now and the end of the years I will share some of the things I learned.

fat cookMany “Healthy” Vegan Recipes are NOT!

The decision to be vegan meant David gave up meat. And we gave up cheese and eggs. Meal planning became a challenge. I spent a couple of hundred dollars (all of it on used bookstores) and many hundreds of hours pouring over menu plans and recipes.

My biggest take is that many vegan recipes do not fit my definition of healthy food. Many of them contain ingredients that I wouldn’t eat on a bet: (more…)

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Plant-based Sugar-free, Gluten-free, Dairy-free All American Apple Pie

apple pieMost of the time the way I eat makes me very happy. I like feeling healthy and light. I never feel deprived or like I am sacrificing until the Holidays come. It gets dark early, it’s cold and temptations abound! It is only human to want a little comfort! It doesn’t take long for me to start telling myself that I have been so good for so long that just “a little sugar/gluten/dairy/etc won’t hurt”. That is kinda true (or so I hear). My problem is once I start eating a little sugar, I want more. And a little sugar has a way of creeping up to a whole lot! (more…)

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Flavoring Whole Food Plant-based Diet

Taste is a funny thing; part biology  part learned and always infused with expectations. We expect certain flavors to meld. An expectation many cooks fail to meet! A great example is in an interview excerpt shown in Forks Over Knives, The Extended Interviews.  In it Doug Lisle tells a story about trying to get his father to switch to a whole food plant-based diet. After one meal, his Father stated that if he had to eat like that for the rest of his life he would rather die of a heart attack.  I just started laughing! Not exactly funny, but very often a too common story. Some of worst tasting food ever created is passed off as vegetarian, vegan or  “healthy!” Lots of people, for good reason, think healthy food and think bland, tasteless and/or ill-conceived.

stuffed peppers

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All Plant-based Split Pea Soup

When I was a 4 or 5  my Dad’s family lived in Santa Barbara. A couple of times a year we would drive up from Los Angeles to visit. Along the way there were always signs for Andersen’s – the split pea soup Andersen’s. The signs featured Hap-pea the big cook and Pea-wee his helper. Some even showed an elaborate split-pea soup factory. The signs were provocative and intriguing. It wasn’t long before the idea of Hap-pea, Pea-wee and a soup factory became as real as the car I was trapped in. I could see just how it looked. And if I scrunched up my face and thought really hard I could even hear and smell it. (more…)

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Green Tea – a Whole Food Plant-Based Beverage!

I am not a fan of bitter. I don’t really like quinine, arugula, bitter chocolate or Starbucks coffee. Until recently I would have included green tea on that list. In my mind it is associated with that bitter stuff you get in Chinese restaurants.

Green tea, however, has always been one of those things that I have thought that I “should” like because it is so good for you. Or so I have read. (more…)

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