Calçotada

Calçots are a member of the onion family, and have the same nutritional qualities as onions. They look a lot like big leeks, and they grow in southern Cataluña between the end of winter and the beginning of spring.
A calçotada is a very Catalan event, I guess it could be the equivalent of an American barbecue or Argentine asado. The calçots are grilled until the outer layer is burnt, then they are wrapped in newspaper so they can finish cooking in their own heat.
Then they are dipped generously in romesco sauce (a sauce you could probably find a million variations for, made mostly of olive oil, tomatoes, garlic, red pepper, almonds and hazelnuts) and gobbled up. It's a truly hands-on experience, so much so that people actually put bibs on to eat them. (A friend of mine -also a foreigner here- once worked as a waitress in a restaurant, and when someone at a large table asked for a bib for the calçots, she brought one over and instantly started fastening it onto a small child at the table, and was shocked to find out it was for the adult!).
When I first hear about the calçotada I thought, how great, their barbecues are all vegetarian -fat chance! After the calçots comes the meat -and lots of it! (But I'll leave that part out here for obvious reasons).
This photo was Olivia and Bruno's first calçotada; they both loved them (minus the sauce, which was too strong for their tender tastebuds).

Soba mushroom sauté

Israel, my husband, is allergic to legumes. This can be a drag (he's also allergic to poultry, but that's not a problem at home), because my policy is to try to cook the same meal for the four of us. I tend to dislike the concept of "children's food"; the menu for children in most restaurants here tends to consist of a combination of steak, pasta bolognesa, french fries, and chicken. I think children should learn from a wee age to eat the same thing as their parents -this is, to eat well. I don't usually prepare legumes often, but I love lentils and garbanzos (I could eat hummus on a daily basis), and I want the kids to learn to love them too (they're delicious and so healthy).
So last night I made a slow cooked stew rich in legumes for the children and me, and put together this dish in a whisk for Israel.


Ingredients
Soba noodles
bunch fresh mushrooms, chopped into quarters
marinated tempeh, chopped into squares
toasted sunflower seeds
fresh parsley
toasted sesame oil
shoyu

Cook soba noodles as indicated on packet. Set aside. Heat a frying pan. Sauté chopped mushrooms in some olive oil with a pinch sea salt. When the liquid has evaporated, add tempeh and stir until golden. Drizzle with sesame oil and shoyu. Sprinkle with seeds and fresh parsley.

Soba noodles are my favorite type of pasta; when they're not overcooked they have a perfect texture.
It took a long time for me to accept the flavor and texture of tempeh. I tried it in all sorts of recipes, and finally I discovered this tempeh that comes marinated in tamari (which is also practical because you don't need to boil it) and browned in some olive oil until the outsides are crispy, it's delicious.

Food for thought: Food for the emotions

This weekend was Seminar number 6 of my natural energetic cooking course. I took some great photos of the delicious dishes we prepared, but my iPhone got stolen on the way back home (an ordeal I won't go into here), and the photos went with it, so all I have are the sensory memories (and the recipes!). Some of the highlights were a seitan and vegetable lasagna with cauliflower white sauce, seaweed croquettes, olive paté, and apple "donuts" with carob sauce and strawberries.

This weekend's main topic was food and the emotions, a very interesting subject because there really are so many people who use food as a surrogate for something else, people who tend to eat in order to feed not just the body, but also the emotions (or maybe we all do this at times). Sometimes we eat to relax, or we eat to get our adrenaline running (physical, energetic needs), or sometimes we just eat because we want to feel a connection to something that we're missing (a "sweetness", our mother...).
So the idea is to reflect on what we eat and see whether we are actually trying to nurture our physical body or the emotions, and if it's the latter, then we have to try to find a better way to find nourishment.
A question Montse had us ask ourselves was how often do we feed our emotional body? We try to give our physical body nourishment three times a day, every day, so shouldn't we do the same with the emotional body, who also needs it?
Nourishment for the emotions are the moments of being present with oneself, in whatever it is we are doing, moments of connection, awareness, being with oneself in our actions, or in our silence.
For me my daily ashtanga practice is definitely food for the emotions, since I started practicing on a daily basis I feel much more nourished in this sense.
For someone else, food for the emotions might be a daily ritual like lighting a candle before a meal. You don't even have to get too esoteric to feed the emotions, it can be just a silent walk back from work or just a moment of inner presence while you are doing the dishes! Anyway, I'm sorry if I'm sounding too new-agey here (definitely far from my intentions), but I found this idea of feeding the emotional body very interesting and necessary and particularly neglected in this day and age. (So here I was, having a moment of inner connection walking back from the course, thinking about how happy I was to be doing things I enjoy and believe in so much, and this freak on a bike rides by and yanks my iphone right out of my hand, hitting me on the cheek in the intent. Talk about a wake-up call...oops, I said I wasn't going to go into that here).

This is another exercise we did in class related to food and the emotions, very illustrative, you can try it:

First draw a circle on a piece of paper (big enough to be able to write some things inside):




Now write how you feel when you cook a meal, on any random day.

This is what I had:






OK, now next to your circle draw a fork and knife.




This is your plate, this is what you are about to eat, how do you like what's on it?

Pretty graphic, isn't it? Our emotions are transmitted into the food we prepare, so it's best to try to cook in a relatively calm, aware state (at least as often as possible, if not at every meal).

He cooks raw food

This weekend was the Fira per la Terra, Fair for the Earth, a fair that takes place every year in the park right by our apartment, which celebrates the planet with all types of activities that try to create an ecological mentality, from -mostly- healthy and sustainable food to natural and alternative therapies of all sorts.
I met a guy -from Argentina like me- who calls himself "spiritual chef", he cooks raw food (but that's an oxymoron, isn't it?). I tasted some of his creations and was utterly surprised at how amazing they tasted. My favorite was the "Sandwich de amor" (Sandwich of love), a sandwich consisting of a crispy cracker-type bread (made of raw, dehydrated seeds), lettuce, tomato, cucumber, alfalfa sprouts, grated carrot, dehydrated onion, tahini sauce and a "magic falafel" (made from sprouted chickpeas). It was absolutely scrumptious, full of flavor and with a perfect combination of the crispy crackers and raw veggies, and juicy, tender falafel and tomato. I had one on Saturday and came back for more the next day.
I know hardly a thing about the raw food movement, it's not at all big here in Spain yet. As a matter of fact, the mostly macrobiotic-like diet Montse Bradford has been teaching me is pretty much against raw food except in the summer months and in small quantities at that. For people like me who are on the thin side and always cold, she doesn't recommend raw food at all. But after having tasted these delicious concoctions I'm convinced that at least a bit more research is called for.
The "spiritual chef" teaches workshops and cooks for small groups at his place, I'll surely be signing up for one soon.
Here's a photo of the "enzymatic crackers" made of all kinds of seeds:

Thistles with Almond Sauce

Yet another experiment with seasonal food!


The trickiest part of preparing thistles is cleaning them of all the prickles (careful -ouch!). The thistle is the national flower of Scotland. There's a story that a bare foot Viking attacker stepped on a thistle at night and cried out, so alerting the defenders of a Scottish castle.
I had only ever had thistles, cardos in Spanish, once in my life before coming to Spain, in the delicious Italian dish -from the region of Piamonte- called Bagna Cauda (served in a sauce made mostly with anchovies and nuts; Argentina has its own variation made with cream). I didn't even know what they were then. Here in Spain people tend to buy them in jars and cook them in a white sauce with the ubiquituous Spanish ham.
Here's a simple recipe:

Thistles with Almond Sauce
Ingredients:
1 bunch thistles
3 tbsp olive oil
pinch salt
1 tbsp flour
1 tbsp powdered almonds
1-2 cloves garlic, chopped (optional)

Carefully clean the thistles, removing all the prickles and threads. Chop, wash and put them in a casserole. Cover with water and bring to a boil. After 15 minutes, drain, cover with water again and boil for another 45 minutes (the water is changed to remove some of its bitterness. you can add a squirt of lemon juice while boiling to keep the water from darkening). Drain, but save about 1 cup of the resulting broth. In a pan, heat the olive oil. (If desired, add the chopped garlic.) Add the flour gradually, stirring continuously, and then the powdered almonds. Gradually add the broth and let simmer for a few minutes. Pour this sauce over the cooked thistles, simmer another few minutes. Sprinkle with parsley. Serve hot.

Beans are in season

Today I opened the 10-kilo box of organic fruits and veggies that comes home every Thursday from Recapte and found a load of these beans. I thought it would be a fun collaborative task with the kids on a cloudy afternoon, and I was right, they loved it:



Okay so now I had this:


and no idea what to do with it. So I played it by ear with what I had at hand. Here's what I did:

Beans à la spring
Boil the beans about 10 min. Drain and set aside. Chop 1 onion finely. Heat some olive oil in a frying pan or wok. Sautée together with 4-5 spring garlics (aka green garlic, young garlic, baby garlic, and garlic shoots, much much milder than plain garlic, a bit like scallions, which can also be used here), and a pinch salt. After about 10 minutes add the beans and a dash of tamari and a few drops sesame oil. I also added some couscous to make the dish more complete and sprinkled some dry thyme on top.

This is the result, which we ate up happily after the team work:

Tofu-Hiziki Quiche

After a rainy Easter week, today is finally a beautiful Spring day. I thought we might go on a picnic, so just in case this morning I prepared a Tofu-hiziki quiche. Montse Bradford has several similar recipes, all tofu-based quiches with different variations, this one is my favorite. It takes a bit longer to make than others, because the hiziki has to soak and boil for a while, but the final result is well worth the wait. Hiziki (or hijiki) is one of the seaweeds with the most intense flavor (don't worry, the fishy smell it gives off when you're cooking it won't come out in the taste; it actually tastes quite sweet after seasoning). It is known to be rich in dietary fiber and essential minerals such as calcium(1400 mg/100g),iron(55.0 mg/100g) and magnesium(620 mg/100g).

Ingredients:
1 block fresh tofu
2 tablespoons hiziki
2 leeks, sliced finely
1 cup green olives, pitted and chopped
1 carrot (or 1/2 red bell pepper), diced
1 teaspoon dried basil
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1 tablespoon soy sauce
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons apple concentrate
3 tablespoons white miso paste
pinch salt

Rinse the hiziki, put in a pot with water and soak for half an hour. Strain. Add more cold water and boil 1-2 minutes. Strain again. Cover 1/4 of the seaweed's volume with water. Cover and boil 20 minutes. Add soy sauce and apple concentrate, let boil uncovered until the liquid has evaporated.
Sautée the leeks in a wok with olive oil and a pinch of salt 10 minutes. Add the carrot (or pepper) and dried herbs. Sautée 5 more minutes.
With a hand blender, blend the raw tofu with a bit of hot water, olive oil and miso paste. Combine this creamy tofu with the vegetables, seaweed and olives. Mix well. Pour into a quiche pan (or square pan) and bake for 30-40 minutes. Garnish with some fresh basil or parsley. Serve cold or room temperature.

We ended up eating at home and I served the quiche with a huge green salad with a dressing made up of mustard, olive oil, toasted sesame oil, honey, and tamari.
The quiche is even more flavorful the next day, so I will take it with me to work tomorrow!

Happy Pesaj!

(The photo is from last year's seder. This year has, unfortunately, been seder-less, my friend Ira moved back to the States. Ira, come back! I will have to learn how to prepare some Jewish recipes.)

1, 2, 3 Sponge Cake

I bake this cake at least once a week. Even though it has sugar in it, everything I use is whole and organic so it's a much healthier alternative to just about anything similar on the market, plus it's homemade! (I still cringe when I remember the twinkies and doughnuts from my youth. Mom and dad, how could you?)
The castle-shaped mold came back from a recent trip to New York: it weighs a ton (as a matter of fact we had to pay for the excess weight in our suitcase that time), but was well worth it, the kids absolutely love it.
The cake's title explained: not only is it as easy as 1, 2, 3, the empty yoghurt cup is used as a measuring cup for the rest of the ingredients in ones, twos and threes:

1,2,3 Cake
Ingredients:
3 eggs
1 125ml natural yoghurt (the secret ingredient that makes the cake so moist)
2 yoghurt cups sugar
1 yoghurt cup extra-virgin olive oil
3 yoghurt cups whole wheat flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Beat the eggs. Add the yoghurt. Gradually stir in the rest of the ingredients, in the order they appear on the list. You can also optionally add 1 thinly sliced apple or pear, gives a great fruity touch and adds moisture. Bake in preheated oven for about 25 minutes or until toothpick comes out dry.

When I first found out that people in Spain used olive oil for baking cakes, I was shocked (a cake with no butter?). You can also use sunflower oil, but trust me, this one works out perfect.
The one in the picture is sprinked with powdered sugar, to make the snow on the castle.
See, it's so easy that lately Bruno and Olivia help out whenever we make it, I'll measure out the ingredients and they'll pour them into the mixing bowl and do their version of stirring and beating. Only problem is, half the batter ends up either on the table or their hands and faces before it even reaches the oven.

Yoghurt and Dairy; Yoghurtish Apple-Banana Compote

Yoghurt is possibly my children's all-time favorite food. They demand it every single day for dessert at either lunch or dinner (I only let them eat one a day). When I first arrived in Spain I found it pretty weird that people ate yoghurt for dessert; I always saw it as a breakfast or snack-time thing.
My daughter has been lactose intolerant for about a year; we discovered the intolerance after a bout with a gastro-intestinal virus, and as I was then gradually weaning her off the breast, she had lactose-free baby formula for a while, and then switched to adult lactose-free milk (which is now pretty easy to find in almost any supermarket, due to the great amount of adults -Israel, my husband among them- who are suddenly discovering their own intolerance). The pediatrician insists that her type of lactose intolerance is temporary, but every time we have tried to reintroduce regular milk, she can't take it.
Yoghurt, however, as the dairy product with the least amount of lactose, is another story. (Ice cream she seems to handle pretty well too:)).
In the cause against dairy I picked up from my natural energetic cooking course, I have been trying to find alternatives to yogurt that they might like. Here's a recipe my teacher concocted especially for people who have a hard time letting go of yoghurt:



Apple-banana compote
Ingredients:
apples
bananas
rice or oat (or other non-dairy) milk
1/2 vanilla bean, cut open and scraped with a knife
milled almonds

Boil the apples and bananas for 30 minutes with the vanilla bean and only a tad of water. Remove from heat, strain and add non-dairy milk and milled almonds to taste. Blend with a hand blender and pour into individual bowls or cups.

I even took the trouble to save and recycle individual glass yogurt containers (packaging is very important with kids). The first time was a failure. Bruno ate it because he'll eat anything, but clearly didn't enjoy it as much as his regular daily yoghurt. Olivia didn't bother to give it the time of day, she just sniffed it and pushed it away. But as kids are creatures of habit and usually don't like things on the first try, I insisted and today I prepared it again. This time was a success, yeah!
Personally, I thought it was a perfect dessert. I've never liked yoghurt (except briefly while traveling in Greece, but Greek yoghurt is another category in itself). My parents never forced me to eat dairy products or drink milk, even though the "Drink Milk" slogan was on full blast when I was growing up in the States (my father, pediatrician and neonatologist, didn't think it was that important. Cheese was a big thing at home, though.). And I find that even today most young people drink gallons of it and are convinced it's good for their health.
Anti-dairy believers argue that milk, and dairy products in general, are not suited for human consumption. Mammals need milk during their growth stage, but not aftwards. But the milk of a different species containts elements that are specific to the development of their own offspring, and not to another species' (for instance, cow's milk has three times more calcium, protein, and sodium than human milk, and five times more phosphorus, but only half the carbohydrates). Why drink milk and eat dairy products, then?


Milk's big marketing slogan is based on dairy as a source of calcium, an important mineral for growth and health of bones and teeth and to prevent osteoporosis.
But other non-dairy products are also great sources of calcium (even better than milk), only they haven't benefitted from such a successful marketing scheme.

Here are some good healthy sources of calcium and facts on its availabilty. The National Academy of Science recommends 1000 milligrams of calcium per day in adults age 19-50, but the results of recent studies question such a high intake as really making a difference in long-term health of bones and teeth. (Source: Harvard School of Public Health):

Food	Amount	Calcium (milligrams)
Collards, boiled	1 cup	357
Spinach, boiled	1 cup	291
Black-eyed peas, boiled	1 cup	211
Canned salmon	3 oz	181
Calcium-set tofu	3 oz (¼ block)	163
Trail mix	1 cup	159
Baked beans	1 cup	154
Iceberg lettuce	1 head	97
Green peas, boiled	1 cup	94
Oranges	1 cup	72
Almonds	1 oz (24 nuts)	70

I like to sprinkle sesame seeds (ground in the suribachi) on almost any meal; not only is sesame a good source of calcium, it also tastes great!

Who says kids don't like veggies?

There's this horrible misconception that good-for-you has to equal boring, bland, flavorless. Adults pass this idea on to children unassumingly, through their own example. A few weeks ago I brought an avocado dip (yummy, recipe later) with celery and carrot sticks to a potluck with families from my son Bruno's class. As I lay it on the table, a woman shrieked "WHAT'S THAT? VEGETABLES?" What does this woman feed her children, I wondered. What does this woman eat, I wondered. I often hear parents complain that their children refuse to eat vegetables. Then you find out what the parents eat. Children are no fools, they pick up on everything, so practice what you preach.

Isn't it great when you find a recipe that calls for stuff you've had in the fridge for a while, awaiting a new idea? Beets are one of my daughter Olivia's favorite veggies, she can eat them endlessly (as her proud mommy watches). Children love beets for their sweet flavor. They are a great source of iron, my midwife suggested eating beets after I gave birth. They are great in juices, too. The other day I had a beet, carrot, apple, and celery juice. Delicious and replenishing. Anyway, I had a load of beets and a huge red cabbage at hand, and found this recipe (in a Montse Bradford book, of course) that fit like a glove:

Sautéed Beets and Red Cabbage
Ingredients:
2 large beets, boiled and cut into cubes
1/2 red cabbage, chopped finely
1 teaspoon ume plum vinegar
1 tablespoon apple concentrate (or rice syrup, or honey)
A dash of toasted sesame oil
olive oil, salt, toasted pumpkin (or sunflower) seeds

Heat some olive oil in a wok and sauté the red cabbage with a pinch of salt for about 10 minutes. Add the beets and season with the umeboshi vinegar (to preserve color) and apple concentrate or other sweetener. Serve sprinkled with toasted seeds.


It turned out really sweet, the kids loved its taste and color! Don't panic if you notice a reddish color in your child's urine, it's the beets!

Before I sign off, here goes the avocado dip recipe, too good to leave out:

Avocado Dip

Ingredients:
2 ripe avocados
juice of 1 lemon
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 teaspoon white miso paste
1 teaspoon ume plum paste
water

Peel and pit the avocados. Drizzle with lemon juice so they won't turn black. Use a blender to purée the ingredients. Gradually add water until it gets creamy. Serve with celery, zuchinni and carrot sticks.

About Me

My interest healthy eating was sparked a long time ago. I quit eating red meat and poultry when I was 17 (I still eat fish and seafood). A highschool classmate was the owner of one of the biggest meat and supermarkets in Argentina, and one fine day her dad invited the whole class to visit the slaughterhouse. I still vividly recall this spectacle: they cows were manually hit on the nape of the neck with a mallet, then slit open from top to bottom and then hung to loose all their blood. I remember walking right next to the row of hanging cows, almost in shock. Right after that, they served us a huge asado or barbecue. The ironic thing is, there were about 100 of us there and I was the only one who was that impressed. The others probably still buy meat from Mr. Coto. Some even asked for the pleasure of killing a cow themselves.
Anyway, with time this interest matured into more of an obsession, especially when I got pregnant with my first child five years ago (I now have Bruno, 4, and Olivia, 2). I wanted to do everything I could to make sure that my child would have the best possible nutrition. I spent my pregnancy and Bruno's first months reading like crazy, and was then so pleased with myself for cooking these healthy alternative baby foods for him, while all the other mothers followed the standard norms, which to me seemed completely wrong. This self-righteousness would later catch up with me.
When Bruno was 20 months old he was diagnosed with nephrotic syndrome, a kidney disorder with unknown causes. A blood test in the hospital revealed an iron deficiency (not related to the disease), even though I had been careful to feed him loads of lentils and other iron-rich vegetable foods. The doctor ordered red meat three times a week. We were so worried about his health for other reasons, I no longer felt I had the authority or expertise to decide not to feed him meat.
The first time I went to buy meat was traumatic. My husband promised he would cook it, but as the kitchen at home seems to be my exclusive domain, there was no other way, and it soon became just run-of-the-mill. Olivia has eaten meat since she was a baby (she now has red meat once a week, and chicken twice a week. I do take care to give them only organic meat, in small amounts.) I take it with equanimity. They are also very happy to eat seitan, tofu, nuts, seeds, grains, fruits and vegetables!
Last year at some point I became utterly bored with the routine obligation of cooking for 4 every single day, and decided I needed something to rekindle my love for the kitchen, and some new ideas to avoid repeating the same recipes over and over. So I signed up for a year-long course in natural energetic cooking with Montse Bradford -a woman with a ton of expertise and experience in the field here in Spain. I'm sure her name will come up frequently in my posts.
I am now about two-thirds through the course and my passion for real food has returned and kept growing! I have been cooking delicious recipes at home, and have learned a lot about a new way of eating. However, I still feel the need to gain enough self-confidence to be able to depart from some of the more strict maxims of Bradford's system (which I could call mostly macrobiotic, with a Mediterranean twist), and find my own path to nutritious, healthy and delicious eating, without becoming a total outcast (recently I was invited to lunch at a friend's house, who prepared ricotta ravioli, and I found myself anxiously debating what to do, eat the dairy and refined starch or not?!). This blog is an attempt to share my reflections, experiences, and experiments and gradually find that path.