Photographing Food

One thing I've learned from my roommate is that all food, especially meals eaten out, must be photographed. I did remember to bring my camera to Pasha, a Turkish restaurant in the Rice Village, but forgot to take the photo until we had already had a few bites. I went with a friend from work and the food was excellent. I had hummus with thick pieces of bread and my friend had the Pasha Meze Platter, a mixture of Turkish appetizers which included hummus, ezme, babaganush, tabuli, eggplant salad, dolma and lebni. They also serve an olive oil dipping sauce with sesame seeds that I could eat all day, everyday. We had tiny glasses of hot chai tea after the meal.

Another Breakfast at the Empire Cafe

Cameron and I had breakfast again at the Empire Cafe. I had the "Mickey Mouse" waffle with vegetarian sausage and Cameron had the egg dish with an entire bottle of hot sauce. It was a beautiful day and we were able to eat outdoors on the patio.

Food Porn Index

This is a pretty addictive site. It's interactive and best with a larger screen and the volume turned up.
http://www.foodpornindex.com/

I really want this bumper sticker.

Fourdogmom's Fabulous Quinoa Recipe

This recipe doesn't have a name since I made it up. On Sundays I make a big pot and put it in little containers and I have my lunch for an entire week.

Ingredients:

1 cup quinoa (2 cups cooked)
1 can Rotel type tomatoes (I use Muir Glen Organic Diced Tomatoes, Fire Roasted with Medium Green Chilies)
1 onion diced
1 red bell pepper (or any color) diced
2-3 cloves garlic minced
1 can black beans, drained and rinsed
1 Tablespoon olive oil
Chile powder and salt to taste


Put the tomatoes in a medium saucepan with an additional cup of water, chile power and salt. When it is boiling add the cup of quinoa (be sure to rinse and drain first). Lower the heat and cook until all the liquid is absorbed (15-20 min.)
While that is cooking saute the onions, garlic, and pepper in the olive oil until tender.
When everything is done mix together and add the can of black beans.
Simple to make, delicious, and very healthy. I've been doing this for several months now and haven't gotten tired of it.. My roommate loves it too and took this picture.

Graupel

Yesterday morning when I went to my car I saw tiny little snowballs like these on my windshield. They didn't look like snow or sleet. They looked like white nonpareils or polystyrene pellets. Thanks to David Paul on KHOU, I found out that they are called graupel. A new word for me.
Here is the definition from Wikipedia: "also called soft hail or snow pellets refers to precipitation that forms when supercooled droplets of water are collected and freeze on a falling snowflake, forming a 2–5 mm (0.079–0.197 in) ball of rime. Strictly speaking, graupel is not the same as hail or ice pellets."
This isn't my picture but one I found on the internet. I was much too cold to take a picture.

Sunday Brunch

Here are some pictures from our brunch last Sunday at the restaurant where Cameron works. Cameron and I had the Vegetarian Eggs Benedict without the egg which is a roasted beet and mushroom patty, with vegan hollandaise and grilled vegetables. This is the same patty they use for their Vegetarian Burger which also has arugula, lettuce, feta cheese, sweet onion, basil pesto, and a Parmesan crisp. It's by far the best burger I've ever had. I also got to meet his aunt, uncle, cousins, and grandfather who, along with his brother and mother, are in the pictures.

Blueberry, Kale and Quinoa Salad with Fresh Blueberry Vinaigrette

Ingredients

For the Salad:
2 cups water
1 cup raw quinoa, rinsed and drained
1/2 bunch kale (6-8 large leaves), stems removed
1 Tbsp avocado or olive oil, preferably organic
1/4 tsp fine sea salt
1 cup grape tomatoes, cut in half
1/4 cup chopped red onion
3/4 cup fresh blueberries

For the Dressing:
3/4 cup fresh blueberries
1/4 cup avocado or olive oil, preferably organic
juice of 1 lemon
1 large clove garlic, chopped

Instructions

Make the salad: Bring the water to a boil in a medium pot; add the quinoa, cover, and lower heat to a simmer. Cook for 18 minute then remove from heat and turn the quinoa into a large bowl to cool to room temperature.
Meanwhile, wash and dry the kale. Chop into bite-sized pieces and place in a large salad bowl with the 1 Tbsp (15 ml) oil and salt. "Massage" with your (clean) hands by kneading and squeezing the kale between your thumb and fingers until it becomes shiny, softer and a shade darker. This will allow the kale to be digested more easily.
Add the tomatoes, red onion and blueberries to the bowl and toss.
Make the dressing: combine all dressing ingredients in a blender and blend until creamy. Pour over the salad and toss to coat. Add the cooled quinoa and toss again. Makes 4-6 servings.

I found this recipe on cookingquinoa.net The original recipe called for only 1/2 cup of quinoa which wasn't enough so I ended up making an additional 1/2 cup which seemed just right. Cameron and I enjoyed it. I'll probably wait until blueberries are on sale before making it again as it is pretty expensive. This picture is from their website. Mine didn't look like this as I used lacinato kale.

Barnaby's Cafe

The roads were too icy on Friday to go to work but just fine for driving to Barnaby's Cafe for breakfast. I had the waffle and Cameron had the French toast.

Rosie Keeping Warm

Quinoa Miso Broccoli Salad

Ingredients

3 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil

1 tbsp white miso

2 tbsp rice vinegar

2 cups cooked quinoa

3 cups steamed broccoli florets, roughly chopped

2 cups baby arugula

1⁄4 cup raw sunflower seeds

1⁄4 tsp salt



Directions

To make the dressing: In a small bowl, whisk together the olive oil, miso and rice vinegar. Set aside.

In a large bowl, combine the quinoa, broccoli, arugula and sunflower seeds. Add the dressing and the salt. Toss gently until combined.

I found this recipe on the Dr. Oz website and made it a few nights ago. Cameron and I both loved it. I'm planning on making it again tonight but will probably double the sunflower seeds.

Breakfast at The Empire Cafe

Cameron and I had breakfast at The Empire Cafe on Westheimer this morning. I had the waffle and veggie sausage and he had an egg dish with spinach, cheddar hash brown potatoes, and fresh fruit. He also ate part of my waffle and sausage. This is the only place in Houston I know of that has veggie sausage. We both had delicious organic coffee too.

Rosie and Adrian

Rosie loves to snuggle up with Adrian when he spends the night at our apartment.
Cameron took this picture.

Rosie, the Lion Pug

Picture by Cameron

Rosie posing under the Christmas Tree (Again)

Gigantic Inflatable Christmas Decorations

I kept seeing this giant Rudolph while driving down Shepherd but since Shepherd is one way I didn't see the other huge inflatable Christmas decorations until I turned onto the street. Cameron took this picture.

Blueberry pancakes and coffee from our Christmas Eve breakfast at Tiny Boxwoods.
Pictures by Cameron.

Christmas Lights in River Oaks

Cameron took this picture as we were driving around River Oaks.

Christmas in River Oaks

Here are some more pictures from River Oaks. We stopped so Cameron could have his picture taken with Santa. We also met and talked to the homeowners who were very nice.

My cubicle all dressed up for Christmas

I took this picture with my new iPad and then tried to create a post and add the picture. This doesn't seem to be possible with the iPad. Instead, I had to send the picture to my email and then work on this post from my computer at work. With all the things the iPad can do it seems strange that it can't do this basic thing. I'm going to investigate further.

Rosie In Her New Red Sweater

Rosie With Her Reindeer

Waiting For Santa

Cookie Day!

Here are our cookies from "The Decider" this year

Cranberries and Cancer

I started adding cranberries to my smoothie a month or so ago when I started seeing them fresh at Whole Foods. After reading this article, I've decided to put them in my smoothie everyday. Frozen cranberries are available year round and there doesn't appear to be any difference in the nutritional value of fresh and frozen. They are rather tart but I've found that if I add an apple the smoothie tastes sweet enough. I also add kale, spinach and a carrot. Rosie knows when I'm making my smoothies and has gotten used to having a piece of carrot and apple.

Which Common Fruits Fight Cancer Better?
by Michael Gregor, MD

Recently, researchers compared the ability of eleven common fruits to suppress cancer cell growth in vitro. Which do you think was most effective—apples, bananas, cranberries, grapefruits, grapes, lemons, oranges, peaches, pears, pineapples, or strawberries?

There are many ways to compare the healthfulness of different foods. For example, if you were interested in antioxidants you might compare vitamin C content. If you compared vitamin C content between our two most popular fruits, apples and bananas, then bananas would appear twice as healthy (10 mg in a banana compared to only 5mg in an apple). But vitamin C is just one of thousands of different phytonutrients in fruits and vegetables. It turns out the vitamin C in apples accounts for less than 1 percent of an apple’s total antioxidant activity.

In my 5-min video Which Fruit Fights Cancer Better? I show a graph of the total antioxidant content of a red delicious apple. The amount contributed to the vitamin C is so tiny you can hardly see it. Even though there are only about 5mg of vitamin C in a small apple, it has the antioxidant equivalent of 1500 mg of vitamin C! I’ve reviewed before how taking that much vitamin C straight in a supplement may actually have a pro-oxidant effect and cause DNA damage (in my video Preventing Exercise-Induced Oxidative Stress With Watercress), but you can get three times that antioxidant power eating an apple, without the adverse effects.

Of course there’s more than just vitamin C in bananas too. I was surprised to see a study out of Harvard suggesting that bananas were a significant source of anthocyanins, the red/blue/violet phytonutrients found in berries. Maybe I underestimated bananas? They are, after all, technically berries.

Anthocyanins have been found in blue, purple, orange-red, red-purple, and pink-purple wild bananas, but none in domesticated yellow. In the Harvard researchers’ defense, they just took values from the USDA, and it turns out USDA apparently made a mistake. There are no anthocyanins in store-bought bananas, and despite twice the vitamin C, bananas are beat out by apples in terms of overall antioxidant power. But that’s just measuring the ability of these fruits to quench an oxidation reaction in a test tube. It would be nice to measure actual biological activity.

In the red delicious apple study, researchers also measured the ability of apple extracts, from both peeled and unpeeled apples, to suppress the growth of human cancer cells growing in a petri dish compared to control. Wouldn’t it be great to be able to compare that kind of superpower between different fruits? Well, now we can!

In my video Which Fruit Fights Cancer Better? I show a graph of cancer cell proliferation versus increasing concentrations of the 11 most common fruits eaten in the United States. If you drip water on these cancer cells as a control, nothing happens. They start out powering away at 100 percent growth and they keep powering away at 100 percent growth. And pineapples, pears, and oranges don’t do much better.

Peaches start pulling away from the pack. At high peach concentrations, cancer cell proliferation drops about 10 percent, but bananas and grapefruits appear to work four times better, dropping cancer growth rates by about 40 percent. Red grapes, strawberries and apples do even better, cutting cancer cell growth up to half at only half the dose, but the two fruits that won, causing a dramatic drop in cancer proliferation at just tiny doses, were lemons and cranberries. So if you look at the effective dose required to suppress liver cancer cell proliferation, apples are more powerful than bananas, but cranberries win the day. And there was no effective dose listed for orange, pear, and pineapple since they didn’t appear to affect the cancer cell growth at all.

Dr. Gregor's website is http://nutritionfacts.org/

My New iPad

This post isn't about anything. I'm just testing out my new iPad.

Vegetarian and Vegan Diet Pyramid

This pyramid is pretty close to the diet I'm following. The only non-vegan thing I have is an occasional cookie or muffin. I usually have 7-9 servings of fruit and vegetables a day thanks to my Vitamix.

Cauliflower and Chickpea Curry

Ingredients:
1 c. uncooked brown rice
4 c. cauliflower florets
1 medium onion, chopped
1 large carrot, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tsp vegetable oil
2 tsp ginger, minced
1 ½ tsp curry powder
½ tsp salt
1/8 tsp ground cloves
1 (15 oz) can chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1 (14.5 oz) can diced tomatoes, undrained
1 c. fresh peas

Directions:
1. In small saucepan cook rice according to package directions, set aside to keep warm.
2. In large saucepan cover cauliflower florets with water, and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer 5 minutes or until tender. Drain, and set aside.
3. In large skillet heat oil over medium-high heat. Saute onion and garlic until just tender, apr. 2 minutes. Add carrots, and saute until tender.
4. Add ginger, curry, salt and cloves to pan, and stir to combine. Add chickpeas, tomatoes, peas, and cauliflower, and stir. Cover and cook 5-10 minutes. Serve over rice.

I made this last night and it was delicious. The only change I made to the recipe is that I served it over quinoa instead of rice. It made enough for 2 meals plus all my lunches this week. The recipe is from Chickpea Recipes: www.chickpearecipes.com

Happy Birthday Rosie!

Rosie celebrated her 14th birthday yesterday with a cake from Whole Foods.

Baba Yega

Some pictures from our dinner last night.  We shared the Green Pizza with Salad, the vegan Hippie Meatloaf with vegan mashed potatoes and sauteed spinach, and then for dessert,  the 3 layer chocolate mousse cake. Cameron took these wonderful pictures.