Curry Butternut Squash Soup featuring Coconut Milk

Coconut milk is my new love. Creamy and sweet and oh so fatty, it hits the heart right in between the om and the ah. It's like the perfect balance of the yin and the yang, or not really, because there is nothing yang about it. You can use it just like you would cream or a heavy milk, yet with a nutrition profile that is astounding. Without regard to the fat content, coconut milk has many benefits that will send your heart soaring and your taste buds gleaming with an inner smile all the way down to your belly.

Following are some of the health benefits of coconut milk:

Manganese Ya! Manganese is an amino acid that gets sucked out of your body due to glucose intolerance. I attribute many blood sugar imbalances to the intoxication gluten can cause, yet it may not be 100% for you if you are reading this and hesitant to believe it. This is my experience and a testimony from years of personal and professional research, and so if it does not resonate, leave the rest to discover for yourself! Manganese is in coconut milk and so you may assure your bones and brain they can have a party because the coconut is going to offer you one! As well, grains, legumes and nuts provide manganese.

Flexifies the skin and blood vessels! No one wants to find their blood has become stagnant, their veins hard to access or their circulation cut down to only in their torso. You want strong arms to support your body, arms to help lift you up (and hands to express through). The copper and vitamin C in coconut milk will encourage flexibility in the blood flow of the body, which means everywhere so drink up!

Your Daily Boost! Coconut milk is high in phosphorus which strengthens bones. So practice yoga and drink/cook with coconut milk for strengthening bones and preventing bone loss.

Keep your blood-a-flowing! Anemia is a common cause of lethargy and over-exhaustion due to a lack of proper mineralization. One cup of coconut milk offers 1/4 the RDA of iron.

Free your mind and the rest will follow! Stressed out in your mind or body? Check your magnesium, perhaps the cause of pain in your neck or back is that your diet is causing your nerves to withdraw from their natural flow of beauty. Coconut milk provides plenty of magnesium to relax your muscles and send healing sparkles of light to those areas which maybe harboring the plague of your current situation. Perhaps coconut milk in some soup tonight?

Full Belly, Full Heart! Coconut milk provides plenty of fiber, which fills you up quicker and may aid in reducing the need to eat more than your body is ready for. So eat more fiber (coconut milk!), ultimately eat less overall.

Silly Seli - what? Selinium is an important antioxidant which reduces inflammation in the body, especially surrounding the joints. So, more coconut milk, especially if you have arthritis - it is observed the people with low levels of selenium may suffer from rheumatoid arthritis.

Pot-ass-what? Potassium, or foods containing potassium (if you break that word apart, it's funny, right?) is a blood pressure reducing-agent that comes naturally in coconut milk.

Immune me, please! I spent a semester in college in Tanzania and once was forced to lie back @ camp and miss a day of beach hiking (hiking on beaches to "island hop" around various un-inhabited aka desert islands) due to a major fever. I went hiking on my own and came to a village known for it's incidences of elephantitits. That's another story, but for now, know this: they gave me coconut to drink and said it would take my pain away. It did, however my taste buds weren't quite mature enough to think that coconut milk was magical. Once I broke through to the other side, now my immune system is in high gear and I haven't been sick since (in 10 years!).

Zinc your taste! Zinc is the key to healthy taste buds, as well as plays a role in promoting the health of the prostate gland. DRINK MORE COCONUT MILK!

Now for the main squeeze :

Butternut Squash Curry Soup featuring Coconut Milk

Ingredients:

1/4 cup onions, diced
1 garlic clove, minced
1/2 T ginger
1/4 t curry powder
1 t coconut oil
1 c butternut squash
1 t coconut oil
1 cup water
1/2 t sea salt
2 T coconut milk

Heat oil until smoking. Add onions, garlic and ginger. Saute until fragrant and clear. Add curry powder, saute 30 seconds. Add squash and water. Simmer and cover for 15 minutes or until squash is soft. Blend. Add coconut milk (optional). Simmer for 2 minutes. Add more coconut milk for a creamier consistency. Serve warm, garnished with cilantro.

Super yum.

Black-Eyed Peas and Dating Luck

I need some luck. My dating life needs some luck. I questioned my mom the other day when she said her usual: well, good luck with that. As if that she is not in support, does not need to hear the outcome and can see the potential mistakes her rebellious daughter is making. Oh, well and I am much like her, except I prefer to live a large life and to explore the unknown (at times with vigor more than fear;).

I was supposed to have a date over for dinner tonight. This is someone I really dig, and am sad I won't be with him tonight because all weekend I have been nursing an infection and need to rest. Went to the doctor this morning and was prescribed antibiotics and yes, it is time to be kind and so gentle with myself. I was choosing some wild men to be involved with lately, thinking that dating means going out drinking and staying up LATE. Oh, well, this marks the first night of my new dating life. Cooking, home, connecting authentically and staying away from men with helicopters (for tonight:). The last guy was fulfilling an agreement that yoga instructors have some special healing power. He charmed me into his story and invited me to escapade with him to Venezuala, Germany, Dubai (all this summer). I was not in. I told him: money does not impress me. Nope. And now I know that I meant it.

Babylicious Black-eyed Peas

1/2 cup black eyed peas

1/3 cup diced carrots

1/3 cup diced onions

3 cups spring water

1 postage size piece kombu

1 t sea salt

luscious greens: broccoli, kale +/- collard greens

Rinse black eyed peas and soak in 1 cup for 5-8 hours. Drain.

Add to pot. Cover with remaining 2 cups water. Bring to boil. Skim off foam.

Add carrots and onions and kombu. Lower heat to low and cover.

Simmer for 30 minutes.

Add: broccoli, kale or collard greens and simmer 4-5 more minutes.

Add salt and cook for 3 minutes.

Serve warm, with bread or perfect brown rice.

Garnish with scallions.

Yum....yum...yum!

Cooking for Mo

I have a new private cooking client this month named Mo. He has become my best friend and I his, well, we'll just say maybe it's a mutual muse we'd both like to claim in each other. I will say, it is one of the best things that has happened to me in 2011 and I will have to get his testimonial to provide viable feedback. First of all, it's made me see how many recipes I have stored inside of my brain. He asked me to cook 3 meals a day for a month. I thought no sweat, and after 6 days, the sweat became daunting, so we reassessed our system and for now, it's working that I make sure he is stocked, and he can take care of meals he chooses to eat out or make himself leftovers. I learned that there is no such thing as perfection and that people know what they love with food, and I can make healthy food delicious, he loves it AND, I don't need to worry about going overboard about doing what I don't know because I know a lot! Ok, enough cheese. What works? I dunno other than I am working on a cookbook filled with seasonal, SIMPLE, vegetarian dishes that will blow your mind!! And teach you how to use your intuition to guide your choices in the market, stock your kitchen so you are prepared for the times when you don't feel like cooking to when you have too much time on your hands and want to stay out of the play dough, and simplicity is what turns on your palate...stay tuned...

Make it yum,

love,

Waller

Squash Blintzes

I am reforming my diet. Going on the un-diet, where everything is allowed, and especially good, healthy fats. Today I am starting with clarified butter and buttermilk to make a Squash Buttermilk Blintze. It started out as a pancake, and looked like a blintze when it came out.

I do not know exactly what a blintze is, but this sure looked like what I would think to be somewhere between a crepe and a pancake...and, it was yellow!! And delicious.

1 cup butternut squash, diced
1 cup spelt flour
1/8 t salt
1/4 t baking powder
1 T jaggery or palm sugar
2 eggs
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 T clarified butter

Steam the butternut squash for 15 minutes, or until soft. Mash.
Sift dry ingredients together into a mixing bowl. Create a hole in the center.
Add wet ingredients (besudes butter) and butternut squash together. Pour into center of dry ingredients. Wisk slowly until mixed. Add 2 t butter, wisk until just slightly mixed.

Heat clarified butter in a skillet or griddle over medium. Ladle a scoop of batter and cook for 2 minutes on each side.

Top with apple sauce, sour cream, maple syrup or caramel.

Superb!

Red Veteran's Day

It feels like there is a battle going on in my head and cooking in the kitchen allows me to see it for what it is. Knives cutting through squash, some pieces more square than other, seeds cut in half not meant for the dish anyways, somehow make their way into the dish, and other pieces meant to be smaller turn out to be large and stick out like a big man in a little chair. Regardless of imperfections, I am forgiving of the battle that takes place in the kitchen. And it's necessary to process this energy that gets stuck inside and otherwise would lead me to a place of most destruction. I'd much rather be cutting onions than cutting my own life force off by withholding my greatness and hanging out in the places that scare me inside of my mind. It's not pretty anyways, and no matter how much I do to try and fix myself, my mind will remain, psychotically attuned to what it thinks is right and how I am never good enough to be better than I think I should be. Anyways, it's a bit too complicated for a paragraph, which is why my book is coming out...in this century which may actually turn out to be this decade.

Today's battle revealed a rather yummy heart healthy dish (that was not a plug in for the American Heart Association to read my blog, by the way). Red, red, red. Since I've been single longer than I've been alive, um, let me rephrase that, for 27 of my 28.5 years on this planet, I think I deserve to take in a little heart energy.

Sweet and Red Lentil Quinoa Squash Smash

1/4 cup red quinoa
1/4 cup red lentils
1/2 cup hard winter squash
1/2 cup onion, diced
1 tiny piece kombu
1 T coconut oil

Rinse quinoa and lentils very well. Place in pot. Cover with water x2 and bring to boil. Skim off foam with a spoon, add squash and onion. Cover and cook for 30 minutes. Add 1/2 t sea salt for the last 3-5 minutes of cooking. Add coconut oil and serve, garnished with cilantro or parsley and a side of greens.

Sweet Carrot Risotto

Risotto isn't really as time consuming as most people assume that it is. There's no need to stand in front of the stove watching the rice cook - in between adding broth you can be making a salad, setting the table, cleaning the kitchen ... Before you know it you're risotto is done and dinner is on. Note: This dish is incredibly sweet and a perfect balance to an autumn fish dinner.

• 1 large peeled and trimmed carrot
• 1 large chopped onion
• 1 thinly sliced clove garlic
• 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil or a nut oil such as walnut or peanut
• 2 cups instant (parboiled) brown rice
• 3 cups carrot-based vegetable broth

Finely shred carrot. It should look like mush. Let it sit while you prepare the rest of the risotto so that it comes to room temperature. By not cooking it you're adding to your live food intake.

Saute onion over medium heat in small amount of extra-virgin olive oil. Season with sea salt and black pepper while sauteeing. When onion becomes translucent (about 5 minutes) add garlic. Stir occasionally to keep onion from browning. It may get light brown, but shouldn't get crispy.
Set onion aside and add oil to pan along with rice. Stir until rice starts to brown then add 1/2 cup broth and 1/4 teaspoon sea salt.

Let simmer without covering pan. When rice is almost dry add another 1/2 cup broth. Continue doing this until you've used 2 cups of broth.

Taste the rice. It should be chewy but not crunchy. You can stop adding liquid at this point or add up to another cup of broth.

When liquid is absorbed remove from heat and stir in carrot puree and cooked onion. Taste and add more sea salt if needed.

Change and Protein

Well, I have been on about every diet out there. Some days raw, some days pizza, some vegan or macrobiotic, mostly what I think my body needs. Grains have been a staple of my diet for 6 years and dairy was a no-show. Recently, sugar, wheat, cheese and anything that had been ruled out was what I was seeking. If anything, availability is key, and unfortunately, if there was a famine of a particular food, a binge was inevitable.

So, I have decided to listen to what I need now. All the research, moral implications and feeling energy I have and have had around food, the number one principle of eating well is balance and delicious flavor. Protein is inevitable. Protein is key to growth, to creating energy and muscle tissue, encouraging healthy assimilation. Thanks to epicurious for the inspiration for this recipe , and the reminder by Elana of Elana's Pantry about protein and amino acids.

Salmon Grapefruit Salad

• 1 lb salmon fillet, cut in half (to fit in a steamer basket)
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• Juice from 2 limes (about 1/4 cup)
• 1 T olive oil
  
• 8 cups mixed baby greens
• 1 avocado, thinly sliced
• 1 pink grapefruit, pith and peel removed, segments separated
• 1/2 cup jicama

Grapefruit-Ginger Dressing

• 5 tbsp grapefruit juice
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1/4 cup white-wine vinegar or apple cider vinegar
  
• 1 tbsp chopped fresh ginger

Mix cumin, olive oil and lime juice and add to salmon. Set aside and marinade for 30 minutes (optional). Add to bamboo or stainless steel steamer and steam for 3-4 minutes on each side.
Set aside and let cool for 5 or 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, whisk ingredients together for dressing.
Add to lettuce, avocado, and jicama mix. Be sure to coat lettuce leaves very well with dressing.
Shred salmon and add to salad.

Enjoy!
Waller