Monthly Archives: January 2012

Slow food, here I come!

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Well, I certainly need to eliminate fast food from my diet, and maybe this is a resolution I can make last for more than one month. You may have noticed that this resolution is in the shortest month of the year, so 29 days to go and hopefully I won’t slip up!

I am considering fast food to be any of the major franchises and pizza delivery. Make at home pizza will be on the white list should I decide to make it. Also on the white list are normal restaurants. Mostly, I want to eliminate all the preservatives and mystery ingredients that have come to light in recent months in fast food items. If you want to ditch fast food, a google search for “McDonalds pink slime burgers” may help. Gah!

There’s a photo circulating on the internet right now of a fast food burger that has been left to sit on the counter in a doctor’s office for over six months. No mold or bacterial growth. No breakdown of the meat. It looks the same as it did when it came through the window and that’s what I’m trying to use as inspiration right now.

Fast food is also addictive. Your body begins to crave the high amounts of saturated fat and perservatives after a while. Maybe if I can get through this month I won’t have to worry about this addiction in the future. 

Wish me luck!

January Resolution: New Food

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As I mentioned a while back in the month, I will be sticking to one resolution per month this year, and January’s resolution was to try new food. Specifically, I resolved to try something new each week. I would not say that I am not an adventurous eater, but I can’t try things that just sound inherently dangerous or outright gross. So puffer fish and chocoate covered ants were just out. This was a bit of a cheat for me because I had voluntarily tried brussel sprouts within the first week of the month, before I put together my resolutions for the year, but I hope you will just forget that.

Each week I considered what my food adventure would be. I did not limit myself to just produce – although that is where my failings lie – but I did try a bit of this and a bit of that.

Week 1 – Brussel Sprouts – brush with a bit of olive oil and roast; I will try these again.

Week 2 – Cinnamon Chicken – ever since I saw a Little House on the Prarie episode where Laura switched out the cinnamon for cayenne pepper before Nellie Olson made cinnamon chicken for Almanzo Wilder, I have wanted to try this dish. I posted on Facebook for food ideas and my friend Brianna sent me the recipe. It was quite good! More savory than sweet because there is no sugar.

I served it with brown rice and green beans and it was a nice change to our regular fare of “chicken something” and veggies. It takes two tablespoons of cinnamon, so poor Almanzo having to politely eat chicken with two tablespoons of cayenne pepper on it!!

Week 3 – Pineapple Melon – I have seen these in the grocery store and wondered about them. Since it was something I doubted I would ever try unless under duress, I purchased one and Melody and I tried it a day or so later.

I sliced it, not knowing what the inside would be like, but somehow not expecting what I found:

This thing is seedy and around the seeds is a gelantanous goo. This wasn’t looking good. I pried out a small piece and put it in my mouth…and immediately spat it out! This thing is horrid! I can only liken this fruit to the consistency of the inside of a tomato (and you all know how I feel about THAT) and bitter, sour, unpleasant. Yuck! Melody tasted a bit and enjoyed pulling the seeds out more than eating it. I threw the whole thing in the trash and shudder when I recall the taste.

Week 4 – Graham Cracker Cake – In an attempt to redeem my tasting tribulation of the previous week, I made a vintage recipe called graham cracker cake, except I didn’t have graham crackers, so I crushed Nilla Wafers. This cake was very good though I think I might have not baked it long enough. It acted a bit like a sponge or angel cake at first, but soon fell while it was cooling. The recipe card didn’t indicate how long to bake it, so next time I’ll try it for longer. It’s worth a second attemp and yes, we did eat it all even if it was a bit messed up.

With a bit of whipped cream, it redeemed the new foods resolution completely! I didn’t mind trying the new foods and I will continue to try to work more foods into our dietary routine. I’ve got a turnip or two in my fridge right now and I’m actively looking for preparations, plus I’ll be trying some new recipes for my sister site Gram’s Recipe Box as the months progress. All in all, I’d call January’s resolution of new foods a success!

Book Review: Darkly Dreaming Dexter

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You know how sometimes you read in the paper about some person accused of murder who gets away scot free? For whatever reason, either the case isn’t prosecuted, or heaven help us it is adjudicated and the jury cannot find them guilty. Don’t you ever think to yourself “someone will do us all a favor and take ’em out”? In real life that rarely, if ever happens. The acqitted person goes on a book tour or gets a reality TV show and we are all disgusted by the twist of fate that let them loose to potentially kill again. Well, in the book Darkly Dreaming Dexter, there is someone who does equalize the situation.

Thankfully, Dexter is just a character in a fiction novel, because he’s a bona fide psychopath. He has difficulty understanding people and social situations, he lacks deeper feelings like love and compassion, does not understand what motivates humans to do the things they do, and does not even consider himself human. He knows he is flawed, with a big empty spot where everyone else has a conscience. But Dexter hunts the bad guys. He is a serial killer, and a prolific one, taking out Miami’s garbage. He only kills the killers, though, and he must have proof of the ultimate badness of his quarry, otherwise, his code will not allow him to act.

You see, Dexter was raised and coached by a cop. His adoptive father Harry realized that Dexter was missing “that thing” other people have, and helped him to shape his need to kill into righteous vigilanteeism. Harry created a code, rules that would help Dexter survive in a world he did not understand; rules that would keep him out of the eye of the police and out of jail. Part of Dexter’s cover is to work for the police as a blood spatter analist.

The best predators hide in plain sight, and that is Dexter. He has learned, like many psychopaths before him, to play the role, say the witty sayings, and pretend to feel the feelings, that normal people expect. And while you might think Dexter is a bad guy himself, in this book, he is the “hero” protecting the city from those other murderers who cannot be proven guilty and preventing them from committing their heinous crimes again.

Darkly Dreaming Dexter is the first in a series about Dexter and was the inspiration for the popular Showtime television drama “Dexter.” If you are a fan of the show, be prepared for the book to have its differences that might not make you happy. The key characters are there: Dexter, Deb, Angel Batista, LaGuerta, Doakes, Masuka; but they are the originals as imagined by Jeff Lindsay, not the screenwriters. Dexter himself is as weirdly lovable in the book as he is in the show, and that is part of the guilty pleasure. You feel like you really should not like him, but you just can’t help it.

Darkly Dreaming Dexter is not terribly long, yet the pages turn at an enjoyable pace, drawing you through the story arc and toward a climactic ending that feels a tiny bit rushed. Did Lindsay come up against a deadline? I would have liked the ending to be developed a bit more, but otherwise this is a very good book. I will be seeking out the next installment soon.

Nothing tastes as good

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I remember probably from the 80s a Weight Watchers commercial starring Lynn Redgrave. She wore this frumpy muumuu and talked about her dieting success, then at the end of the commercial she declared “nothing tastes as good as skinny feels!” as she whipped off the muumuu and showed off her newly trim body. As far as marketing campaigns went, this was a good one considering I still remember it twenty years later. Lots of women responded to the slogan and spat out mouthfulls of chocolate, cookies, cake and donuts in the quest for what skinny feels like.

As someone who has never as an adult been anything close to resembling “skinny” I have never been able to identify with this slogan. Certainly, I have been thin and maybe when I was 10 I could have been considered skinny. However, my body type and genetics provided me with curves long before my straight framed peers had them, leading me to believe I was never thin enough. Anyway, looking back on my life, I have come to realize that I quite often was in a state of “not fat” meaning I was attractive, healthy and happy. Maybe I could have lost 5 pounds or so to drop a dress size, but at some of my happiest moments in life, I was healthy and looked good.

So, I plan to take this well worn slogan and adapt it to mean something for me: nothing tastes as good as healthy feels.

I know what healthy feels like. I know that when my body feels healthy it does not fit onto the BMI charts that were put together in the late 60s. I will never be considered skinny, and if you find me in a state of being skinny get me to a doctor quick because it’s not a healthy weight for me. I can be trim, healthy, comfortable, fit. Never skinny. I have also come to realize that trying to live up to someone else’s expectation of what skinny looks like will never work for me! Skinny to me means narrow frame, flat chest, no butt, no curves. Unless I plan to lop off a couple pieces, that will never happen to my body.

So, friends go forth and remember that nothing tastes as good as healthy feels. Be healthy, eat right, exercise. Do not deprive yourself for something unattainable.

Unless you are one of those skinny bitches who populate the pages of fashion magazines. Then can you just eat a couple cheeseburgers after midnight please? You are giving the rest of us a complex.

 

2012 Resolutions, month by month

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Here we go folks!

I don’t have a very good memory for certain things. I freely admit it! In the past I have made resolutions for the new year, only to forget within the first two weeks that I had promised myself to drink less or exercise more. Let’s face it, if something isn’t enormously important to me, I put it out of my mind and move on, which is why I rarely make New Year’s Resolutions. Resolutions, with a capital R, sound so final, so set in stone, and if you break (or even bend) a Resolution the flying monkeys will swoop down and castigate you and fling their poo and all sorts of awful things will happen! Not for me, nope, thanks for playing, take your Jiffy Pop and leave.

However a few years ago, a woman who’s blog I read did a monthly resolution (note the lower case r, by the way, no flying monkeys here). Each month she would do something new to work on improving herself, her life, her marriage or her home. Being that I have a pretty good chance at remembering a resolution for thirty days, I have decided to give this a whirl. I just hope that in two months I will remember that need to change to the next resolution. I hope to blog at the beginning and end of each month about the designated action, once with a plan and once with the result. Wish me luck!

January: try a new food each week

February: no fast food

March: walking more, 20-60 minutes per day, 3-5 times per week

April: read to Melody at least 3 times per week

May: no TV 4 nights a week

June: make dinner 6 nights per week

July: migrate this website to WordPress

August: no more than 1 soda per day

September: blog every day on all three sites (omg!)

October: no candy or cookies

November: write a short story

December: get to work on time

I figure a lot of these are stretch goals and there will of course be circumstances beyond my control that prevent me from being 100% perfect. Heck, 90% is still an A in college, so I will even allow myself to slip up from time to time. Besides, I am in no way close to perfect, I’m just a perfectionist. Frustrated much? Yes. I just want to try to improve my well being and happiness, and these seem like areas where I could use improvement, and also, areas where I feel like I can let go of old habits.

So, January’s resolution is to try a new food each week. I chose this for January because in a bit of a cheat, I have already tried a new food this month. At my big family dinner last week, my cousin Diana brought roasted brussel sprouts. In the past, these miniature cabbages were either bitter, slimy or mushy, all of which are unappealing in food, so I thought I didn’t like them. But, I took my “no thank you” helping and actually enjoyed them. Diana told me the secret is in roasting them with a bit of olive oil to bring out the deeper flavors. She claimed there is a sweet flavor but I don’t buy that. Let us say that they were not bitter, slimy or mushy, and actually were quite good! I must figure out what my next three to four foods for January will be. I’m pretty much an omnivore when it comes to food with the exception of veggies, so the foods may all be produce. I also plan to consider “rerun” foods, e.g. foods I didn’t like as a kid, as new foods since I’m the type that if I didn’t like it when I was six, there’s a good chance I never touched it again. 

Wish me luck!