This past Saturday I went with a friend to the Stonewall Kitchen headquarters in York, ME to take a cooking class. As neither one of us had been before, we were unsure of how it would go – would it be “hands on”, would we get just tastes of the food or a whole meal, would there be wine? (key question!).  When we arrived, we walked into a room with a long open kitchen on one end, and rows of high narrow tables facing the kitchen. Each seat was set with a full set of tableware (a good sign!) with a cute little vase of fresh flowers. We were offered tea or coffee and the chance to mill around checking out the cool Stonewall Kitchen jams, sauces, jellies and mixes for sale (10% off for class-goers). Plus they had all kinds of fun kitchen gadgets. When the class started we sat down and were immediately served a gorgeous roasted beet, blue cheese and walnut salad and offered (yea!!) a glass of wine for purchase.

The class turned out to be fantastic – with the chef and her assistants demonstrating each recipe but serving (full-sized – another “yea!!”) dishes that they had prepared earlier. The first recipe she demonstrated turned out to be one of my favorites of the evening – Roasted Tomato Soup. So I thought I’d share with you that recipe – it is fairly easy and unbelievably delicious! And with this being tomato season, it is a great way to use the juicy tomatoes that are available in the farmer’s markets. In addition to the salad and soup, we had Shrimp and Chorizo Skewers, Artichoke Risotto Stuffed Zucchini Blossoms (incredible), Lemon Broccolini and Peach Raspberry Pie (making my mouth water just thinking about it).

So here’s the recipe for the soup, and if you are interested in any of the other recipes, just let me know! This soup can be served chilled or hot, and you can skip the crisps and the bruschetta if you just want the unadorned soup (saves a lot of time too!).

Roasted Tomato Soup

• 12 large (about 4 pounds) tomatoes, stemmed and quartered
• 1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil, divided
• 1/4 cup good-quality balsamic vinegar
• 12 large cloves garlic, peeled (you could cut back on this if you don’t like a lot of garlic)
• Salt
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1 cup chopped yellow onion
• 2 cups lightly packed fresh basil leaves, plus a few leaves torn for garnish
• 2 cups cold water

For the bruschetta:

• 1 loaf country-style bread
• Finely minced garlic
• Extra-virgin olive oil
• Salt

For the parmesean crisps:

• 2 cups grated parmesean cheese (good quality)

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees

Prepare the tomatoes. In a large bowl, mix the tomatoes, 1/4 cup of the oil, the vinegar, garlic, salt and pepper to taste. Spread the tomatoes out on a non-reactive baking sheet. Roast the tomatoes in the oven until very dark in spots, 35-40 minutes. Remove and allow to cool a bit as you prepare the next two steps.

Prepare the bruschetta. Cut the bread crosswise into slices about 1-inch thick (you will need 8 slices). Lightly brush the slices on both sides with oil, a little garlic and sprinkle with salt. Place the slices on a baking sheet and toast in the oven until they are golden brown and just beginning to crisp – about 6 minutes. This can be done ahead of time if you’d prefer.

Prepare the crisps. Lightly fill a 1/4 cup measuring cup with the grated parmesean cheese. Tip over onto a baking sheet lined with parchment or silpat (or sprayed with cooking spray), and flatten slightly. Repeat until you have 8 flattened mounds of cheese. Bake in 350 to 400 degree oven for 8-10 minutes until they are golden brown (watch to make sure they aren’t burned). You can do this at a higher temperature but just watch more carefully. This can be done ahead of time if you’d prefer. Also – if you’d like smaller crisps, you can use a heaping tablespoon instead of 1/4 cup.

Prepare the soup. In a large saucepan over medium heat, combine remaining 1/4 cup of oil, the onions and a pinch of salt. Cook until the onions are very soft, 8 to 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the 2 cups basil leaves and saute with the onions for about 1 minute.

Add the roasted tomatoes and water to the saucepan. Bring the mixture to a simmer and cook for 10 minutes. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Puree the tomato mixture with an immersion blender or in standard blender. The mixture should be very smooth. You should have about 8 cups. You can prepare the soup to the point and refrigerate it. When ready to serve, pour the soup into a medium saucepan and bring it to a slow simmer over medium heat.

Serve the soup. Place 1 bruschetta in the center of each shallow soup bowl. Pour the soup around each bruschetta. Garnish with one parmesan crisps and torn basil leaves.

If you’re not already on Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution email, I highly recommend it. He doesn’t send out a zillion emails – just maybe one every week or two – but they are always interesting, helpful and thought provoking. Jamie’s “Food Revolution” is his effort to improve the health of children by encouraging them to eat healthier foods – and his first target has been improving the foods served in school cafeterias (an effort I fully support!). But he also looks to parents to get their children to eat better choices at home as well. And in this week’s email, he underscores the fact that one of the biggest sources of sugar in a child’s diet in the U.S. is from soda. We’ve heard that over and over in the news as well. However, he also reminds us that sugar is in many other drinks that are popular with kids. And some are even “healthy” options like juices.

So he created a handy “toolkit” using data from the Harvard School of Public Health’s The Nutrition Source (another great source for tips on healthy living and eating). Jamie’s toolkit is an easy to read chart that shows how much sugar is in 12 ounces of drinks like cranberry juice cocktail (12 teaspoons!!!), orange soda (11 teaspoons) and even orange juice (10 teaspoons). It’s pretty eye opening!

And if you want to get even more detailed, check out The Nutrition Source’s How Sweet Is It? chart. Oh boy. I always knew that 100% grape juice was sweet – but didn’t realize that it has 15 (!) teaspoons of sugar per 12 oz. glass! How about that tasty Odwalla Apple Raspberry drink? A whopping 14 teaspoons. I definitely recommend a quick browse of the chart – and possibly printing it out.

We are not big soda drinkers in our house – but my oldest son loves it as a treat. I told him about a “The Nanny” episode that I saw once where she made one of the children, who was addicted to soda, spoon 12 spoonfuls of sugar into a 12 oz. glass. It took up nearly half of the glass. She pointed out to him that he was drinking that, basically with water and colors and flavors, every time he had a soda. It was a pretty strong visual. And even just telling my son about it got the point across. If you want more visuals, check out this cool site, Sugar Stacks, that shows you exactly what the amount of sugar in drinks and food looks like by featuring photos of the food and drinks with stacks of sugar cubes next to them (the photo above is one of their photos).

And Jamie Oliver’s point? Sugary drinks are OK for a treat, but stick to water for the bulk of your beverage consumption. No calories. No concerns. He even has some great ideas for flavoring your water and some fruit smoothie recipes as well. Fruit smoothies again can pack some serious natural sugar if you use too much juice or milk, or add additional sugar. But they are also a great way to start the day with protein and vitamins. And Jamie suggests throwing in a handful of nuts and/or natural oatmeal as well, both of which can slow down your body’s process of absorbing the sugar.

I have been on a smoothie kick for the past year and a half (ever since I got my Silver Bullet little blender – I love that thing!). Anyway – I do a quick smoothie in the morning with about 1/3 cup frozen blueberries (look for pesticide-free or washed frozen berries as they are often loaded with pesticides, unfortunately…), a little OJ, and about 1/3 cup fat free greek yogurt. I throw in a handful of oatmeal and some flax meal. I know – it sounds nasty that way but it’s surprisingly good and incredibly filling! And this summer I ventured into new territory at the suggestion of a friend who’s a nutritionist. I add a couple of leaves of kale into the mix. Granted you have to have a lot of berries to overpower the kale taste but it grinds up so small you really don’t even realize it’s there. And with kale being such a “super food” – it’s a pretty great way to start the day! (OK, I can hear collective groans from you all – but really, it’s way better than you’d think!)

Regardless of whether you want to do a deep dive into crazy smoothie world or not, the moral of this whole story is that you can easily cut out wasted calories by watching what you drink. Choose water, seltzer or sparkling water (try it with a splash of juice), tea & coffee (easy on the cream but it’s even ok to have a teaspoon of sugar in there) or other low-calorie, low-sugar drinks.  Save the other drinks for a treat. And keep an eye on what the kids drink – teaching them healthy habits at a young age will pay off for sure.

EWG has posted it’s 2010 Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides and it is really worth a look.  They have a quick and easy to use guide that you can print out OR you can download an app for your iPhone. But the long of the short of it is:

Dirty Dozen (Buy these organic – have highest pesticide levels – #1 has highest):

1. Celery
2. Peaches
3. Strawberries
4. Apples
5. Blueberries
6. Nectarines
7. Bell Peppers
8. Spinach
9. Cherries
10. Kale/Collard Greens
11. Potatoes
12. Grapes (imported)

Clean 15 (lowest pesticides – #1 is the best)

1. Onions
2. Avocade
3. Sweet Corn
4. Pineapple
5. Mangoes
6. Sweet Peas
7. Asparagus
8. Kiwi
9. Cabbage
10. Eggplant
11. Cantaloupe
12. Watermelon
13. Grapefruit
14. Sweet Potato
15. Honeydew Melon

EWG says that people who eat 5 fruits and veggies from the Dirty Dozen list consume an average of 10 pesticides a day. Those who eat from the Clean 15 list  ingest fewer than 2 pesticides daily.

And I think it’s worthy to note that this data was compiled based on produce “tested as it is typically eaten (meaning washed, rinsed or peeld, depending on the type of produce). Rinsing reduces but does not eliminate pesticides. Peeling helps, but valuable nutrients often go down the drain with the skin. The best approach: eat a varied diet, rinse all produce and buy organic when possible.”

When I was at Kohl’s of all places, I grabbed the book called “The Green Book”. I know – how did they POSSIBLY come up with such a clever title?? Anyway – I figured it would be a fun and helpful book to have around. It’s listed as “the everyday guide to saving the planet one simple step at a time.”

So I started reading it bits at a time. It’s an easy book to just pick up and read for a few minutes – check out a few tips. And while I’ll say I don’t think all of the tips are necessarily 100% thought through (don’t consider the total environmental impact) and they are certainly simplified, it is still overall a pretty good and handy and thorough list of tips and tricks. It’s broken down by subject, and even some of the more “obvious” tips still offer a tidbit of something new/interesting (see the Farmer’s Market tip below).

The other thing that I like about the book is it has a very extensive reference list at the end of the book. The sources are well-known, recognizable and credible.

I thought I’d share a few tips and then continue to periodically post others that I find interesting. For now, I’ll focus on food shopping tips:

“Farmer’s Market vs. Supermarket

Try doing some of your shopping at a local farmer’s market. And if you can, walk or bike there. Of the total energy used in the United States per year, 4 percent is used to produce food, and between 10 and 13 percent is used to transport it. On average, U.S. supermarket food travels 1,500 to 2,500 miles before it reaches the family table. Buying local food can reduce the amount of petroleum consumed to transport your dinner by as much as 95 percent.

Meat

If you have the option, choose your meat at the butcher counter and purchase only as much as you know you’ll use. You’ll reduce food waste, save money, and conserve resources. The average person wastes over twenty-two pounds of edible store-bought meat each year. Given that it takes five pounds of grain and 2,500 gallons of water to make one pound of beef, that’s more than one hundred pounds of wasted grain and 55,000 gallons of wasted water per person! If all households decreased their beef purchases by just one pound per year, 250 billion gallons of water would be saved. It would take five days for this amount of water to pour over Niagara Falls.

Organic

You can lower your exposure to pesticides by 90 percent just by choosing organic varieties of certain fruits and vegetables. If just 1 percent of the nation’s farmlands converted to organic (non-chemical) agricultural systems, it would remove twenty-six million pounds of pesticides per year from the food we eat and from the environment. If you buy organic, you’ll encourage this type of farming.”

As I said, some of the tips – like the ones I highlighted here – are ones you have probably heard before. But they are able to add a new twist to make you think even more about making the change. And most are fairly simple changes. I will offer more of their green ideas in a future post, so stay tuned! And if you are interested in getting your own copy, just click on the book picture above and it will take you to the Amazon.com page.

I was at Whole Foods a few weeks ago  (the new one in Dedham, for you local folks – LOVE it!), and there was a woman who was demonstrating a new line of locally produced eco-friendly cleaning products – Modern Mermaids. Although the All Purpose + Glass Cleaner is great (she gave me a sample – smells fresh like peppermint) – I decided to try the “Vitalizing Fruit & Veggie Wash”. I’m always happy to support a local business.

I know – there’s tons of veggie washes out there, but I have never bought one before. I have typically just used either castile soap or very hot water. But neither was really working that great for me. So I’m happy to say this has been great! It’s not cheap (the bottle is $5.29 at Whole Foods and $5.99 online), but it has lasted a long time. And I feel much better about the fruit and veggies we’re eating. Even organic produce has dirt and other stuff that it comes in contact with so this has been a great addition to our kitchen. Plus, with its big trigger spray it’s very convenient and easy to use.

So if you’re interested in supporting a small business and eating healthier, check out Modern Mermaids. They have a complete line of cleaning products, and based on my experience I’m guessing you can’t go wrong with any of them.

I know – this seems like a pretty random post but I was intrigued when a colleague recently told me that his wife makes her own spreadable butter. He said it’s healthier than butter and tastes better than the other spreads. I checked it out online and there are all kinds of posts on different sites from people who make soft butter. Most people do it for the cost savings (which is definitely a bonus) but I was more interested in the fact that people say it tastes like butter but it’s better for you. I also checked out the Land OLakes soft butter spread and saw that it’s essentially a blend of canola oil, butter and water – similar to the “recipes” I’d seen.

So the other day I made it for the first time. It’s incredibly easy, and I have to say it tastes just like butter (which I LOVE). All you need to do is mix equal parts of softened butter with canola oil in a food processor (or you could probably use a mixer as well). Other recipes say you could do 2 parts butter, 1 part canola oil and 1 part water. I haven’t tried the version with water yet, but I will try that next. But this worked really well – I just put it in a clean Earth Balance spread tub that I had saved. It’s really soft – almost liquid- when you first make it. But no worries – once you put it in the fridge it firms up. But the great thing is that it stays soft enough to spread. It does get very soft if it’s left out – but you just can pop in back in the fridge to firm it up again.

I’m thinking you could also bake with this since I know you can substitute oil for butter in a lot of recipes anyway? I’ll be trying that out, too!

So it’s nothing exciting, for sure, but I thought it was pretty cool (and yummy!). Let me know if you try it!

The problem with the holiday season, I think, is not necessarily that there is so much AMAZING and yummy food around all the time – it’s that there’s never enough time to burn off the calories. ‘Tis the season to run around like a madwoman so typically our days are packed with regular life plus all the extra activities that come with the holidays. That leaves little – if any- time to exercise and burn off those gingerbread cookies, chocolate + candy, and those incredibly yummy little pretzel-with-the-Rolo-and-M&M thingies.

So I was particularly intrigued by some tips in this month’s Prevention magazine for tips to make “Small Changes that take off Big Pounds”. Sounds good, right? They had 11 great tips, but many of them are the typical ones that you hear – keep a food diary (blech), limit high fat foods to once per week (really? doesn’t sound fun), and climb more stairs.

However, they did have some ones that were new to me – or an interesting twist on an oldie-but-goodie. Here are my favs:

1. Sign up for healthy newsletters. Apparently a recent study from Kaiser Permanente found that “people who received weekly e-mails about diet and fitness for 16 weeks substantially increased their levels of physical activity and intake of helathy foods while cutting back on trans and saturated fats.” Huh! I have a favorite – Deborah Enos sends a daily email (or is it weekly?) that is touted as taking only 20 seconds to read and it always has something interesting and helpful. You can sign up for it on her website: http://www.deborahenos.com/. I am also a big fan of the WebMD emails.
2. Walk 5 minutes more every day. This one is not new, but they had some interesting ideas – walk around the perimeter of the grocery store before you start shopping, move in place whenever you are on the phone, go through or around the entire shopping mall instead of parking next to the store you need.
3. Take 10 minutes to eat a treat. I should REALLY try this – I inhale sweets. They are a little over the top with this one, however, since they say “take a minute to smell it, look at it and think about it.” I dunno – I think that’s a bit odd. But taking small bites and chewing slowly is definitely something I’m going to try. They say that by taking more time to eat something you are more likely to feel more satisfied. You also might find that you are content after only a few bites.
4. Obey the 1 mile rule when doing errands. I would be even more gung-ho about this one were it not snowing heavily outside as I write this. But the concept is that you should walk briskly to do any errands that are 1 mile away or less. If that’s not feasible – then park in one location to go to multiple stores (good for when you shop in a town center). They say that Americans use their car for two-thirds of all trips that are less than 1 mile away. Yipes! I have to say – we live 1/2 mile from our town center and I love being able to walk into town to do errands or go out to eat.

The article in Prevention cited recent research from the Annals of Behavioral Medicine found that “participants who made one small, potentially permanent change in tehir food choices and/or physical activity each week lost more than twice as much belly fat, 2 1/2 more inches off their waistlines, and about 4 times more weight during a 4 month program, compared with those who followed traditional calorie-restriction and physical-activity guidelines.”

Check out the article to read all of the tips. You never know – there might be a few that will help you get through this season made almost entirely of calories.

Yesterday I picked my share of a 1/4 steer of local grass fed beef from a small local farm. My sister was the coordinator of this adventure and when she mentioned it to me I told her we definitely wanted in. I was very curious about what we’d get – how much would it be, how would it be packaged, would we have to do any of our own cuts, how would it taste etc. So when I went to my sister’s to get it, I was surprised at how “normal” it all was.

The farm from which we bought the beef, Berry Hill Farm of Sherborn, MA, raises the cows on their property and feed them a very healthy grass diet. They send it to an FDA approved facility. Then what we get is actually pretty “old school”. It comes to us frozen in packages wrapped in freezer wrap and labeled clearly with the cut. We got ground beef, a sirloin steak, a little tenderloin, some stew beef, some stir-fry beef, a pot roast, and a couple of small steaks.

So cool! Tonight we cooked our sirloin steak. Grass fed beef is definitely different from what you get at the supermarket. It tastes a little more “natural” – or at least that’s the only way I can think of putting it. But that’s not in a bad way. It was delicious! It’s funny – we aren’t big meat eaters in general. We stick to a lot of meatless meals or poultry. So this will be a lot of beef for us – but once I started to research, I understood the benefits of this type of beef.

Grass fed beef:

• has less total fat, saturated fat, cholesterol, and calories
• has more vitamin E, beta-carotene, vitamin C, and a number of health-promoting fats, including omega-3 fatty acids and “conjugated linoleic acid” or CLA
• has been raised on feed of grass. Commercial beef are typically raised on genetically modified grain and soy, and are often given ‘filler’ feed that is cheap and plentiful including municipal garbage, stale pastry, chicken feathers, and candy. Eew. For real.

There’s a great site that is a terrific resource: www.eatwild.com. If you are interested in exploring the possibility of getting local beef (or poultry, eggs, etc) this site can connect you with resources in your area. It also has some great information on the benefits of eating locally grown meat and poultry. There’s also a great article from Mother Earth News that speaks to the benefits of grass fed beef.

File this under “huh”. I didn’t realize that those annoying little stickers on produce actually have a meaning other than just to help the stores and the distribution companies. While that is clearly the main reason for those little bits of plastic that seem to grip tighter once you get them wet, it is great to know that there is a benefit to consumers as well! The numbers on the stickers tell you whether the fruit is genetically modified, conventionally grown, or organic. Isn’t that worthy of a “who knew”? (OK – maybe everyone else already knew this?)

Anyway, for those of you who were unaware like me, here’s the scoop:

• A 4 digit number means it was grown conventionally
• A 5 digit number beginning with an “8″ means it was genetically modified
• A 5 digit number beginning with a “9″ means it was grown organically

Pretty handy! Now I’ve gotta run. Need to go check out the stickers on my produce!

(and if you want to know what is best to buy organic, and which conventional products are generally OK to buy, check out my previous post “The Dirty Dozen – What to Buy Organic”)

I just was reading someone’s Twitter posting and I found this great link to the Local Harvest website. This site is an amazing resource for finding CSA’s (community supported agriculture farms) where you can buy “shares” of the farm and then every week you get your share of the “loot”.

The site also lists local farmer’s markets, restaurants that use local produce, and local food co-ops. It’s a huge wealth of information – and it is all done by zip code so you can find what’s closest to you.

Have fun!