Food Lover’s Cleanse 2012, Day 1

As you may remember from last year, I did the two weeks of Bon Appetit’s Food Lover’s Cleanse – this is not one of those vinegar-cayenne-honey liquid cleanses, but is basically two weeks of eating real, whole foods after the abundance of fractured foods present at the holidays.

This year, I’m doing it again, though not as strictly as last year (it made lots of leftovers and was a little overwhelming). Plus I’ll change things up to be more compatible with NT ways of cooking. So with this in mind, I know 2012’s Food Lovers Cleanse is going to be a fun adventure.

In the tradition of being less strict, I didn’t start until Tuesday the 3rd. From the start I altered things. I chose for breakfast to do soaked oatmeal (rolled organic oats, since I don’t have any steel cut right now) with whole milk, grass-fed yogurt, and the last of the frozen blueberries from the summer. I also spiced it up with cinnamon and freshly grated nutmeg.

soaked oatmeal blueberries

I was sad to see the blueberries go, but dang they were tasty. I will definitely freeze blueberries again next year, and in bigger quantities. I’m currently eating a pasteurized whole milk yogurt from Trader Joe’s, since I ran out of raw yogurt; I’ll get some more of the raw stuff soon. This is a pretty decent commercial product, though. I like that it’s full fat and made from the milk of cows that eat grass.

For lunch I ate leftover Hoppin’ John from new years – leftovers are actually called “Skippin’ Jenny” (one day delayed for me). I had some roasted butternut squash with that, too.

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Thanksgiving 2011

thanksgiving dinner 2011

Thanksgiving 2011 was a modest time, but really nice. We made a (relatively) simple meal, complete with traditional and not-so-traditional dishes. Everything was delicious! Our menu was:

  • turkey chili
  • celery root and apple remoulade
  • roasted root vegetables (carrots, sweet potatoes, rutabagas, garlic)
  • roasted brussels sprouts
  • pumpkin pie with whipped cream (sweetened with maple syrup)

The turkey chili was made with organic, free-range turkey from our CSA  – I used a pound of ground turkey and a half pound of turkey sausage. I’ll share the recipe very soon – it was a huge hit here at home. The root vegetables all came from the CSA, too, including the celery root.

I was introduced to celery root remoulade about 8 years ago, when I tasted it at an elaborate Thanksgiving dinner. I remember not being able to get enough of it, it was so delicious! It’s basically raw celery root cut into matchsticks, and it is sauced with a mixture of sour cream, mustard, lemon, and vinegar. I think it’s wonderful and it does well with the addition of diced Empire apple.

I roast brussels sprouts in olive oil and salt. I roast the root vegetables in olive oil, thyme, and salt. Both pans cooked at 400 degrees for about 45 minutes. Both dishes were delicious – I love how everything caramelizes and turns sweet and salty.

I forgot to cook the kale I had planned! D’oh. Tomorrow.

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Food Lover’s Cleanse Day 8

Day 8 of the Food Lover’s Cleanse gave me the opportunity to be successful in cooking potatoes for breakfast.  So often I cook them and they still taste raw, yuck.  I learned some tricks this morning (peel and boil the potatoes for 5 minutes), and I’m so pleased.  Cooking this hash also brought back many happy memories of sitting at the counter at the Homemade Cafe in Berkeley, CA and watching the cooks prepare the home fries. Mmm…

It was sweet potato hash and fried eggs this morning.  I was pleased to be able to alter the dish to include more saturated fat, in the form of healthy virgin expeller-pressed coconut oil and grass-fed butter.

The potatoes were seasoned with cinnamon and a little brown sugar.  Really good and a nice accompaniment to the fried eggs (topped with chipotle Tabasco).  Had some coffee (Stumptown) with raw milk.  Was so happy to receive my raw milk yesterday, I can’t even tell you.

Lunch was leftover curried lentil soup with a glass of raw milk.  Shortly after that I made a date shake (with raw milk and raw yogurt), which was a great afternoon treat.

Dinner was so, so, so simple: roasted salmon with a grapefruit-avocado salad. Took about 20 minutes to prepare total. Gotta love it.

This sockeye salmon is part of my salmon CSA stash.  It continues to be such a taste treat, though with only two filets left I’m starting to feel a little melancholy about its impending absence.  So, I was happy to have been able to stretch this last filet for two meals. Gorgeous fatty fish.

As for the salad, again I used mâche for the greens, and put the grapefruit-avocado combo on top, dressed with a shallot vinaigrette.  It called for walnut oil, which adds such a good, nutty flavor.  I will use walnut oil more often in the future.

Tonight was the first real deal dessert on the menu – trail mix cookies.  However, I had a log of korova (aka “world peace”) cookies in the freezer, so I thought why not use them!  These are incredible cookies – made with grass-fed butter, organic cocoa, and Scharffenberger bittersweet chocolate.  I sliced up a half dozen and baked them tonight, and was reminded just how chocolatey, melt-in-your mouth good they are.

Looking ahead to the coming week, I’m going to have to leave a number of recipes out.  As a working person, it’s just not possible for me to make, for instance, soup from scratch at lunch.  My hope is that making the full recipe for dinners will allow me to have leftovers the next day. The lunch recipes look good, though, so I plan to make some of them for dinner the following week.

All in all, this first week was highly successful.  I learned some new techniques, new flavor combinations, and was introduced to some new ingredients that really thrilled me.  Here’s hoping the second week is just as impressive!