Alex’s Chili

It would have been nice if my school had cancelled classes before I woke up for lab, but oh well. At least now I can get some backlogged work done and maybe take a nap later. This week has been a little too busy, and I used up all my cooking-as-procrastination points yesterday, so I have no excuse not to cross a few things off the to-do list. Oh well, at least I have some kick-ass chili and cornbread to look forward to.

After receiving an email from my friend Alex about this amazing-sounding chili the other night, I just had to try making some myself. It sounded much livelier than the sweet potato and black bean chili I’d been planning on making. Unfortunately, my beloved sketchy markets were out of a lot of things, so I had to make a few adjustments.

Alex’s recipe:

First I braised a lb of chicken and set that aside and put in 2 3/4 cups of onions with chili powder, garlic and then added a red and yellow pepper, a full jalapeno, and then tomatoes, blackstrap molasses, tyme, basil, cumin, chicken stock, masa harina, and then garbanzo, adzuki, black and kidney beans… it was good with or without the chicken. Very satisfying. I placed it over brown rice and a small amount of jalapeno cheese.

My make-do interpretation:

¼ cup olive oil

1 large onion

4 cloves garlic

2 jalepeno peppers

1 red pepper and 1 orange pepper

1 can each black beans, kidney beans, pink beans (low sodium)

1 32-oz can crushed tomatoes

2 tbsp blackstrap molasses

¾ boullion cube dissolved in ¾ cup boiling water

1 cup leftover tomato sauce

a few sprigs of thyme

cumin, chili powder, salt, pepper to taste

Directions:

Chop the onion, garlic and peppers (including jalepeno) either by hand or in a food processor. Sautee for a few minutes.

Add the beans, tomatoes, boullion, crushed tomato, tomato sauce, molasses, and spices. Bring to a boil and then turn heat down and cover.

Simmer for an hour or so.

Chris got in on the act and whipped up some cornbread, which we threw in the bowl and poured the chili over. There was also some cheddar cheese involved. It was the perfect thing on a miserable day…

Meatless Mondays to Come to New York City Schools?

This week, Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer released a report titled “A Blueprint for a Sustainable Food System,” in which he proposed several health-promoting measures for New York City schools. As ways of addressing the fact that one in five NYC kindergarten children is obese, Stringer suggested the following measures:

• Require Food Curriculum in Public Schools
• Expose City Students to Farms and Gardens
• Institute Meatless Mondays in City Schools

For more info, check out NYU’s Wagner Food Policy Alliance blog.

There have been both positive and negative responses to the “Meatless Mondays” proposal, in particular. I, for one, am in favor of it—as long as the food being served includes real vegetables and whole grains rather than just pizza, french fries, and ketchup. For example, vegan chili is incredibly easy to make in large quantities for cheap and is packed with nutrients.

One of the main concerns of people unfamiliar with vegetarian eating is protein. Nine times out of ten, the first question is, “WHAT ABOUT PROTEIN?” Contrary to popular belief, once you know what to do (key word: nutrition education), it’s incredibly easy. And anyway, as a country, Americans get much more protein than we technically need. One meal without animal protein is not going to cause your kids to shrivel up and die.

Wal-Mart holding its own against Whole Foods?

While it’s hardly news that Wal-Mart has become a huge purchaser of organic milk and dairy products, few people think of the superstore giant as a place to buy organic and local produce. In this Atlantic Monthly article, Corby Kummer takes a look and conducts a few blind taste tests.

His overall takeaway?

IN AN IDEAL WORLD, people would buy their food directly from the people who grew or caught it, or grow and catch it themselves. But most people can’t do that. If there were a Walmart closer to where I live, I would probably shop there.

Most important, the vast majority of Walmarts carry a large range of affordable fresh fruits and vegetables. And Walmarts serve many “food deserts,” in large cities and rural areas—ironically including farm areas. I’m not sure I’m convinced that the world’s largest retailer is set on rebuilding local economies it had a hand in destroying, if not literally, then in effect. But I’m convinced that if it wants to, a ruthlessly well-run mechanism can bring fruits and vegetables back to land where they once flourished, and deliver them to the people who need them most.

Aspartame, by any other name…

While I am by no means a fan of artificial sweeteners in theory, in practice, I am a compulsive gum-chewer and definitely reach for a can of diet soda a few times a week. The dangers of aspartame are not an alien topic to me. Some people smoke; I gnaw on carcinogens. We can’t all be perfect.

I am pretty ticked off, though, about aspartame‘s new name change. Now called Amino Sweet (because it’s sweet and made from two amino acids), it is being marketed as a natural sweetener. Seriously? A substance (created in a lab) initially intended to be a drug that happened to be sweet enough to be a food additive does not sound natural to me. Also, it makes it harder for people with allergies to avoid unless they know about the switch.

This article, the tone of which I find a bit alarmist and grating though informative, offers a history of aspartame and details about its PR makeover. After reading it on my mom’s blog, I had to repost.

And take a look at the Ajinomoto press release.

Healthy Cocktails?

It’s finally Friday, and if my body could talk (vocal chords aside), it would say, “Get this girl a drink!” Preferably, a sparkling red wine—my new favorite.

While a little bit of any kind of alcohol can be good for you, “health” isn’t exactly one of the words most of us think of when we hear “cocktail.” However, in recent years, health-conscious concoctions have become pretty trendy.

Personally, I’m more of a wine drinker and think the idea of trying to make cocktails into health drinks is pretty silly, but I did go to bartending school, so I can see the fun in coming up with new recipes. Maybe if I ever get around to having that dinner party I’ve been wanting to have, I’ll whip something up. Here are a couple ideas from Women’s Health.

Cheers!

In Honor of Fashion Week

Earlier this week, the New York Times ran a piece about (surprise, surprise) the casting of young, super-thin models in favor of older girls with healthier BMIs.

You can read it here.

There was something about it that rubbed me the wrong way. At first I thought it was the model they profiled, then I thought maybe it was just the choppy flow of the article. I realize, though, that it’s more likely that I’m just sick of hearing the same thing.

Part me of me wonders, “Why print the same old thing year after year after year?” Has it really gotten any better or worse? If you’re going to tell me about the size of fashion models, rather than print one woman’s complaints, why not write about a few models who died of anorexia this year or devote an article to shows whose designers insisted on having girls who’ve gone through puberty on their runway?

New Blog

Good morning! Just wanted to let you know that I recently became the Daily Plate Food Blogger for All Access Internships, a site that was created as a resource for dietetics students.

I’ll still be posting here regularly, but you can read even more (and see more pictures) on All Access. You can view the blogs here.

And please follow if you’re interested! There are lots of really great bloggers writing on all different hot topics in the field of nutrition. For a change, I’m just the recipe gal who posts about eating and cooking well, which I’m finding to be really fun. It’s making think I’d like to write a whole cookbook or some kind of cooking/nutrition hybrid.

Anyway, that’s still a long time away. Got to get my degree first!