An interactive  Whole foods/vegetarian cooking class

After all the washing,sorting, chopping, slicing, sauteing, flipping and frying you get to sit down and enjoy our creations.

With humor and guidance we will collectively make the meal together.

We’ll make a party out of it!

Bring your partner or other guest and a bottle of wine to enjoy the results of your vegetarian cooking  class at the Y Loft.

Mmm citrus, mmm cinnamon, mmm pine, mmm ginger.

A great way to add a cozy festive atmosphere to your home is to have these tempting aromas in the air. Every year we hang oranges pierced with cloves. They look beautiful and smell great! We also put a few pine cones into the oven and allow them to slowly fill the house with scent. Ginger tea anyone? So warm and soothing on these winter nights. Or maybe a cup of hot apple cider?

Clove Orange

1-2 Tight skinned oranges or lemon or grapefruit

1/2-1 Cup of whole cloves

Ground cinnamon (optional)

thimble

Wash and dry the oranges. Mix together a large pinch of cinnamon with the cloves. Using a thimble cover your orange with the cloves, Pushing the pointed end first. Cover all over or make designs. Place in a bowl or hang with a ribbon.

Spiced Hot apple cider

Ingredients

1/2 gallon apple juice or apple cider

1 cinnamon sticks

2 whole cloves

1 whole nutmeg

1/2 orange peel, cut into strips

1/2 lemon peel, cut into strips

(make sure your peel is organic)

Directions

Pour apple juice/cider into a large stainless steel pot

Place spices and peels into a cheese cloth. Drop cheesecloth into apple juice/cider. If you don’t have cheese cloth, just throw it all in loose and pick it out later or let the spices sink to the bottom.

heat to just short of a boil. Then remove the cheese cloth and serve!

Baking Pine Cones

Pine cones

Baking sheet

Place a single layer of pine cones on a baking sheet and bake in an oven at 200 degrees for about 45 min. This will fill your house with an amazing smell and also help your pine cones to last longer.

Can also add slices of orange or cinnamon sticks.

Ginger Tea

4-6 Slices or raw ginger

2-3 Cups of spring or filtered water

small pot

cast iron frying pan

Rice syrup (optional)

Lemon (optional)

Heat the frying pan to medium and saute the ginger slices for 3-5  to bring out the natural oils. Add the ginger  and water to the pot. Bring to a boil and let simmer for  5 minutes. (longer if you like it stronger) Add rice syrup or lemon juice to taste.

*NEWS! Kids Can Cook program will be held on Thursdays ONLY for the Fall Semester. Starting September 22 at 3 p.m  Hope to see you there! 

After School Program

Fun in the kitchen with macrobiotics and fresh local whole foods, sewing creations, crafts and dance!

I’m very excited to be spending time with your wonderful children. I hope they all enjoy the fall program with me. We will be dancing, making crafts and doing lots of cooking! All of our projects will be hands on, using local organic ingredients as much as possible and recycled goods for our craft projects.

September 16-December 14th 2010

All Elementary School kids -Tuesdays and Thursdays 3:00-5:30

All Junior High students- 3rd Tuesday of the month from 6:00-8:00 p.m

$15.00/a day

Please contact me for further information. Sign up today!

Location:Charlottetown Prince Edward Island

Telephone: 902-367-9491

Tomorrow I will be starting the second annual spring challenge. Last year went great! I used Aveline Kushi’s book(The Complete Guide To macrobiotic Cooking). This year I have chosen Christina Cooks-Everything You Always Wanted to Know about WholeFoods but were afraid to ask. She is a wonderful chef with a great sense of humor and style. Soon you will be inspired by her as much as I am.Do not worry if you don’t own this book. I will be posting the recipes everyday with photo’s.Or, pick your favorite cookbook  or Chef to follow. The point is adding new recipes to our daily repertoire.

This first week all  recipes will be Soups!

1-Adzuki Bean And Farro Soup

2-Tuscan Kale Soup

3-Miso Soup With Sauteed Greens

4-Spicy Lentil Soup

5-Creamy Cauliflower Bisque With Pumpkin Seed Pesto

6-Kale And Black-Eyed Pea Soup

7-Noodles And Broth With Fried Tofu And Scallions

Please post comments and photo’s of what you are cooking!

All recipes are printed with permission from Christina Pirello

Please join me starting May 1st and enjoy a fresh new (or old favourite) recipe every day for a month..  Bring on the spring.

AN INTERACTIVE COOKING CLASS SERIES

WINTER, SPRING, SUMMER , FALL

Tasty whole foods supper club. Fun, interactive cooking classes. Monthly starting January 20th at 6:30p.m

After all the washing,sorting, chopping, slicing, sauteing, flipping and frying you get to sit down and enjoy our creations.

With humor and guidance we will collectively make the meal together.

We’ll make a party out of it!

EVERY THIRD THURSDAY EVENING AT THE ST PAUL’S CHURCH COMMUNITY KITCHEN ON THE CORNER OF PRINCE AND RICHMOND ST CHARLOTTETOWN 6:30 P.M  $25.00 PER PERSON CALL 902-367-9491 FOR MORE INFO

Whole foods cooking class CBC interview

Bancha Tea-by Aveline kushi

Place 11/2-2 tablespoons of roasted twigs in 11/2 quarts of spring water and bring to a boil. Keep unused twigs in an airtight jar until needed. When the water boils, reduce heat to low and simmer for several minutes. For a light tea, simmer 2-3 minutes. For a darker, stronger tea, simmer 10-15 minutes. To serve, place a small bamboo or metal tea strainer  in each cup and pour out tea. Twigs in the strainer may be returned to the teapot and reused several times. Bancha tea may be served hot year-round as well as cool in the summer. It is usually drunk plain, though for medicinal purposes a drop of tamari soy sauce, kuzu, or other ingredients may be mixed in.

-When it is hot outside I like to serve cold bancha with lemon or mis it with some apple juice.

-For more on tea go here .

Tomorrow I will be starting my spring cooking challenge.  If you don’t own Aveline Kushi’s book(The Complete Guide To macrobiotic Cooking) don’t fret, I will be posting all the recipes as well as photos and you can follow along. Or, pick your favorite cookbook  or Chef to follow. The point is adding new recipes to our daily repertoire.

As I look at my bookshelf I realize that I have many favorite cookbooks and admire many Chefs.  For instance Wendy Esko, Christina Pirello, Jessica Porter, Jack Bishop, Warren Wepman, Lima Ohsawa and Meredith McCarty to name a few.  For some reason when I travel I always end up finding room for “The Complete Guide To Macrobiotic Cooking ” by Aveline Kushi. I know that macrobiotic cooking has changed over the years,  There’s a little less salt a lot more variety, but my Father was healed from cancer by using the cookbooks of amazing women and their families  like Cornellia Aihara ,Lima Ohsawa, Aveline Kushi and Wendy Esko. Those are my roots . My comfort foods. So let’s begin!

This first week all  recipes will be using Grains.

1-Summer style fried Rice

2-Maki sushi

3-Arepas

4-Noodles and broth

5-Fried noodles

6-Seitan Kinpira

7-Buckwheat pancakes with strawberry kuzu sauce

Please post comments and photo’s of what you are cooking!

A nice cup of  tea, hot or cold is relaxing and refreshing.

Bancha Tea

Place 11/2-2 tbsp of roasted twig tea in 1 1/2 quarts of water and bring to a boil. When water comes to a boil, reduce heat to low and simmer for several minutes (for a light tea 2-3 min) For a darker, stronger tea simmer for 10-15 min. To serve, place a small metal or bamboo strainer in each cup and pour out the tea. Twigs can be left to dry, saved and reused several times.

-Let tea cool, add lemon or lime slices , a little sweetener and serve chilled.

- Not ideal , but if in a pinch tea can be made in a coffee maker.

Other yummy teas.

-Green tea

-Kukicha tea

-Roasted barley tea

-Brown rice tea

-Mu tea

-Chamomile

-Dandylion

-Lemon balm

-Nettle

I guess part of me is still in Tobago. I’ve been cooking Caribbean food, mostly homemade roti, mild curries and rice. I have a few books about Rastafarianism and I was thinking about their diet and the similarities between it and
macrobiotics…

The Rastafarians believe that they are what they eat. They
shun additives, preservatives and processed foods, red meat and dairy. They strive to be at one with nature, even cooking without salt, a practice known as”ital”. All the care taken in preparing the food is to preserve the natural purity of ingredients and this extends through the preparation to the serving and eating. They try to use only utensils made from natural materials such as stone, wood and earthenware. Only foods that are organic and in season are used, and only minimal amounts of spices are added to enhance the natural flavors and keep the food as vital as can be.

Here is my interpretation of a complete Rastafarian meal:

Celery ginger rice

4 stalks celery, diced

1 tbsp minced ginger

1 tbsp sesame oil

2 cups long grain organic brown rice

1 large bay leaf

4 cups of water

Pinch of  sea salt

Heat oil in a frying pan. Gently stir fry celery and ginger until celery is soft. In a heavy pot wash and rinse the rice, add the bay leaf ,the celery mixture and water. Bring to a boil and add a pinch of sea salt. Put a cover on the pot and turn down heat, simmer for 50 min or until water is absorbed.  When rice is done give it a gentle stir and serve.

Kidney beans

2 cups cooked kidney beans

1 sun dried tomato, sliced

1 tbsp of olive oil

1 pinch allspice

1 tsp cumin

1 small dried red chili (optional)

Heat oil in a heavy skillet, add spices and tomato and gently brown for 1 min . Add beans and cook on low for 25 min, adding a bit of water if beans dry out. Stir gently and be careful not to crush chili. Add salt as desired.

Curried butternut squash

4-5 cups butternut squash, cut into chunks

1/2 lg onion sliced into thin half moons

2 tsp curry powder

1 cup coconut milk

1/4 cup water

sea salt to taste

Add all ingredients into a medium size pot and bring to a boil, turn heat down and simmer for about 20 min or until squash is very soft. Mash all ingredients in the pot with a potato masher until  smooth and creamy.

Cabbage salad

1/2 a medium green cabbage, shredded

1/2 cucumber sliced into thin rounds

1 cup bean sprouts (aduki or mung bean) loosely packed

11/2 tbsp olive oil

2 tbsp  seasoned rice vinegar

1/4 cup orange juice

1tsp ginger juice

2 tbsp raisins

Mix all ingredients in a large bowl and set aside to marinate for 1/2hour before serving .

Carrot fritters

3 carrots grated

1/2 cup whole wheat flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp nutmeg

1/4 tsp sea salt

1 tbsp rice syrup

3 tbsp soy milk

oil for frying

whisk all the dry ingredients together, add carrot, rice syrup and soy milk. Heat a tbsp of oil in a frying pan and add small spoonfuls of mixture to pan , flatten them out slightly and brown each side. Place on a paper towel when done to absorb oil.

Banana Punch

4 ripe bananas

11/2 cups water

1/2 cup soy milk

1/4 tsp nutmeg

honey or rice syrup to taste

Blend all ingredients in a blender until smooth and frothy. Chill before serving

Ginger drink

1 lb ginger root, grated

8 cups water

juice of 2 limes

maple syrup to taste

Put water and ginger in a large pot and bring to a boil . Turn down heat and simmer for 5 min. Cover the pan and turn off heat and let sit until cool. Store in the fridge overnight. Strain liquid through a sieve. Add lime juice and maple syrup and serve.

Kukicha with lime

11/2-2 tbsp roasted twig tea

6 cups water

2 limes, juiced

Bring water and tea to a boil, reduce heat to low and simmer for 5 min. Strain trough a seive  and add lime juice. Chill in the fridge or serve room temperature

Peace , Love and Yummy food!