Warm mushroom salad x2

With the changing of the season once again upon us, the cold starting to settle in I love being in the kitchen cooking up a storm of warm wholesome foods. With school also starting so do the extra curricular activities for the kids which leaves little time some nights to prepare a satisfying home cooked meal. So this Beauty Detox blogging assignment was perfect to take me away from my staple ingredients and cook something satisfying and simple.

kenoki mushrooms

warm mushroom salad with homemade green and red tomato sauce on a bed of fresh spring green mix 

I felt the idea behind this assignment was to keep it simple, so that is what I tried to do. I love throwing a whack of spices and ingredients into a recipe but sometimes simple is better and in this case it was as it helped to highlight the flavors of the mushrooms and keep my schedule on time.

green and red tomato sauce.

My 5 year old daughter actually called this recipe mushroomtastic!

mushroomtastic!

Recipe:

Fresh spring salad mix

portobello mushrooms

kenoki mushrooms

fresh garlic minced

coconut oil

nutritional yeast flakes

Sauce ingredients:

4 green tomatoes

2 large ripe tomatoes chopped

1 sm onion chopped

1 stick of celery chopped

1 clove of garlic minced

fresh oregano

pink himalayan salt and black pepper to taste

In a pot over medium heat put in all tomatoes, onion, garlic, salt and pepper put on a lid and stir occasionally. The juice from the red tomatoes will keep a nice consistency for the sauce. Next in a frying pan on medium heat add coconut oil, then garlic and portobello mushrooms, allow to cook for 5-8 min before adding kenoki mushrooms. Add oregano to tomato sauce and stir. Next add kenoki mushrooms to frying pan and allow to cook for another 10 min or so till mushrooms are soft. On a plate add a big helping of spring salad mix, tomato sauce and then top with mushrooms and sprinkle with nutritional yeast flakes and enjoy!

fresh oregano used in my tomato sauce

For my second recipe I made it because I had fresh left over mushrooms from my first recipe. I always buy in bulk due to having to feed so many mouths. Which in turn inspires many different variations of the ingredients at hand.

warm mushrooms with sauteed greens on a bed of butternut squash

Recipe:

1 butternut squash

1 package of salad greens

brown button mushrooms chopped

portobello mushrooms chopped

1 onion chopped

1 clove of garlic chopped

pink himalayan salt and black pepper to taste

nutritional yeast flakes

coconut oil

In a 400 degree oven place butternut squash cut in half and emptied of seeds, face down on a lightly greased pan for 30-45 min. Meanwhile in a pan over medium heat add coconut oil, when heated add garlic, onion and cook till onions are soft, next add chopped mushrooms and season with salt and pepper. Allow to cook for 10 min till mushrooms are soft. Add greens and cook for 5 more minutes till soft. On a plate lay down a bed of butternut squash and top with mushroom mix and sprinkle with nutritional yeast flakes. Enjoy!

butternut squash with mushrooms sauteed with salad greens, on top is fresh parsley

I loved these recipes because they were simple, delicious and the kids really loved them. The first recipe was a take on spaghetti, while the second recipe was to help use up leftover produce. Both recipes are vegan and packed full of nutrition for being  as quick and  as simple as they were.

kenoki and portobello mushrooms ready to cook

Let’s get physical; camping and hiking

Let’s get physical! is this weeks Beauty Detox blog assignment and it couldn’t have come at a better time. Actually since I started blogging with The Beauty Detox community all the assignments seem to come at the perfect time for me. When I contemplated whether I would blog or not I knew that if I did I would always make sure to come from a place of inspiration, since that moment I decided to blog that is exactly what has been happening and I couldn’t be more thankful!

Taking a moment to talk with the trees.

For me getting physical is an everyday thing when you are running around after 3 young children. On this particular weekend when this assignment came out it was my birthday weekend and my husband surprised me with a 2 night stay at a yurt in one of the provincial parks close by.

This is me with our camping gear at the yurt.

We stayed at yurt # 3 on my 33rd birthday, oh did I mention I love numerology and this spoke mountains to me.

The yurt is located in one of the 15 provincial parks here in Manitoba, it has a nice beach and a ton of hiking trails. The one thing I love the most is a getaway into the wild where I can reconnect with nature. To help me remember my journey is alive and important.

The province of Manitoba and the 15 provincial parks, we were at #13 Spruce Woods.

It has been a very busy summer of activities with the kids but this one was for me and it all couldn’t have come at a better time. My birthday, an almost full moon and summer is officially over and the routine of school has once again commenced, meaning the parks would be empty and so quiet that you could feel like you owned the place.

Sunset walk on Isputinaw trail, 1.4km.

On our drive and for 3 days previous it had been raining and cold. It was an hour and a half drive to the yurt and by the time we arrived the clouds had started to clear and it even slightly warmed up, the weather just got better with each passing day. On our first evening there we went on a sunset hike and cooked our supper over the fire. My husband is completely on board with BDS. We had quinoa and vegetables stuffed in a Japanese pumpkin cooked over the fire.

Quinoa and vegetables stuffed in a Japanese pumpkin and cooked over the fire.

On our second day we went for a hike at Spirit Sands to the Devil’s punch bowl, it is a 7km hike through sand dunes and prairies and forest. It is truly quite amazing to see so many different terrains in one area. We saw many animals on our hike which represent different messages for me. I love following a book by Ted Andrews called Animal Speak. At the start of our walk we saw a garder snake so we picked him up and took a selfie.

Snake selfie!

I love this place, it has such calm energies.

We also saw a rare skink lizard, it is so small and quick it is amazing one even sees them at all. I have been coming to Spruce Woods for over 15 years and it was the first time I had ever seen one of these lizards. Actually we saw 2 and the second one let us spend time with him so I snapped a picture.

The skink lizard. He is about 2″ from mouth to tail. It is amazing to have spent time with him, he was curious and kind.

At one point when we were crossing the prairies these clouds rolled through in front of us and the thunder roared. Boy did it feel electrifying, like the clouds were talking to us.

Clouds passing through on our hike at Spirit Sands.

At the Devil’d punch bowl. My husband takes great photos.

Later that night we went on a 4 km moonlit walk through the woods and it was the highlight of my whole trip. My husband is a long distance truck driver so spending this kind of time wit him is priceless when we have so little time at this moment in our lives.

The moon and on the right is light from the yurt.

The next morning it was my birthday and it was time to pack up and leave, but first we eat cake! I will not divulge what kind teehee. After we finished eating cake I was ready to leave and go home to the 3 little loves and more awaiting my return. At the end of my short journey I felt reconnected, re balanced and relaxed as if I had just come from a spa. After supper with my beautiful family, the house was settled and quiet again and there was one last thing I enjoy doing when I come home from camping. Take a nice shower with a long hot bath with my favorite ingredients to soak in and my favorite mask. This night is organic Hawaiian mud mask. Yum!

I tried to smile for the camera but it doesn’t work well with dried mud on your face.

Harvest season = baked squash

Harvest season is my favorite time of year and for this weeks Beauty Detox blog assignment squash is on the menu! For this Kimberly Snyder CN has a great Baked Kabocha squash with mushroom sauce recipe which you can find on her website kimberlysnyder.net.

On Wednesday last week when our assignment came out I was on my way to the grocery store, so perfect timing. I chose butternut squash and eggplant. 

This recipe is super simple and very delicious.

Recipe:
1 butternut squash

1 eggplant

1/4 of a vegan vegetable bouillon cube

1/4 c. of rice milk

dehydrated parsley flakes

Salt and pepper to taste

Side dishes:

Arugula

homemade sauerkraut

homemade fermented pickles

Turn oven on to 350 degrees, bake squash and eggplant whole for 30 min. Remove and cut eggplant into pieces and put in blender and add the bouillon cube and some salt and pepper, add rice milk and blend till smooth. Remove and place in a pot on the stove to keep lightly heated. Cut up squash and remove seeds.  Plate with salad, kraut and pickles and serve. This recipe served 4 1/2 people, 2 adults and 3 young kids.

Now I couldn’t stop there, it’s harvest and we are bursting with squash so I made a second recipe with acorn squash and a kohlrabi that I had picked up at our local farmers market. I call it baked acorn squash with kohlrabi carrot fritter and arugula salad with white onion and pumpkin spice dressing.

 

Recipe:

1-2 acorn squash

1 kohlrabi

4 small carrots

fresh garlic

chili flakes

nutritional yeast flakes

1/4-1/2 c. chia seeds

Arugula for salad with avocado slices

Salad dressing:

6 small onions

coconut oil

2 TBSP maple syrup #1 grade

vinegar infused with sweet basil and rosemary

pumpkin spice

Turn on oven to 350 degrees. First thing you will want to do is peel and shred the kohlrabi and carrots, add diced garlic and chia seeds and chili flakes and mix well in a bowl, add salt and pepper to taste. Now this will need to sit while you prep the rest of the meal so that the chia seeds can gel and work their magic. Next place squash whole in oven for 30-45 min to bake.

In a frying pan add oil, once heated add pumpkin spice then onions and allow to cook for 5 min till onions are soft and fully coated with pumpkin spice, add maple syrup and vinegar. Let cook for 1-2 min and be careful not to burn the spice. Set aside to cool. Now come back to the fritters, they should be done setting, fry in coconut oil on low for 10 min on each side.

Once squash is done cut and remove seeds. You can garnish this dish with young parsley and german thyme.

 

After all this there is bound to be left over squash. So what to do with it? Make it into a coconut carrot curry squash soup.

Recipe:

leftover squash

2 carrots 

1 onion

2 cloves of garlic

1 vegan vegetable bouillon cube

4 c. of water

1/2 can of coconut milk

1 cinnamon stick

2 TBSP curry

Heat water to a boil add bouillon cube, shred carrots and add, then diced garlic, diced onion and cinnamon stick. Boil down for 15 min till vegetables are soft and remove cinnamon stick. Add rest of ingredients and blend in the pot with a hand blender and serve with glueten free Artisan black olive bread baked at 350 D with coconut oil for 15 min and young parsley. My one year old loved this soup recipe and devoured it for 3 lunches in a row!

Eat more vegetables and less animal protein

For this Beauty Detox assignment I found it hard to write about only one of Kimberly Snyder’s Detox principles as all of them have revolutionized my health and my diet. The topic I chose to write about is ‘eat more vegetables and less animal protein’.

Fall veggie harvest

Simply delicious salad

For me this was easy as I do not like handling raw meat, it is the least appetizing kitchen prep for me. I find I am more creative and passionate when I am challenging myself to do a deliciously veggie filled salad or meal.

romain lettuce, homemade kraut, sprouts and strawberries

I used to enjoy the art of painting and since having children my ‘me’ time is almost non existent. So I take it where I can. Since discovering BDS I have quite happily added more veggies to my meals or as the whole meal and the time I get in the kitchen is for me.

Lightly sauteed beets leaves with zucchini and beans with fresh dill, garden goodness at it’s finest

I have found through adding more veggies that I thoroughly enjoy making my meals look like art pieces, it just seems to flow out of me making my head spin in joy.

You can use anything to complement a dish aesthetically, this is the lid from my vegetable steamer

A vegan taco butterfly

I always enjoy starting my meals with a huge salad and have gotten the kids in to the habit as well. Seeing the love and knowledge they have acquired since adding this principle in to our diet has done wonders in all areas of our health. Each family member has their own unique issues in health but by sticking to mainly vegetables at each meal it addresses them all.

left over taco salad with humus

Photo Opp: My Growing Beauties

Our Welcome sign from an old shovel handle and barn wood, painted by my daughter and I

Gardening is a huge passion of mine. I have been gardening since I was a little girl growing up on a farm. So for me when Kimberly Snyder announced that this weeks Beauty Detox assignment was a photo opp I knew it would be about my garden.

Coleus and decor at my front door

The completed bed. I used and old steel clothing rack as the trellis.

 I love companion planting, planting with the moon cycles and will grow anything that will sprout. I have even told my husband on numerous occasions that someday we will live in an atrium! 

The compost my husband built from reclaimed wood

My husband and I bought out first home in Oct 2013 in a small rural town across from the local school. It is a well established mature lot. Kinda a blank canvas. How lucky could I get. It is the house of my dreams and I am forever grateful for being so lucky as to own this home.

bursting at the seams

So I set out on a mission to make it even more amazing, but one thing I knew I would never do again was dig up dirt to have a garden. When my husband asked this spring what I wanted for mothers day I said dirt and wood so he could make a raised garden bed for me. 

kale harvested from my garden

parsley growing in a container

my cat Jane loves to follow me around when I work in the yard

When we built the first bed I knew it would be the first of many. Next year I plan on adding a minimum of 3 more raised beds with a walk way and sitting area.

My brother on his boat in British Columbia, he is a huge inspiration to me and is the epitome of this saying

I am fortunate to be a full time stay at home mom of 3 where I can freely teach my children about the importance and love of growing your own food. 

Happy tummies = happy kids

Green smoothies have become my all time favorite breakfast! Before green smoothies were introduced to me, I wouldn’t eat anything till lunch. I have never been much of a morning eater and I know that not eating in the morning robs me of my energy for the day.

It has been just over 2 years since I was introduced to the idea of drinking my greens for breakfast from Author and clinical nutritionist (CN) Kimberly Snyder and her book The Beauty Detox Solution. Since then I have involved my children in all my smoothie and juicing undertakings.

Creating a recipe for them helps them to feel important as to their specific wants and needs. I will definitely blog more on that another time. That is for winter months because right now is harvest time and there is too much in season to stick to the same old. So lets make fun with it.

It had been a couple of days since our last smoothie and my 5yr old daughter came up to me saying “my tummy feels sick, I need a green smoothie” so off we went to the garden and chose a few items and scoured the fridge for the rest. Having her help create the face and choose ingredients always makes it more fun. I will chop the fruit and vegetables while she puts them in the blender. Because of this she asks for smoothies instead of being told to drink it.

Green Smoothie Ingredients

Ingredients from the garden include:

Kale

green leaf lettuce

tomato

2 cucumbers

5 sage leaves (scarlette pineapple)

Other ingredients:

1 lemon

1 apple

1 peach

1 avocado

1 banana

Make sure the store bought ingredients are organic. I added between 500-750 ml of fresh water, then blend and serve. With this recipe my blender was bursting at the seams, it usually is when you try to fit 4 servings in one!

Once the smoothie was in my daughters belly she said it felt better.

Making smoothies with the children is fun and simple, getting them involved with the ingredients creates a life long bond to knowledge of food which is so important to pass on at these young ages. Now more than ever we need to take control of the food that is fed to our children, keeping them involved in the kitchen will insure love is provided in their relationship with food.

That is one happy smoothie!

Our abundance made with love

Blueberry Spirulina Power Protein Smoothie

                                

Blueberry Spirulina Power Protein Smoothie

Doing these blogging assignments with The Beauty Detox has really sparked something inside me about writing and food that I didn’t know was there. I find an energy ignites every time I think about creating and captioning healthy, healing, whole fresh foods.

With the last assignment I mentioned how my kids were not fond of the taste of Nori wraps. To my surprise when I finished the recipe they asked for some and loved it. My son even asked if we could have it for desert after supper that night (he prefers savory to sweet). I even had the post up the other day and my son saw a picture and asked if we could have it for lunch. It really excites me when the kids want to get involved in the kitchen with these new ways of looking at and making food.

So when this weeks #beautydetoxrecipe came out I was excited to incorporate spirulina into a smoothie as I find it has too strong of a taste on it’s own but digests really well for me and gives me such lasting energy. It is also a good way to get it into the kids diets without straining my brain trying to find ways to incorporate it.

Because all my smoothies are shared with my children I made the recipe without the protein mix, served them their share then added a serving of protein powder and blended my serving.

Recipe:

750ml Original Unsweetened rice milk

1 Serving of Sunwarrior chocolate protein powder (raw sprouted from brown rice)

1-2 Tbsp Spirulina powder (Nature’s Sunshine brand)

2 shots of fresh organic frozen wheat grass juice 

2 cups of fresh organic blueberries (these ones are from Sioux lookout, Ontario Canada)

1-2 lg. organic frozen ripe bananas

Put everything in a blender and enjoy! This recipe is enough to feed 3 hungry children and 1 hungry mama. I really enjoy a recipe like this for breakfast as I find the combo of wheat grass and spirulina gives me energy to really power through a busy morning.

I am learning how to blog like a herd of turtles and finally found out how to add extra photos and look forward to posting a lot more pics in the future. Cheers!

Nori Veggie Wraps with Sundried Tomato Asian dipping sauce

For this #beautydetoxrecipe I had made an earlier attempt at it and found out later I had missed one of the rules. So I am re-posting a different recipe that is completely plant based and follows the guidelines.

I really enjoy the taste of Nori wraps and usually have a stack of them on hand. My kids are not too fond of them so they are usually a side dish for my husband and I. Slowly I have been introducing them into the children’s diet so I am always trying different flavors to help meet their taste buds expectations.

With this recipe I knew I would like it, but I was very skeptical about the kids. The baby obviously didn’t have any other than picking at the cucumbers and carrots. My oldest though loved it and wanted more. So I was one happy mama.

For this recipe I used what I had on hand and adapted another recipe for the dipping sauce.

Dipping sauce:

10-13 sm sun dried tomatoes (or 2-3 lg)

1/2 of a roasted onion

1 fresh garlic clove

1/2 cucumber

1 Tbsp Apple cider vinegar

1 Tbsp of water

1/4 tsp honey

1/4 tsp sesame oil

2 Tbsp roasted sesame seeds

Himalayan pink salt and black pepper to taste

Wrap:

4 Nori sheets

Filling:

Carrots sliced thin

Cucumber sliced thin

6 pitted Kalamata olives sliced thin

Fermented Cabbage

For dipping sauce, roast sesame seeds in a dry frying pan on the stove till slightly browned, next add the rest of the ingredients in a blender. It should be fairly thick. Once blended add sesame seeds and mix well. Place in a container in the fridge till time to serve. 

Now grab a nori sheet and place on a rolling mat and line wrap with fermented cabbage, sliced veggies and kalamata olives. Roll tightly, having the cabbage in there will make it very messy. Slice roll in half or smaller, take dip out of fridge and serve. Since the dipping sauce is so thick you can use a spoon to serve. This recipe is enough for 4 Nori sheets.

This assignment was fun and helped my son to enjoy Nori wraps that much more.

Home made sun dried tomatoes preserved in organic extra virgin olive oil

kid, garden and BD inspired spring rolls

When this weeks assignment came out for the #beautydetoxrecipe I was excited to see that it was spring rolls. I love them, my kids and husband love them and they are always welcomed in our home. It has been quite a while since we did rice rolls here so the excitement was on.

I live about 20 minutes from the nearest health food store and only go in to town with a list in hand and an afternoon of errands to run. This particular week has been hot and busy so when I did my trip in to town I did not notice that I forgot my rice wraps.

Getting home and realizing this I knew that there was no way I would make it back to town before this weeks assignment was due. I do have Nori wraps but the kids are not too fond of them unless it’s sushi. So I challenged myself to get creative with what I had while keeping it BD friendly and kid approved. Which is what I am doing with most meals around here.

I have a garden that I am able to harvest from so that is where I started. My lettuce and kale are too long and thin to wrap much in so I went on to my next option, sage. Could I use it? Could I really pull it off? According to my kids and husband I did. I call them sagealicious summer rolls.

Filling:

4 boiled eggs

1 Tbsp veganaise

1 Tbsp stone ground mustard

chives minced

garlic clove minced

purple onion minced

celery chopped small

paprika

salt & pepper

Wrap:

fresh sage leaves

Add on’s:

carrots thinly sliced

cucumber thinly slice

purple onion thinly sliced

pitted kalamata olives

In a large bowl mix filling ingredients till well mixed, seasoning to taste. Next arrange sage leaves with a small dollop of filling then hold together using a tooth pick. Arrange add on’s in a fun way so the kids can pick and choose as they desire and enjoy! 

This recipe was enough for 2 kids and a grown adult. With the sage leaves being so small they were a bit finicky to work with but made an excellent afternoon snack to keep us refreshed and full of energy.

We are no strangers to flavor here especially since I first started following Kimberly Snyder’s Beauty Detox Solution. This one I gotta say was a big winner around here for being a bit out there.

from BS to BDS eating light to heavy

For me it all started when I actually started questioning my health. Why am I so sick? Why is everyone around me so sick? Is there another way?

For years I questioned and searched and always felt there was something wrong with me, not the sick people. That was the norm. I couldn’t make sense of anything. No one around me seemed to think the way I did about health. I was alone and confused. 

I knew food and thought had a lot to do with it and I had done so much research that I could not make sense of anything or what to do with all this acquired knowledge.

Slowly certain tools came into my life that were helpful to me, one being The Beauty Detox Solution. My first intro to Kimberly Snyder’s books came from my sister. She was so excited about this P&E salad in the book that she wrote the whole recipe down for me and raved about the book the whole time. I went home astounded at what I had just seen and heard and I knew that book needed to be in my hands. One week later it was my 2nd wedding anniversary. I told my husband that the only thing I wanted was this book. My sister had found it in a drug store of all places and they were sold out not getting more in, so I sent my husband on a journey to find it. 3 book stores and 1 city away is where he found it and I couldn’t of been happier.

Now that the book was mine and in my hands I devoured it like a ggs!

Most of what KS said in the books was confirming rather than new information but the one bit of information that I had never really thought about before was eating light to heavy. What a concept! From then on I started to look at my eating habits and how they affected my body. She was right! It really did affect my energy and I felt so much better when I followed this rule.

Now ALL my eating is done light to heavy. Even if I break the rule of no protein with starchy foods I feel much better if I eat my fruit a half hour before then veggies then starch then protein. I feel less bloated and more satisfied with a lot more energy. The only time I tend to break this rule is at supper time. Now I find my morning and lunch meals have to be light and properly combined or I lose all energy for the afternoon. I always try to not be hard on myself and keep everything in moderation….even moderation!