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Tag: organic

Holy Cow! How to Choose Between Milk & Milk- Alternatives!

Posted in Food, Health & Wellness, and Michele Jacobson Nutrition

Milk and Milk Alternatives

What’s in your refrigerator? Almond or coconut milk, soy milk, low-fat, raw milk? These days it could be just about anything.

Milk is officially defined as the liquid produced by female mammals as food for their infant young. We humans love to consume the milk of other mammals; and not just cows, but also goat, sheep, camel, buffalo, yak, you name it.

The problem is that humans need the enzyme lactaseto digest milk sugar (lactose) but production of this declines significantly after weaning. That’s why so many people have difficulty digesting milk and other dairy products. Gastrointestinal issues are most prevalent in African-, Asian-, and Native-Americans, with up to 90% of these populations suffering from lactose intolerance. Those of European descent have a less difficult time with dairy digestion.

But there are other reasons that people avoid dairy: allergies, inflammation, veganism, animal rights and environmental concerns sway people to seek milk-alternatives. In fact, the FDA identifies milk as the most allergic food in America.

Easy Baked Polenta

Posted in Food, Health & Wellness

Cornmeal is a wonderful, healthy grain! High in fiber, low in fat, and gluten-free; it is also abundant with B-vitamins and minerals to ground you! When you are looking to make an easy side dish, don’t discount polenta. Long regarded as difficult, because it required endless stirring, this recipe couldn’t be easier to make. And it beats the packaged tubes of supermarket polenta HANDS DOWN.

Polenta is a staple of Northern Italian cuisine, but you will find it an excellent side dish for any meal. It’s also wonderful for babies and children.

Make sure to always buy organic Polenta corn grits. Corn is a genetically engineered crop (GMOs). Cornmeal comes in a variety of grades, fine (corn flour for baking), medium and coarse, so be sure to buy the medium grade appropriate for Polenta!

Healthy Blueberry Corn Muffins

Posted in Food, Health & Wellness

Stuck in on a snow day – or any day – is a perfect time to bake a batch of muffins! Not the
cupcake-y kind, full of sugar and unhealthy fats, but this healthy redux of corn muffins. They will immediately become a favorite!

Healthy Blueberry Corn Muffins

Ingredients

  • 1 cup organic cornmeal
  • 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
  • 1/4 cup wheat germ
  • 1 and 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • 2/3 cup plain, whole fat yogurt
  • 1/4 cup plus 3 tbsp organic apple juice concentrate, defrosted. (You can save the remainder in a tupperware in the refrigerator)
  • 2 eggs
  • 1/8 cup organic canola oil
  • 1 and 1/2 cup fresh or frozen organic blueberries

Instructions

  • Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
  • Combine the cornmeal, flour, wheat germ and baking soda in a mixing bowl.
  • Beat the yogurt, juice concentrate, eggs and oil in a separate bowl.
  • Add the liquid ingredients to the dry ingredients and blend well with a few quick strokes.
  • Fold in the blueberries quickly until distributed evenly.
  • Spoon the batter into 12 muffin tins (I line with paper liners). Bake until lightly browned, about 20 minutes. Remove from tins immediately.

Notes

Adapted from What To Expect When You're Expecting, 1986 edition.

Is This Heaven? No, It’s An Organic Blueberry Field!

Posted in Food, Health & Wellness

I’ll willingly skip a day at the beach or a sail around the lake…for me it’s worth the hour long drive and the simmering heat to be out there in the fields – picking buckets of delectable, sweet and tart, sun-warmed, OMG I just can’t eat enough of these super-fruits: organic blueberries.

 

Truly, every sense is heightened during this most pleasurable of summertime activities. The fact that most people buy blueberries icy cold at the supermarket, and then eat them by the handful from a punnet* is wrong, all wrong. Blueberries are best eaten one at a time, sun-kissed off the bush. Dusky and bright, each one explodes in your mouth with a warm, juicy POP! 

At the organic blueberry farm where I regularly pick each July – Emery’s Certified Organic Blueberry Farm in New Egypt, New Jersey** – there are 20 acres of blueberry bushes spread out in all directions. Amidst the rows of high bushes you are surrounded by the scent of summer, the faint buzz of baby bees, and the laughter of children a few rows over. If you get your timing just right – early morning; mid-week – you can sometimes get the blueberry field almost entirely to yourself. One year it was only me and another lone picker just a few rows over. After a while I realized he was quietly reciting bible verses to himself. “Peculiar,” was my initial thought. But then I realized, what could be more apropos? This field is just heavenly.