Well 2020 is coming to a close; I am sure many are glad this year is almost over and looking forward to a New Year. When looking back on a year, I like to share which have been the most popular posts. I am going to share the top three recipes and the three most read posts for the year. If you missed any of these posts, follow the links provided.
I think is a pretty safe bet that most of us struggle to get our recommended daily servings of fruits and vegetables. Fruits are easier for most people to eat on a daily basis, veggies not so much. The recommended daily servings of vegetables is two to three cups a day for most adults. Do you get that many cups a day? Even though I am in the health and wellness field, I sometimes struggle to do this. Many struggle with this; in a 2017 survey, only 1 in 10 adults ate the recommended daily amount of fruit and vegetables.
What in the world is a stewing hen? What is the best way to prepare one? Check out this week’s post to discover all about this nutrient-dense food and how to use it.
Fall is here and the weather is cooler! This time of year often brings us back into our kitchens preparing soups, stews, casseroles, and hotdishes …
This year I planted a garden after taking about 15 years off of this exercise. Yes, gardening is considered exercise! Prepping, planting, weeding, and harvesting all provide a great opportunity to exercise, grow your own food, and be outdoors. I love tomatoes and homegrown are definitely the best. I planted three different heirloom varieties and now have an abundance of tomatoes. I did plant two zucchini plants and that has provided way too many zucchinis, especially if I don’t get out there every day to check on them. They can become huge in no time at all.
Last summer I had the opportunity to teach summer school cooking classes for grades 3 through 6 (cancelled this year due to COVID19). I wanted my classes to be about cooking and healthy food, AND I wanted it to be an experience the kids would remember. Food has a way of bringing people together, I thought it would be fun to learn about different cultures and the foods they eat along with cooking skills. I encourage people to eat local so one of the cultures we learned about was Native American food from the Minnesota area. In doing my research, I came across the book The Sioux Chef’s Indigenous Kitchen by Sean Sherman with Beth Dooley. I first found it at our local library, but my mom actually blessed me with my own copy last Christmas.
I have been gluten free for close to two years now. There have been ups and downs on this journey, but for me it has improved my overall health. Do I miss bread? Of course, I do; just thinking about the texture of a piece of bread with lots of butter on it can be hard. BUT being healthy is more important to me and for right now that means keeping gluten out of my diet for a while longer. The adventurous part about this gluten-free journey is learning to be creative in the kitchen. Yes, that is my way of keeping it positive.
Most of us have had applesauce, but other fruits make yummy sauces too! Pears can make a great sauce. Often when I purchase pears, they all get ripe at the same time; once they are ripe, they need to be used or they will become brown and mushy. Making ripe pears into a sauce is a great way to use up them. Making a pear sauce is similar to making an applesauce. The sauce can be eaten plain, with yogurt, or as a pancake topping instead of syrup. I often use homemade fruit sauces instead of syrup on my pancakes.
As 2019 comes to a close, I review which blog posts were the most popular. This year, two of the three were recipes. I hope to be adding more recipes in 2020. I am working on taking family favorites and “healthifying” these recipes. If you have a favorite recipe but have removed it from your diet due to health reasons, send me a copy and let’s see if we can “healthify” it!
