Ginger-Cashew Tempeh Stirfry {Vegan}

Happy Friday!  I made a pretty cool discovery at Trader Joe's this afternoon - they now carry organic 3-grain tempeh!

 

Tempeh is a great source of vegan protein. It's heartier than tofu, which would lend itself well to marinating & grilling.  I had to pick some up, and glad I did.

Flyin' solo this Friday night, I whipped up this nutrient dense vegan meal for one and served with a glass TJ's Green Fin Organic White wine.

Ginger-Cashew Tempeh Stirfry

Serves 2
Prep time: 5 min
Cook time: 10 minutes

Stirfry Ingredients:
1 T safflower oil
1 package tempeh
1 oz raw cashews, roughly chopped
6-8 shitake mushrooms
1 c pea sprouts, a little more to top
1 c baby spinach
1 small white onion, finally sliced
2 carrots, finely sliced
1 small zucchini, sliced
4 cloves garlic, roughly chopped
1.5-2  in chunk ginger, roughly chopped

Sauce Ingredients:
2T Bragg's Amino Acid
1 T safflower oil
1 tsp sesame oil
1/2 lemon, small orange or lime,  juiced (I used lemon)
2 tsp. Sriracha sauce (or use chili paste)

Mix together the sauce ingredients and set aside. Heat a large sautee pan to medium.  Add 1 T of the oil, and warm it.   Add garlic, onions and ginger and sautee for about a minute.  Then add zucchini, carrots, mushrooms, cashews and tempeh.  Sautee for another 3 minutes or so, until veggies are almost done.  Lastly, add the pea sprouts, spinach and the sauce.  Sautee for 30 more seconds.  Top with more cashews and pea sprouts.   Serve over rice if you want...but this plant-based meal was hearty enough to eat on its own.  YUM.

Nutrition per serving:

568 calories

44 g carbs

32 g fat 

28 g protein

Celebration: Rhubarb-Ginger Champagne Crisp

Ruby-red rhubarb at Eastern Market looked gorgeous this week!  I decided to purchase a bunch and figure the details out later.  Glad I did.  I'm in celebration-mode after a great work week!  With a little bit of tweaking some other recipes...and the fact that I just happened to have a chilled bottle of bubbly...the rhubarb became a deliciously gooey crisp.

If you're craving healthier-for-you dessert; this one definitely fits the bill.  It has relatively low added sugar, fresh ginger, rhubarb, coconut oil + it's vegan & gluten free.  Happy Friday!

Rhubarb-Ginger Champagne Crisp 
(Gluten Free + Vegan)
Serves 4

Ingredients: 

5 stalks fresh rhubarb, chopped into 1/2 in pieces (roughly 3.5 c)
1.5 tbsp ginger (approx) - minced
1/2 c gluten free flour (I used 1/2 legume mix, 1/2 tapioca)
2 oz +2 tbsp organic cane sugar
2 tbsp coconut oil (chilled)
2 tbsp dry champagne (or just use water if your're feeling less festive than I am...)
1 pinch sea salt

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350*.  Wash, peel, chop & mince rhubarb & ginger.  Combine rhubarb and ginger with 2 tbsp of the sugar and the champagne.  Toss well and put into a 9x4 baking pan (a loaf pan).

In a mixing bowl, combine 2 oz of the sugar, flour, sea salt and coconut oil.  Crumble with your fingers until the texture even and crumbles are about half the size of peas.   Crumble evenly on top of the rhubarb mixture.

Bake about 45 - 65 minutes, or until you see the fruit bubbling and crumble browning slightly. Serve with a glass of champagne.  Enjoy! ;)

Shrimp with Papaya-Coconut Sauce + Brown Basmati Rice

I found a beautiful papaya at Trader Joe's the other day!  Since it's especially good for the digestion and we're on our second week of the Gut Rehab, it was a must-buy. It felt like a mini tropical get-away to enjoy shrimp with papaya coconut sauce over brown basmati rice. Along with papaya and it's unique enzymes, the  ginger and garlic give the sauce a kick & are also great for the gut. This dish is great for digestion, gluten-free, dairy-free and 100% delicious. ;)

Ingredients:

1 lb raw shrimp (I used wild red argentinean shrimp)
1 small papaya or 1/2 large papaya
1/2 c coconut cream
1/2 tbsp garlic (minced)
1/2 tbsp fresh ginger (minced)
1 tbsp lime or lemon juice
1/2 tsp crushed red pepper
2 tsp coconut oil (or other high-heat oil)
1/2 tsp cumin
1/4 tsp allspice
White Pepper
Sea salt
Dried unsweetened coconut flakes (optional garnish)

1 c dry brown basmati rice (cooked to package directions

Directions:


Start the basmati rice as it takes 35-40 min to cook; salt the water well & prepare it to package directions.


Sauce: Scoop out meat from the papaya and place into a food processor along with a pinch of sea salt, allspice, red pepper flakes, coconut cream and lime juice.  Blend until smooth.

Clean the shrimp. Pat dry and season with salt, white pepper, and cumin.   In a medium-large pan, heat to medium-high and add the oil.  Sautee shrimp for just a couple minutes on each side until cooked on the outside, but not thoroughly.  Add the minced ginger & garlic.  Sautee a couple more minutes.  Add the sauce and reduce to low.  Let simmer for 15 min.  Serve papaya-coconut shrimp & sauce over the rice and garnish with coconut flakes.

Juicing: Top 10 Pros and Cons

Juicing is such a hot topic in food and health right now!  If you're like me, you watched the documentary Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead and ran out to immediately buy a juicer.  I even attempted a juice detox to cleanse and "reboot".  Now, after having the juicer about a year, I have to say that while I enjoy the occasional juice and its benefits, there are certainly some cons too.   After being gifted 6 lbs of carrots today (long story!) and 4 cabbages, I decided to make some juice.  Here's the good, the bad, the messy and the recipe! 

PROS:

1. Floods your body with nutrition

Yes, this is a very quick way to get your nutrition in!  You can really get your creative juices flowing (lol) and change up the veggies to suit your body and your dietary needs.  ;)

2. Great way to use leftover veggies

Say your garden is overflowing with tomatoes or cucumbers...or maybe you over-calculated the amount of {Insert fruit or veggie here} you needed for a recipe. Or you're going on vacation and need to get rid of all fresh produce.  Now you have a use for all of that goodness before it goes bad! 

3. Helps with detoxing

A quick dose of vitamins and minerals help the liver detox (flush out toxins) naturally. Juicing is a much safer detox than fasting completely, keeping you hydrated and nourished!

4. Easy to absorb

It doesn't require any real digestion because it lacks fiber and other complex carbohydrates.

5. Creates fantastic compost (seriously.)

The super-fine fiber remnants that are leftover decompose way faster than other veggie scraps, leaving you a rich compost for the garden.  

CONS:

1. Expensive

Very.  Especially if you go organic with your juice (which is a great idea especially when juicing your vegetables), it can cost a pretty penny.   A 4-day cleanse for 2 people cost us somewhere between $120-150!

2. Creates lots of waste

It's pretty sad to see that huge bowl/tub full of waste.  ESPECIALLY if you do not compost!

3. Messy clean-up

Imagine juice (beet juice especially) splattering your kitchen walls, counters.  Pulp everywhere.  A juicer that must be washed by hand.  This is not a quick and easy process.  It takes about 15 minutes to scrub the juicer down, and another 10 to wash, prep and juice your veggies. 

4. Removes fiber and it's benefits

Man cannot live on juice alone!  Fiber is what cleans our gut and is the food that our probiotics thrive on.  Plus, it moves things along... 

5.  Tons of SUGAR!

Most people like the taste of sweet, so they end up picking fruits and veggies (but mostly fruits) with a high sugar content.   While these drinks are delicious, it's a better idea to use the 80-20 rule (80% vegetables to 20% fruits) in order to keep your drink nutritious and cut back on the sugar.  One 16 oz glass of juice (as recommended as a meal replacement)  can have 90+ grams of sugar if you're picking (for example) apple-orange-pineapple!

(Look how much FIBER and SCRAPS are left over to make just over 50oz of juice!)

RECIPE 
Apple-Carrot-Ginger-Cabbage Juice

Carrots -  6 lbs peeled
Apples - 4 
Cabbage -  1 softball sized 
Ginger - 3 inch piece
Sea Salt  - to taste

Pretty tasty and kind of "zingy" with the cabbage & ginger.

Anti-Inflammatory SUPER SHOT!

So, my shoulder has been a terrible wreck for the past 6 weeks. Pretty sure I injured my rotator cuff by "flipping my dog" wildly in yoga. So, upon Dr. Matt's recommendation, I have ceased all yoga (trust me...it's been a LONG month) and any weight training. I have been incorporating fresh turmeric & ginger in my cooking, juicing 1x a day, eating lots of fresh veggies (per usual) and overall taking it easy.

But 6 weeks...and no improvement. :/ Time to go see Dr. Rich, DC. He's very holistic-minded, which of course, I like. He did a vision test and some physical tests. I am stressed, he says. He might be right. His RX? Well, I'm sporting purple kinesio-tape on my shoulder, doing left-brain exercises on the computer, and spinning slowly (clockwise) in my chair 3x per day. I have to work on another form of stress relief besides yoga, he says. I have also agreed to keep up on the couch potato-ing, high dose of EPA/EHA and potent anti-inflammatories. I decided to get SERIOUS about turmeric today, which is the whole POINT of this post. :)

Went to Whole Foods, which is right next to Dr. Matt & Rich's office and bought a big bag of turmeric root, and a big bag of ginger, and a couple of habanero peppers. I juiced THE most powerful concoction I've tasted today, to help heal my inflamed shoulder: approx 1 lb ginger, 1 lb turmeric root and 1/2 HOT habanero. I got about a cup of beautiful bright yellow liquid, with a bit of screaming from my Breville juicer. Had to scraped the mesh screen a few times to move all of the thick pulp out of the way.

I took a shot of it plain earlier, but as Dr. Matt & I were thinking about it, realized that the anti-inflammatory powers of the turmeric are fat-soluble, so it is best taken with a fat. Thinking of traditional curries (which traditionally incorporate spicy, ginger & turmeric anyway), I decided to use coconut oil, and created this second "shot" for before bed. Went down a lot smoother, but....OH MY. This stuff. Is. Strong!

Here's the finished potion: 1.5T turmeric/ginger/habanero juice + 1.5 tbsp warm (liquid) coconut oil. Mix and drink quickly (the coconut oil will turn back solid if the refrigerated juice is too cool).
TURMERIC is part of the same family as ginger. It's the small, orange root sitting on top of the ginger in my photo. It's beautiful, and be careful, because it stains everything (even stainless steel knives). That's how you know it's working, I guess. ;) Turmeric supports everything from joint pain to Alzheimer's to detox of liver to a possible prevention for cancer. Warning: it's said to NOT take this during pregnancy. You can read more about it's healing effects on Natural News. Also, here is some more info on World's Healthiest Foods.

GINGER is delicious, also a potent anti-inflammatory, known for soothing the stomach, and boosting the immune system. I love the taste and use it in juices and stir-frys, as well as in asian/indian dishes. Here is some more info on Ginger.

HABANERO PEPPERS are small and usually bright orange or red. I generally use only 1/2 of one in any given recipe, as they are WILDLY hot. They have a high capsaicin content helps lower blood pressure and cholesterol, and is also a potent anti-inflammatory. (hence it's included in my shot!) LiveStrong talks about the benefits of the habanero pepper here.

COCONUT OIL is a super versatile oil rich in monolauric acid and therefore has wonderful anti-bacterial and anti-fungal properties. It helps control weight and supports thyroid and heart health. It's usually in solid form (here in MI), but when it gets warmer (76+ degrees), turns to a liquid. I cook (anything/everything) with it these days: cooking eggs, in pie crusts, in curries, stir frys, use it for oil-pulling, as a body lotion on face & body. I even make home made sugar or sea salt scrubs with coconut oil. I love the taste of it, and it's a good-for-you fat with MCFA's (medium chain fatty acids). Here's Dr. Mercola chatting about the benefits of coconut oil.

I plan on taking on 3x a day until I feel better.
TRY it yourself and let me know how you like it!