I missed Christmas…but made a Soft Egg & Avocado Sandwhich instead

06 Friday Jan 2012

Posted by in Recipe, Sandwich, Uncategorized

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OK, so I didn’t literally miss Christmas but with how fast the season went and looking at my blogroll, one could rightfully assume that either I’m a scrooge or I missed the whole thing all together. I had grand visions of beautiful baking photos, posts about my homemade eggnog–made with raw organic milk–and maybe even a guest post from the guys at Stiff Sip featuring a holiday libation crafted with care. I have been dwelling on it long enough and am ready to get over the fact that I missed it this year.  With the Christmas season as special–yet packed full–as it always tends to be, I’ll be sure to learn from this “rookie blogger lesson”: curate the Christmas posts in November…or heck, October!

During this past crazy holiday season, there were a lot of warm & comforting yet “no-fuss” meals to get us through when having a well-planned meal just wasn’t going to happen! Here’s how I made the sandwiches:

Soft Egg & Avocado Sandwich (makes two)

  • 4 eggs
  • 4 whole grain sprouted bread or baguette slices
  • 1 avocado
  • fresh dill pickles or some fresh Farmhouse Culture sauerkraut
  • thinly sliced or crumbled cheese of your choice (I used a raw, French cow/sheep’s milk blend) *for a lighter variation, omit the cheese and replace it with some good quality hummus
  • leafy lettuce
  • unrefined salt & pepper

Get out the eggs and let them rest on the counter while you bring a pot of water to boil.

When the water (enough to cover all your eggs) comes to a boil, remove the pot from the heat, turn off the burner and carefully lower the eggs in, cover and set a timer for 8 1/2 minutes.

While the eggs are slow-cooking, slice up your avocado, cheese & pickles; get out the leafy lettuce; and get the bread ready to toast. I usually do a short pre-toast before putting the cheese on the bread (right around the time your timer is about to go off).

When the timer for the eggs goes off, carefully cool the eggs under cold water until you can handle them easily, set aside.

Put your choice of cheese on one side of toast per sandwich and put all the pieces into a toaster oven or under the broiler just until the cheese is hot and bubbly.

Turn the heat of the toaster oven or broiler off, and take out the non-cheesy slices of toast so you can then cover them liberally with avocado slices. Then add a few pieces of leafy lettuce on top the avocado slices.

Get the eggs from the cool water, and one at a time, gently tap them on the counter (I put down a paper towel first) and roll lightly until they’re cracked nicely. Peel off a few shell pieces around the middle of the egg until you have enough room to simply insert a sharp knife in to cut the egg in half. Now just scoop out the egg halves from the shell with a spoon and place four halves on each avocado side of the sandwich.

Get the two cheesy toast slices from the toaster oven and top them with the pickles or sauerkraut, sprinkle with a touch of salt & pepper and put the sandwich together. Cut that warm goodness in half and enjoy (with a napkin)!

Thankful for the Fallidays: Harvest Soup

23 Wednesday Nov 2011

Posted by in Fall, Recipes, Thanksgiving

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What the…Fallidays? Yes, sounds like “Holidays” and occurs during the Fall. I came up with this phrase years ago because right around October, some people I know (who will remain nameless) begin talking about “how exciting the Holidays are going to be this year.”  As you all know by now, I’m always more excited about Fall than the huge elephant in the room (the Christmas/Holiday season).  Because of this, I’d declare “I’m not ready to think about the Holidays yet! I’m currently celebrating the Fallidays!” It stuck.

Thankfulness.  What will I be thankful for this year when sitting around the tables surrounded by great friends and a feast created with love?  Well, those friends and that feast for sure…but also there’s a deeper sense of gratefulness I can’t quite capture in writing.  A sense that even though I have so much to be thankful for (a great community of family & friends, the “other J”, the ability to live in an amazing city with a good roof overhead, the opportunity to be back in school, and having access to healthy & delicious food), there’s a bigger picture of gratitude that always hits me this time of year that is hard to ignore. So even though the exact articulation escapes me… Thank You.

It’s hard to believe tomorrow is the big day!  This year will mark our 2nd annual Feast in the City–and this year we’ll be co-hosting the hearty holiday soiree.  There’s something about having a full house on Thanksgiving, and all that hustle and bustle will most certainly make us hungry before its time to cut the bird…so we’ll be serving a few light cocktails and hors d’ouevres before the big feast.  Call it “old hat” by now, but I love serving soup from little shot glasses because its a great way to serve it as an appetizer.  So without further adieu, here is a recipe I created for some golden and warming Harvest Soup:

Harvest Soup

  • 3 medium sweet potatoes/yams (skin on) cut into quarters
  • 4 medium apples (skin on), cored & consistently sliced
  • 1 medium yellow/sweet onion, chopped
  • 1 large carrot, halved and cut into strips
  • 6-8 oz. reduced turkey stock (that means it’s been simmering on the stove for quite a while to concentrate the flavor, gelatin and minerals from the bones)
  • 1 garlic clove, smashed
  • 1 bay leaf
  • 4 juniper berries, smashed (in dried spices section at your market)
  • 3/4 tsp cumin
  • 1/4 tsp nutmeg
  • 3 sprigs fresh thyme
  • 2 fresh sage leaves + 1 to chop for the garnish
  • 1-2 T butter, extra virgin olive oil (EVOO), or coconut butter
  • Sea salt and pepper to taste

Poke sweet potatoes with a sharp knife a few times and roast on a parchment-lined sheet pan at 375* for 45 minutes or until knife cuts the potato easily. When done, remove from the oven and set aside.

While the sweet potatoes are roasting, heat up the oil or butter over medium heat in a large sauce pan (or stock pot). Saute the onions, fresh herbs, and spices for 3-4 minutes, then add in the apples, carrot and garlic.  Sprinkle in some sea salt (about 1/2 tsp) and saute the mixture over medium, stirring occasionally, until it begins to cook through.  At this point, add in the turkey stock and the roasted sweet potatoes and let the pot simmer very lightly for about 15-20 minutes.  When the flavors have married and all the contents are tender, turn off the heat and use your immersion blender (or a regular blender) to blend the soup to your desired consistency.

Taste the soup and adjust the S & P and/or the cumin to your liking.  After serving into bowls (roughly 4 servings–but honestly I can’t remember), garnish the finished soup with some freshly chopped sage leaves.

Enjoy*

How to Go Coconuts

10 Thursday Nov 2011

Posted by in How-to

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As someone who is extremely into food, food culture and making things from scratch (when reasonable of course!), I’ve been feasting my eyes upon certain “gadgets” that would allow me to go further down the path of creating delicious goods in the kitchen. Gadget #1 is The Hatchet: it’s certainly not shiny, new or cutting edge (no pun intended), but it has allowed me to delve into the world of using fresh coconut.

Coconut water from truly fresh coconuts is inarguably better–in taste and nutritional value–than all the bottled & pasteurized “fresh coconut water” that is out there on the shelves (*see the bottom of this post to learn a bit more about the benefits of fresh coconut water). Also, the fresh coconut “meat” is amazing when blended into oatmeal or yogurt, used in desserts and best of all, smoothies–which brings me to Gadget #2, The High Powered Blender. It is shiny and new, extremely powerful and currently being used to make the most delicious breakfast smoothies ever. (More on smoothies in a future post.) However, the smoothies wouldn’t be quite as good or satiating if they didn’t have that fresh coconut meat in them…so here’s a “how-to” on cracking the nut:


What you’ll need:

  • Hatchet or substantial meat cleaver
  • Young, green coconut (the ones that are pointy on top: check Whole Foods or other Natural Grocers)
  • Large chef knife
  • Brown grocery bag
  • Glass jar/container for coconut water & coconut meat

(images brought to you via my phone’s camera)

Find a sturdy surface and put down the paper bag or any other material to have a clean working surface.  I do this on our back porch so it doesn’t sound like I’m trying to do a kitchen remodel.

Place the coconut on its side and use the chef knife to cut away the top part of the coconut, rotating it a few times. You’ll know you’ve done enough when you hit the shell.

This is the point at which you should BE CAREFUL! Use your chef knife as a steady “hand” to keep the coconut in place–DO NOT use your hand to hold the coconut steady! Picture cutting a 1 inch square hole at the top of the coconut with the hatchet. Give it a couple good strong smacks, then turn to cut the next side until you’ve done all 4 sides or until sweet & refreshing coconut water splashes up when you’ve broken through. Pour that nutritional goodness into a glass!

Finally, give the coconut a few more good swings of the hatchet to fully crack it open and then use a large metal spoon to scrape out the coconut meat. You’re now ready to “go coconuts!“

*Why make the extra effort to drink fresh coconut water?  Coconut water brands on the shelf such as Zico, Vita Coco and O.N.E. are pasteurized and less beneficial since the heat destroys the enzymes and most nutrients. (Have you ever noticed that it doesn’t need refrigeration?) They’re all around less fresh. When you drink the good stuff–straight from the nut–you get all the benefits of young coconut water’s nutrients, enzymes and healthy microflora because it has been protected by the nut’s shell: nature’s method of sealing in the freshness.

When Autumn Gives you Apples…Make Applesauce

28 Friday Oct 2011

Posted by in Fall, Recipe

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It’s official. Fall is all around us, and I couldn’t be more thrilled! Growing up in the Midwest definitely had something to do with the development of my “Autumn Obsession”: the brilliant colors of the turning trees, the crisp mornings, the smell of the crunchy leaves underfoot, carving bright orange pumpkins….these are all important to me, but more exciting to me than any of those is my love of all things apple.

It started as a little kid when my class got to visit the local apple orchard and watch how they made cider (coming from someone who now lives in the city, I can’t believe how lucky I was to have access to local gems like that). I remember the little paper cone cups they would serve the cider samples in–man I loved those!  Every fall, Mom would take us to Hoosierland (the apple orchard’s storefront) and we’d buy cider by the gallon along with some glorious apples.  Apples for eating of course–and making baked apples too–but my favorite activity was making applesauce!

A couple weeks ago, my mom and her French friend came to visit during the most beautiful time of the year here in the Bay Area: October. I had planned a day of apple picking up in Sebastopol for their first day.  After winding along the beautiful back-country roads through orchards, we reached an organic humble orchard where a lovely young couple live and had agreed to allow us to pick for a “donation.” Come to find out, we were the first people to approach them for such a thing and it worked out just how I had hoped: an afternoon of fall fun (except it was almost 90* F), picnicking and picking apples in a beautiful landscape–there were no petting zoos or corn mazes to be found…just us, the apple trees and les bonne pommes.

I think we all walked away that day feeling reconnected to nature and bountiful seasons of the past…not to mention about 30 lbs of apples.  My mom made an apple pie, I’ve made at least a gallon of applesauce, I think apple cider is on deck (stay tuned)–yet there is still an extremely large amount of apples standing by in an extremely small laundry room.

Here’s my take on the fabulous, comforting dish that we call applesauce. I love the color that the cranberries give the sauce (got the idea from good old Apple Hill up in the Sierra foothills), and I use an immersion blender to give it an extremely velvety texture.


“La Bonne Pomme” Cranberry Apple Sauce

  • 12 medium-large apples (use a variety) cored and sliced (don’t peel)
  • 2 cup fresh cranberries
  • 1 1/2 cups water
  • 2 dashes unrefined salt
  • 6 T honey (or experiment with maple syrup, molasses or stevia leaf)
  • 1 tsp each: nutmeg, cinnamon
  • 1/4 — 1/2 tsp clove (your preference)
  • 2 T fresh lemon juice

Combine apples, cranberries, dash of salt and water in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and cover—let mixture simmer for 20-30 minutes, stirring occasionally, until fruit is soft.  Add the honey/sweetener and spices and cook another minute until well combined.  Take saucepan off heat and use immersion blender or normal blender to puree until a very smooth consistency is reached. Finish by stirring in the *lemon juice.  After the applesauce has cooled slightly, taste and adjust the seasoning to your liking. Serve with toppings of your choice or refrigerate and serve chilled. Makes 2 quarts. Enjoy!

*adding the lemon juice after it’s cooked helps preserve the delicate vitamins.


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This is Juicy 1.0

09 Friday Sep 2011

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I’ve been thinking about writing this post for almost a year now…so this is quite an exciting day!  My hesitations have been around wanting to “make it just right,” having the “perfect pictures” or wanting to make sure everything I say is completely fact-based.  The more I learn–the more I realize that in the world of food & nutrition, one person’s statistic may be another person’s speculation!  With that said, here’s how I feel about juicing:

There was a time when I was intimidated by “juicing” (as I’m sure most of us are or have been at one point).  I had been planning to do a cleanse from one of my favorite resources, The Seasonal Detox Diet by Carrie L’Esperance,  so I bit the bullet and purchased a basic juicer. Honestly, right from the start it felt empowering and adventurous–I mean I was making juice from scratch, people!  After doing the cleanse (which was of course challenging but oh-so-rewarding), I started experimenting with my own juice recipes: what tasted good, what ratios were best, and frankly which combos wouldn’t turn out brown (because no one wants to drink brown juice).

For a while there–depending on who you ask–some might have said that I was getting obsessed with juicing. At one point last year I remember packing up my juicer (it’s not light) when we were only going to be away for a 2-night trip, and on a separate occasion I recall a friend asking me if I had been using a self-tanner! (thank you carrots). It had become a part of my morning ritual and I loved starting my day off with freshly pressed fruit & veggie juice. My skin felt more radiant, I felt lively and charged with nutrients!

I’ve since scaled back a bit–I juice about every other day–but still fully enjoy the benefits of juicing. Some are listed below:

  • immunity boosting
  • cleansing to the organs
  • nutrients go directly to the bloodstream–don’t have to go through digestive system
  • energizing
  • soluble fiber-packed–great for the intestinal tract
  • hydrating–especially great after you’ve been traveling and/or dehydrated
  • alkaline-forming (helps balance out the acidic condition of your body)

So hopefully this has encouraged you to try juicing for yourself! Here are some of my thoughts and pointers on how to juice as well as my “Everyday Juice” recipe:

  1. It’s best to juice first thing in the morning on an empty stomach. Drink up, then wait 20 minutes or so before breakfast, coffee, etc.
  2. Watch out for sugar-heavy fruits & veggies; try using green apples  as the base of your juice(they have less sugar than carrots or beets!) If you do use oranges, use 1/2 orange at most for 2 servings.
  3. I know it’s hard, but drink slowly! Let each sip sit in your mouth for a few seconds so the digestive enzymes in your saliva (mmm…) can dilute the juice before it hits your system.

OK, you’re ready.

JUICING FOR TWO PEOPLE:

  • green apples (cored), 2
  • carrots, 3
  • beet, 1/2  medium sized
  • lemon or lime, 1/2 (peeled)
  • ginger root, 1/2 inch slice
  • parsley and/or mint, 1-2 small handfuls
  • greens, 3 big handfuls (examples listed below)
    • spinach
    • chard
    • kale (dino, curly, red)
    • lettuces

*note: if you save some of the juice for later, be sure it’s in airtight container and drink within a few hours

Posted by | Filed under Juice

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Let’s Start from Scratch

29 Monday Aug 2011

Posted by in Uncategorized

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My name is Jeanne and this blog is an outlet for sharing recipes, adventures in the kitchen and abroad, and my findings as I learn more about food, nutrition and how to make them come together in the most beautiful, delicious way so that mind, body and soul can flourish.

In the time to come, I hope this space reflects my love of creating, serving and eating real food– and how it brings people together!

I live in San Francisco with my husband (who for the purposes of this blog we’ll call “Other J”) where we’re quite lucky to be surrounded by others who care as much about eating real (organic, “non-processed”, seasonal, local) and exciting foods as we do.  With that said, as much as I strive to eat and live by those standards, you can be darn sure that there are some absolutely amazing eats here in the city that aren’t exclusively “organic” etc., and that’s where my ongoing pursuit of healthy life-balance comes in…we’ve all got to indulge every once in a while!

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