SPRING NOURISHMENT

Spring has arrived and with it the abundance of natural tonics for the season! Eating what grows in season is not just a statement about committing to local, more sustainable food choices or reducing your carbon footprint. It really is the simplest way to maintain harmony in your body by aligning it with the natural medicines the earth offers for each season.

Dandelion, chickweed and nettles are the greens of spring. They are also natural tonics that help our digestive and lymphatic systems after a long winter of more dense and,often, rich food. These wild greens, or edibles weeds, are packed with minerals and amino acids.

Nettles have long been prized for building bones and nourish the associated tissues hair, nails and teeth as well as the skin. Like nettles, chickweed is a common weed packed with nutrients, including calcium, iron and chlorophyll. The sweet and mild grassy taste of chickweed is a lovely and nutrient-dense addition to any spring salad. As a spring tonic chickweed stimulates the lymphatic system, which can often be sluggish after winter.

For me Dandelion greens , from the French, “dent de lion”, are central to spring salads. Dandelion is a “bitter” green and bitter foods are vital to tone and stimulate the digestive system. Dandelion is also considered a potent liver tonic. Just a few leaves each day contribute to making a smooth transition into springtime.

So celebrate SPRING by going out to gather some wild greens or visit your local farmers market where the farmers have gathered the spring jewels for you. Align to the youthful and potent energy of spring by eating what is offered from the Earth, in her native season.

SPRING TONIC SALAD
6-8 leaves of dandelion, torn
1handful of chickweed or tender chicory leaves
1 handful of watercress, chop larger stems
1 scallion, white part only, thinly sliced
2 cups of young spring greens
a few wild edible flowers, to brighten your spirit

FOR THE DRESSING
2T extra virgin olive oil or hemp seed and flax oil
1-2 T freshly squeezed lemon juice or raw cider vinegar
Pinch of Celtic or Himalayan salt
1/2 teaspoon fennel seed, crushed
Combine the salad greens in a large bowl.
Whisk the dressing ingredients together thoroughly in a small bowl and pour an amount to your taste over salad. Garnish with edible flowers.

JUICING ON THE ROAD

This week we are in Miami, offering the ever-growing RASA Life Cleanse to a whole new group of people. It's an exciting adventure and has certainly already had its moments that have required enterprise and facile response. The highlight being Sunday evening when I (intuitively) thought, "Let me test run the juicer". Well folks spirit was with me because at 10:30p.m. Sunday, on the eve of my largest group cleanse to date, I discovered that the juicer was defective!

Now I must take a moment to explain that most of the "juices", with the primary exception of the High Green, on the RASA Life Cleanse are actually blended in the ever trusty Vita Prep blender. Blending actually retains the nutrients for a longer period of time than traditional juicing (with the exception of juices made in a Norwalk press). Blending also retains some of the fiber content of the food and I find provides more sustained energy throughout the day. So as unsettling as this discovery was that evening, there was nothing left to do but respond and add our much loved High Green juice to the list of blended drinks!

The result? YUMMMM

Blended High Green- for 2
Please choose organic and when possible locally grown produce.

2 cups romaine lettuce, chopped
4 hearty leaves of Laciento kale, torn
1 c celery, chopped
1/2 apple, sliced (I really like Gala apples. You could also use pears)
1/2 lemon, peeled
knob of ginger, peeled (you control the kick by how much you use!)

Place all ingredients in your blender, add about 2c filtered or spring water. Blend from low to high for about 30 seconds. You can either drink it as is like a smoothie or strain it for a soother texture.

This recipe is just a platform for endless taste sensations! You can also add watercress, sunflower greens, cilantro, parsley.....Use your imagination and enjoy!

PATIENCE & PRACTICE

Almonds, lentils, buckwheat, quinoa. Rinsing, soaking and sprouting. I am spending a lot more time these days sprouting nuts, seed, grains and the occasional legume. One of the most important parts of this process is rinsing. You can never really tell how long it is going to take for the water to turn from a cloudy hue to clear and sometimes it takes many more rinses than expected for the water to run clear. This is not so unlike asana or meditation practice, as, on any given day it can take longer for the mind to ease and come to reside in a more open and relaxed state. Often I find myself creating a potent brew of frustration because my personal(asana)practice is not as consistent as it once was. Yet when I am practicing and teaching I find myself being more grounded and clear than ever. Where does this come from?

Rinsing. Soaking. Sprouting. This, I am coming to understand, is my practice right now. Patience & Practice



Red Lentil Soup
1c red lentils, rinsed, soaked and drained.
1T ghee
1t cumin seed
1c onion
2T ginger, finely minced
1 green chili, seeded and finely minced
2t coriander
1/2t turmeric
1 -1 ½ qt water
1t sea salt
1-2 lime
2 Scallions, sliced for garnish
Cilantro, leaves for garnish

Heat ghee in a 3 quart pot. Add the cumin seeds, listen for the "pop" and wait for their fragrance to emerge. Add the onions and cook until translucent. Next, add the ginger and chilies, cooking them for and other minute or two so the flavors begin to mingle. Finally put the red lentils, coriander powder, turmeric and water in the pot. Bring to a gentle boil and then reduce the heat to a simmer. Cook for 20-30 min. Let cool and blend some of the soup. Return the blended soup to the pot, add the sea salt and season with lime, cilantro and scallions.

TURNIP PICKLES

TURNIP PICKLES
Yields one quart
The ingredient measurements are approximant, and can be adjusted to your taste. I like to eat these with either raw or lightly steamed hearty winter greens and winter squash

1c unpasteurized cider vinegar
2c filtered water
2t coarse Celtic sea salt
2T Nama shoyu or tamari
2T raw honey
1-2 garlic cloves, peeled and sliced
a few spring of thyme
1 bay leaf
1t each coriander and fennel seeds
1 red chili pepper, if desired
1 generous bunch Hakurei Turnips, unpeeled or 2-3 large pink turnips, cut into wedges (if using the pink turnips, I prefer to peel them)

Combine the water, cider vinegar, shoyu, honey and salt in a bowl, stirring to dissolve the salt. Add the spices, herbs, garlic and option chili pepper. Pack the turnips into a clean glass container and pour the cider mixture over them, to cover. Cover and let sit on the kitchen counter for 7-10 days. After about a week, they will be ready to eat and can be stored in the refrigerator for up to 3 months

AUTUMN-TAKING ROOT

This morning’s trip to the market was a bit rushed. I wandered out of the house quickly, only to find the air crisp and, almost too cool for a light, wool sweater. It’s truly autumn now. Although I was rushed, NYC style, to get to the market, once I arrived, my whole rhythm slowed and I was mesmerized by the autumn bounty that seemed to have appeared over night in the market. Brisk air can center the mind and sharpen the senses. This time of year the Union Square Market is teeming with all manner of dark leafy greens, turnips (regular, gold ball, Hakurei), many varieties of winter squash and enormous heads of cauliflower and cabbage beckon; can I just sit home and play with food all day? Oh wait, that’s kind of what’s been happening in my life! Somewhere between the height of the economic tsunami last fall and a fast forward to now, I find myself more and more in both my own kitchen and in the kitchen’s of various clients. This has presented it’s own unique set of circumstances and has been requiring me to recalibrate my perception of the scope of my work. I move and I teach movement; hatha yoga, Gyrotonic and Pilates every day, but more and more the “work” that comes my way is food/holistic nutrition based. It’s requiring that I build a new set of skills, not unlike approaching a new yoga pose or any new situation in life. It goes like this (but not in a linear fashion, more like a spiral): situation arises, pose/ option presented, new set of circumstances observed, toes touch water, writhe at the thought of going to next level, have success dreams and nightmares simultaneously, realize old patterns don’t encompass new requirements. Require lots of sleep & tears. Then suddenly one morning or late evening I wake up in the pose/fully embracing the shift. It takes time but if I stay responsive it happens.

So tonight after a day of preparing food for clients, I come home and realize that it really is a new era. I arrive home to find a sink full of dishes and in my bag a dinner waiting to be constructed. I come back to the feeling and experiences I have had around the practice of being present and the practice of gratitude and I turn to what is basic, grounding and nourishing: ancient wheat (faro), kale & wild mushrooms.
Both recipes can be prepared either raw or consciously cooked.


WILD MUSHROOM “STOCK”



FARRO (or SPROUTED BARLEY) WITH MUSHROOM STOCK AND HEARTY GREENS

ANNA'S TOMATO SALAD

LUNCH WITH MOM

I had the somewhat rare experience, for a person of my generation, to have had two generations on my mothers maternal side influence and shape my earliest experiences. Anna Romano was my great grandmother and she lived in a two family home that she built in Netcong New Jersey. She raised her family there and continued to live there when most of her children and grandchildren were grown, with my maternal grandmother, her daughter Rachel. When I was young my mom returned to work, and Rachel, my grandmother, also worked; so I was naturally left in Anna’s care.

What do we really remember from our early life? I don’t know, but in some ways I think those memories or rather “re-memberings” are the most true reflection of our souls impressions of those moments. I sense this is because they are not filtered by the developing ego. So here is what I remember: lots of sunshine and the earthy, wet smell of the dirt in the garden and the constant changing into crisp white frocks, but most of all I remember LUNCH with Grandma ‘Mano!

Lunch was always something from the garden with warm, freshly baked bread and some sort of warm soup or grain dish, but the highlight was always the salad. Depending on the time of year it would have various lettuces or dark, leafy greens and of course in the mid –late summer TOMATOES! This tomato salad was tossed with red onions and herbs, also from the garden, and dressed with olive oil, coarse salt and red wine vinegar. Perhaps the memory of those summer tomato salads is still so potent, because Grandma ‘Mano let me be free with picking up the salad platter and drinking the juices from the salad after the meal! But where did all that juice/dressing come from? There was never too much oil and the vinegar was just splashed.

Last week the mystery was solved and here is where I am reminded that re-membering our memories often happens in concert with others.

It happened over the lunch that my mom, Patricia Anne, and I made together when she came in to help me refresh and organize our live/work space. My mom has always been my number one go to person when I know I need “third eye” in my life to help me execute and follow through on visions and plans. We arrange a date (well really we arrange and rearrange several) and Patricia Anne arrives with her usual mom accoutrements: paper towels, witch hazel, extra towels, etc., and her own home grown TOMATOES. Actually, it was one tomato, one perfect green heirloom variety. That tomato became the center of that sweet and simple lunch.

Our lunch was a salad of local arugula with red scallions, herbs, olive oil, fresh lemon and Celtic sea salt and then we made a the tomato salad. A plate of sliced tomatoes, with red scallion, some fresh oregano and thyme, a drizzle of olive oil and bit of Celtic sea salt, and here is where the secret to the abundant juice/dressing was revealed. as we are getting ready to sit, my mom asked if I had an ice cube, well Anna must have been watching over our freezer, because we NEVER make ice cubes, but there happened to be some, deeply contracted, cubes lingering in the tray from who knows when. Even though I find this request odd, I don’t question my mom because I sense that she is up to some sort of inherited alchemy. I hand her the ice cube and she promptly tops the tomato salad with it! “What’s that about?” I ask. And she tells me that this is something Grandma Romano did to chill the salad (after all you don’t keep real tomatoes in the refrigerator), and that it was the secret to a flavorful juice at the end of the meal!


Anna’s Tomatoes - Remembered

Obtain a wonderful tomato grown from your own hands or from a local farm, where you know the people who own the farm still get their hands in the dirt. Slice the tomato. Thick or thin, just have a sweet sense while you do it. Thinly slice some scallions or red onion,then clean and gently tear some fresh herbs; fresh oregano and thyme are a wonderful change from basil and strew over the tomatoes. Then drizzle the best olive oil you have over the salad and season with some sea salt and a grind or two of fresh pepper. Finally the magic, place an ice cube on top of the tomatoes and pause a few moment to let it begin to melt into the salad. Savor the salad and the nectar of the juice at the end with someone you hold dear. That is nourishment.

LATE SUMMER, SUDDENLY

The last several weeks I've been so excited to eat, almost every day, some variation of cabbage "slaw". It’s kind of funny because this is a fetish that usually arrives during the fall when more rustic and hearty greens arrive at their peak in the market. But this year the green market was offering lovely heads of cabbage throughout the summer. Red cabbage, green cabbage, Savoy cabbage. So I’ve been making cabbage slaw with ginger, jalapeno, turmeric, lime, cilantro and coconut milk or with ume vinegar, sesame oil, shoyu, black sesame seeds, daikon radish and ginger; the variations go on and on. I bought a beautiful head of green cabbage on Wednesday when the heat was still on and the sun high. I was already working my way through a red cabbage slaw and knew I wouldn't get to this lovely head until Friday. So when Friday arrives and we wake to a cool, gray, rainy day that has me running around in rain boots all day, I have the first glimpse of what's ahead: Autumn. Excited yet with a touch of melancholy, I am reminded that we are in the midst of a seasonal transition. Transitions, both seasonal and certainly any life transition can create a sense of uneasiness and a feeling for wanting to be grounded. So I'm with this head of cabbage and some beautiful wild Alaskan King Salmon. The rain, the rain boots and umbrella in the corner and the sudden gray coolness all confer to make me realize a cool, crisp slaw won't do. Instead, I want something warm more aligned with what's ahead. So coconut oil, cumin seed, ginger, red scallion make their way into the pan. Once the mix is fragrant and the scallions are softened I add the cabbage, which I have lightly salted, rinsed and drained to break down the cell walls a bit so that the cooking time and heat can be reduced. Once it’s gently wilted I add a touch of sea salt, turmeric and chopped jalapeno and cilantro to brighten and deepen the flavors. The result is warm, satisfying and nourishing. This time of year I do find myself shift between wanting simple foods in their raw and fully energized state and something a bit more grounding, centering and warming. I am reminded that it is vital to remain flexible and responsive when considering how to nourish myself. Responsive to the seasons and their changes and especially to what is happening inside of my body, heart and mind; not to some external constraints such as “to be raw or not to be”. Remembering that, above all, eating should be a joyful, nourishing and inclusive experience.


Cabbage-Hemp Slaw
1 head Savoy or green cabbage, cored and thinly sliced
Celtic Sea Salt, for salting the cabbage
½ cup mung bean sprouts
3-5 scallions, sliced thinly on the diagonal
1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and finely diced
2T ginger, finely diced
1/4 cup currants
1/3 cup shredded coconut, optional
2 tbsp lime juice
1/4 cup olive or hemp oil
1/2 tsp turmeric
1 tsp ground cumin
1/2-1t Celtic or Himalayan salt
¼ cup hemp seeds
2 tbsp black sesame seeds
½ cup cilantro, chopped

Place the cabbage in a large bowl and generously salt with course Celtic sea salt. Massage the salt in to cabbage and let stand for about 15 minutes to help soften the cabbage. When softened to your liking, rinse well and drain.
Combine the cabbage with the mung beans, scallions, jalapeno, ginger, currants and coconut, if using. Whisk, by hand, the lime juice, olive or hemp oil, turmeric and cumin powder. Pour over the cabbage and toss to combine then season with Celtic or Himalayan salt to taste. If possible, chill for at least an hour and toss thoroughly again before serving. This will allow all the flavors to mingle and blend. Garnish with hemp, black sesame seeds and cilantro and serve as a refreshing salad or side dish.