Quarantine Food Diaries, Happy Easter, Nostalgia, Poppy Seed Filled Krantz

It ran me over like a freight train, it started with a whimper, quiet but persistent and slowly groaned into a full blown attack of nostalgia which led to today’s recipe. Maybe it was the recent Terrence Malik movie I just watched,  A Hidden Life, which took place in Austria.   My Polish grandparents were in charge of Easter meals, and this year, this time, though I have never had the urge to make this before, nostalgia for family holiday gathering gripped me and wouldn’t let go. So I upturned my storage unit looking for my Polish family recipes, paged through until I found this poppy seed filled, yeast risen pastry we ate every Easter morning together, Frozen Krantz is what we would call it, not sure why as it was not frozen but it is utterly Eastern European in it’s use of Poppy seeds. It was a labor of love taking two full days and phone calls to both my mother and my aunt to establish proper ingredients from my grandmother’s handwritten and now photocopied original recipe. I found it, I found my togetherness through making this. And brought it to my kids as well, I had my son roll out the dough and spread the poppy seed paste. We FaceTimed my mother and she watched in approval. I found that first bite when just barely cool enough to cut, flooded me with the scents of my grandparent's kitchen on Easter morning. Polish kielbasa my grandfather had made boiling in giant pot, pierogi sliding into their pot one by one, the bacon rendering in preparation for running over the cooked soft dough pillows stuffed with sweet cheese, the ham on the bone baking since early morning. My cousins and I would reach for the then uncut frozen Kranz and my grandmother raising that one crooked but beautiful pointer finger would say, "not yet" to all of us while wielding a wooden spoon. Her round body was dressed to the nines and Zsa Zsa Gabor famous swooping waves framed her forehead. My grandfather stood by basting the ham and checking on his kielbasa, always between a soft hum and a whistle between his teeth while he worked. I can honestly say I truly eat nothing like this and have not longed for these flavors much at all, but something about this holiday has me searching for ways to relive these gatherings centered around food, and I found it around a sweet polish pastry, thank you Grandma ( for the nudge from above), Mom, and Aunt Susan, Happy Easter.I may regret the effects of white flour and sugar on my body later but my spirit needed it. It was Anais Nin who said " we write to taste life twice, in the moment and in retrospect" nothing more true than that, and well possibly the making of frozen Krantz before writing about it. And music, between my tastebuds and my ears a literal symphony of moving memories flood in.You may never make this, but I will share the recipe all the same.

Poppy Seed Frozen Krantz

Spotify Playlist

Polish Easter

Quarantine Food Diaries, Day 18 ( really 24), Jai Hanuman, Moqueca ( Brazilian Fish Stew)

“The day the power of love overrules the love of power, the world will know peace.”

― Mahatma Gandhi

 We all have power, each of us, but how we use our power, that sets apart those who are able to stand outside of ego based consciousness and those that are not able. I woke this morning feeling once again my devotion to unconditional love being challenged by the misuse of power in others and was left feeling a deep sadness.
 Today is the spiritual holiday of  Lord Hanuman in India. Lord Hanuman symbolically stands for pure devotion, complete surrender and absence of ego or the lower self. His character tells us what we can do in our lives by becoming pure devotees of God, aligning ourselves with the forces of good, helping the weak, with self control, unconditional love and total surrender. How many of us are actually willing to make this our daily discipline? This period of quarantine can be a time to reflect on how we use our power, how we can discipline the mind  to leave the ego in each instant, raising our vibration  to one that seeks to offer love and view with compassion. Couldn't we opt to press the pause button before speaking, take a breath, see behind the thought creating the desire to misuse the power we have? I challenge you to choose today to empty your cup of all the preconceived ideas you have about how one is supposed to be a parent, a child, a friend, a lover, a coworker, an employer, a student, a teacher and instead ask how understanding we are all the same can shake up your perceptions. 

I love you when you are strong.
I love you when you are not.
I love you when you are beautiful and
I love you when your physical beauty fades because it is not that which made you beautiful to me to begin with.
I love you when I see your light shining, burning through all your shadows and 
I love the you that sees the shadows and has compassion for what they were born of.
I love the you that embraces the world and the you that takes reprieve from it to restore. 
I love the you that is the witness and the you that struggles to return to it over and over  again.
I love the you that reaches the stars and the you whose roots touch the core of the earth. 
I love the you that is me and the you that is all of us.

Moqueca - Brazilian Fish Stew

Feeds 2 

1/2 lb cod

4 small squid with tentacles

2 limes

2 garlic cloves minced

2 tomatoes

1/2 red onion

1 red or orange pepper

1 bunch cilantro

1 14oz can coconut milk

1 tbsp paprika

1 tbsp coriander

1 tbsp chili oil

1 cup Nishiki rice

Mirin 

Cut squid in rings and cod in pieces and coat in juice of 1 lime, salt pepper, and 1 minced garlic clove, set aside.

Saute´chopped onion, red pepper and tomatoes in olive oil until translucent on medium heat, add spices and coat well. Add fish and coconut milk, cilantro, bring to a boil cover and simmer 10-15 min.  At the same time start your rice. 1 cup rice to 1 1/2 cup water, pinch of salt, boil cover and simmer 10 min. Add a dash of Mirin, set aside.

Plating, use a soup bowl and ladle in your Moqueca, place a ball of sticky rice in a separate bowl to add in. garnish with sauteéd dark greens, cilantro leaves, and chili oil !

Meet me on the mat Budokon Yoga flow

Budokon Flow

Quarantine Food Diaries, Day 17, Sushi !

"The way you do anything is the way you everything"

Wake, meditate, practice, coffee, meal plan, eat, enjoy my company, or my partner's, write, take a bath, rest, watch a movie, indulge in something sweet and maybe some wine, sleep. Rinse, wash and repeat. It's been ok, somedays it's been soothing and satisfying to be out of routine of going out and allowing for the pleasure of staying in. But yesterday I couldn't settle into anything, I felt I had lost my muse, my inspiration, felt scattered and not particularly vibrant, and so I noticed that, accepted it and waited for it to pass, compassion for myself. Each day brings a gust that aims at teetering even the most practiced mind, invite it, welcome it. Teach your practice to be steadier.
Today my partner said....why not get dressed up today? Date night? That was it, the care and mindfulness we choose to take with anything we do, say or think is really the way we do, say or think everything, so let's pay attention. I meditated, walked the dog, took in the deep green hues the rains of spring are bringing forth, returned, showered and got dressed up!

There is no more mindful practice of cooking and plating than creating sushi, the decorative designs creating almost sacred geometric patterns with placement of each ingredient, it is much like the Tibetan sand mandalas.  I brushed my eyelid with a burnt umber shadow, the mirror revealed the contrast between the blue iris and brown umber lid, a plump coating of  black mascara and a swish of clear gloss and my face was defined differently. A pair of stilettos, white bodysuit and black gauchos, my french grey linen apron donned and my posture changed to reflect the  poise and elegance of show horse. I sauntered to the kitchen, he caught me off guard and I coquettishly raised a stilleto in the air like a classic pin up girl and flashed him a smile as he snapped a photo, forever memorializing this moment.  I think both about the absurdity of all of this and how my inner child loves the attention, mainly from him. 

 I examined the Albacore steak, let it sit to take the chill off and dry it before coating it with a generous brush stroke of a wasabi, mirin, and homemade mayonnaise paste. 

At each step of the process, opportunity for trying. I brought in a sweet cherry blossom and it found it's way into a small appetizer of the albacore sushi grade tuna with a mirin, ginger, and  amino acids ( gluten free soy sauce) . I could have stopped there, the seared wasabi crust balanced the cool raw albacore, the drizzle a fragrant trinity, undertones of orange, subtle sweetness and zing of freshly grated ginger.
Simplicity.

I laid out a sheet of Nori and began composing, rolling and slicing little round worlds of color,  land masses in greens and pinks surrounded by a sea of white contained within the thinnest sheet of deep green black. They did look like planets to me. I continued creating planet upon planet with, slow roasted beets, cucumber, avocado, and I even made a variation of a buffalo albacore roll with a hot sauce drizzle and crushed potato chips.. not sure I enjoyed that much fusion but it was fun.  Find the joy in everything, create a practice of discipline in all that you do.

Albacore Sushi Rolls

1 Sushi grade albacore loin ( Whole Foods) 

3 sheets Nori seasweed wraps

1 cup Nishiki rice

1 Avocado sliced in batons

1 Cucumber sliced into batons

( I had leftover beets too) 

wasabi paste

pickled ginger

black and white sesame seeds

2 tbsp amino acids or soy sauce

2 tbsp Mirin

freshly grated ginger

for the wasabi paste:

1 tsp wasabi paste

1 tbsp homemade or store bought maionnase

2 tsp Mirin

1 tsp freshly grated ginger

Put 1 cup of Nishiki rice and 1 1/2 cups water to boil, when boiling simmer and cover 10 min. Add a dash of Mirin when done and keep covered off the heat until you need it.
Make your wasabi paste, dry the tuna after letting it sit outside the fridge for 10 minutes. coat the tuna and sear, high heat 2 min each side careful not to burn.  Please don't cook all the way through, we are only trying to sear the outside surfaces and keep the tuna raw.
arrange your batons of veggies and even if you don't have a bamboo sushi roller, as I don't, no problem, just roll carefully pressing from the center to the edges as you go. Lay the rice in thin sheet in the center of the Nori extending to the edges, delicately build tuna, avocado, cucumber additional wasabi paste and sesame seeds, tuck and roll. Important to have a sharp knife and consistently clean it between slices. Don't worry about the wild ends, they are the abstract versions of your sushi rolls!!
Origato cos hai mas!!

Quarantine Food Diaries, Day 16, Enough!

Last year same time, Notre Dame near the Shakespeare and company bookstore with a golden milk latte, how things have changed, woah! When I think back on all the giant change I have seen in my lifetime I weep for the world. Hope that all the rub creates the most brilliant polished gold of who we can be and how we treat our planet and each other, enough! 

A short blog today, it’s just enough. Introspecting. Enjoy a Golden Milk Latte recipe on me.

•••••Golden Milk Latte•••••

1/2 cup water

1/4 cup turmeric 

1 tsp black pepper

1 tbsp coconut oil 

1 tsp fresh ginger grated 

1/2 tsp cinnamon 

1 tsp ashwaganda

Heat the water until boiling add all ingredients and reduce to a paste, remove from heat and set aside.

Meanwhile warm 2 cups coconut milk add 1/2tsp cinnamon, 1 tsp coconut oil, 1 tbsp of newly made turmeric paste and honey to taste!

Quarantine Food Diaries, Day 15, Herbed Beluga Lentils and Seed Sounds

I have never met a lentil I didn't like, but Beluga lentils are a rare and beautiful thing, they keep there shape and have the most satisfying "pop" in your mouth like the famous caviar they are named after. Please don't waste these on soups, the more familiar Castelluccio lentils are the soup lentil as they break at perfect cooking time and have a potato like texture making them the right bean for the job.
Beluga lentils are the luxury lentil and need to be treated as such. They are boiled for just 30 min, an addition of an onion in the cooking water or broth is essential for even cooking and then can be dressed in a myriad of ways to highlight their refined bean stature.
This brings me to my generous peppering of philosophy talks during these days. Today we are talking about seed sounds used to literally vibrate your chakras back to harmony.  So lets back up for just a second, we agree that atoms organize into matter, how dense this matter is depends specifically on how fast they move, solid, liquid or gas. We know that all things are made up of atoms and each specific thing has a specific rate of movement of those atoms, or frequency, to remain in the state they are. For example if you speed up water atoms enough they turn to a gas...think water boiling.
Great so now take this and we can apply it further to sound, each tone has a specific hertz or sound frequency when we use our vocal chords to produce specific sounds these sounds vibrate specifically in the same frequency that align to our individual chakras. Not mysticism, science.  SO...we are all isolated, it's the perfect time to try out your shower singing on your chakras,  rebalancing your sense of security, Root Chakra, your creativity and libido, Sacral Chakra, your self confidence Solar Plexus Chakra, your compassion, Heart Chakra, find your voice, Throat Chakra, and trust in your own intuition, Third Eye Chakra.
And how exactly, you might ask? Repeat the seed sound at least ten times each, moving from root chakra to crown chakra, make your voice natural but feel your own vocal chords as you repeat each sound, they are subtle changes, we are working with subtle energy bodies.

Have fun, don't take yourself so seriously, and Bija (seed sound) away!

Meanwhile I'll be making my Beluga lentils for you.

Herbed Beluga Lentils 

1 1/2 Cups Beluga lentils

4 cups broth or water

1/2 white onion

olive oil

fresh herbs, dill, parsley, mint

red cabbage

lemon zest

sal and pepper

(indulgent- drizzle black truffle oil) 

Saute' minced onion in 2 tbsp olive oil until translucent, add lentils and thoroughly coat with oil before adding 4 cups of broth or water ( I used chicken broth) 

bring to a boil and cover, slow boil for 30 min. Every once and a while check, the lentil should "pop"in your mouth with a soft center, not crunch.

Once lentils are cook drain them of excess water or broth and dress. Add olive oil, salt and pepper, chopped fresh herbs, as many as you'd like, I like a lot. arrange on a plate and top with julienned red cabbage, grated lemon zest and voila! If you happen to have truffle oil , drizzle it on top and skip the lemon zest.

Quarantine Food Diaries, Day 14, Doshas , Root Vegetable Lasagna

Starting our third week of quarantine and I'm called to return to root veggies. Ayurvedic medicine will say that root veggies address balance in your root chakra, makes sense, right? So what resides in our root chakra, well it is what we are all feeling right now, our sense of fundamental security. Root chakra governs our feeling of stability in life, our basic needs of food, water, shelter and safety. If we are secure in our basic needs then generally our root chakra is balanced and we feel grounded. Because our very basic needs are being threatened almost daily, no matter who you are it will take some serious discipline working with those things that would help to balance our root chakra. Through diet this means root veggies, warm milks, porridges, grounding foods. Now might not be the time to do a juice cleanse, but rather to allow yourself the physical grounding of the aforementioned foods.
I've made various versions of veggie lasagnas in my day, not being able to eat eggplant is such a bummer as it makes for a perfect veggie lasagna, zucchini is a little watery for my tastes in a layered dish and they are not in season locally anyway. Remember, for so many reasons, eat seasonally and locally. Fruits and veggies that don't have to travel and are local are of a much higher vibration and therefore assimilated by the body better.
Root veggies like sweet potatoes, rutabagas and parsnips are high Vitamin A, K and C boosting immunity and are super anti oxidant.

In Ayurveda one aspect of looking at wellness involves knowing your specific dosha or breakdown of doshic dominance. Translated literally,  the word dosha means, that which can cause imbalance, therefore we are clued into the fact that balancing our doshas is a lifelong journey. Each of the three doshas are comprised of a combination of each of the five elements ( ether, air, fire, water and earth)
Vata governs air and space, Pitta, fire and water and Kapha,  water and earth. So what does all this mean? The answer is, like so many answers in eastern medicine, "it depends".  All of us have each of the doshas within us, but primarily one and secondarily another.  Once you know which one is your primary and secondary you can really begin to holistically look at how you function based on this information. To find out take this free quiz. You will have to put in your email, sort of annoying but, it's a very well done test with a ton of information for your specific doshic distribution. 

Banyan Botanicals Dosha Quiz

I am mainly Vata mind / Pitta body, when I feel things spinning for me I do two things, I eat something grounding and I put on a hat, yes, a hat. There are doshic balancing postures in yoga too, this week at Balanced Planet Yoga I am teaching a Vata balancing gentle vinyasa...feel free to join me. Thursday morning at 9:30am. Follow the link below and set up your mind body account if you don't already have one. If you do, find Balanced Planet Yoga in Marlton and sign up for my class, an email will be sent to you on what to do next.

mind body log in

Have fun with your quiz and feel free to ask as many questions in my comments section as I love love talking specifically about balancing doshas and keeping them from derangement.

Root Veggie Lasagna

350F    

1 Japanese white sweet potato

1 sweet potato

1 rutabaga

1 turnip

2 potatoes

1 can peeled tomatoes

fresh basil

1 white onion

extra virgin olive oil

Vegan version ( silken tofu, soy milk, garlic, basil, salt, pepper)

dairy version ( goat cheese, parmiggiano, basil, parsley, salt and pepper)

I used my mandolin component to my cuisinart, it is key to slice your root veggies exactly the same widths so they cook evenly, attempting to thinly slice a raw rutabaga or sweet potato by hand is not easy.  Place sliced root veggies in water and put aside.

saute' 1/4 of the white onion chopped in a little olive oil in a small pot until translucent, add crushed peeled tomatoes, torn basil leaves to taste, salt, and pepper. Bring sauce to a boil and simmer 15 min longer. 

Meanwhile, if you are preparing the vegan version put in a blender about 3 oz. silken tofu, 1/2 cup of soy milk, 1 garlic clove, basil and salt and pepper) blend into a "cream sauce" put aside.

Otherwise once the sauce has simmered you are ready to layer, using one layer of goat cheese and parmiggiano in between alternating layers of sauce and veggie "pasta" sheets.

Layer until finished. If using the vegan cream sauce layer that in place of the goat cheese.

cook at 350F for 2 hours covered with foil. 

Take out and garnish with fresh herbs of your choice!!

Quarantine Food Diaries, Day 13, Resourcefulness

We are adaptable creatures, humans, and this global time out was what we had been screaming for actually. As a yoga teacher I can't tell you how many times I heard people silently screaming for down time. This forced down time has seen many faces, I revisited  a passage recently that I thought really talked about this well. Christopher Sartain in his book,  The Sacred Science of Yoga and the Five Koshas, poses this:
"It is imbalance, chaos, and disharmony that causes creation. It is the universe's ebb and flow and search for harmony and order out of chaos that allows all to exist and evolve. " 
Necessity is the mother of invention. Though this period seems outrageously oppressive and disconnected, literally isolating, it has also brought about creation in areas that may not have been explored by individuals looking to reach a new normal within this chaos.
I am watching and listening to those I know and love talk about deeper connections with family, making bread and milks at home, going inward and discovering that landscape. I love these aspects of this time. It is a rare and amazing, looking at this helps to balance the onslaught minute by minute news reports, I implore you to turn off your televisions and bake bread, make almond or cashew milk.
My daughter called me and excitedly shared she was making a variety of nut milks and wanted to share, have a tasting... like mother like daughter I suppose. She walked out to me, silver tray in hand, 5 crystal shot glasses filled with variations in sweetness, additions of espresso and a beautifully whipped espresso cream to add as the "crema" atop any of the 4 versions. I've made this the subject of today's recipe. I will say I preferred the cashew milk which surprised me. I was also amazingly surprised at the

Almond or Cashew Milk 

1cup raw nuts (almonds or cashews) 

4 cups filtered water

3 tbsp maple syrup

2 tsp vanilla extract

pinch of salt

cheese cloth

blender

mason jar for storage

soak nuts overnight, or 6 hours in hot water if you're impatient

drain nuts, blend with 4 cups of filtered water blend on medium, add maple syrup, vanilla and salt, blend another minute. Strain through cheesecloth or nut milk bag and squeeze as much out as you can, you could double strain but she doesn't. 

Another friend I'll pass along found a foolproof no knead bread recipe for those of you out there who are eating wheat products... looks good, keep up the kitchen love.

Artisanal Bread

I have stalled on this post for one reason, I recorded a good vigorous vinyasa flow of 1:15 minutes but I totally screwed up a posture name and decided I would cut it and be able to edit later... I'm stumped, no go, can't edit it out who knows, but excuse the blip and enjoy the class!!

Vigorous Vinyasa Flow