atlantalarry

The pink slime dilemma

Whether you call it "pink slime" (the most popular term) or "lean finely textured beef" (the beef industry's preferred name for the substance) that particular emulsified food product consisting of beef trimmings treated with ammonia has become one of the most notorious food additives of the past few decades.

Various forms of meat slurry are not unique.  The popular engineered food "chicken nuggets" are produced by a similar process.  And those longtime slurries of the processed meat world, hot dogs and sausages (unless you make them yourselves), have always included components that it's best not to think about if you intend to eat them.  Meat slurries and chemical additives are among the reasons I mostly eat food from plants, and overwhelmingly buy those foods in a form which makes them easily recognizable to me.  The tomatoes I buy or grow look like tomatoes.  The beans are clearly beans.  Even the flours I buy tend to look like what they are purported to be, and if I buy organic whole wheat the likelihood that it is really ground grain is high enough for me to accept.

The argument that pink slime is being treated unfairly may have a grain of truth to it.  Pink slime has the disadvantage of being pink and slimy.  It also had the misfortune to have its derisive popular name stick.  The likelihood that the industry's chosen name, "lean finely textured beef" is ever going to gain currency is nearly zero.  But on the other hand pink slime is probably no more unsafe (or in my opinion unappealing), than the tens of thousands of other highly processed food-like products foisted upon the public every year.

There are two interesting arguments I've seen advanced defending pink slime.

The first is that the controversy is killing companies, and consequently jobs.  That's true, but industries are hurt by negative publicity all the time.  The same argument could be used to defend the tobacco industry, or to remove toy safety regulations.  Consumers have indicated clearly that they don't want to eat a slimy, pink, ammonia-processed food additive in their hamburgers.  The USDA actually approved the stuff.  So if you would like to use the "job killer" argument blame the consumer. 

The second is that pink slime serves a resource friendly and animal friendly purpose by using more of the cow.  True, as far as the argument goes, but not eating beef is an even better way of conserving resources (the inefficiency of cattle as a food source is well documented).  Likewise not killing the cow at all is a kinder act than making sure that every bit of cartilage and ligament winds up in the hamburger or hot dog..

My own preference, and there isn't any means of enforcing it except by increasing the availability of nutritional information, and knowledge of the process by which food gets to our table, is for people to eat real food rather than highly processed and highly engineered extruded "product".

As a start, I think everyone should read the book Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal, by Eric Schlosser.  It goes into a great deal of detail on how factory farming and the fast food industry operates.

In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto is another book with excellent descriptions of our descent from eating food to eating highly engineering food-like product. I think the bar should be set higher for what we consider acceptable eating habits. "It won't kill you", while a good criteria at the extreme end, is hardly an encouraging endorsement of any food or diet.

 

 

 

Smoothie with a bit of a kick -- Habanero spinach smoothie

I experiment with food combinations with an enthusiasm that has often horrified my friends and relatives.  Sometimes the more unusual combinations are quite tasty, and only sound awful.  Sometimes they are just awful.  I also browse the Dekalb Farmer's market, and the various ethnic specialty grocery stores in metro Atlanta for new ingredients, and follow studies in the scientic press on possible beneficial (or detrimental) effects of various food components.

Lately I decided to add more hot peppers to my diet, based on studies indicating that capsicain, the chemical which makes hot pepper hot, might lower blood pressure and cholesterol.

Since I'm drinking a lot of smoothies these days, I decided to try a smoothie with habanero pepper (for breakfast, no less!)

Here's what I came up with.  It was actually quite tasty.

1 avocado

1 medium tomato

1 banana

1/2 cup frozen blueberries

2 cups soy milk

1 cup spinach

1/4 habenero with seeds

1 T flax seeds

1 T chia seeds

1 T walnuts

1 t cinnamon

I ground the dry ingredients (flax seed, chia seed, walnuts) first, then added the other ingredients and blend until smooth. By my standards, it's hot, but not blazingly hot.  If your tolerance for heat is lower, you could try using less habanero, or subsitute a milder pepper.

Cold Kale and Apple soup

The highs have been greater than 80 degrees fahrenheit here in Georgia (27 C).  Consequently I've been assembling a list of cold foods to add to my menu rotation.

I'm not a raw foodist by any means, but I do appreciate the health benefits of eating raw vegetables.  So I've been experimenting with cold, raw blender soups and smoothies, and browsing raw food recipe books for ideas.  I stumbled on one of by favorite cold soup recipes by accident.  It's a modified version  of a smoothie from the book 12 Steps to Raw Foods: How to End Your Dependency on Cooked Food

 

While Ms. Boutenko's version included lemon, and two cups of water, I didn't have lemon on hand, and wanted to use up some kale I had in the refrigerator.  I used the amount of apple she recommended, but increased the amount of kale, decreased the water by half, and added basil and parsley.  The increased solids transformed it from a smoothie to a cold soup.  In subsequent versions I added a medium tomato to the mix.

So here's the finished recipe:

4 cups chopped kale leaves

1 large or two small apples, cored but with the peel left on

1 medium tomato

2 teaspoons dried basil

2 teaspoons dried parsley

1 cup water (add more if the consistency is too thick)

Blend until smooth.

I'd highly recommend Ms. Boutenko's book, too.  I almost always modify recipes significantly, but the smoothies and soups in her book provide a great starting point for an introduction to green smoothies and blender soups.

 

Crafting the ultimate healthy breakfast -- a work in progress

Partly as a result of turning 60 (and a subsequent increase in my sense of mortality), and partly as the result of a recent physical which revealed elevated LDL (the "bad" cholesterol) and elevated blood pressure, I've doubled down on my eating habits and exercise regimen.  I've always been very healthy and active, and intend to stay that way for as long as I can stave off the inevitable decline.  I don't view this as frightening, or even sad.  In fact, at the moment I'm having fun with it.

I'll describe my revised exercise regimen in a future post, but one of the more fun things about embarking on this project is menu planning.  I love to cook, and I love to plan menus and shop for ingredients. 

One decision I made was to make breakfast my central meal.  The criteria I've set is low fat, low sodium, high fiber, and densely packed with nutrients, including a wide range of phytochemicals.  Variety is good from a nutritional standpoint, but I'll shift most of the variety to dinner, since that is the meal my wife also eats, and I don't want to create monotonous meals for her.    For breakfast and lunch, the important thing for me is the highest nutritional value packed into the fewest possible calories.

Here's my current regular breakfast.  I'm still working on lunch.

The meal consists of a warm cereal, a smoothie, a tangerine or banana, and a glass of herb tea mixed with psyllium husk.

The warm cereal consists of the following ingredients:

1/4 cup steel cut oats (aka "Irish oatmeal")

1/4 cup oat bran

2/3 cups blueberries

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon turmeric

2 teaspoons olive oil

I just cook the steel cut oats (it helps to presoak overnight so that the cooking time is faster, mix in the bran and cook for another five minutes, then add the other ingredients.

The smoothie is a particular point of pride for me.  Despite ingredients that may seem bizarre, it actually tastes quite good.  The ingredients as my current recipe stands are:

 

1 cup raw kale

1 medium tomato

1 cup blueberries

1 tablespoon flax seeds

1 tablespoon chia seeds

1 tablespoon raw cocoa nibs

2 cups soy milk

1 tablespoon vegan protein powder

1 teaspoon cinnamon.

I grind the flaxseed, chia, and cocoa nibs before adding the other ingredients.

 

My plan for lunches is to emphasize legumes and whole grains.  I don't have the complete details worked out, but yesterday for lunch I ate some hummous I'd made on whole wheat pita.  Along with that I drank a smoothie consisting of:

2 cups raw kale

1 gala apple

1 medium tomato

1 cup water

I intend to keep tinkering with the breakfast menu, but it will generally stay somewhat invariable.  The lunch will consist of similar elements (eg, beans and grains with a vegetable smoothie), but will vary somewhat in the specifics.

So far, so good.  I have an appointment in four months to revisit the blood work.  If the numbers are still less than optimal, it won't be from lack of effort.

 

 

A stuffed winter squash recipe from the Fat Free Vegan Kitchen

Since I made the decision to opt out of the manner in which most Americans (and most people worldwide, for that matter) produce food and eat, and since I adopted veganism, I've been on the lookout for good sources of cooking methods, ingredients, and recipes.  There are a number fantastic vegan cookbooks on the market now, and four or five really good web resources.

One of my favorite sources for recipes is the Fat Free Vegan Kitchen .  The recipes have been fantastic with clear instructions and beautiful photos.

This weekend I made Sweet Dumpling squash stuffed with lemon-herb rice.  The Dekalb Farmer's Market had everything I needed, aside from the time spent cooking the brown rice the time requirements weren't daunting, and the result was spectacular.  It was a very delicious and attractive side dish.

I'd recommend this blog as a good source of vegan recipes.  My next dish from this blog is going to be
the Mushroom, Lentil, and Wild Rice Timbales

Vegan night at Kasan Red

For about the past three weeks Kasan Red, a restaurant on the corner of Glenwood and Flat Shoals in East Atlanta, has been hosting a vegan night on Tuesdays.  In addition to the standard menu they have an assortment of vegan selections.  Here is a description I posted on a couple of East Atlanta forums:

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Tuesdays Kasan Red offers a vegan menu (along with the regular menu). You can get coupons at SOPO for five dollars off the starter/entree/dessert combo.  I went last night, and below is the mini-review I posted on another forum:

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I picked up one of the coupons from SOPO yesterday evening, and had dinner at Kasan Red.  Since I
don't generally eat out on weeknights and considered this a special exploratory expedition, I went all
out and ordered a starter, entree, and dessert.  It turned out pricey, but an overall good experience, and
one consolation is that there was so much food that I don't have to prepare lunch this morning.

My selections were the Veggie Panini, the Vegan Rosti, and a chocolate tart.

It was all delicious.  I particularly liked the Veggie Rosti.  Also the sweet potato chips were among
the best I've ever had.

The one thing I wish were done differently is the choice of bread for the Panini.  I love Panini, but wish
there were more availability of whole grain focaccia.  My motivation for my veganism is mixed
(compassion towards animals, environmental and ecological concerns, global economics, and health),
but the part of me which is focused on the health aspects much prefers whole grains to white flour, and
I'll bet there are many other vegans out there who agree with me.

All in all it was a great experience, and the folks there were really friendly.

Green Sprout Restaurant

I made a decision a few months back to write only when I have something to write about, and to write about anything which interests me, not just the urban and neighborhood issues which made up most of my subject matter when I was at my most active blogging.Lately I've been exploring vegetarian and vegan restaurants in Atlanta.  I wrote the review below of Green Sprout for HappyCow's Vegetarian Guide.

As a vegan, Green Sprouts is on my top five list of restaurants in Atlanta. 

First of all, the staff understands the concept of vegan, so I don't have to interrogate them about where the food comes from and what animal products may be hidden therein.

Secondly, the menu is extensive and varied, so I'm not confined to a third class afterthought section of the menu, which even happens all too often in ostensibly "vegetarian" restaurants.

Finally, the food is absolutely delicious, so I feel very comfortable bringing my non-vegan friends along with me.

It's also an excellent restaurant for a group of people to order a selection of menu items and share. I went in a party of five yesterday, and consequently got a really broad sampling of choices, from an odd but tasty sauteed potato dish, to a tofu skin wrapped bean sprout dish, a butternut squash selection, and a couple of stir fried noodle dishes.

The last time I was there, I ordered one of the simulated chicken dishes (Empire Chicken). While I realize many vegans object to that sort of dish, it was eerily convincing, and very tasty. Since a large part of my decision to go vegan was ethical,
I think well prepared dishes of that sort serve as
a "soft landing" means of introducing people to the possibility of veganism.

Many kudos to this wonderful restaurant.

Veganomicon

I have no idea what caused me to abruptly adopt a vegan diet.  I imagine it was some combination of the recent news from the beef industry involving the slaughter of animals too sick to walk, environmental concerns regarding the efficiency of animal-based food production, and the health issues involved with a meat centric diet.

But mostly I think I'm just an experimental sort of guy, who also loves to eat and cook, and given the existence of stores like the Dekalb Farmer's Market, Sevananda, the Rainbow Market, and Return to Eden, it's both possible and fun to set some parameters on what I will or will not eat. 
And restaurants like the Cafe Sunflower and R Thomas make it possible to eat out without being relegated to the bland and oddly textured portion of the menu.

Another thing making veganism possible without descending into a miserable sort of asceticism  is the proliferation of decent vegan cookbooks.

A few weeks ago I bought a copy of Veganomicon: The Ultimate Vegan Cookbook by Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Hope Romero.  These two interesting women produce a vegan cooking show called the Post Punk Kitchen.  Their website contains past episodes of the show, in addition to recipes, a discussion forum, and lots of other interesting stuff.

I have many cookbooks, but I can say honestly that Veganomicon has become my primary cookbook over the past several weeks.  I began by making their Tofu Florentine with a side of Diner Home Fries.  It was absolutely wonderful.  I've used their instructions for roasting vegetables nearly every day since the book arrived.  I've made their Chickpea Cutlets twice, and have made numerous batches of their Cheezy Sauce (a gravy like cheese sauce substitute centered around nutritional yeast).  And bear in mind I've only been using the book for a little over two weeks!

Everything I've cooked from this book so far has been delicious. 

The recipes I've used from the book were not for the short-of-attention span, however.  With the exception of the roast vegetables and the Cheezy Sauce the prep time has been considerable, particularly the first time.  But I think the preparation involved is worth it.  If you're interested is checking out just how tasty vegan food can be, this is the cookbook I'd recommend.