Soy Curls Noodle Soup

Well, what's Christmas in our house without someone being sick, and this year all 3 of us were. It's this darn bug my son picked up his first week of work in September, and it just gets passed around, over and over again. On Christmas day, it was day 5 of my husband's second go-round, day 1 of my son's 4th bout and day 2 for me and my second battle with it (or is it third?). My husband kept sneezing, my son kept coughing, and I had the sore throat and ear ache. Today I have the runny nose and cough on top of that. Sometimes it hurts to even breathe!

Needless to say, nobody felt like eating, much less cooking, yesterday. Luckily there were plenty of my son's leftovers in the fridge so he helped himself to some of that for his lunch, and he popped a frozen pizza on for his dinner. This isn't the first time he had pizza for Christmas dinner, so it was a good thing to him. He told me weeks ago he wanted pizza, anyway, that's why I had one. My husband insisted on his usual sandwiches for lunch and refused my offer to make him something else. I really needed soup of some kind and found this video by Jill McKeever while roaming the Internet while son fought with his computer and hubby dozed:


This soup is the first one she does in the video, and the written recipe is available for free on her web site in PDF format. You have to go to the store, choose the Winter Soups file, go through the whole paying info page (use a fictitious name and numbers if you want), and then download the file.

Jill's Soy Curls Noodle Soup 

After you make this the first time, you'll want to keep lo mein noodles on hand all the time. For soy curls fans, this soup is perfect for those soy curls crumbs you have waiting in the freezer.

Serves 4 to 6

3 celery stalks, chopped
8 button mushrooms, sliced
1 large carrot, diced
1 1/2 cups dry soy curls, broken into small pieces
8 cups vegetable broth
2 teaspoons soy sauce
2 teaspoons curry
1 teaspoon ground mustard
2 cups fresh spinach
1 package lo mein noodles, broken into fourths

Water sauté celery stalks, mushrooms, and carrot until tender. Add soy curls, vegetable broth, soy sauce, curry, ground mustard, soy sauce. Bring to a boil. Stir in spinach and lo mein noodles Turn off heat; partially cover with lid for 5 minutes. Dinner is on!

Now for my changes. Because I didn't plan on making this soup, especially on a day when all the grocery stores are closed, I didn't have all the listed ingredients, but Jill says in the video even *she* didn't have all the ingredients when she made it and improvised.

Celery and carrots - I always try keep a few containers of mirepoix on hand in the freezer, so even though this soup didn't call for onions, I just tossed the whole frozen lump of veggies in the IPot. My store carries one pint sized containers.

Mushrooms - Tossed in an 8 ounce can of no salt added stems and pieces, complete with the water. This way I didn't have to add any water to saute the veggies.

Veggie broth - in the video she uses only 1 quart of broth, but at the end she plays around and adds some plant milk to make it into a creamy noodle soup. I stuck with the one box.

Soy curls - Even though they're allowed in small quantities on the McDougall program, I keep forgetting I have some in the fridge. When I dug down and crawled to the back of the bottom shelf where I still had a bag and a half of them I saw they were both dated 11/2015. Oops. No Soy Curls for the soup. That's okay. With this throat, they probably would have hurt going down, anyway.

Noodles - Ever since I read Dr. McD advising those with auto-immune diseases, especially RA, to go gluten free, I've been avoiding wheat, so no lo mein noodles for me. Luckily, a few weeks ago we made a trip to Target and I found these rice ramen noodles. So I tossed the "flavor pack", broke up the noodles in the bag, and used these. Not perfect, but better than opening up a pound bag of Tinkyada spaghetti. Our local Stop and Shop is phasing out Tinyada products (NO!!!!!!!!!!) so only has 3 or 4 different shapes, and fettuccine isn't one of them. That would have been perfect.

Spinach - Frozen, of course.

I'm sorry, no picture. I ate all but about a cup of it, and that's packed away in a container in the fridge. Jill's video has better graphics than my soup in a container.

It tasted delicious! The curry was what my sinuses needed and it may have even relieved the ear ache for a while. By the time I got down to that last little bit, my throat was saying "Enough!" and my tummy reluctantly agreed. I'll probably finish it off as a mid-morning snack today. It's not even enough to pour over some rice and call it lunch.

Will I make it again? Definitely! I already tossed some Soy Curls in my cart in Amazon so I can have them on hand again. I just have to remember I have them and use them. As written, this would make a nice, filling soup for dinner for the 2 of us and I look forward to having it again. 

Now to find a nice soothing soup for today's lunch. I had already planned last week to have Mary McDougall's Curried Split Pea Soup (subbing turnips for the taters) for tonight's dinner. Maybe the blended up Quick Black Bean Soup? Oh, wait. I already planned on Potatohead's Black Bean and Sweet Potato Soup for Wednesday. Maybe Jeff Novick's grand-cousin's Pinto Bean Soup but without the rice and veggies. It's hard to find something spur-of-the-moment to make when avoiding gluten and nightshades! In the past, I would have just made some mashed potatoes and be done with it! I'll figure something out between now and noon. Maybe I'll even make this soup again. :)

Webinar - Urinary Diseases

Darn! I forgot all about this and missed the live broadcast. My husband has been sick - another cold - so we've just been hanging around, reading and watching tv. At least I can watch this later while he takes a nap.

I better not forget about next week's webinar on arthritis - I even submitted questions for that one.

Congrats, SpudFit!

You know you've got it made in America when SNL mocks you!

Dr. Lisle Subbing for Dr. McDougall Webinar

For some reason Dr. McDougall couldn't make it to the scheduled webinar on arthritis, and Dr. Doug Lisle filled in at the last minute. The arthritis talk will (hopefully!) be next Thursday. Don't forget to download the chapter from the book from the web page.

A Christmas Miracle!

In my email when I awoke this morning came an announcement from YouTube that Gustavo was currently live doing a webinar entitled "Whole Foods Webinar." Of course, it was no longer live, since I read this email hours after it was sent, but I clicked the link, anyway, and look what I found - a webinar with not only Dr. McDougall, but his wife Mary and daughter Heather, another Gustavo favorite Dr Doug Lisle, and - are my eyes deceiving me?? - Jeff Novick! This is truly a Christmas miracle, seeing Jeff in a discussion again! Oh, how I missed him!


I haven't had a chance to watch it yet but did download it to my computer, in case it vanishes. That happens frequently on Gustavo's YouTube page. I suggest you all hurry and do the same.

IMPORTANT - Cusinart Food Processor Blade Recall

I just found out that my food processor is one of the many that has the S-blade that's being recalled. My machine is around 10 years old, so it's not just newer models with the faulty blades.

To see if your Cuisinart food processor is on the recall list GO TO THIS PAGE and check.

The "form" they refer to later in the page is the box with the questionnaire near the top. If you click enough boxes the form will appear where you place your address so they can send the replacement blade.

Dr. Lisle is a Busy Man - Talk with Chef AJ

Another Dr Doug Lisle Q&A Webinar

Another Starch Solution Webinar

Um, not really a webinar on the Starch Solution, just the usual jumble of whatever he feels like talking about at the time.

The most interesting part was when Mary McDougall would pop her head in, sometimes literally, to show off her cooking skills with making mashed potatoes in the Instant Pot. It's so cute how she treats her husband after all these years!

30 Ways to Eat Sweet Potatoes, Revisited

Jill McKeever has updated her free booklet, 30 Ways to Eat Sweet Potatoes:

New to the Instant Pot?

I know many people bought their first Instant Pot last weekend at the Amazon Black Friday/Cyber Monday sales, and many of those people never had a pressure cooker before in their lives and are deathly afraid to USE these new pots.

Well, Jill Nussinow, author of a number of cookbooks, including 2 pressure cooker books, to the rescue! With the help of some other ladies, Jill started a FaceBook community called Instant Pot Beginners Veg Support.

Even if you've been using a pressure cooker for a while, it won't hurt to join this community for all the support and information. It's just a few days old, so not a lot in the Photos, Links or Files sections yet, but there's already over 1200 members, so things are sure to pick up. Jill knows everything there is to know about pressure cookers, especially the Instant Pot, and will answer all your questions, help you solve any problem you have with your new toy.

Jeff Novick - Reduce Diabetes Risk

Difference Between Yams and Sweet Potatoes

Happy Holidays - From Jeff Novick

Frazz Comic Strip

I see someone else loves potatoes as much as McDougallers do:

Frazz on GoComics

Thanksgiving Holiday Recipes from The Nelson Twins

Like then or loathe them, one thing you can always say about Nina and Randa Nelson is that the recipes they post are always 100% McDougall-safe and usually (not always) MWLP/Jeff Novick safe.

These, being holiday recipes, do contain flour - rice, oat and/or whole wheat - and in a few recipes they add salt, something Jeff would never do.

Review of Potato Gadgets

A few months ago I discovered this guy on YouTube called Crazy Russian Hacker, who does so-called scientific experiments (like a poor man's Mythbusters) and reviews of gadgets. I showed him to my husband, then our son, and now we're all hooked on him.

Some stuff he does is just silly, like What Happens if You Freeze Balloons:



but every now and then he does something useful, like various kitchen gadgets. One of his newest videos is right up a McDougaller's alley - Potato Gadgets!



I nearly cried when I saw one of the gadgets he reviewed - an automatic potato peeler, the type I've seen (on a MUCH larger scale) in commercial plants on shows like Food Factory on TV. I said to my family it may be worth taking all the side effects I currently get from eating potatoes just to own and use this gadget! The only thing is, it only fits new/baby/creamer sized potatoes, up to 2 pounds, according to the Amazon description. Since I usually never peel that size potato, this is another gadget I now see is not worth the money, even though the premise is fantastic and exactly when I was looking for to peel potatoes like russets. If only it were larger. :(

As for that potato sensitivity - I ate Yukon Gold potatoes and plain whites 4 times last week after no spuds for at least 2 months and thought I was home-free, with not one tingle to my tongue or sinus effect. Then on day 5 I woke up in agony, with one of the most painful sore throats I ever had in my life and a snoot full of phlegm. But was it a delayed reaction to the potatoes, or did I finally catch the cold/flu that my husband and son have been passing back and forth since mid-September? I mentioned previously (here or some message board - forget where) that it feels like I'm living in a TB ward, with the 2 of them coughing day and night, as well as hearing my downstairs neighbor coughing through the floor. I'm going to assume that the fever I had for 2 day was definitive proof it is indeed the flu, even though I had gotten the flu vaccination last month.

So there's still hope I can eat potatoes again.

If my flu follows the same path as my fellows', it will be at least after January before it's gone for good. Like I said, my son has it 2 months already and called out sick from work again yesterday. But since I have an auto-immune disease, and one other year when I had the flu it lasted from December until May (NO exaggeration!), I don't expect to feel fully human again until Spring 2017. So far my son saw his primary care doc for this once and may go again this week or next (May have to wait that long for an appointment, especially with the holiday this week), and my husband wound up at the ENT once and may have to go back. I wonder which, if any, doc I'll wind up having to see? A pulmonologist? Cardiologist? MCTD can cause all sorts of problems, even without having the flu weaken an already under attack immune system!

Dr. McDougall was right again - the flu shot does nothing if it's not the exact strain of influenza that's going around that year.

Register for Next 2 McDougall Webinars

Thursday, December 1, 2016 at 11 a.m. PST

Title: The Starch Solution Master Class

Description: In this live webinar, Dr. John McDougall, MD presents The Starch Solution in a clear and concise manner so that you can invite your family and friends. This is a sustainable, simple and easy-to-follow program for everyone. Dr. McDougall will share his most practical advice that he has gathered throughout his 44 years of practicing medicine. Don’t miss this webinar that will propel you into success in 2017!

Presenter: Dr. John McDougall, MD

Host: Gustavo Tolosa, DMA

Register Here

Thursday, December 8, 2016 at 11 a.m. PST

Title: Open Question & Answer Session

Description: Dr. Doug Lisle is the psychologist for the McDougall Wellness Program and the Director of Research for True North Health Center.  Dr. Lisle has lectured at Stanford, Cornell, and other universities and is the co-author of The Pleasure Trap: Mastering the Hidden Force that Undermines Health and Happiness. He is the founder of Esteem Dynamics (esteemdynamics.org).

Presenter: Douglas J. Lisle, Ph.D.

Host: Gustavo Tolosa, DMA

Register Here

Thar Be Whales! Okay, Just One

This is about 5 minutes away from my home:

Dr. Doug Lisle Q&A Webinar

Webinar Fatigue

(Edited after seeing the written recipes and put in parentheses)

Boy, sometimes I really hate it when I'm right.

Remember this post, when I predicted what the recipes in the webinar would be like? Well, the webinar was last night. While we don't have the written recipes yet, and I was getting really tired near the end (That happens when you wake at 3am and the webinar goes until 9:30pm), here's what I got out of it so far:

It starts with AJ and Gustavo in his Dallas kitchen, AJ saying Gustavo will be doing the cooking, then she takes over and runs around messing up the place. He runs behind her throwing things in the garbage, picking up fallen food and crumbs from the counters, etc. If you've seen ANY of AJ's cooking demos you know how sloppy she can get. I'm just as bad. Fun to watch.

The recipes:

• Creamy Curried Kabocha Squash Soup
• Bodacious Beet Salad on a bed of Arugala
• House Dressing 2.0
• Stuffed Acorn Squash
• Wild Rice Stuffing
• CranPEARy Relish
• Gustavo's Green's Supreme
• Roasted mini bell peppers and Heirloom carrots
• Truly Crispy Baked Fries
• Air Fries
• Butterscotch Pie or Parfaits
• Pumpkin Pie Ice Cream

Most were done in Dallas, but 2 AJ did later in her own kitchen when she got home.

Creamy Curried Kabocha Squash Soup - Take your favorite squash soup recipe. Use Kabocha squash. Shake some curry in at the end as an afterthought.

Bodacious Beet Salad - as you can see in the photo I linked to the other day, it's beets, that orange stuff is mango, red onion. The green is fresh mint. The arugula wasn't even mentioned, but it's probably the green stuff on the platter it's later served on. (Recipe is by Shayda Solemon originally)

House Dressing 2.0 - Take the Esselstyn 3-2-1 dressing and use lime juice instead of maple syrup.

Stuffed Acorn Squash - Roast up some squash. Stuff with the wild rice recipe. While the squash is in the oven, toss in a tray of:

Mini Peppers and Sliced Heirloom Carrots - and shake on some spices, like rosemary, if desired.

Wild Rice Stuffing - It's not much different than most other wild rice stuffing recipes out there.

Gustavo's Greens Supreme - Gustavo was finally able to do his own cooking. He said he also made this dish after a McDougall webinar. Nice looking dish and probably the first, and maybe only, one I'll make from the entire webinar. 

Gustavo's cooking demo starts at 1:08

Truly Crispy Baked Fries - Gustavo's next entry. See Chuck's (Brand New Vegan) Crispy, Oven-Baked French Fries. Granted, he never claimed it was his own recipe, just how he makes them. He admits to using different spices each time it's made.

Air Fries - Again demonstrated by Gustavo. Cut up some potatoes. Toss in air fryer. Cook.

Butterscotch Pie or Parfait - sweeten some cooked sweet potatoes (by adding bananas and add pumpkin pie spice). Make a date and oatmeal raw crust and make a pie or toss it in a glass and call it a parfait. (Original recipe by Mairead Reddy)

That's the end of Dallas. Now on to AJ's kitchen:

cranPEARy Relish - I was right. It's her relish from Unprocessed made with roasted pears.

Pumpkin Pie Ice Cream - I was partially right. It's the "butterscotch" stuff that she froze in silicone trays, but tossed in a Vitamix with a bit of milk, and processed until it's soft-serve consistency. She also froze some of it in those round popsicle trays she has (In another video she showed the trays with frozen beet juice).

Then, after all the cooking was done and AJ and Gustavo said their Happy Holiday greetings and good-byes, the video ended, even though AJ had said a minute before they were going live again. A few of us are in the chat asking what happened, is it over? Turns out AJ went live with Charles and Bailey, but to see it you had to refresh your browser page, so most people missed the beginning. It was just a short holiday greeting by them. We'll see if it's in the replay or not.

AJ announced that this webinar will be rebroadcast with live chat again in December because a lot of people paid and never got the link to connect, even though they followed all the instructions. Remember how I wrote you have to hit a few more links before you were finally registered? Yeah, even jumping through all the hoops some people were left out, so they're going to re-do it. If you already paid, you can watch it for free, but if you didn't, you can pay now, get the replay and printed recipes now (When they're ready - Gustavo said by tonight - Wednesday -  they'll be sent), then catch the replay with live chat in December.

So, was it worth it? Well, unfortunately, it was worse than I expected. Recipes that aren't recipes, recipes that were direct ripoffs of someone else's recipes, recipes that changed one ingredient and were called a new recipe. But also as I expected, it was entertaining. Will I ever pay money for another cooking webinar? Even with all my bitching, yeah, I probably will. 

Again, I was tired. I was cranky. I may have mis-heard things. I'm STILL tired and cranky while writing this so early the next morning. Please don't get mad at me if I got something wrong in the comments above. It's only a blog and these are only my personal ramblings.

Ignore Everything I Say

I wound up purchasing tonight's holiday cooking webinar.

I was looking at someone's Facebook page and there was a post about it, and my husband happened to look over at the screen and saw the photos. He asked what the various dishes were and after I explained them, he said some of them look great, and asked when the webinar is. I told him I didn't bother registering because we would only use one or 2 of the recipes, and he said "So what?! Go ahead and register. You like watching AJ anyway, right?"

So I registered.

At least I now know what I'll probably be making with the squash I have sitting in a bowl in the kitchen later this week.

Dr. Doug Lisle Q&A with Chef AJ

Holiday Extravaganza Cooking Party with AJ and Gustavo

HOLIDAY EXTRAVAGANZA PARTY! 

Watch Chef AJ and Gustavo prepare TWELVE delicious recipes for the holidays!

All recipes are whole food, plant based, gluten free, free of all sugar, oil and salt and delicious!  Suitable for those following the Ultimate Weight Loss Diet or the McDougall Program for Maximum Weight Loss.

The 12 Recipes:

• Creamy Curried Kabocha Squash Soup
• Bodacious Beet Salad on a bed of Arugala
• House Dressing 2.0
• Stuffed Acorn Squash
• Wild Rice Stuffing
• CranPEARy Relish
• Gustavo's Green's Supreme
• Roasted mini bell peppers and Heirloom carrots
• Truly Crispy Baked Fries
• Air Fries
• Butterscotch Pie or Parfaits
• Pumpkin Pie Ice Cream

REGISTER HERE

Be careful when registering - you have to click and hop from page to page to finalize the process. You go to PayPal then have to go BACK to WebinarJam before you're completely registered.

The registration page doesn't say it, but when you do click to register, if you're doing it before November 15th, the price is $19 for the live and replay, probably the written recipes (sorta) in PDF form, too. I say "sorta" because so far, in all the paid cooking webinars I've attended, the written recipes don't always jive with what AJ does on-screen. If you don't belong to her UWL private Facebook community (which comes with the purchase of the $150 UWL program) you have no idea which is the correct recipe. In the past, the directions for one recipe used 3 cans of beans but the written one said 12 cups. Big difference, and to this day the PDF file sent out with the purchase of that webinar hasn't been corrected. Sometimes she adds or omits ingredients when doing it live but they're in the written recipe.

You can see photos of some of the foods cooked on THIS PAGE, AJ's personal public Facebook page. You don't need to belong to FB to see them.

I think I'm going to sit this one out. I've learned her tricks. She says "12 recipes" but when she does the actual webinar, you find out one of the "recipes" is the ingredient for another, and I suspect in this case the Wild Rice Stuffing is what goes into the Stuffed Acorn Squash. That's ONE recipe, not 2. She was playing with this recipe for about a year now. I remember she had to leave one video talk to go grab the squash out of the oven before it burned, and I think that was around this time last year. 

Edited to add:
OK, I just saw a different picture of the squash and now realize it's probably not filled with the Wild Rice Stuffing. Sorry for the rant. 

Beet Salad on Arugula, followed by House Dressing 2.0. Gee, I wonder if this dressing goes on the beets and greens to make it a salad? If so, again, ONE recipe, not 2.

Roasted peppers and carrots - This is a recipe that requires a recipe??

And I'm sure the cranPEARy Relish is a rehash of her old cranberry relish but with pears added and maybe a few other minor changes. 

Air Fried Potatoes is a recipe worth paying for? And I though "Baked Fries" was in the first cooking party webinar and we had to buy $45 Crisp Ease trays to make them? 

The 2 desserts probably both require the Cuisinart sorbet maker she showcased in another cooking webinar, so if you don't own one, and don't own a $500 blender, you can't make them (Or wind up with lumpy puddings/parfaits).

It's not worth $19 for a soup and a sauteed greens recipe to me, but I'm sure there are many others who would like all these recipes. If you do, go for it. AJ is always entertaining.

Weight Loss Wednesdays with Chef AJ

For a few weeks now, Chef AJ has been doing a Facebook Live video (2pm Pacific, 5pm Eastern) called Weight Loss Wednesday. You could email her questions you want answered, too, and she does reply to them. The talks do assume you know all the info on her Ultimate Weight Loss program, like "eating to the left of the line" and VFB - veggies for breakfast.

Or Above the Red Line, as this Caloric Density chart shows

And now you can see them all on her YouTube channel, now called called Weight Loss Wednesday.

Here's the first WLW from a month ago. All 7 she has done so far, as well as other older videos, also appear on the site.

Qigong with Lee Holden

I've mentioned this man's qigong videos before, and just found another YouTube channel he has. There you'll find a number of these short workouts, many for pain and stress relief as well as general well-being. A great introduction to the art!

Sounds of Silence

This scene may make it worth watching this movie! I ADORED this song in my youth and still own my original vinyl of the album Simon and Garfunkel album (as well as every S&G and many Paul solo ones on CD). 

Dr. McDougall Webinar on Diabetes

New "Perfect Plate Graphic

Dr. Rosane Oliveira and Jeff Novick have been working together to develop a new version of Jeff's Perfect Plate placemat. You can download it in PDF form at this link from the UCDavis Integrative Medicine site.

Dig These Crazy Pumpkins NASA Made

Shayda Speaks in New Movie

Another movie about WFPB eating is making the rounds called "Big Change." Along with a slew of our plant based doctors and other health and cooking professionals they also interview success stories.

Here is an excerpt from the movie where they interview Chef AJ's early follower and friend, Shayda Soleymani. From the YouTube description:

Shayda Soleymani is from California and previously weighed 240lbs. Shayda talks about how she had previously been on a ton of diets and at one point in time a doctor actually told her that, “it would take herculean efforts for you to ever lose weight and to maintain that weight loss”

Since then she has lost the weight, kept it off, and is even now been able to get off her diabetes and cholesterol medicine (which was much to her doctors surprise. 
In talking about her life now she said, “I’m happy, i’m back to wearing light and bright colors, i’m back to being myself again. It’s just emotionally, mentally, physically, everything has changed. It’s just nice to be out of the dumps."

Here is my conversation with Shayda and I hope that you enjoy it.

Connect with Shayda at https://www.facebook.com/shayda.soleymani 

  

From the September ASW - Jeff Nelson and the VegSource Story

Sometimes I wonder why I bother paying money to view these Advance Study Weekend videos - Dr. McD has so many of them available for free in the months afterwards. I used to buy them mainly for Doug Lisle and Jeff Novick's talks - always fantastic. But now Dr. Lisle is repeating old talks and Jeff hasn't appeared at an ASW for a few years now. This past one featured the next generation of doctors and I was interested in their stories, but I'll probably skip the next one in February 2017. I forget exactly who Dr. McD said was going to be there, but do remember I either never heard of the person or didn't care what they had to say.

This talk went more into the history of Jeff Nelson's family and how they made their fortune. It's only near the end you find out about Sabrina's illness and their introduction to the McDougall program - and the McDougall family.

Do Not Cath - I Will Sue, from the September 2016 ASW

Jill McKeever's LIVE Thanksgiving Palooza Announcement

27 Recipes being prepared in her LIVE broadcasts in early November (Schedule below). In the video above she says all the recipes will be available in PDF and even Kindle format before the holiday, but didn't specify when, but in one of the comments to the video says this:

I'm hoping the Kindle will be ready for download by the following Tuesday (Nov 8th) Amazon takes 24 hours to approve ebooks. And I'm planning to photograph every finished recipe as I go and have it included in the ebook. Can't have a cookbook without photos. It's just wrong. ;D

JILL'S LIVE THANKSGIVING PALOOZA SCHEDULE

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2016
(CENTRAL TIME)
11:00AM 
MAKE AHEAD RECIPES
Baked Eggy Tofu
Jill's Trusty Cornbread
Fresh Cranberry-Chia Jam
Cultured Cashew Cheese, Part 1
Buttermilk Bread Rolls, Part 1
Jill's Trusty Pie Crust 


FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2016
11:00AM 
PIES & SNACKING 
Max's Fancy Apple Pie


11:45AM 
Charlie's Pecan Pie
Maggie's Pumpkin Pie
Jill's Sweet Potatoes


1:00PM 
PARTY FOOD
Cultured Cashew Cheese, Part 2
Ranch & Onion Cheeseball
Party, Party Cheese Log
Hot Veggie Dip


SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2016
9:15AM 
THE BIG DAY
Cornbread Dressing
Savory Spinach Muffins


10:15AM
Creamy Mashed Potatoes
Buttermilk Bread Rolls, Part 2


11:00AM
Cream Gravy
Steamed Broccoli


11:30AM THANKSGIVING MUKBANG! 

Mark Sutton's Memorial Service

This was posted recently to the Fat Free Vegan Yahoogroup:

Hi,
I am recipe lurker here on this site, so I don't post. However, I need some help from you.
I was a friend of Mark Sutton's for 36 years; he lived at our farm in PA. As you may know, he recently passed on suddenly.  His family would like to have a memorial gathering for him at their home on November 19th at 4 p.m. They live in Northern Virginia in Fairfax County.
His mom asked me to get contact information for his friends and to let her know.
Quite honestly, Mark was very active on many online groups, in the Veg Movement, Animal iIghts and obviously the Esselstyn no fat vegan groups but that is part of the problem.  We didn't run in the same groups. I don't know anyone's name or who would attend something like this unless they interacted deeply or long term with Mark. Unless he was attending or working in DC, he didn't have friends who came all the way up to PA.
I asked  his mom to post on his Facebook page  ( I am not on his friend list as I saw him all the time) but I am not sure if she will.
Could you help me spread the word to people and groups that he may have been part of just to get the message out there? People can attend or send regrets to his Facebook page/Heart Healthy Pizza or to my other address  (Sue@hoodel.com). We don't have access to Mark's e-mail accounts.
Thank you so much.
Sue

McDougall Webinar - Hypertension

And don't forget to download the book chapter and newsletter article that were reading material for this session from Dr. McDougall's website.

BTW, the webinar web page for this says a closed caption version of this is available on YouTube. Don't believe it. 1) This particular video, as of 10/21/2016 @ 12:45pm EDT, is NOT caption-enabled, and 2) When his videos are captioned, it's the YouTube voice-to-text software translation, not a real "someone listened and typed it out" closed captioning. 9 times out of 10 these are totally useless and instead of being informative, are either frustrating or entertaining, depending on your mood. I'm sure you all know of some TV closed captioning occasions where the text on the screen bears little resemblance to what's being said, and many times aren't even showing real words. Well, YouTube captioning is like that. Believe me, with my 60+ year history of being hard of hearing, I know bad captioning when I see it!

Yet MORE Chef AJ Webinars - Surviving the Holidays: An 8-Week Series

https://app.webinarjam.net/register/14990/8526c625b4

Surviving the Holidays with Chef AJ: An 8-Week Webinar Series to Inspire You and Support You.

The holidays can be a joyous time for many people, but for those of us who suffer with food issues or are not happy with our weight they can be a nightmare.

What starts out as an innocent little Fun Size Snickers Bar on Halloween can turn into a 63-daybinge that lasts until New Year’s Day.  

More people start their diet on January 2nd than any other day of the year. But wouldn't it be great if you could just coast through the holiday season this year, completely stress free, and eithermaintain your weight or even lose weight?

We can show you how. Simply register for our Surviving The Holidays Webinar Series and we'll get through this difficult time of year together.

WHEN?

Every Wednesday at 5:00 p.m. PST from November 2 to December 21

HOW MUCH?

Only $77 for all 8 sessions.

WHO?

Chef AJ, Gustavo Tolosa, and special guests Dr. Goldhamer, Dr. Lisle, Dr. Ifland and John Pierre.

CANNOT ATTEND LIVE?

Cannot watch the live webinars? Don't worry! When you register, you are elegible to receive the private REPLAY LINK to watch the recorded sessions any time you want, as many times as you want.

Wednesday, 2 November 2016, at 05:00 pm

Pacific Time (US and Canada), GMT -7

I Want To Participate!

Weight Loss Wednesdays with Chef AJ

I know, I'm a day late, but I rarely catch these videos live and have to wait for replays, especially now that I'm in bed at 7:30pm and up at 3 every morning.

Every Wednesday (usually - last week it was Tuesday because of the Jewish holiday on Wednesday) Chef AJ does a FaceBook Live video titled Weightloss Wednesdays on her personal Facebook page, Chef AJ. You can send her an email (address is on the Contact page of her website) at any time or use the chat box during the talks to make a comment or ask a question.

She appreciates it if you "Like" her site, and you can sign up to get her emails which will tell you about upcoming videos and offers, too.



BTW, the Pecan Pie she talks about in this video (NOT UWL!!) is in her "Sweet Tooth" cooking webinar. You can register for it here to see the replay, cost $24.

7 Strategies for Surviving the Holidays with Chef AJ

Webinar with Dr. Lisle: Panic Attacks and Anxiety Q&A, Part 2

With my son's new job (finally!) and then his being out sick so soon after starting, all my days are mixed up and I forgot all about the weekly webinar. Luckily, Gustavo has the replay out already so I can watch it some time later today.

Peeled: The Potato Resurrection Trailer (Parody Horror Film)

I found this on YouTube and it's a really scary movie for us McDougallers. Well, if it were real, that is.

McDougall Webinar - Heart Disease; Gustavo's Cooking Demo

Lima Bean Stew

I decided to make something different for today, and with some of Dr, McDougall's recent webinars focused on heart health, I decided to pull out The McDougall Program for A Healthy Heart and look around. The book is currently out of print, but you can get used copies of it from many on-line book stores, and Dr. McDougall is also selling a PDF version of it on his web site. The 20% off all digital books sale is still going on so you can grab this for only $8.

Lima Bean Stew looked good, but before I started a new post here about it I searched and saw I did a quickie post about it back in 2008. Unfortunately, the link to the recipe itself died along with Geocities, so I guess I better share it again:

Lima Bean Stew
Serving Size: 8     
Preparation Time 15 minutes
Cooking Time: 1 hour

  1             medium  onion -- chopped
  1             medium  green pepper -- or red, chopped
  2             stalks  celery -- sliced
  2             medium  carrots -- sliced
  8               cups  water
  3               cups  frozen lima beans
  16            ounces  tomato sauce -- canned
     3/4           cup  barley -- uncooked
     3/4           cup  brown rice -- uncooked
  2        tablespoons  soy sauce, low sodium
  1         tablespoon  parsley, freeze-dried
  1           teaspoon  dried basil
     1/2      teaspoon  paprika
     1/2      teaspoon  dried oregano
                        fresh ground black pepper -- to taste

Combine all ingredients in a large soup pot. Bring to a boil, cover, reduce heat, and simmer for 60 minutes.

The McDougall Program for A Healthy Heart (page 350)
McDougall Quick and Easy Cookbook (page 90)
John McDougall, MD and Mary McDougall

NOTES : This may also be made in a slow cooker. Add all ingredients at once and cook on low for 4 to 6 hours. We have let this cook as long as 8 hours with no adverse results except for softer vegetables.

Instead of chopping up a bunch of fresh veggies, I used a container of mirepoix - a carrot, onion, and celery pre-chopped mix from the grocery store - and added some frozen onions, because we love onions in this house.

The tomato sauce is Hunt's no-salt added version. I was so happy when I saw our grocery store decided to stock not only the small 8 ounce size cans of this but also the 15 ounce and 28 ounce cans. It makes it so easy now to make home made, no salt added pasta sauces.

Since the ingredients read green or red pepper, I opened a small jar of sliced pimientos and used that. No pepper skins glueing themselves to my upper palate to worry about.

The lima beans. I had belonged to the Rancho Gordo Bean Club for a year and a half. I didn't immediately renew after the first year and missed one shipment while on the waiting list, then renewed for another quarter and dropped it again. Why? First off, the beans are delicious and definitely fresher than you would ever find in grocery stores. I quit twice because of lima beans. I'm not that big a fan of them, but in the 5 shipments from Rancho Gordo I had gotten 6 bags of lima beans. There aren't the cute little baby limas, either, but honking, gigantic creamy white ones, with skin so thick you can use them to make shoes out of. OK, slight exaggeration. I still had 4 bags of lima beans left in my pantry and figured I better start eating them before they become as old and hard as grocery store beans, so last night I set a bag of Royal Coronas out to soak overnight, and this morning cooked them up in the Instant Pot. It made up 6 cups of beans, so 3 were set aside for this recipe, the others I split in half, put into freezer bags, and when cool, put into the freezer for the next time I need lima beans for anything. If I plan on making more recipies from this book, they'll get used, because Mary does seem to like using lima beans in her older recipes.

Everything got popped back into the cleaned Instant Pot and put on Low for 6 hours. I can never remember if the vent stays open or closed when slow-cooking in this thing. When I used the 6-quart as my primary pot I didn't have any problem - I had purchased the accessories package had had the glass lid that I used. But the 8-quart doesn't have a glass lid, and none of my other pot lids really fit it, so I'm stuck with the regular lid. Even with the valve closed, the house smells great. I can't wait until dinner time!

Here's a photo at the 4 hour point, fluffed up so you can see the ingredients and not just tomato sauce:

I apologize for the fuzziness of the photo. My son said the steam kept clouding his iPod lens.

I really should use these older books more. Some of these recipes are fantastic!