Maybe Sriracha sauce Isn't All That Bad, and More Beans, Mr. Taggert

Over on the Engine 2 Seven Day Recipe Rescue Facebook group there's a gentleman named Joseph Alexander who frequently shares all sorts of recipes he's developed. The other day he posted a sort of batch cooking guide for his lunches for work for the week, and included in this pictorial was his recipe for maple mustard dressing. Here's what he wrote under the photo of this sauce:

This sauce is loosely based on the Forks Over Knives Maple-Mustard Dressing, and I do mean loosely. This batch has
- a can of cannellini beans with the liquid
-1/2 cup nooch
-2 Tablespoons maple syrup
-3 Tablespoons stone-ground, no-salt-added mustard
-2 teaspoons powdered garlic
-2 teaspoons onion powder
- fresh-ground black pepper
-1/3 cup balsamic vinegar
-2 Tablespoons sriracha
all blended in my Vitamix.

Alrighty. Let's see - the base is cannelini beans. I've seen and done a number of dressings that start with this, so no problem.

Nooch? Natch! Ditto the rest of the ingredients. So far sounds like a number of other recipes.

Sriracha sauce. 2 TABLESPOONS??? Is he crazy??? One drop leaves my tongue sweating for an hour!

But my husband loves it, and it's him I'm making this for, so I go and add 2 tablespoons of the devil's tear drops to the blender.

This made close to 3 cups of dressing, so I had to split it up between 2 jars. It's also an ugly dark beige, but a lot of Chef AJ's recipes look unappetizing yet taste good, so I didn't let that throw me.

As I'm pouring it from the Ninja to the 2 jars my husband walks into the kitchen and says "Whatcha doing?" Annoyed, I reply that I'm turning doggie crap into gold, what does it LOOK like I'm doing?!?! After 42 1/2 years of marriage I can say what I want to him, right?

Anyway, I offer him a taste and his eyes light up. "This is great! Even you would like it!" I tell him there are 2 tablespoons of sriracha and he says you can't even taste it, for me to give it a shot. I take about a quarter of a teaspoon of it.

He was right - it's not a throat-burner and actually tastes pretty good!

So, we now have another liquid to pour over our rice and veggies. Since more of our meals lately have been that simple - rice and veg, rice and beans, potatoes and veg, pasta with veg - it's nice to have a variety of sauces to make them seem a little less plain.

Over the weekend I started flipping through some of the McDougall books, copying down a few other dressing/sauce recipes, so I hope to post a few more in the future.

Another thing I did this weekend was order some more beans from Rancho Gordo. I used to belong to their Bean Club (3 or 4 times) but when they kept sending the same beans, the last time I got 2 bags of the same bean in the same shipment, I kept cancelling it and started buying single bags of beans we liked most, instead.

At the beginning of the covid crisis I wanted to load up on beans, but they were sold out of just about everything, so I ordered other beans from Amazon, because store shelves around here were pretty bare, too. Even though I ordered organic, the price was still better for those big bulk bags than Rancho Gordo's beans, but they're just not as tasty. In fact, the cannelini beans are nearly tasteless, no matter how I cooked them, so that bag will be buried in the back and saved for desperate times. I've been able to buy other beans locally lately and now have a stash of Goya beans on hand for adding to soups and stews, but for plain bean and rice meals we both decided it's worth the price to get Rancho Gordo again.

So I'll have a half dozen each of cranberry and yellow eye coming within the next few weeks, and after that I'll order 6 bags each of a few others they offer. 

Why not order them all at once?

Well, because these boxes have to be carried by us up 3 flights of stairs after they're delivered.  Carrying up 12 pounds is bad enough, but who wants to carry 25 or more pounds in one big box? I made the mistake of making an order even heavier than that a few months ago and we wound up opening the box down in the foyer and transferring things to tote bags so we can make multiple trips up the stairs. Now I pay attention to the total weight of an order. And the size, too. We once had a Harmony House order of dehydrated foods that wasn't particularly heavy, but the volume was so much that it was all delivered in a box big enough to fit a small chest freezer! It wouldn't even fit through the front door! The landlord got a laugh watching us unload the box from the front porch into the foyer, then bagging everything to carry upstairs from there. At least we didn't have to worry about getting rid of the giant box - he asked if he could have it because it was the perfect size to store some of his bulky stuff out in the garage. I wouldn't be surprised if I find out he put his grill in it for the winter, it's that big!

In past years I made sure I had at least a 2 week supply of foods handy in case we lose power from a hurricane during the summer, blizzard during winters. With covid-19, I want at least a 2 month supply on hand! Our local stores still aren't totally restocked, and it appears many items are never coming back. I haven't seen a bar of soap since early March, nor single boxes or rolls of tissues. Many brands and varieties of canned and frozen vegetables are gone. The rice and bean aisles are still half empty. It's crazy! At least we have enough rice and pasta on hand, although the rice in those 20 pound bags are the white variety and a few precious 2 pound bags of brown are in the pantry, and much of the pasta is whole wheat instead of Tinkyada brown rice.

Yadda, yadda, yadda. You've seen me complain about this way too often. I'm just grateful for what stores do have in stock, and what items I can get via mail order. As the Rolling Stones sang decades ago:

It Pays to Be Stocked Up

We have a potato problem in our area - so many stores are full of green potatoes, russets that look like they've been hanging around for years, or split or otherwise deformed looking spuds both white and sweet potatoes. Last week we managed to grab what we thought were decent enough looking Russets and planned to have them for last night's dinner.

So, the potatoes were in the Instant Pot, the frozen carrots were in the microwave, and a pot of fat-free Golden Gravy was on the stove. Our simple McDougall meal.

At 5pm hubby and I start making our bowls, and his is ready long before mine because I've been peeling the skin of my spuds because I find I tolerate them a little bit better when I do. Being a good husband he waits until I'm done before he eats. Finally I'm ready and take a bite of the plain, gravy-free potato and tell him to wait before he starts in eating. The potato tastes funky to me, to take a bite of his and see what he thinks. Many times I think something is off and he says it's fine and blames my sinuses for weird tastebuds. As expected, he declared to potato good and forked up a few carrots.

"Wait!" This time it's him saying it to me. "There's a bitter aftertaste. "Don't eat the potatoes!"

No argument from me! Now what to do about dinner?!? My stash to the rescue!

While he sat there picking carrots off his bowl I put on a pot of water for pasta. Luckily we had just gotten a VitaCost delivery of 20 pounds of various Tinkyada pastas last week. By the time I got the carrots picked off of my bowl and we got rid of the potatoes not only from our bowls and still in the Instant Pot but the few uncooked ones from the same bag, the pasta was finished cooking. Hubby grabbed 2 clean bowls while I drained the pasta and tossed everything together.

So, our three ingredient quickie McDougall potato meal turned into a pasta meal with carrots and gravy. Hubby mixed some cranberries in with his (The kind that come in the shape of the can, as Ernest P. Worrel described them in Ernest Saves Christmas). I still shudder thinking about it. LOL





Sorry about the bad audio but this was the only clip I could find.

Anyway, this wasn't the first time we had to chuck out a whole bag of potatoes. Luckily, thanks to my sensitivity to them we don't have them too often around here, and the few soup recipes I use do quite nicely with red potatoes. Amazingly, I've never had a bad bag of those. Otherwise, I still have plenty of dried ones left in my Harmony House stash. 

And all this happened just 2 days after I had to toss out a bag of organic sweet potatoes I bought just 2 weeks ago that liquified on me. No wonder they were on sale!

I think last night's dinner was the final straw and we won't be buying fresh potatoes any more, white, yellow, or sweet. I'll use the dehydrated or frozen hash brown cut ones, and that'll be that. I'm tired of spending good money on bad food.

The Esselstyn Plant Strong Community

Plant Stock 2020 was last weekend. A wonderful time was had by all who attended the virtual seminars. The link to the replay videos was mailed out the other day, and there was mass confusion! Instead of a link to the videos, the link went to a whole new on-line community called The Plant Strong Community. It was then a matter of click, click, click, return and click something else, nope - that wasn't it, click something else . . . Such a frustrating time! Eventually the replays were found, then it took a few dozen more clicks to find how to sort them so they appeared in order. 

It seems the videos were "sent" as posts to the new private social community and not in a separate section of just the videos. Clicking to sort the "messages" in order of when they were first posted only holds for as long as you remain on that page - click away to watch a video and return and you have to change the settings all over again to find the next video. 

So much wasted time! Most of the messages posted so far have been "Where are the videos? I can't find them!"

It doesn't help that the Plant Stock 2020 private community is a part of a main Plant Strong community that is/will be open to the public to join and all posts are appearing on both the private and main pages, and unless you change your settings, you're also getting all posts sent to your email AND in the Notifications section, and a little bell dings each time one appears.

I'm sure things will get better as time goes on. It's a brand new software (Mighty Networks), a brand new community, and, as I said, dumped on us without any warning.

For now, the Plant Strong Community is only open for those who attended Plant Stock, but some time this week it will open up to everyone. When that happens, if you use this link it totes up to my Ambassador page if you join. Ambassadors get points for every person who joins using their specific link. What do we get out of it? As far as I can tell, we get a little badge, the color depends on how many join from using our link. Why? Makes life interesting? Leads to competitiveness? Gives the Esselstyns more eyeballs on their page? Who knows? If the link doesn't work today, try again during the week. We members have no idea when things are happening (or why). All I wanted was to watch the replays of the Plant Stock 2020 talks.

It's Baaaaaacccckkkk!

Our city's covid-positive count recently went from 7 cases to over 30 in just one week.

And this week we had our first covid-related death since mid-July.

And 2 people are currently hospitalized for it.

Why does our son mock us for wearing masks every time we go to the store, use sanitizer after we touch things outside the home, and refuse to go where there are crowds? Because like all young adults he feels indestructible, I guess. His attitude towards covid-19 is in line with Jeff Nelson's! This is why I wipe down everything he touches and try not to get within 6 feet of him. Easy enough to do because he works nights and we barely see him, anyway.

But schools open around here in 2 weeks - all the public schools and many colleges may be doing virtual classes but all private schools around here will be in-person, the high schools going full time, so the light rail trains and buses will be filled again. Because restaurants, theaters, etc. are still closed, even in NYC, going in to work at night my son says the trains are still pretty empty, but coming home during the morning rush hour the trains look back to pre-covid level capacity already and will be worse when school starts. Even Mr. Skeptic is now wearing his mask on the trains and scrubs up when he gets in, so deep down he does believe.

Time to lock myself indoors again. I already started to restock my supplies, much like Mary McDougall said she started doing in the interview she did recently with Chef AJ. I've got VitaCost coming today, 2 Amazons early next week on top of the 2 this past week, and I'll soon put in another Harmony House order. At least I now know what items I need and not over-buy like I did in the Spring. I'm still trying to use up those Harmony House soup and chili mixes! My doc says to hold off on getting the flu shot (Yes, with my medical history I DO take them yearly) until October so it'll last all season. If I get it now, even the senior-strength dosage like I did last year, I'd need to get another one around January. Once is enough, thank you very much!

Who's Minding the Store?

A few days ago, this post appeared on the official McDougall message boards:

Post by JeffN » Fri Aug 14, 2020 1:38 pm
This was written in response to a few questions on the Mary’s Mini program and some comments that were made in a Mary’s Mini social media group.

“Allow me to clarify a few things.

The Mary Mini Facebook Group is an independent group and has nothing to do with Dr. McDougall Health & Medical Center. No staff oversee this group and we do not approve of everything they say and do not endorse it.

Mary’s Mini is not about weight loss. Mary’s Mini is a simplified way of eating to reset your taste buds and get back to eating the McDougall diet. This is great for people who have “fallen off the wagon” and want to come back to the McDougall diet. Mary’s Mini helps with weight loss because it is a simple diet that promotes eating monotonously.

If weight loss is something someone is seeking, they should follow the McDougall Maximum Weight Loss program. We have a forum on our website to help people achieve their goals and is moderated by McDougall staff and people who have been approved by us to lead as moderators.

In regards to fruit, Dr. McDougall stated long ago that if you want to lose weight you may want to limit your fruit consumption to two servings per day because some people have an tendency to overindulge in fruit. That being said, fruit is very low in calorie density, and we believe that eating fruit is a great way to still achieve your weight loss goals; however, if you find yourself eating copious amounts of fruit every day and are not seeing the results you want, that is an indicator that you may want to slow down on your fruit consumption.

This is an excerpt from one of our newsletters written by Dr. McDougall:

"While root vegetables like potatoes and sweet potatoes provide well-rounded nutrition—grains and beans lack sufficient vitamins A and C to be eaten alone; therefore add some fruit and/or green and yellow vegetables to make your grain and bean meals complete."

The goal of the McDougall Program is simple: to achieve optimal health through eating a starch-based diet with fruits and vegetables with no added oils or animal products. Weight loss is a side-effect of eating this way.

I hope this answers your question.

Best of Health,
Tiffany Hobson
Operations Manager

Hmm, the writing in this message that supposedly comes from Tiffany reads exactly in the type of language Jeff Novick uses in his program proclamations. And lately Jeff has really been pushing the fruit and said a few times fruit is encouraged because of its low caloric density. I had written out along reply to this, saved it as a draft, but when I went back to finish and post it, it was gone. Many people have complained over the years of things mysteriously vanishing from the draft folder, but stupid me didn't think to save it elsewhere. Now I have to start all over again but I'll post it here, instead, because for sure anything I post will be removed by a certain moderator, and I don't mean Jim.

Mary’s Mini is not about weight loss.

Um, yes it is. Doctor McDougall said so in the Mary's Mini webinar:


Listen at the 7:26 point: "...if you want to lose weight quickly..."

In regards to fruit, Dr. McDougall stated long ago that if you want to lose weight you may want to limit your fruit consumption to two servings per day because some people have an tendency to overindulge in fruit. That being said, fruit is very low in calorie density, and we believe that eating fruit is a great way to still achieve your weight loss goals. . .

Well, while fruit is allowed on the Maximum Weight Loss version of the McDougall Starch Solution program, he explicitly states that NO fruit is allowed on the Mary's Mini:



And in a more recent interview, Dr. McDougall again stressed to limit fruit because it's so tasty people tend to overeat it. Unfortunately, he's done so many interviews in recent weeks I can't find the exact one he said this right now. If I do wind up rewatching the one he said it I'll add the clip here.

So who is changing the guidelines? Is it Tiffany? Jeff? Certainly not Dr. McDougall!


Another instance - just yesterday an email and Facebook post appeared of a newsletter article from 2004: How to Prevent and Treat Degenerative (Osteo) Arthritis that recommended things like glucosamine. I commented that this was an old article, that he had written another one in 2010 saying glucosamine was useless, that he changed his mind about it. Less than 5 minutes after I wrote that another post/email appeared: Important Update on Glucosamine and Arthritis, linking to the 2010 newsletter article I referred to.

So, again I ask: Who's minding the store? Who is sending out all these emails and guidelines?

Flying Zucchini Slabs

Back in 2018, Ann & Jane Esselstyn did a video called Frying Zucchini Slabs that I commented on here.

Well, I finally got around to making some yesterday on the last day of our vacation. All week the daytime temps were in the 90's and night time not much cooler so I really didn't want to spend much time in the kitchen, but the heat broke yesterday so I had a chance to play.

Unlike Ann & Jane, I peeled my zucchini before slicing it, and like Ann, regret not slicing it even thinner than I did. I used the video's recipe that called for balsamic vinegar instead of the book's recipe's Bragg's Aminos. I also used the air fryer instead of a skillet. I placed my parchment paper circle down, laid out the slabs of zukes, coated them with balsamic, then air fried for 8 minutes @ 370º.

Well, it was barely warmed. I flipped them over, put on a coat of vinegar to the other side, then cranked the heat up to 400º and set it for 10 minutes.

 

Ah, looks a lot better now!

First I tried to just pick one up to eat, but it was a bit tough to bite into. I tried breaking it with a fork, but again no go. Out came one of the 42 year old steak knives. Some were cutting easily, but the tough parts were still tough. But to be honest, as tough as it was to cut, it really wasn't "chewy" tough. Maybe I'm just a weakling. 

And they tasted delicious.  

I have 5 more zucchini in the refrigerator, and will make up another one or 2 for today's lunch, but this time will do it as written, with Bragg's Aminos instead of balsamic vinegar. It'll be a bit neater because I'll use the spray bottle instead of pouring and using my finger to coat them. I'll also use the onion and garlic powder and maybe the black pepper that the original recipe also calls for. Once again they'll go into the air fryer, but I'll start off at 400º for 10 minutes. I'm sure it'll be just as tasty, if not more so, as this one.

AJ Interviews Mary McDougall

And Doctor McDougall sticks around and tosses his own 2 cents into the conversation frequently. :)

Is It Yak Shaving Day Yet?

‘Ren & Stimpy Show’ revival with new episodes coming to Comedy Central

“The Ren & Stimpy Show” is returning with all-new episodes — 25 years after ending its original run.

Full article can he read here. I'm sad John K isn't part of his - his years were the best, both in storylines and animation.

But for now, I'll go play with my log.

 

Dr. McDougall Speaks

So far it's a commercial for his new 12 Day program.