Healthy Grilling Cooking Class – Recipes

by Sheila | Aug 3, 2010 | Uncategorized

We had a smokin’ good time at the last cooking class!  Try them yourself. I LOVE fish tacos – I probably eat them everyweek.  I ALMOST can’t eat them when I go out because my recipes is SO good!  I am constantly switching it up adding or subtracting depending on what is available.  Let me know what you think!

Optimal Body Balance Cooking Class – Healthy Grilling

Fish ‘Tacos’

A white fish (tilapia, orange roughy, cod, etc.)

Napa Cabbage for the ‘taco’

Toppings for the taco

Fish:  Marinade in the juice from one lime and ½ a packet of Simply Organic fish taco seasoning mix.

Coat the fish with the breading of your choice (Almond flour, crushed rice crackers, etc) salt to taste and the

remaining ½ of the Simply Organic fish taco seasoning mix.

Grill on the direct heat of the grill or use aluminum foil ‘packs’. The fish is done when it ‘flakes’.

Clean the Napa Cabbage and keep the leaves whole – trimming off the thick white section – set aside to use as the ‘taco’

Toppings for the taco:

Lime, cilantro, re-fried beans, red onion – marinated in white balsamic vinegar or green onions and Ojai ‘Latinaise’.

Black and White Bean Salad

1 can of Black Beans

1 can of ‘white’ beans of choice

Tomatoes (and any available veggie)

Roasted Bell Peppers

Roasted Jalapenos

Roasted White Onion

Avocado

A sprinkle of turmeric

A sprinkle of cumin

Olives

Olive oil

White balsamic vinegar

Salt and Pepper to taste

Cilantro or Basil (or other herbs that you love)

Marinated Portobello Mushrooms

½ bottle of Italian Seasoning poured over sliced Portobello mushrooms

Or

Bragg’s Vinegar and Bragg’s amino acid (equal amounts) with a little sea salt

Grill over open flame. Serve as a ‘burger’ or add on top of a greens salad.

Guacamole Stuffed Cucumbers

Make little cups out of cucumbers

Add a dollop of prepared guacamole

Top with shredded Goat or Sheep’s cheese

Medjool Dates with Tahini and Pecans

Cut medjood dates in ½ and remove the pit

Fill the date with tahini and top with a nut (any kind will do)

I like to freeze mine in the summer to prevent the tahini from getting all over the place

Grilled Fruit

Pineapple

Plumbs

Nectarines

Make a sauce of agave nectar, sprinkle of nutmeg and cinnamon.

Cut the fruit into chunks and put on pre-soaked skewers

Coat with the sauce and grill until heated through.

Enjoy warm or cooled.

A ‘dude’ explains why salad is ‘man food’

by Sheila | Jul 15, 2010 | Uncategorized

I loved this article so much that I thought that I’d share it!

Editor’s note: John DeVore is a former editor at Maxim magazine and maxim.com and former host of “The DeVore and Diana Show” on Sirius XM radio. He currently offers man-centric perspectives as a columnist at Guyspeak.com and TheFrisky.com. He’s a lifelong food freak and yo-yo dieter and speaks fluent “dude.”

(CNN) — Real men eat salads. I know this because I am a dude. Right now, in my fridge, I have five bottles of hot sauce, a jar of Cheez Whiz and half a pack of hot dogs. But recently I went to lunch with a couple of buds, and I ordered a salad. I ordered it hard.

It was a basic frissée salad with bacon, shallots and a poached egg, tossed in a light vinaigrette. Frissée is a curly, toothsome leaf, bitter enough to balance bacon and egg but still possessed of a pleasant spring.

My friends laughed at me. They pointed. One ordered a burger, the other fried calamari. I was chastised for not eating “man food.”

For those of you who aren’t familiar with this gender normative term, “man food” is food that you’d imagine a lumberjack or a cowboy or a Viking would eat. Towers of butter-soaked pancakes. Pots of napalm-hot chili. Meat on a bone.

Thoroughly unsubtle, “man food” is rustic fare meant to satisfy a hearty appetite. Quantity is prized over quality. Calories are “fun points.” The more “fun points,” the tastier the belly filler.

But sometimes a dude needs a change. Specifically, a salad. A fresh, crisp, crunchy salad. Salads offer breathers between manly meals. Spinach, cucumber, tomato, red onions, mushrooms, chickpeas, oil and vinegar — that is my usual jam.

I don’t need any fancy, goopy dressings compromising my vegetables. (What does a ranch actually taste like, anyway?) Sometimes, I might throw some almonds or walnuts up in there. I’ve been known to be down with blueberries and mandarin oranges. I like bacon or grilled chicken on occasion. I am not a fan of unnecessary carbs like croutons. And then there are those moments I go crazy and get a frissée freakin’ salad.

I didn’t evolve without help. There was a time where, if I cut myself shaving, I’d bleed sausage gravy. My heart squeezed more than it pumped. And I also grew what I call “fat wings.”

Luckily, the woman I was dating at that time didn’t like any of those things. Being able to sit in a bathtub full of buffalo wings is every dude’s birthright, but I eventually learned that being attractive for your significant other is also pretty manly.

My girlfriend was a smart woman and didn’t bring up my devolving into a human biscuit. What she did was announce that we were going to save money so that Saturday nights, we could go to the local barbecue joint and destroy some cow with our faces.

Obviously, my first thought was, “Aww, she wants me to help her lose weight.” So I humored her. She came home from the supermarket with a stack of plastic disposable containers. In each, she put one potential salad ingredient. Not only the ones that would become my favorite but kidney beans, green peppers, corn and pepperoni slices.

She created a mini-salad bar in our fridge. It was easy, and I was told I could eat as much as I wanted. This became my lunch and occasional dinner.

You know what? We saved money. I lost weight. Gained energy. And my girlfriend and I, well, let’s just say we had the whoopee time.

I kept this up this salad-centric diet for months. My friends would come over to watch a fight or brawl on the PlayStation, and I’d meet them at the door with a salad in my hand.

The landlord would need my help with some drywall; I’d put my salad down.

At work, I’d articulate corporate strategy during lunch meetings spearing cucumbers in my lucky bowl of awesome salad. I made eating salad sexy. I made it macho, macho.

Is it rabbit food? Friend, if it’s rabbit food, then that rabbit is the size of a ferocious bear.

My friends poked fun at me as I munched on my fancy salad. It was tasty. I love how the warm yolk from the poached egg lightly coated the frissée, adding a dimension of hardiness to a dish with such leafy bounce. And the bacon chunks added just the right amount of fatty salt, more sturdy ballast. I wiped my mouth.

We were out celebrating one guy’s birthday. The other guy, an old friend from college, was “in-between gigs.” It had been another tough year. “Salad is not man food,” they mocked. Oh, but it is. I ordered a final round of beers. Then I picked up the check. -John Devore