Back to School - Lunch Time!

Once again another summer has flown by way too quickly and I realize school time is here already!!  Mornings are hectic around here - everyone needs to be washed and combed and dressed and fed and brushed and out the door by 7:15, so I can go milk cows.  In the midst of all this chaos we still need to plan ahead for lunchtime, too.

There are many attempts around the U.S. to make school lunches healthier - but most schools are still like our local school and have a very small budget to work within, which means heavy on the carbs and starches and processed foods to remain within budget.  For those of you trying to eat a traditional foods diet this can be frustrating.  Many of us working moms would love the convenience of school lunches but know we have to prioritize our children's health.

You also have to consider your kid's personality - are they the type that has to fit in and doesn't want to be different so therefore has to have the same hot lunch everyone else is having, or will they be able to stand up for their homemade grub that doesn't come in fancy shapes with a cutesy name?  This may determine how traditional looking you make your lunches.

Shivan's lunch this week - meatballs, enzyme rich ketchup, fruit, yogurt smoothie.

Shivan's lunch this week - meatballs, enzyme rich ketchup, fruit, yogurt smoothie.

Let Them Help

I have found that if my daughter gets to choose her lunch foods and helps prepare it then she has complete confidence eating it in front of all the pre-packaged and fried goodies that her friends have.  Now that she's 5 she loves to help by cutting up her own fruit and veggies and packaging them in her lunch box and she also helps make her own smoothies in the blender.  We also practice the 80/20 rule at school, just like we do at home.  If we eat a traditional foods diet 80% of the time than we give ourselves 20% leeway.  In this case I let her choose one lunch per week if she'd like to indulge in a cheeseburger or spaghetti or "chicken" nuggets.  This also gives me an "out" if we are really running late or I ran out of time to prepare for lunch.  Moms - it's ok to give yourself some grace and not be perfect every time!!

This week when I asked her what she wanted in her school lunch box she said, "meatballs, oranges, grapes and a yogurt smoothie."  Excellent choices!! I was so proud of her!  So this is what we are starting with the first week.  She helps me make kefir smoothies with honey and frozen blueberries we picked this summer and we put it in a thermos and it stays cold enough for her to drink it through a straw.  She's not a big sandwich person so meatballs or hunks of our home raised chicken is just right and she's huge on mixed fruit, especially if she can peel the little "cutie" oranges herself.

Other great options we will prepare:  steamed broccoli and carrots and some homemade hummus or ranch dressing to dip them in.  For the dip, I simply make some fromage blanc with raw milk, stir in some minced chives, parsley and garlic salt and it tastes just like ranch dressing from the store only far healthier.  If you mix the fromage blanc with a little honey it makes a nutritious and delicious fruit dip, too.  It can also be spread on bread or a tortilla for a sandwich - stack it or roll it with other goodies your child will eat. 

Sneak in the Enzymes

A challenge for me is getting enough fermented veggies in my kid's bellies - I still have to disguise them or mask them.  This week I am serving our homemade ketchup with her meatballs.  We use Sally Fallon's recipe from Nourishing Traditions which I've listed below.  Shivan also loves the homemade fermented pickles and has no idea they are full of enzymes to help start the process of digestion and reduce the strain on the pancreas.  Traditionally fermented salami slices are another healthy meat option whether on a sandwich or roll up with some fromage blanc again. Yogurt and kefir and even raw milk in a thermos will satisfy, feed the brain and the immune system!

Additional lunch box ideas:

• hard boiled eggs, sliced plain or in sandwiches and wraps
• homemade (or purchased :) raw milk cheeses, cubed 
• sliced traditionally fermented salami
• pepperoni sticks from (our) grass fed beef cow
• muffins with grated zucchini, carrots, or sweet potato
• sliced pita triangles dipped in hummus or fromage blanc dip
• homemade chicken soup packed in a thermos 
• Leftovers! - lasagna, pastas, casseroles in a thermos are all satisfying and nutritious
  
  

Lacto-fermented ketchup, rich with enzymes, is easy to make - mix the ingredients together and let ferment on the counter for a couple days.

Nourishing Traditions "Ketchup"

3 cups canned tomato paste, preferably organic
1/4 cup whey
1 tablespoon sea salt
1/2 cup maple syrup
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
3 cloves garlic, peeled and mashed
1/2 cup homemade or commercial fish sauce
Mix all ingredients until well blended.  Place in a quart-sized, wide-mouth mason jar.  The top of the ketchup should be at least 1 inch below the top of the jar.  Leave at room temperature for about 2 days before transferring to refrigerator.

The Healthy Home Economist has a great recipe out this week for Lacto-Fermented Sloppy Joes using this homemade ketchup - we will definitely be eating them this week.

Make your back to school lunches delicious as well as nutritious and your kids will be equipped to fight off all those back to school colds!

Warmly,
Charlotte

Charlotte Smith
@champoegcreamry
www.champoegcreamery.com
Charlotte passionately believes in the health benefits of a traditional foods diet, especially dairy products from grass-fed cows. She loves sharing time honored traditions of transforming milk into delicious and nutritious cheeses through her classes which are also teeming with nutrition facts and wisdom. Charlotte owns Champoeg Creamery, a pasture based raw milk dairy in St. Paul, Oregon, and is the mother of 3 and a certified Nutrition Wellness Educator.

Home Style Fermentation Projects | Pineapple Vinegar

This week, Contributing Writer Michelle Felt shares step-by-step instructions to transform organic kitchen scraps into nourishing, fermented fruit vinegars. Enjoy!

Fermentation obsession is in full force at our house. For at least the last 4 or 5 months. It started with lactic acid fermented or 'raw' sauerkraut. Which for some reason I still haven't posted about. I feel that's craziness, especially as I opened our 3rd batch of sauerkraut yesterday and started our first batch of pickles last night. The sauerkraut, I've been making in our first ever Harsch crock. Those delicious experiments are for another day.

The idea to make my own pineapple vinegar came about after I referenced the amazing resource, Wild Fermentation by Sandoor Katz. I first checked out this book at the library along with a bazillion other books in order to soak up as much information as I possibly could about home fermentation and specifically lactic-acid fermentation. Lactic-acid or lacto-fermentation is basically what happens when your starches and sugars in your fruits and vegetables start to break down and change to lactic acid. This happens because friendly bacteria (think about the stuff in yogurt) is munching away at the sugars in your fruits/veg. This type of fermentation not only preserves the fruit but also increases its nutritional content (Vitamin C, B12, healthy flora). Very soon, I found that his book, was worthy of gracing my book shelf - it is a wonderful read - giving you inspiration to delve into all things 'fermentable'.

I've done a few posts on how to cut your own pineapple. One with a pineapple corer and the simple knife route. Cutting your own pineapple is way cheaper than buying store bought and now you have a way to use the outer skin too, using all the bits, except the crown, but maybe I can think up something for that. I was working on the corer post when I came across Sandoor's recipe for Pineapple Vinegar. Say what?

I'll be honest I'm still not sure what I'm going to do with it, but so far I've used it in a very good smoothie (see below) and I'd also like to use it in a quick salad dressing, so stay tuned.

What you need:

• sharp knife
• cutting board
• skin from one organic pineapple
• a wide-mouthed jar that can hold about 8 cups of water + pineapple
• 1/4 cup sugar (I used organic evaporated cane juice sugar)
• water (preferably filtered)
• some cheese cloth or a nut milk bag you won't need to use in the next 3 weeks

Instructions:

  

Please note, I think the jar I used was cute and it worked, but next time I would like to try one with a wider opening, to allow more air circulation during the fermentation process.

Start by placing 1/4 cup sugar in your jar and adding a little over 4 cups of water (about 1 quart). Swish it around until the sugar is dissolved.

   

Then cut the pineapple skin into small chunks (I even removed the bit around the crown). Make sure to remove any additional fruit that is along the skin, perfect for noshing on the job. I found it helpful to prop the pineapple strip upright instead of laying it down, it was far easier to cut this way. Places pieces in your jar of sugar water as you go.

   

Once all the pineapple has been placed in the jar, cut a piece of cheese cloth large enough to cover the opening and down the side of the jar about an inch. The cheese cloth will keep dust and bugs out of your business.

Secure with a rubber band and set in an out of the way place to ferment for the first week at room temperature. After 7-8 days the liquid should darken and that is when you will strain the fruit pieces and continue fermenting the liquid until it turns to vinegar about 3-5 weeks later.

   

Here's days 1-4 and you can see the liquid darken and the bubbles grow a little more each day!

  

Strain the fruit pieces using a colander to drain 'vinegar' into a bowl. Discard or compost fruit pieces. Return 'vinegar' to original fermenting container and replace cheese cloth and rubber band. Continue fermenting the liquid another 2-4 weeks; stirring and agitating every once in awhile. Depending on the average temperature of your home this could be 2 weeks if it's warm and humid or 4 weeks if it's between 66-69F (like our house).

  

Wow and already 4 weeks later (38 days) from straining the fruit, the vinegar is done. The color looks like pineapple juice and I'm pretty sure it has 'mother' just like Bragg's Apple Cider Vinegar does. Cool!

Empty into a jar and secure with a lid. I've been storing mine in the refrigerator.

Random Bits:

• The smell in the beginning will be 'yeasty', like beer. It's pretty cool. By the end, the vinegar smelled like vinegar and a little bit beer. I think with a wider jar opening and periodic swishing the vinegar smell will be stronger.
• At the end of the 1st week, when I strained the liquid, I did not have mold growing on the fruit, but I imagine if you are in warmer climate this could happen. Just skim it off OR try to keep the jar in a cooler room of your house (about 69F).
• Just like making our sauerkraut in our crock, this was pretty uneventful. I took pictures along the way to help jog my memory and give you an idea of what it will be like but yeah this was on the easy side.
• I know I bolded organic pineapple in the ingredients but it is VERY important to use organic produce when fermenting, especially something like this, where you're soaking fruit skin for a week. You don't want pesticides or nastiness going into you or your ferments. That being said - with all the pesticides used on conventional fruit and veg to prevent them from turning quickly, those same monsters are going to prevent your cabbage or whatever from properly fermenting and prevent the good bacteria from doing its job. You'll end up wasting the 4 weeks of time and produce. Buy organic for these projects.

I look forward to doing this one again or making other fruit scrap vinegar!

Cheers!

Michelle Felt
@meeshfelt
www.feedyourskull.com
Michelle is a graduate of the Raw Gourmet Institute in Chicago, Illinois. Having grown up in the suburbs of Chicago, she has recently relocated to Portland, Oregon, where the produce is crazy fresh abundant and the culture is as thick as the Midwest’s humidity. She loves raw foods and advocates for eating with realism and relish. "Approach each eating experience as an opportunity to nourish your body, eating the best you can, in the moment."

Food Group Resources

Thanks so much to those of you who were able to join us for last Wednesday's Food Group. I really enjoyed catching up with so many of you, and swapping ideas. For those of you who couldn't make it, you were missed...
I mentioned that I'd pass along the following info. Hope it's helpful to some of you~

The Montavilla Food Buying Club has some great deals available right now (Yahoo Group: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MontavillaFBC/)
- Organic Peaches $22 per 20lb. box (ordering info here) - orders due by August 10th for pickup in NE Portland on Friday the 13th
- Organic pickling cucumbers $.85/lb. (ordering info here) - weekly orders for August due by 10am Wednesday for pickup the following Sunday
The book I mentioned: Preserving Food without Freezing or Canning (read a review of it on Culinate)


Mark your calendars now ~ next Food Group is Wednesday, September 1st, 6:30-8:30pm. To receive email updates with details on locations, etc., for future Food Group meetings, please join our Google group.

Enjoy the sunshine,
Bethany

Happy May Day!

April's Food Group was a blast, and I defininately had fun trying out lacto-fermenting garlic. For those of you who missed Food Group but are curious about lacto-fermenting, here's a little excerpt about it:


Lacto-fermented foods have been around for a very long time. Common in Korean, Chinese, Japanese, and North and Central European cuisine, fermentation has been used to enhance the flavor of food, create food, and help food having a longer shelf life. Fermented foods are delicious and nutritious. These traditional foods are key to our health.

Fermentation allows the bacteria, yeasts and molds to "predigest" and therefore break down the carbohydrates, fats, and proteins to create "Probiotics" which offer friendly bacteria into our digestive tract. This helps keep our immune system strong and supports our overall digestive health. Courtesy of www.deliciousorganics.com

The recipe we used for lacto-fermented garlic can be found in Nourishing Traditions. All the recipe required was garlic, water, sea salt, and oregano. I'll let you know in another day or so if it worked! :)

~Emily

Food Sharing Hands-On Workshop

As a member of Portland Bright Neighbor, I came across this information and thought I'd pass it along for those of you interested in a free "light breakfast and lunch" and hands-on workshop. Find the details here.

Also, cheers to another lovely food group meeting! Margaret shared her sweet abode with us and we swapped vegetable gardening stories and feasted on carrot ginger soup (garnished with fresh, homemade yogurt and cilantro), local apples with scrumptious cheddar cheese, and the oh-so-delicious spinach hummus with its cleverly simple secret ingredient. (Maybe Margaret can post the recipe?)

We chatted about the rhythms of seasonal planning/planting/purchasing/preserving and our various current endeavors (square foot gardens, pear tree planting, local beef pickup, and even last night's project of lactofermenting garlic!)...and decided to continue the discussion of Animal, Vegetable, Miracle next month when more readers can join in. (We missed those of you who were away!)

Please feel free to post and share your own stories...the more the merrier!

For now...I'll leave you with last night's recipe:

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Carrot-Ginger Soup
(modified from Caroline Cummins' recipe ~ Culinate Kitchen Collection)

Proportions needn't be precise; the ingredients tend to balance out in the end...

8 to 12 carrots, depending on size, peeled and chopped
1 yellow onion, peeled and chopped
4 cloves of garlic, peeled and chopped
2 Tbsp. fresh ginger root, peeled and chopped
1/4 cup olive oil
1 Tbsp. butter (optional)
4 to 6 cups chicken or vegetable stock, depending on desired soup consistency
salt and pepper to taste

Plain yogurt, sour cream, or creme fraiche as a garnish
Freshly chopped chives and/or cilantro leaves as garnish

1. In large, heavy stockpot, cook carrots, onion, garlic and ginger in the oil and optional butter until the vegetables begin to soften.

2. While vegetables are cooking, heat the stock. Add stock to vegetables and simmer on low until the vegetables are thoroughly softened, about 20 minutes. Using an immersion blender, puree the soup in the stockpot until the soup has a nearly smooth texture. Add salt and pepper to taste.

3. Ladle the soup into bowls. Dollop each serving with a bit of yogurt or cream and sprinkle with the chopped chives and/or cilantro. Serve immediately, preferably with slices of crusty bread.

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Eat well!