health

Broccoli Drawing

Here’s a drawing I did for a post I am planning. The post is going to be about getting kids to eat healthy. Or about giving up trying. Probably both. See “Broccoli for dessert“…

The Big C

My mother, z”l (zichrona l’bracha, may her memory be a blessing), called it ‘the Big C.’ She couldn’t say its real name, Cancer. That would be too much of an admission of its arrival, of the arrival of this dreaded, unwelcome guest. My mother was diagnosed with colon cancer soon after my wedding. The early years of my marriage and of my sons’ babyhoods were marked by worry about how was she doing, how much longer would she be with us, could we do anything at all to reverse the decree, as it felt to us. The doctor gave her less than two years to live; she lived for more than five. Part of her longer survival might have been due to the force of the chemotherapy. My father’s care for her helped, too. A large part was her own desire to live just a bit longer, to see a few more grandchildren born, to dance at a few more simchas.

Unfortunately, I have been impacted by cancer much of my life. In 4th grade, a dear boy in my class died of this disease. Would I get a lump on my leg, too? I used to think. Every ache and pain for the next few years scared me. There was a little girl whose family had come all the way from Israel to the Boston area so she could be treated for cancer. The little girl lived a few more years, but then she too succumbed. As the years rolled passed, I learned of adults who had died of cancer. A friend’s aunt. A friend’s father. An aunt in Israel.

In my twenties, a friend’s mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. I remember how warm a woman she was. I loved going to her home on Shabbat, the table spread with delicacies, and her warm smile making me feel welcome. Once, I went with my friend and her family on a hike in Maine. Out in the woods, we cooked hot dogs over an open fire. I remember her mother said: “I never ate these before I was diagnosed. I always avoided food like this (hot dogs). But now, what does it matter.” What a sad, sad day it was when we attended her funeral.

Years later, my friend would blame fat. “My mother made everything with fat, fat, fat,” she would say. What kind of fat wasn’t clear. One can only guess (saturated animal fat at the main course, with hydrogenated fat for dessert? With some rancid, overcooked oils thrown in anywhere?) Her father, too, would be stricken; about a year or two before my mother died, her father died of prostate cancer.

How I got stuck on the cancer and nutrition link and continue to follow this issue is a subject for another post. I can only write so much on this topic without feeling emotionally drained.

But I will say this: remember how my friend’s mother never ate hot dogs before she got sick? I gradually came to the opposite conclusion. Giving up hot dogs wasn’t merely enough. The food pyramid that we are taught about nutrition isn’t enough. There’s a lot to know about nutrition, and all our bodies are different.

In memory of my dear mother, here are some of her paintings.

Minestrone Soup

I took a cue from blogger me-ander and decided to photograph part of last night’s dinner. Well, only the final product, not the process and ingredients.

Here are the ingredients for this vegan, pareve soup:

• 1 tsp. olive oil
• 1 chopped onion
• 1 sweet potato or yam, chopped into pieces
• 1 big fat carrot, peeled and chopped into pieces
• 1 zucchini, chopped into pieces
• 1 tsp. sea salt (or to taste)
• pepper to taste
• dried thyme to taste
• 2 Tbsp. tomato sauce
• half a can of northern white beans
• pieces of napa cabbage
• handful of snow peas
• water

Put enough olive oil in a pot to cover the bottom. Chop your vegetables. Heat the pot, and then put in the onions. Saute until they are translucent. Add chopped yam, chopped carrot, then chopped zucchini. Add salt, pepper, thyme to taste. Add tomato sauce. Stir, so the yummy olive oil permeates the vegetables. Add enough water to cover the vegetables. Cook for about twenty minutes or the vegetables are tender. Add cabbage, beans and snow peas. When the snow peas are soft, it’s time to eat!

Note on napa cabbage: it has thinner, less fibrous leaves than your standard cabbage. I like it for my coleslaw recipe. I put it in the soup because I had leftovers from making the coleslaw for Shabbat. Will post the coleslaw recipe at some point…

My daughter tasted it, thinking it was chicken soup. I told her it was chicken soup without the chicken. She made a face, and asked if she could put some chicken in it. I told her we had none, and tomorrow night I will make chicken soup. Life with children!

My husband and I thought it was delicious.

How One Cooks Food

This week my husband asked:
Why is the Korban Pesach (the sacrificial lamb) roasted?
You can come up with your own answer, but his answer was because it is a sign of a rich person. When you roast a piece of meat, much of the fat drips away. A poor person would lament the loss of much of the meat. But a rich person is OK with parting with all that fat. It is yet another sign of freedom.

Which reminds me that when I started this blog, I intended to write about food and “you are what you eat”. So I’ll get started here, by saying: pay attention to how you cook the food, as well. Quick broiling is a healthy way of cooking. I am a big fan of steaming vegetables; I own three steamer inserts for my pots.

So maybe I haven’t blogged much about food, food choices and cooking methods because it comes across too preachy. And also, if you think my family only eats healthy food, hah! We do (the adults, anyway) have a tendency to sit around and discuss the junk food after we eat it. My eldest son at a young age could read the sugar amounts on cereal boxes and complain that the ones I bought did not have enough sugar.

I’ll save my complaints about kosher bakeries and hydrogenated fat for another post.

Earth-Friendly Food in a friendly store

Lori at Lori’s Earth Friendly Products has been hard at work redesigning her home page. Who says the mom and pop store is gone? Sometimes you just have to know where to look. Lori is a local Highland Park resident who has been selling juice with fiber for kids and other kosher, healthy products from her internet website for many years (and that’s just her part-time job!).

Bought some coffee last week from Lori’s, and I’ve been enjoying every drop of the fresh coffee I’ve made with it.