Nourishing My Tummy in St. Lucia

Travelling to another country with any sort of dietary restriction can be a challenge, but going on a retreat with Meghan meant that I knew I would be taken care of 100%. I could probably go on about every single meal that I ate at Balanbouche, because Tania and Laila (who I went to nutrition school with!) took the most amazing care with every meal that we ate, but instead I’m going to give you the highlights.
 
Warning: Expect to feel hungry, curious and envious by the end of this post.

Green smoothies that just kept getting greener

Meghan definitely introduced me to the joy that is the green smoothie, and Tania made sure we got our daily dose of greens nearly every morning. The smoothies all week were delicious and filled with unexpected combinations of fresh organic greens and herbs from the nearby farm, coconut, aloe, garlic and many surprises. This incarnation included greens, parsley, cilantro, garlic, avocado and oj. Wonderfully refreshing and the perfect start to our brunches.

Fresh tropical fruit, picked less than 50 meters away

Our mornings always began with wonderful tea and fresh fruit. Bananas, papaya, coconuts, citrus and mangoes that put any fruit that I’ve eaten in Canada to shame. The mangoes were quite possibly one of the most delicious things I’ve ever put in my mouth. Whenever we walked to the nearby beach I would enlist a tall person to pick starfruit for me, which had the most amazing combination of sweet and sour. I could have probably just been a fruitarian all week and have been the happiest girl on the planet.

Okra spinach soup

Have you ever made okra at home? I sure haven’t. I had nothing against this often neglected southern vegetable, I’ve just never really thought much about it nor have I had an epiphanies on what the heck to do with it. This soup changed my mind and I really need to give okra some more love. It was brilliant, made creamy with coconut milk (as many things were) and enhanced with garlic and some simple herbs. Oh so delicious. Going to make and tweak Meghan’s version in the future and show my love for okra…

Laila’s cocoa pancakes

Laila still owes me the recipe for these (hint, hint) but I know that she used a mixture of buckwheat, brown rice and legume flours. Some might be sceptical of a gluten free vegan pancake, but these little guys were out of this world. Paired with a cacao sauce and mango sauce (pureed mango with lime), I couldn’t get enough!! I’m running out of words for delicious, but these absolutely were. Can’t wait to make them at home for an extra special breakfast treat.

Cassava

Prior to St. Lucia I don’t think I had ever heard of cassava, but little did I know I had been eating it for quite some time as tapioca. It’s a root vegetable and in St. Lucia it is often made into this amazing bread that is kind of like naan. It was all kinds of awesome. Tania also made it into a pizza crust for us one day, and it may have been the best gluten free pizza I’ve ever had. I can’t wait to make this and blow other people’s minds with its awesome flavour and texture.

Green banana salad

Similar to potato salad, but much more delicious and not as heavy with green bananas replacing the potatoes and coconut milk adding creaminess. Totally changed my opinion of bananas and reminded me that they don’t just have to be a sweet fruit!

Amazing teas

It’s no secret that I love tea… so it was kind of heaven to experience wonderful, fresh teas from many locally grown ingredients including hibiscus, lemongrass, turmeric, ginger and cacao. Every tea was such a delight, and I brought back a couple cacao sticks so I can make it at home to remind me of St. Lucia.

Cacao Seed Truffles

Cacao, almond butter, chia, maple syrup, vanilla and rum – do I really need to say much more? Bonus points for the presentation in the cacao pods.

Special mention go to: the banana flambé, the spiralized cristophine, the wonderful porridges, the vibrant salads, the plaintain sushi, the chilled cucumber soup and anything seamoss related. Oh. So. Good.

The food at the estate continually blew me away and I’m glad that I’m not committed to picking just one or two favourites! While the objective of the trip was for my soul to be nourished, my tummy was definitely nourished as well! More to come on some of the amazing superfoods that we enjoyed whilst on the island!

If you’re looking for some more travel food porn, be sure to check out Lisa’s blog post discussing the best of the best amid her travels through India, Bali, Thailand, Australia, New Zealand and Hawaii

What’s the best meal or food you’ve experienced while travelling?

Belmonte Raw aka My New Love

A few months ago I heard that there was going to be a new raw food place opening up in my neighborhood and I got pretty excited. Last weekend when I had brunch with Lisa and Carol that anticipation started to build as Carol told us more about the restaurant and then it grew even more so when I saw the Twitter updates of the doors being open.

On Saturday I finally got to visit and was blown away.

Belmonte Raw is everything that I hoped it would be and more, especially since it’s down the street from my house in the heart of Leslieville at 1022 Queen St E. The decor is simple and pretty and our server was positively delightful. The dine-in menu consists of mains that will rotate each week along with 2 daily salads plus an assortment of juices, smoothies and desserts with a commitment to local and organic produce.

I met up with Dani and Lisa by chance when I arrived, and both had opinions on what I should order. My meal got off to a lovely start with a Happiness juice

which was an amazing mix of grapes, grapefruit and pear. It was all kinds of awesome. For my main, I opted for the burrito

It was unbelievably good. A collard wrap with jicama, tomato, veggies and a nut-based taco filling served with dehydrated tortilla chips and 3 dips. The cheezy sauce that came with the chips was out of this world. Why bother eating cheese when you can have sauces that are cashew based and taste just as rich and creamy with so much depth of flavor?! The wrap was amazing too.

I find that sometimes raw food can be way too heavy when it relies heavily on nuts and seeds to make it good. Belmonte Raw has found a great balance between food that is delicious, nutritious and going to keep you full. At the end I found myself dipping the collard wrap in the cheezy sauce because it was just that good.

Dani and Lisa told me that I had to try the chocolate, and who was I to argue?

It was like the best Reese Peanut Butter cup ever without the crap they put in Reese Peanut Butter cups, because it was entirely raw. I loved every single bite.

My meal was the perfect fuel for my crazy Saturday (pictures and video from the Ashleyx2 cabaret to come!) and I even grabbed a beet salad to take with me for later. I didn’t end up eating it for dinner, but the next day, and it was delicious as well.

I told Carol that I’m vying for her best customer award since it’s right down the street and an amazing option for healthy, scrumptious, take away food close to home.

Found this great reminder to “live what you love” in the rest room and took that message to heart as I headed to my show!

Belmonte Raw, it’s official: we’re in love and there’s no turning back!

Expressing My Gratitude

Happy Thanksgiving to my fellow Canadians! I hope you had a great weekend with your family and friends and were able to find time to enjoy the gorgeous weather and beautiful colours of the leaves that have been changing rapidly over the last few weeks. I had a wonderful weekend and was reminded of all the fantastic things in my life that I have to be thankful for. While different than last year’s list in some ways, many of the elements remain constant.

I am thankful for my beautiful friends and family with whom I had the pleasure of spending a lot of quality time with this weekend. I neglected to take a ton of pictures of my beautiful walk through our neighbourhood with Nicole (my new roommate!), but managed to snap a photo of our delicious almond chai lattes from Broadview Espresso. On Friday I enjoyed a delicious lunch at Fresh with a delightful friend and then spent the afternoon basking in the sunshine on the U of T campus. [insert giddy Ashley here]Friday night also marked the first of two shows I saw this weekend, fuelling another one of the things that I’m thankful for this year: performing and being inspired. I’ve been so lucky this year to be a part of some amazing shows and it’s absolutely wonderful to go see other talented folks onstage and feel inspired. Ashley and I had the pleasure of seeing [title of show] at the Toronto Centre for the Arts. I’m so sad that it has since closed, because I would tell all of you to go see it. It was smart, hilarious and brilliantly performed and both Ashley and I left the theatre feeling inspired. I laughed my face off, left humming the songs and plan to adopt the song Die Vampire, Die! as my new theme song when I’m feeling insecure. I loved the show and was so thrilled that I had the chance to see it.

The Ashleyx2 adventures continued with a matinee of Banana Shpeel on Saturday.

We had a lot of fun at the show. The sets, costumes and lighting were breathtaking, the featured performers were ridiculously talented and the ensemble were awesome too. We had fabulous seats and truly enjoyed ourselves. Cirque du Soleil is pretty amazing…

Both shows left me wanting more and feeling inspired to come home and work on my own art. I want to be performing more and more these days and I feel so blessed to be surrounded by so many talented people to influence my art.

It goes without saying that I’m thankful for my health, and one of the reasons for the way that I feel is how I eat! Gluten-free vegan living is so normal to me now and I was thankful to enjoy some delightful fall/Thanksgiving inspired treats this weekend including Fitnessista pumpkin chocolate chip muffins Snobby joe lentils stuffed into acorn squashand my weekend pride and joy – a gluten free vegan apple pie!I’ve never made a pie crust before, so it was pretty exciting that my first one was actually gluten free and vegan! As usual, Meghan’s recipe rocked and the crust was super easy to make. I made the apple filling from 2 lbs of peeled & diced apples (Granny smith/Pink lady combo), cinnamon and agave. It was delicious!! I had so much fun baking, eating and sharing it – I felt so domestic and the house smelled amazing.

It was such a great weekend and demonstrated that I have a lot to be thankful for on top of a pretty amazing year… what are you thankful for?

Catching Up on Summer Foodie Goodness

I’ve realized I’ve been hoarding a lot of food photos from the summer…Lots of fruit and veggie goodness… many salads and stir fries and simple things. It’s been too hot to cook anything elaborate so I’ve kept things pretty simple. The summer has also made me pretty social, so there have been meals out at lovely places like Fresh, Live and various sushi restaurants.

This weekend I also made a couple of raw soups as a part of Meghan’s green smoothie weekend. I had a lot of fun with an abundance of green smoothie goodness, but wanted to change things up a little bit. Both recipes were from Natalie Rose’s Raw Food Life Force Energy. The first was pumpkin pie in a bowl I opted for steamed sweet potato since I don’t have a high powered blender and it turned out beautifully. It truly was like pumpkin pie in a bowl and it made me really happy.

The second was the pineapple’s just peachy soup with pineapple, berries, spinach, mint and some sweet Ontario peaches. I fed some of this to one of my roommate’s and he inquired what made it a soup and not a smoothie? I said it was because I opted to eat it out of a bowl with a spoon rather than from a glass. I guess it could be a smoothie too, although I might add some additional liquid. I loved the fresh flavour and really enjoyed the pineapple and peach combo.

I’m hoping to get back to the farmer’s market today to pick up some more delicious summer-y goodies while they’re still fresh and delicious!

What are your summer staple foods? Are you looking forward to any particular fall foods?

Words To Live By

I was killing a bit of time in Indigo the other night (before seeing The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo which was awesome!) and couldn’t help but feel overwhelmed by the number of diet and nutrition books that the store had on its shelves. Now I’m a sucker for a good book about food but really, do we need that many? Perusing the titles, there seemed to be something for everyone with every gimmick known to man.

The experience brought me back to the simplicity of a great Michael Pollan quote:

”Eat good food. Not too much. Mostly plants”

What else is there beyond that in food land? Obviously lifestyle choices, behaviours, feelings, emotions and exercise are all going to play into a healthy lifestyle (which is why I still love Weight Watchers after 4 years of following the program) but I’ve realized that the gimmicky stuff doesn’t turn me on, nor do I believe that it has staying power. Lately I’ve just been trying to listen to my body and nourish it the best ways I know how: What are your thoughts on the number of diet and food books out there? What are your words to live by when it comes to food and nutrition?  

Sunny St. Patrick’s Day With Kate, Kale and Cruda Cafe

I can hardly believe that yesterday was March 17 as the weather in Toronto was absolutely glorious!!

Started off my day with some banana soft serve and fruit I honestly felt like I was eating ice cream for breakfast and I would be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy it!! It was so smooth and creamy and the perfect way to start my day. We have a new roommate here at the house Miss Iris!! I’m delighted that she is with me and having fun watching her get settled into her new digs. Other roommates are less excited… Judas was camped outside my door for most of the day, waiting for an opportunity to greet the new inhabitant. He was unsuccessful, but something tells me this won’t be the last I see of him trying to sneak a peek. We’re trying to avoid World War 3 by introducing them to one another slowly…

I decided that it would be brilliant to spend the morning at St. Lawrence Market as I had not been in quite some time. I had mentioned this idea to Kate when I ran into her on the streetcar on Tuesday and she said she had been thinking the same thing, so off we went! Toronto’s St. Lawrence Market has been around for more than 200 years and has been heralded as one of the 25 best food markets by Food and Wine magazine. There are a wide variety of vendors selling produce, meats, cheeses, housewares, and pretty much anything you can imagine. I scored some great produce including organic purple kale, purple carrots, bok choy, asparagus and blood oranges but there were three other things at the market that made me ULTRA excited… Gluten free grains in bulk at Rube’s! I had just been talking to one of my roommates about teff the other day and was so excited to find it alongside amaranth and other goodies at the market. I grabbed teff and amaranth as well as some millet and sorghum flour. The booth also had amaranth, chickpea and quinoa flours (all well-priced)  plus a variety of lentils, beans and rice noodles so I know I will be going back there again!

Second piece of excitement… Fresh organic sprouts from Uncle George’s Sprouts. I opted for the sunflower sprouts and can’t wait to add them to my salads this week and enjoy the delicious-sprouty-goodness. Last but not least… Cruda Cafe is a raw vegan cafe located in the basement of the North building nestled in amongst the stalls of meat and cheese. I was so excited to try Cruda’s menu of raw delights. After some deliberation I opted for one of the wraps, filled with a pesto and tonnes of colourful veggies and sprouts. It was delicious!! The wrap was flavourful without being overpowering and the pesto was a wonderful compliment to the beets, avocado, carrot, greens and sprouts. There were many other options on the menu that sounded delightful as well as a variety of vegan and/or raw truffles, pies and cupcakes. I hope it does well in the Market as I look forward to going back again. Kate and I declared our market visit a success. I definitely need to visit more often! I celebrated with a delicious stir fry of some of the veggies I had procured. Kale, asparagus, bok choy and tofu with green onions, garlic, ginger, tamari & apple cider vinegar (in Drew’s coveted bowl that I kinda want to steal…) Other than the green-hued sweater I wore, it was the closest I got to sharing in the St. Patrick’s day festivities as I ventured!

How was your St. Patrick’s Day?

And What’s More, Baby, I Can Cook

While it may look like I know what I’m doing in the kitchen in my weekly meal recaps, it hasn’t always been that way!

I did a lot of cooking and baking with both of my grandmothers when I was younger. My Nana (dad’s mom) was Ukrainian and during the holidays we would make perogies, cabbage rolls, and borscht plus tonnes of cookies, cakes and sweets in addition to the turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy and vegetables!

Nana was always in her kitchen and I have a lot of fond memories of us chatting away while we cut out circles of dough for perogies or kneaded dough for bread.

With my Nanny (mom’s mom) I did a lot of baking. We would put on little cooking shows in her kitchen while making every kind of cookie imaginable! Every time I went to visit, Nan would make me a lemon meringue pie because it was my absolute favourite! We always laughed a lot in her kitchen and I have a lot of funny memories of us acting silly together and singing while we did the dishes (like in this picture she made me hold for – I was putting butter in that bowl and when I went to flick it off the spoon it ended up on my face instead)

In my teenage years I didn’t do a ton of cooking. I have to hand it to my dad for feeding my brother and I. I didn’t become particularly maternal after mum died, and he did the best he could to put meals on the table for us. I fell into the habit of buying my lunch and the dining out trend continued when I was in high school and constantly on the go.

By the time I was in college, I was eating in restaurants all the time and I really think that it contributed to my weight. I made my lunch sometimes and brought some snacks with me, but most of my meals were eaten outside the home.

This really changed when I joined Weight Watchers and met Joey. I realized when I joined WW that I needed to change my habits and I knew that I wasn’t going to be able to figure out the Points values for everything so I just started cooking.

I met Joey the week I joined Weight Watchers and sometime in those first couple weeks I invited him over and made him lasagna.He was impressed! When I moved into his house, there was a box of leftover pad thai, and some vinegar in the fridge and some cereal and ramen noodles in the cupboard – boy, did that change quickly! I began getting ideas from websites and magazines and then I started to amass my cookbook collection. I experimented with meals; most were successes but there were definitely some failures in there too. After I reached my goal weight I treated myself to some cake decorating classes with the amazing Bonnie Gordon and since then have made a lot of celebration cakes including two wedding cakes.

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I’m really proud of how far I’ve come in the kitchen and it’s really become a place where I feel at home again. Since going gluten and dairy free, and ultimately vegan, I’ve worked to keep things interesting at our table. I bring my lunch almost every day and make dinner most nights so I love trying new recipes and reading new cookbooks. It has been fun to experiment with new techniques and see my progress from that very first lasagna. Joey often sends me messages at work to tell me how much he loves his lunches and that brings me a lot of joy. I look forward to trying new recipes and nourishing people with delicious, healthy eats. I still consider myself a work in progress and have areas where I would like to improve. I would like to work on my confidence in the kitchen. I’m not always sure of myself, so I just need to work on trusting my instincts. I would also like to use this confidence to create more of my own recipes. While I adore using cookbooks and other people’s recipes, I want to be more experimental and try some things on my own.

I know that getting busy in the kitchen can seem like a daunting task for many people, so I’ve compiled a list of tips that helped me:

• Take baby steps– Don’t start out with a huge meal with lots of unfamiliar equipment and complicated steps. Keep it simple!
• Take a class – There is so much to learn from the experiences of others and gain knowledge from other people’s passion for food!
• Use your favourite foods – Do you have a favourite food item? Maybe a dish from your childhood that you can’t live without? Use the things you love, and your enthusiasm will shine in the meal
• Make soup – Before I started cooking regularly, the only soup I knew came out of a can or carton. I’ve since learned that making soup is not only incredibly easy, but it’s one of the most rewarding dishes you can make
• Get the right tools – While I do advocate keeping it simple, proper equipment can make your life so much easier. Start with the basics (a good knife, cutting board, measuring cups/spoons, bowls of different sizes, spatula) and work your way up to the big guys (I don’t know how went on without my food processor and I really love my blender, mixer, and slow cooker)
• Cook for someone you love – There’s nothing more rewarding!

Julia Child is quoted as saying, “I was 32 when I started cooking; up until then, I just ate” and I totally understand! I feel like I lost out on a ton of cooking years, but finally woke up around age 22 and got my butt back in the kitchen. I’m so happy that I did and can’t wait to see what culinary masterpieces are around the corner.

How did you learn to cook? How would you like to improve in the kitchen? Do you have any tips for people starting out?