Can exercise be fun?

The bounce in my step has everything to do with exercise — except I don't work out, at least not in the traditional sense.

I don't go to the gym, take fitness classes or participate in any routine that includes fancy equipment, special clothing or patterns of "reps." Yet, I do exercise.

I go for long meandering walks, pull weeds in the garden and take slow rows around the lake. Occasionally, I bicycle at the beach. None of those activities feels like exercise because instead of focusing on working out, I'm working at focusing in. I'm paying attention to the birds, looking at plants or taking quiet pleasure in a stunning skyscape. Instead of having a desire to burn calories, I'm having a burning desire to see what's around the next corner or to find out what kind of turtle just poked its head out of the water.

The kind of exercise I like best is the kind that doesn't feel like exercise at all. That's why I'm excited about stability disks, also known as wobble cushions or domed balance balls. My husband Ralph ordered a pair of the inflatable nubby-surfaced disks for his stand-up computer desk and used them during a period when he was busy with office work.

Eventually he began spending less time indoors, and the unused orbs sat idle until I got tired of seeing them on the floor and brought them into my office.

Like Ralph, I also have a stand-up desk, but my laptop is set up on a treadmill so I can walk while I work. For years, I racked up miles while writing, doing research or wiling away time on Facebook. Eventually, however, the treadmill stopped working correctly. Annoying squeaks made walking less enjoyable, so I stopped using it. I still did my typing standing up, but I did it standing still, which wasn't nearly as much fun.

The day I swooped Ralph's two wobble cushions off the living room floor and brought them into my office, was the day I set into motion an entirely new way of combining fun with fitness. I placed the flat-bottomed, rounded disks on the non-working treadmill and balanced myself on their textured skin, one foot on each ball's springy surface. As I started to type, my feet instinctively found purchase. They shifted back and forth and bounced up and down. My body swayed as my fingers tapped the keys.

Six months have gone by since I first put my feet on the round rubbery disks, and I've been "dancing" on the wobble cushions ever since. Without pattern or prescribed routine, the improvised movement has improved my balance and toned calf and leg muscles. This low-impact activity is said to build core strength while providing weight-bearing exercise, which are both important benefits. However, the main thing I like about using the wobble cushions is how much I enjoy standing on them when I'm on the computer. Just like rowing in the lake, meandering through hiking trails or tidying up flowerbeds, I'm doing things I enjoy.

Exercise is important, but it's not always fun. One way to change that is to choose activities that don't feel like exercise at all. For me, balancing on two wobble cushions fits the bill as another simple, safe way to incorporate healthy activities into my everyday life.

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Where to buy wobble cushions - We purchased ours (we have several pairs) online from amazon.  They come in a range of colors and cost less than $15 each.  Check out SUESPORT Air Inflated Stability Wobble Cushion, Banlance Disc, Twist Massage, Fitness and Exercise, Pump Included

No guilt: Enjoy chocolate without fat or sugar

Chocolate covered strawberries is just one way to enjoy homemade cacao powder concoctions.

Simply Living
February 4, 2013

I’m not a big fan of chocolate but my husband is.  However, until recently, Ralph has been careful not to overindulge.  For health reasons, he didn’t want to consume too much saturated fat or sugar, ingredients found in most manufactured chocolate products.  His self-imposed limit was one small piece of dark chocolate a day and he rarely cheated. 

He doesn’t restrain himself anymore. 

Ever since we discovered how easy it is to make fat-free, sugarless, no-cooking-involved confections at home out of raw cacao powder, Ralph eats as much chocolate as he wants without guilt or health worries.  In fact, the way he now consumes chocolate might even be beneficial to his health.

Raw cacao beans are high in essential minerals like iron, magnesium, calcium, zinc, potassium and copper.  Research suggests that the antioxidants found in raw cacao beans aid cardiovascular health by improving circulation and lowering blood pressure. 

As if that weren’t enough, when you eat a confection made out of raw cacao powder, feel-good signals flood your body.  Neurotransmitters like serotonin and endorphins send out messages of calmness and wellbeing that improve moods and act as anti-depressants.

Sound good?  Tastes better!   

It only takes three basic ingredients - raw cacao powder, liquid and stevia – to make fat-free, low-calorie, no-cook chocolate confections at home.  However, how much of each ingredient to use depends on what you want to make.  I like to start each day with a hot chocolate drink made with more liquid than the gooey mixtures Ralph prefers.  Adding extra liquid to the powdered cacao creates a thinner, syrupy concoction while adding less yields a more fudge-like texture.  Similarly, the amount of stevia (we use both a powdered form and a liquid form of stevia) will determine how sweet the chocolate becomes. 

The two brands of cacao powder we use – Raw Cacao Powder by NavitasNaturals and Madre Labs’s CocoCeps – are both excellent.  For stevia, I’m partial to the brand NuNaturals, which makes both a Pure Liquid Clear Stevia as well as NuNaturals' NuStevia White Stevia Powder.  For a liquid, we have tried water, tea, juice and unsweetened soymilk but any liquid will do. 

Making no-cook, chocolate at home is all about experimentation.  It’s important to begin with just a little, perhaps a couple tablespoons of powder mixed with a teaspoon of powdered stevia or about 10 drops of liquid stevia.  Add to that a few drops of liquid, stirring until it is no longer lumpy then increase the liquid a little at a time until the desired consistency is achieved.  To determine if the chocolate’s texture is what you want or if it is sweet enough, take frequent tastes.  Remember, eating chocolate made without the fat or sugar is good for you! 

Once you’ve arrived at a desired consistency and flavor, try dipping various fruits and nuts into the chocolate.  Strawberries, which are just coming into season in Florida, are yummy when dipped in stevia-sweetened cacao syrup.  After enjoying them fresh, try placing a few chocolate-dipped fruit on a platter to place in the freezer for a few hours where the cold air will cause the chocolate to harden. 

End result:  A satisfying dessert that’s low in calories and fat, tastes delicious and - most important – will make you feel good while improving your health.

(Helpful Hint) - You can save money and shopping time by ordering all the products mentioned above from www.iherb.com where you'll automatically receive $10 off your first purchase if you use the code LEJ891 at checkout.

A Holding Pattern...

Unripe fruit – neither ripening nor rotting – on a papaya tree

Simply Living
January 28, 2013

Even though it’s winter, the papaya tree on the south side of our house still has fruit.  The fruit aren’t ripe nor have they noticeably matured over the last few months.  On the other hand, they haven’t frozen or fallen off.  They haven’t rotted either.  They’re in a holding pattern, a tropical plant trying to exist in a semi-tropical locale.

I can identify with the papaya.  I’m hanging on too, waiting to see what will happen.

We all go through situations with resolutions beyond our control.  We wait.  We wonder.  We anticipate results.  What kind of winds will blow?  Will they be cold and biting or warm with relief?

With plants, the answer is relatively simple and unimportant.  Sure, I want the papaya tree to survive.  I’d love to know it made it through the winter so we can reap our reward and enjoy the sweet fruit.  But if it doesn’t make it – if the fruits fall to the ground and rot - it will be a small disappointment.  

We tried.  We failed.  We’ll try harder next time.

With people, it’s different.  The result is everything, the waiting interminable.  We do our best to improve situations.  We ask questions, do research, discuss and debate.  Ultimately, it’s no different than it is with the papaya.  We hang on and wait to see what will transpire.

To be a successful gardener, you must choose the right plants to put in the proper location at the appropriate time of year.  If you provide adequate water, the right soil mixture and fertilizers and monitor pests, there’s a good chance the plants will thrive. 

But not always. 

Unanticipated variables can arise.  Unexpected weather shifts can wreak havoc on a garden or grove.  So can insect infestations or damage done by animals.  Sometimes plants don’t thrive even when it seems you’ve done everything right.  

That’s how it can be with people too.

You nurture your internal garden.  You plant judiciously, feed and exercise with care.  You provide balance and an ideal locale.  Still unexpected variables emerge, dispelling intentions, redirecting plans. 

Sometimes I wish it were simpler.  I wish for a formula – a prescription of truth.  In my personal sci-fi fantasy, we start each day by stepping into a fail-proof machine to calculate body chemistry.  If the machine finds an excess or lack of a specific nutrient, it spells out in unequivocal detail a remedy for the problem.  No conflicting data.  No Google search needed. 

Although I try not to squander valuable time contemplating imaginary scenarios, lately I can’t help but wish for something better than our current medical system.  When plants are in a holding pattern, we can afford to let them be but people are too precious for a similar passivity.

Unfortunately, conversations about health care reform often fail to answer the most basic of questions.  For instance, why should it be so difficult to find out how much specific medical services cost?  In no other industry are prices so infuriatingly inaccessible.  Treatment options are another subject of inscrutability.  There is no consensus among medical experts.  How is a patient supposed to know what information to believe, what path to follow, what direction to take?  Finally, why do health care professionals continue to rely on outdated modes of communication like faxes and written records when every other industry has switched to online or email transmissions? 

When I look out the window and see the unripe papayas still hanging on the tree, I see a simple plant with an unknown future to be determined by climate, weather and timing.  Like the papaya fruit, I’m in a holding pattern but without answers so simple or clear-cut.  

Hopefully, both there will be a sweet ending, a fruitful conclusion to an uncertain fate.

Versatile kale packs nutritional punch

Young Red Russian kale plants thrive in Florida throughout the fall, winter and early spring.

Simply Living
(First appeared in Orlando Sentinel January 10, 2011)

Every day around lunchtime, I go into the garden and cut a few kale leaves. After shaking water droplets off them, I bring the crinkly edged greens inside to use in place of lettuce on my sandwich. Kale leaves add a pleasant crunch to my midday meal as well as a slightly sweet, pleasant flavor.

Unlike lettuce, which has few vitamins and minerals, kale leaves pack a nutritional punch. Each bite provides antioxidants, anti-inflammatory nutrients and cancer-fighting glucosinolates. Kale is a rich source of vitamins A, C and K as well as minerals such as calcium, copper, potassium, iron, manganese and phosphorus.

Kale belongs to the Brassica family, whose members include arugula, bok choy, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, collards, mustard greens, radishes, rapini, turnips and watercress. While some of its cousins are strong-flavored and bitter, kale is mild-mannered and inoffensive. Consider it the Clark Kent of cruciferous veggies.

Kale is easy to grow. Its growing season is long — August through March. It likes cold weather and is seldom bothered by bugs or disease. The variety we're growing this year is Red Russian, ordered from Fedco Seeds in Waterville, Maine (fedcoseeds.com). Although the company's main clientele lives in Northern climates, many of its seeds, including Red Russian kale, do well in the South.

In late August, Ralph sowed about half of a 70-cent, 2-gram packet of the tiny black orbs into three 15-gallon containers filled with our special soil mixture, a rich combination of composted manure, peat and woodchips for aeration. Within a few weeks, dozens of sprouts began to appear.

When the young shoots were about an inch high and sported a few small leaves, my son Tim, who inherited his father's green thumb, transplanted them into two dozen 15-gallon containers. From then on, the seedlings developed quickly. We began harvesting the frilly leaves in late September. Today, four months later, the plants are still producing growth without showing any sign of decline.

I take scissors with me when I'm out gathering leaves. Kale leaves grow on tough stems that resemble pinkish-green celery stalks. The stems are edible, but they taste better when cooked, while the tender young leaves are delicious raw. For each sandwich, I snip off four bread-slice-sized leaf sections. I come back for the stems when I'm making soup or looking for a crunchy ingredient to add to a stir-fry.

There's much more to do with kale leaves than use them as a substitute for lettuce. The chopped greens also work well in stews or in any recipe that calls for spinach. Sometimes for dinner, I'll gather a basketful of the fresh tops and chop them into small pieces before sautéing them in a cast-iron frying pan lightly coated with olive oil and pressed garlic. When the leaves are turning bright green — it's important not to overcook — I pour in a dash of lemon juice, turn off the heat and cover the pan for about two minutes before serving. If Ralph is making dinner, he'll add a sprinkle of turmeric as a seasoning.

When we lived on Cape Cod, my kids were partial to kale soup, a Portuguese staple available in many local restaurants. I haven't had that ethnic delicacy in years, but recently, Ralph and I spent time in St. Petersburg, where we discovered a completely different use for this most versatile and nutritious vegetable. Leafy Green Café, a wonderful little vegan raw-food eatery, serves side orders of a house specialty called kale chips. The chips — crunchy, seasoned morsels that melt in the mouth — are the result of slowly drying fresh kale leaves sprinkled with a special spice mixture. They were unexpectedly delicious.

Just as Clark Kent changed into Superman, the modest kale plant reveals superpowers of its own. The difference is that kale's transformation requires no telephone booth. All that's needed are an inexpensive packet of seeds, some potting soil and a desire to experiment with your taste buds. No matter how it is used — cooked, raw or dehydrated — kale is one vegetable worthy of attention.

After a long wait, mushrooms crop up at last

Fresh picked shiitakes!

And another mushroom still growing

Simply Living
(First appeared in Orlando Sentinel December 5, 2010)

What a surprise! After two years of waiting — long enough to have just about given up — the oak logs that my husband seeded with mushroom spores have produced a small crop of shiitake mushrooms. My son Timmy discovered them sprouting from the pile of stacked logs.

"Look what we've got!" Ralph said, as I came into the kitchen still drowsy with sleep. I knew something was going on from the sound of slamming doors and excited voices during the normally sedate pre-breakfast hour.

"Timmy found all these shiitakes growing on the logs," Ralph announced, holding out a plateful of round, brown mushroom caps ranging in diameter from 3 to 6 inches.

Shiitakes are Ralph's favorite mushroom. For years he has been eating both fresh and dried versions of this historically prized, nutritionally rich fungus. It has been a long time, however, since he has had a homegrown supply.

Shiitake mushrooms originated in Asia and have been around since prehistoric times. For thousands of years, Chinese and Japanese farmers have cultivated shiitakes on logs cut from the "shii" tree, a medium-size evergreen related to beech and oaks.

Ancient peoples noted the mushroom's numerous health benefits, and recent research supports many of those traditional claims. Low-fat, high-protein shiitakes are an excellent source of vitamins and minerals. These qualities have not been overlooked by my health-conscious husband.

"I wonder if that's all we'll get or if it's just the beginning," Ralph mused while trimming off the bulbous stem ends and brushing away a small spider hiding on the white underside of a mushroom cap.

My husband's uncertainty is understandable. He hasn't had a reliable mushroom crop since we left Cape Cod. In the late 1980s, Ralph took a three-day mushroom growing course at Fungi Perfecti, a family-owned company in Washington State founded 30 years ago by Paul Stamets. Stamets is renowned mycologist, a scientist who specializes in mushrooms.

Ralph returned from that hands-on workshop with his mushroom fervor at full throttle, revved up and ready to establish his own supply of edible fungi.

Back on the Cape, he felled some large oak branches and drilled many small holes to receive the inch-long dowels containing the shiitake spores, or spawn. Less than a year later (spawn mature at 6 to 18 months), he was sautéing his own homegrown mushrooms with olive oil and garlic in an cast-iron pan. The logs continued to produce a bumper crop of brown-capped beauties for several years.

Then we moved to a completely different climate.

Ralph assumed that without an extended cold period, shiitakes wouldn't grow in Central Florida, so he didn't try to establish a colony. For the past two decades, we relied on fresh shiitakes purchased locally and on dried mushrooms ordered from an online supplier.

My husband's mycological musings started anew when he read an article about a Floridian with a backyard shiitake mushroom operation. Inspired by that farmer's success, Ralph decided to try again. While waiting for shiitake plugs to arrive from Fungi Perfecti, he cut up oak logs and readied them for seeding. That was two years ago. Until this week, the only mushrooms he had harvested were two or three small specimens, barely enough to provide a satisfying meal for one.

Only time will tell if the logs will continue to produce a crop. I hope they do. Growing your own food is satisfying on so many levels. Not only do you savor the incomparable flavor of homegrown edibles and enjoy the nutritional benefits of eating the freshest food possible but you see how each type of food grows. By watching their development, you get to know plants. You even become familiar with whatever little bugs, butterflies or, in the case of shiitake mushrooms, tiny spiders find those crops attractive.

With shiitake mushrooms — at least with those spawn that manage to establish a colony — the process of producing your own food is as basic as it comes. Choose logs. Drill holes. Insert seed plugs. Seal holes. Provide a shady, moist location. Sit back and wait.

But be forewarned: By the time you're ready to give up all hope that you'll ever reap a harvest …surprise! Shiitake mushrooms for supper, homegrown and delicious!

Manna Bread — a little slice of heaven that's also healthful

Simply Living
(First appeared in Orlando Sentinel November 14, 2010)

Many of the foods my family eats are not your typical grocery store finds. One such food, Manna Bread, is a moist, cakelike loaf made from sprouted grains, fruits and nuts. My husband adores Manna Bread. It has been an essential part of his diet for the past 35 years, and when his supply runs low, as it did this past week, he enters a state slightly south of Panic.

"I'm almost out of Manna Bread!" he announced.

"Maybe I can get some in town," I said, hoping to alleviate his anxiety. Although it's not usually available in the grocery store, health-food stores sometimes carry it in their refrigerated cases. I figured I'd go to town and check it out.

We discovered Manna Bread 35 years ago, when we owned a small natural-food store on Cape Cod. For Ralph, it was love at first bite.

"It tastes like carrot cake, yet it has no sugar, no salt, no oil and is made from sprouted grains. What's not to like?" he said, referring to Carrot Raisin Manna Bread, his favorite among the nine varieties produced by Manna Organic.

This concoction is remarkably flavorful despite its minimal ingredient list. Sprouted organic whole-wheat kernels, filtered water, organic carrots and organic raisins are all that's in a 14-ounce loaf of Ralph's favorite bread.

"By fully germinating our grains, we convert the starches into easily digested natural complex sugars, similar to those found in fresh fruits, hence the sweetness," explains Manna Organic on its website, http://www.mannaorganicbakery.com. "The sprouts are ground and hand-shaped into loaves, baked at a low temperature, then packed and frozen to preserve shelf life, without any chemical additives."

The bread's sweetness — especially in the Carrot Raisin loaf — makes it a perfect dessert food, and that's how my husband usually uses it. Ralph ends most meals with a serving of Manna Bread.

"It's like having a piece of carrot cake without eating any sugar or oil or salt or preservatives," he explains. "It satisfies my sweet tooth."

With only 130 calories in a two-ounce serving, Manna Bread is kind to the waistline. Flavorful enough to eat plain, it is also tasty when toasted and served with a smear of nut butter, jam or cheese.

"I don't know what I'd do if they stopped making it," he lamented after we returned from a trip to town empty-handed. "I'd be devastated."

I'm hoping that won't happen. Although local stores may not normally carry this less-than-mainstream food, it has been a standard item at large, natural-food chains for more than a quarter-century. It is available in Orlando at Whole Foods Market, and smaller stores can order it if a customer requests it.

We all have special foods that make us happy. For me, it's a cup of stevia-sweetened jasmine green tea. For my husband, it's the naturally sweet taste of carrot-raisin manna bread. If I have to take a 45-minute trip to the city to satisfy my partner's food needs, I'll gladly rev up the motor.

After a few growing pains, fig trees are fruitful

Simply Living

(First appeared in Orlando Sentinel July 11, 2010)

My husband is happy. Every day he walks out to check the fig trees and returns home with a bowlful of fruit. Like a child with a new toy, he likes to show off his treasure.

"Look how many figs I got today," he says after tracking me down to the laundry room, where I'm sorting through clean clothes and folding towels. "We're going to have a great harvest this year."

I'm happy for my husband. I like figs, but Ralph loves them. His passion for this member of the mulberry family of plants isn't new. He has been growing figs for more than 30 years, though his early attempts were not especially … fruitful.

In the 1970s and early '80s, we lived on Cape Cod, where fig trees grew but were susceptible to cold. To protect the plants in winter, he would partially uproot the trees and tip them over before blanketing them with a thick layer of mulch.

The theory behind all this effort was that the mulch would provide sufficient warmth to prevent the cold from damaging the plant.

In spring, when the weather warmed, he reversed the process. He removed the mulch, righted the plants and tamped down the earth. It worked, to an extent. The trees survived, but they never thrived. Despite all his pampering, I can't recall a single harvest.

Nonetheless, he continued trying.

When we moved to Florida, land of mild winters, Ralph went a little crazy. He bought several varieties of fig trees and planted them around the property. Unfortunately, Florida soil is susceptible to infestations of nematodes, microscopic roundworms that live in the soil and attack the roots of certain plants. Nematodes are a fig tree's nemesis.

Although nematodes didn't kill the trees, they severely limited fig production. Nematode-infested plants produce figs that drop off the tree before they're mature.

Unwilling to give up, Ralph sought out nematode-resistant cultivars. Somewhere along the line he chanced upon the LSU purple fig, a nematode-resistant variety developed by Ed O'Rourke, professor of horticulture at Louisiana State University. O'Rourke released the LSU purple fig in 1991. Ralph purchased some trees shortly after they came on the market, and he has been growing them ever since.

The LSU purple fig resembles the black mission fig in size and shape. It is a vigorous grower and prolific producer of sweet, medium-size fruit. Ralph has more than a dozen mature trees planted not far from the house. He can walk outside with a large plate or bowl and within minutes return to the kitchen with more fresh figs than any one person can possibly eat.

"Sixty figs," he announced last night. "That's how many I just picked."

"We're going to have to start drying them," I said as I surveyed the kitchen counter where plates full of ripening figs covered most available surfaces.

Last year, Ralph froze our extra figs. It turned out that figs freeze remarkably well. When thawed, they lose very little taste or quality of texture. This year, however, fresh-picked blueberries fill our freezer.

Unless I start making several pies each day (highly unlikely), there won't be room for too many bags of figs. We haven't experimented much with drying figs, but I expect we will soon begin.

Then again, our oldest son is due to arrive home in a few days and, like my husband, he has a passion for figs. Timmy has an uncanny ability to make food disappear, which might turn the "problem" of excess figs into a non-issue.

If you're going to have a problem, having too much of a good thing is a great problem to have.

A new look at an ancient food

 Vats of fresh bean curd can still be found in ethnic food stores

Simply Living

(First appeared in Orlando Sentinel May 17, 2010)

When I say "tofu," what comes to mind?

If your answer is "a strange-looking, foreign-sounding food," then chances are you probably don't have packages of bean curd stacked in your fridge.

Although it has been an essential part of Asian diets for more than 2,000 years, tofu wasn't commercially available in Western markets until the mid-1960s. Since then, this highly versatile, nutritious food has risen slowly but steadily in popularity.

Tofu has eased its way into mainstream American culture over the past five decades, thanks in large part to books such as Frances Moore Lappé's Diet for a Small Planet, first published in 1971, and The Book of Tofu by William Shurtleff and Akiko Aoyagi, which appeared in 1975.

Ralph and I owned a natural-food store in Wellfleet, Mass., when these authors were encouraging a generation of young adults to explore more healthful ways of eating. At that time, anyone who wanted to try tofu had two choices: They could buy it at a natural food store or make it themselves.

Packed away in our attic is a wooden tofu-making kit. Made by Larry Needleman in 1976 and based on designs from The Book of Tofu, the soybean press was a popular item during that burgeoning period of do-it-yourself food preparation. Although we owned the kit, we seldom used it, relying instead on the fresh tofu we sold in our store.

Our store was on Cape Cod, and to supply our customers (and our own family) with the tofu we wanted to eat, Ralph and I traveled to Boston. We took a four-hour round trip at least once a week in our station wagon to buy several five-gallon containers of freshly made bean curd from a tofu maker in that city's Chinatown. We brought the containers back to Wellfleet and sold the cubes, still floating in the watery brine, by the piece to eager customers.

Stepping into that tofu shop was like walking into another world. Steam rose over vats of boiling soybeans as an aged tofu maker stirred the mixture with a long wooden paddle. The floor was wet, English was barely spoken, receipts were scratched on soggy pieces of paper, and the tofu was incredibly fresh and flavorful.

Anyone who has ever tasted tofu knows it is not notable for its remarkable flavor. Tofu is a bland food that picks up and absorbs the essence of other, more distinctive-tasting seasonings and spices. However, the tofu from that old Chinese tofu maker had a taste sensation all its own. Ralph has fond memories of driving home from Boston while devouring one fresh cake of tofu after another. I can't say that I did the same, but I have always enjoyed incorporating tofu into our family's diet.

In our house, we usually eat tofu at least once a day. As I sit in my office writing this column, our dinner of roasted vegetables and tofu is cooking in the oven. When tofu is not being roasted together with onions, garlic, zucchini, carrots, broccoli and whatever other vegetables are handy, I often sauté thick slices of it in a cast-iron pan that has been lightly coated with olive oil and seasoned with freshly squeezed garlic. Sometimes I make lasagna, using an entire cube of crumbled tofu in place of cheese.

The use of tofu is not limited to main-course menus. One of my favorite ways to enjoy tofu is as a dessert we call tofu cream. To make it, I put into a blender about a cup of liquid — sometimes I use fruit juice and sometimes soy milk — add a banana broken into pieces, an entire cake of tofu crumbled up and about a quarter-cup of honey or agave. If stevia is used instead of honey or agave, one teaspoon of powdered stevia is enough to sweeten the mixture. When blended together, tofu cream has the consistency and taste of pudding.

Tofu is a heart-friendly food. It is an excellent source of protein, high in iron and calcium and low in calories, and it contains no cholesterol.

If you haven't tried it, don't be scared by its foreign-sounding name. Pick up a cake at your local grocery and experiment with one of the many recipes available online for this versatile, nutritious and historically important food.

Broccoli is the beneficial harvest of March

Simply Living

(First appeared in Orlando Sentinel March 29, 2010)

Think of harvest time and autumn comes to mind. But if you live in Florida, and if you grow broccoli, March can also be a bountiful month.

In our family, broccoli dominates. We devour green florets with the voracious appetite others reserve for sweet treats, salty foods or chunks of red meat. Seldom does a day go by without one or more servings of broccoli on the menu. Light steaming is our most common method of cooking, but the green tops also find their way into stir-fries, roasted vegetable concoctions, quiches, soufflés and sandwiches.

When broccoli is not growing in the garden, we buy it at the store, but fresh-picked vegetables are more flavorful than anything found in the produce aisle. Fresh-picked, however, is not always available. We planted our current harvest from seeds sown in early January. Broccoli is one of many edibles that do best when planted successively. Seeds can be sown every week from mid-August through early March. Follow that schedule and you will have broccoli ready to pick from early October through May. That's eight months of healthful eating. It's a wonderful plan if you can manage to follow it. Unfortunately, we never have.

Most years, we get off to a good start. We think about planting in August when the weather is too hot for anything other than thinking. Sometimes, like this year, we actually go a step beyond the thought process and plant seeds in the fertile ground. The problem is, we don't continue. One planting, maybe two, and our momentum is lost. Seeds germinate. Young plants develop. Flower heads form. But instead of putting more seeds into the ground as we know we should, we become sidetracked with other projects. We often don't put in another planting until several months later — as we did this year — when we realize we've fallen behind.

A member of the Brassicacae family, broccoli shares its heritage with such "love them or hate them" vegetables as cabbage, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, kale, collards, kohlrabi and horseradish. When cooked, broccoli emits a strong sulfuric odor, a smell strong enough to discourage many people before the first bite. And that first bite can be disappointing. Too often broccoli is overcooked, mushy and dark green instead of being fork-tender, crisp and brightly colored. A light steaming is all that's needed to provide nutritious eating. Broccoli is an excellent source of vitamin C and minerals such as potassium, calcium, magnesium, iron, zinc and copper. Research has shown that broccoli also contains several important cancer-prevention elements.

I'm sure that the plant's potential health benefits influence our family's eating habits. But even if broccoli wasn't a nutrition powerhouse, we'd still be growing and eating it. We eat broccoli because we like the way it tastes, and we have it in our garden because it is such an easy, productive plant to grow. A single mature broccoli plant requires about two square feet of space and takes about 60 days to go from transplant to cooking pot.

Although broccoli leaves and stems are also edible, the portion of the plant most commonly consumed is the flower head, which forms — quite beautifully — in the center of the leafy surround. Once the flower head has reached an acceptably large size, it is "beheaded" and eaten. But that's not the end of the plant's life. Small side shoots soon appear, extending the plant's productivity for several more weeks. A single round seed or a young transplant purchased at the garden center provides months of edible goodness.

I wonder if we'll ever manage to plant our favorite vegetable at successive intervals. Ever the optimist, I'm hopeful we will, but even if we don't, I won't despair. It's hard to feel disappointed when you can walk out your front door at the end of March and return moments later with an armful of nutrient-rich veggies. Autumn may still be months away, but I have no reason to wait for September. I'm cooking up a batch of fresh broccoli for dinner and celebrating harvest time today.

There's a fungus among us — and we like it

Simply Living

(First appeared in Orlando Sentinel August 10, 2009)

My husband is a fungi. I know - it’s a (s)poor joke, (there I go again…) but the truth is, my sweet partner of almost 40 years happens to be a big fan of edible mushrooms. That’s why he was so excited when a package arrived last week.

"What've you got there?" I asked after seeing the contents of a large box sprawled haphazardly across the kitchen counter.

"The dried mushrooms I ordered arrived!" he said with unrestrained enthusiasm.

"Oh, yeah," I responded with a tinge of skepticism. "How many mushrooms did you get?"

He handed me the invoice. On it were listed a dozen varieties of fungus with intriguing names such as matsutake, chanterelle and candy caps as well as a few suspicious culinary monikers, including one called "yellow foot."

"What kind of mushrooms are these?" I asked while examining one of the many 1-ounce packages of what looked like small pieces of brown cardboard.

"I don't know," he responded with a giddy smile. "I ordered an assortment so we could try lots of different types. Which ones do you want to taste first?"

"You pick," I said, aware that this particular pleasure was mainly his to enjoy.

We settled on a random assortment, but before any cooking could commence, the dried mushrooms had to regain their lost moisture. Ralph submerged the flat slivers in a small amount of water. Within minutes, the liquid was absorbed and cooking could begin.

He then coated a large cast-iron pan with a small amount of olive oil and added a spoonful of crushed garlic before placing the rehydrated mushrooms in the sizzling oil. A heavy, woodsy smell permeated the air. Using a spatula, he stirred the heady mixture until the mushrooms were soft and well-coated with garlic oil.

"What do you think?" Ralph asked as we began our taste test.

"Interesting," I remarked. "They're a little chewy and tough, but flavorful, too. Which ones are these again?"

We were sampling a mixture of maitake, black trumpet and lobster mushrooms.

Of the three, maitakes were the only ones we had previously tried. Ralph discovered maitakes — also known as "hen of the woods" — after reading an article about them by medical doctor and author Andrew Weil one of my husband's favorite sources of health information. His Web site, www.drweil.com, says that "maitake has anti-cancer, antiviral and immune-system-enhancing effects and may also help control both high blood pressure and blood sugar levels."

Weil's endorsement motivated Ralph to purchase a supply of dried maitakes to incorporate into our diet. Much to the chagrin of my 17-year-old son, small pieces of the meaty, nutty-tasting mushroom were soon appearing in omelets, stir-fries, soups and just about any other appropriate (or, from Toby's perspective, totally inappropriate) meal.

Ralph's fascination with mycology more than compensates for our son's lack of interest.

Back in the 1980s, while still living on Cape Cod, Ralph traveled to Washington state to attend a weekend mushroom cultivation seminar with Paul Stamets, founder of Fungi Perfecti. Stamets is a pioneer in edible and medicinal mushroom cultivation. After returning home, Ralph began growing his own crop. About six months ago, my husband repeated the process in Florida by inoculating shiitake spores into a stack of freshly cut oak logs. Thanks to the recent delivery from Oregon Mushroom, we have no shortage of other mushrooms to sample while waiting for the shiitake spores to produce edible fungi.

So far, in addition to maitake and shiitake mushrooms, Ralph and I agree that morels have the nicest texture and most pleasant taste. After working our way through each type, we'll probably reorder only our favorites.

"This was just a sampling," Ralph explained while he reorganized the remaining packages. "I just wanted to try a few different types to see how they taste."

I guess that makes him a sporadic spore-addict. Sorry, the temptation to poke fun(gi) was just too hard to resist.

Breathe in...breathe out

Simply Living

(First appeared in Orlando Sentinel July 6, 3009)

Breathe in ... breathe out.

We do it about 20,000 times each day. That's more than 7 million times a year for every year of our lives. From the moment of birth until the instant of death, people process the world through the act of respiration. Good air (oxygen) comes in. Bad air (carbon dioxide) goes out. Breathing is an action so automatic — so second-nature — that most of us are barely aware it's happening.

Not me. For as long as I can remember, I've been attuned to how well (or not well) my breath is flowing.

I was one of those kids with allergies — dark circles under my eyes, a constant stuffiness-runniness in my nose and a soggy, white tissue permanently affixed to my clenched right hand. I never went anywhere without a supply of Kleenex wadded up in pants pockets or tucked into the side pouch of a backpack or purse.

Things haven't changed much for me in adulthood. Although I've figured out which allergy medicine works best and have successfully managed to avoid dairy products (a major allergic trigger), I still find myself tethered to a clutch of tissues. And those dark circles beneath my eyes continue to elicit the occasional crass comment.

"Who gave you the two black eyes?" some witless twerp will inevitably ask. As a child, I found such thoughtless remarks devastating. Now I give them the attention they deserve, which is no attention at all. I find myself annoyed more by the offender's lack of sensitivity than by the words themselves.

Despite a lifetime of labored breathing, the situation during mid-June became particularly severe. Allergies, however, were not the culprit. An injured rib affected my breathing, making it extremely difficult to get a good breath.

"Just one breath — one long, deep breath. That's all I want," I murmured to myself. And when that breath finally came, I inhaled so gratefully. Fresh air — oxygen — was all I wanted. It was the only thing that mattered. Life was complete.

I promised myself that when I got better — when my bruised rib healed and I could once again breathe with relative ease — I would treasure each moment, each inhalation, each release. I'm at that point now. The hurt that caused my chest to feel like a compressed squeeze box has finally abated. I can catch a breath easily. I'm free of aches and pains. Even my allergies seem to have improved.

Sometimes it takes an injury, an accident or an illness to make us realize how much we stand to lose. Little things become significant when threatened or compromised. I'm not pleased to have allergies or a bruised right rib, but I'm glad for the insights those ailments provided.

Life is nothing if not full of surprises. None of us knows what tomorrow will bring — what problems, what joys, what pleasures, what woes. In light of such uncertainty, the only thing to do is to live each day fully and appreciate the little things that make life worthwhile. Simple things like breathing that we tend to take for granted.

Breathe in ... breathe out. It's what life's all about.