Jul 24, 2016

Mushrooms in More Ways than One

We love to put mushrooms in our chicken soup as well as make a cooked mushroom salad. So since I heard that mushrooms are good preventative medicine and have various health benefits; I wondered whether they lost the benefits by being cooked so I asked.

The following is the quick and informative response I received from The Food Revolution Network.

Hello Aimee,

Thank you for your question. Both cooked and raw mushrooms are beneficial to your body, and there are actually many surprising benefits to cookingmushrooms. Check out this article for more information on benefits of cooked mushrooms http://healthyeating.sfgate.com/cooking-mushroom-deplete-its-vitamin-content-7548.html

 I hope this helps! 

All the best,

Sierra
Community Support Team 
The Food Revolution Network

Matzo Musings

This past Pesach season I saw in the store gluten-free "matzo" squares - i.e. something that looks like matzo but isn't for the gluten free crowd who misses their matzo. Not approved for Seder use though. And I didn't try them so I have no idea what they taste like but they seem to be made of similar ingredients as many other Pesach products such as tapioca.

 There were also several matzo products labeled organic this year. I am not endorsing this officially but I did buy some especially after the holiday when they were cheaper. One person commented to me that matzo and matzo meal are already organic enough for her. Use at your discretion because not everything labeled organic actually is, and even if it is it's not necessarily 100%. Plus there are many products that don't get the organic certification for various reasons but they may be quality products from good sources. That information is from the Annemarie Skin Care list http://annmariegianni.com I am not endorsing their products officially as I have yet to try them but it seemed to be a good practical tip. 

Bone Broth Continued


This week we didn't make dafina however we had already defrosted half a pack of meat so my husband made a very lovely meat dish with that and some vegetables and left it on low overnight. We used to eat our Friday night chicken soup with a chicken breast in, sometimes on the bone, sometimes not. But since hearing about the benefits of "bone broth" and specifically dark meat, we now use a thigh/drumstick in the soup to hopefully reap said benefits. We also add mushrooms to it as well as a turnip or parsnip and carrots. Then we put tarragon, dill, turmeric and paprika as well as a bit of black pepper and a couple of bay leaves in it. We enjoy it with matzo balls or knaidlach - not from a mix, which sometimes contain MSG. But it's made easily from matzo meal. However that is optional especially for people avoiding wheat or gluten. 

Is your Mother’s Chulent a Superfood?

Ashkenazim call it Chulent, Morrocan Jews eat Dafina or Schena, Syrian Jews call it Chamin. It’s that delicious weekly Shabbat food that traditional Jews have been eating for thousands of years. It’s a mix of whole foods like beans, grains, meat and bones that cooks overnight from friday afternoon and eaten hot on Saturday for Shabbat lunch.

We add eggs to our Dafina, a soupy mix of potatoes, chickpeas and meat with bones. My wife has her own heavenly version... she adds turnips, sweet potatoes, turmeric and cayenne. Spicy and yummy!

Now hear this… nutritional experts are discovering the many health benefits of Bone broth. Some even sell it as a nutritional supplement in powder form. My naturopath makes his own organic Kosher bone broth and freezes batches for later use as soup stock. He tells me it does wonders for your gut flora.

Here are some of the incredible benefits of bone broth:

So, next time you want to throw away your Shabbat left-overs, think again.
Here’s an easy bone broth Chulent recipe:



Jun 16, 2016

Probiotic-rich easy Kimchi recipe

Naturally fermented foods are the best probiotic sources available. I just bought some from my local naturalist that makes his own organic Kim-chi, I love it. This is an easy Korean Kimchi recipe:

http://www.meghantelpner.com/blog/easy-kimchi-recipe-simple-fermentation/


Jun 2, 2016

The Benefits of Turmeric

Health Benefits of Turmeric

When examining the research, turmeric benefits go beyond that of these 10 drugs:
  • Anti-inflammatory drugs
  • Anti-depressants (Prozac)
  • Chemotherapy
  • Anti-coagulants (Aspirin)
  • Pain killers
  • Diabetes drugs (Metformin)
  • Arthritis medications
  • Inflammatory bowel disease drugs
  • Cholesterol drugs (Lipitor)
  • Steroids
Now let’s jump deeper into the research on turmeric benefits at potentially reversing specific diseases. read more

May 17, 2016

Is Soy sauce bad for you?

"If you really love your Chinese or Sushi take-out, you might want to sit down for this. 
Soybean meal and often corn starches are rapidly reduced to their component amino acids using a high-tech process known as “rapid hydrolysis” or “acid hydrolysis,” which involves heating defatted soy proteins with eighteen percent hydrochloric acid for 8 to 12 hours, then neutralizing the brew with sodium carbonate. 
The result is a dark brown liquid — a chemical soy sauce.
When mixed with some genuine fermented soy sauce to improve its flavor and odor, it is called a “semi chemical” soy sauce. Sugars, caramel colorings and other flavorings are added before further refinement, pasteurization and bottling. 
The rapid hydrolysis method uses the enzyme glutamase as a reactor. This creates large amounts of an unnatural form of glutamic acid that closely resembles that found in MSG. In contrast, production of genuine old-fashioned soy sauce uses the enzyme glutaminase to form naturally occurring glutamic acid..."  read more
MSG Ingredient list http://www.truthinlabeling.org/hiddensources.html

May 1, 2016

Vitamin D inhibits inflammation



Researchers at National Jewish Health have discovered specific molecular and signaling events by which vitamin D inhibits inflammation. In their experiments, they showed that low levels of Vitamin D, comparable to levels found in millions of people, failed to inhibit the inflammatory cascade, while levels considered adequate did inhibit inflammatory signaling. They reported their results in the March 1, 2012, issue of The Journal of Immunology.
"This study goes beyond previous associations of vitamin D with various health outcomes. It outlines a clear chain of cellular events, from the binding of DNA, through a specific signaling pathway, to the reduction of proteins known to trigger inflammation," said lead author Elena Goleva, assistant professor of pediatrics at National Jewish Health. "Patients with chronic inflammatory diseases, such as asthma, arthritis and prostate cancer, who are vitamin D deficient, may benefit from vitamin D supplementation to get their serum vitamin D levels above 30 nanograms/milliliter."

Dr Den Boer on Probiotics

Dr. Boer seminar about the benefits of Probiotics on gut health:


Tzaar Baalei Chaim - Cruelty to Food Animals - and if you protest, you are a terrorist!

Animals Raised For Food Are Being Abused -
And Peaceful Activists Are Treated As "Terrorists"

According to a recent ASPCA survey, 94% of Americans agree that food animals deserve to be free from abuse and cruelty. Yet in most states, food animals are specifically excluded from laws prohibiting cruelty to animals!
Factory farmed animals are fed routine doses of antibiotics, whether they are sick or not. Eighty percent of all antibiotics used in the U.S. are fed to livestock, and factory farms have become breeding grounds for antibiotic resistant bacteria, which are killing nearly 100,000 Americans every year. We’ve turned our farms into biological weapons factories.
Worst of all, in 2006 the U.S. government caved into the food industry and passed the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act. Now people who protest factory farms through peaceful civil disobedience can be arrested and punished as terrorists. Are you willing to put up with this?

Food Revolution Introductory Email - nonGMO sales up $5 billion in last 3 years!

http://foodrevolution.org


The outrageous reality is that all around us, it’s considered normal to eat highly processed food-like products that have been genetically engineered, doused with chemicals and pesticides, contaminated with antibiotics and hormones, and stripped of fiber, vitamins and minerals.

These same foods are the products of unspeakable cruelty to animals, exploitative conditions for farm workers, and are totally unsustainable for our planet.

We have a medical system that pays no attention to food, and a food industry that pays no attention to health. And hundreds of millions of people are sick or dying because of it.

In short, we need a food revolution!

Did you know that sales of certified non-GMO products have gone from zero to $5 billion in sales in the last three years? That sales of organic foods have increased 10-fold in the last 13 years, and there are now four times as many farmers markets in the U.S. as there were a decade ago?

All over the world, movements are growing for real food that is nutritious, sustainable, organic, non-GMO, fair trade, local, plant-strong, and humane.

Got Shabbos Nosh after Pesach? Get some healthy ones

Here are some recipe ideas for snacks your kids can enjoy eating, Shabbos or anytime! Be sure to avoid food with dyes and other carcinogens. Check it out!

https://foodrevolution.org/5-snacks-your-kids-should-not-eat/

Is MSG Kosher?

This Passover we found a few products on the shelf containing MSG or Monosodium Glutamate. It's well known that MSG is not safe for human consumption. Please read below studies:
"The first published report of a reaction to monosodium glutamate in the United States appeared in 1968 when Robert Ho Man Kwok, M.D., who had emigrated from China, reported that although he never had the problem in China, about 20 minutes into a meal at certain Chinese restaurants, he suffered numbness, tingling, and tightness of the chest that lasted for approximately 2 hours.
The following year, John W. Olney, M.D. reported that laboratory animals suffered brain lesions and neuroendocrine disorders after being exposed to monosodium glutamate. Scientists studying retinal degeneration in mice treated with free glutamic acid had noted that these mice became grotesquely obese. Olney, who speculated that the obesity might be a sign of damage to the hypothalamus (the area of the brain that regulates a number of endocrine functions, including weight control), found that infant laboratory animals given free glutamic acid suffered brain damage immediately, and assorted neuroendocrine disorders later in life.Pharmaceutical grade L-glutamic acid was often used to produce these disorders until neuroscientists observed that monosodium glutamate, an inexpensive food additive, could be substituted for laboratory-grade free glutamic acid in these studies and produce the same effects. 
In the years that followed, neuroscientists replicated the work of Olney, and Olney spoke out repeatedly about the toxic potential of monosodium glutamate. In 1972, for example, Olney testified before the Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs that ingestion of MSG places humans at risk, with the greatest risk being for the very young; and that a National Academy of Science panel organized earlier to determine whether MSG ought to be banned from baby food had produced an industry arranged whitewash by a group of scientists with almost no experience in neuropathology. "
http://www.truthinlabeling.org/IVhistoryOfUse.html

If you see Kosher products containing MSG, please contact the manufacturers to have the ingredient removed from our Kosher food. Kosher consumers should also contact the Kashrut organizations to have them not label dangerous ingredients as Kosher. The Kosher consumer should be mindful of labels and ingredients and should not assume that all Kosher products are completely safe to consume.

Is MSG Kosher? It should not be! 

Watch this video and please tell your friends about the dangers of MSG.