It doesn't have to be complicated. Quick mashed potatoes and green beans. #vegan #eatlikeahorse #eattolose #foodismedicine #kosher #pareve #glutonfree

Steamed green beans, sweet red peppers, mashed potatoes with tomato

I tend to make cooking complicated, but I can make it simple as well.  Above is a picture of my messy desk and my lunch. All the essential amino acids are included. I made 2 generous servings the night before along with dinner and brought half with me to the office to warm in the microwave on a paper plate. Simple, fast, filling, tasty and nutritious with no animal fat and no oil.

Quick Mashed Potatoes

Prep and Cook time:  12 minutes

Makes 4 servings

4 Medium Yukon gold potatoes

2 Roma tomatoes

1/4 tsp salt

1/8 tsp ground black pepper

Wash the potatoes. Wrap them in moist paper towel. Microwave them on high for 7 minutes. While they cook cut the tomatoes into quarters. Strip out the seeds then roughly chop them up. With the skins on, mash the potatoes. Mix in the tomatoes and spices. Serve hot.

Green Beans 

Prep and Cook time: 20 minutes

Servings: 4

6 generous handfuls of green beans

1 sweet red pepper

1/4 of a yellow hot pepper sliced into rings

2 TBSP white vinegar

1 clove finely chopped garlic

1 tsp salt

Wash all the veggies. Remove the seeds and ribs from the peppers. Chop the peppers roughly. Cover the bottom of a pot with 1/2 inch of water. Add the beans and peppers. Pour on the vinegar. Put all the seasoning and garlic on top.  Steam or boil for 12 to 15 minutes or the desired tenderness is reached. Drain and serve.

(I also added some Thyme and basil, but that's me trying different things.)

I ate 2 servings of each with a salad for dinner. Even I was impressed with how filling it was! Plenty of roughage, protein, resistant carbohydrates and even some Omega 3 fatty acids in each serving. 

You have to eat. Eat well to stay well!

Vegan Lasagna #eattolose #foodismedicine #plantbasedwholefoods #oilfree #veganpasta #Kosher #pareve

Vegan Lasagna

Being a whole foods plant based vegan, I get asked all the time if there are any foods I miss.
Well yesterday I was missing lasagna. With very little effort, I managed to veganize my old recipe and was amazed at how well it came out!
I already had a big container of oil free marinara sauce in the fridge that I cooked up over the weekend. All I had to do was come up with a substitute for mozzarella and ricotta cheeses.
Just to make it a challenge, in addition to dairy free, let's make it nut free and oil free too. Nuts and oil add a ton of calories. I already lost the weight. No need to risk packing it back on if I can avoid it.

Off we go to the market! I have a friend who is like me but will only eat whole grain pasta. Challenge accepted!  Barilla has it right on the shelf at my local supermarket. It only contains one ingredient: whole grain durum wheat flour.
Well that was easy!  I already have a recipe for a gooey white cheesy sauce that can substitute for mozzarella.  That just leaves the ricotta cheese.
I found a basic recipe online and twisted it around until it met my oil free, nut free and dairy free vegan parameters. I used extra firm tofu, nutritional yeast, white vinegar, salt, ground pepper, basil and parsley flakes, fresh garlic and starchy water. This part was left grainy for texture keeping the layers of the lasagna distinct. After all, as remarkably delicious as this main course proves to be, we need to complete the picture. It has to be visually pleasing as well. Taste is not limited to the tongue. It already smells great so we just have to make it look great.
While that delicious mazzarella-ish layer on the top is stretchy and tastes wonderful, it just does not easily brown. We need to do something about that.
Here's my solution. Coincidentally, I happened to be walking by the deli case in a restaurant and saw their beautifully presented servings of lasagna displayed with slices of tomato covering the top.
Brilliant and simple! Off we go to the produce department one more time. Colorful, inviting Heirloom tomatoes were on the shelf. The red and yellow varieties were large, firm and plentiful so I got 3 of each. After cooking the lasagna for an hour, I covered the top with thin slices of tomato then ground up some fresh garlic and spices to sprinkle over everything.  Another 5 to 10 minutes under the broiler gave it the finishing touch.   I let it cool for 20 minutes and cut out a slice, just to make sure it held together and tasted right.  It was perfect! Lasagna always tastes better the next day, so after it cooled completely I covered it and put it in the fridge. Now I can just cut out a slice, microwave it for 2 or 3 minutes and I no longer have to miss lasagna!! This time I wrote down the 3 building block's recipes so the next time I have 3 or 4 hours to kill...well...you know.  I don't have to miss lasagna anymore and neither do you 🇺🇸

Vegan Lasagna

The prep and cooking time was 4 hours. I made  the 3 building blocks over 2 days and kept it refrigerated until I was ready to put it together.

Marinara Pasta Sauce

1 can of tomato sauce 28 oz

1 can of diced tomatoes 28 oz
1 can of tomato paste 12 oz 
1 large sweet onion chopped
4 cloves of garlic chopped
2 TBSP of Oregano
1 TBSP of Sweet Basil

1 TBSP of dried Parsley

2 tsp salt

¼ tsp pepper

6 dates finely chopped

    In a large pot bring 1 cup of salted water to a boil. Add the onion and garlic. Let it boil and stir until the onions become clear. Add the Basil, Oregano and Parsley. Add the tomato sauce, diced tomatoes,  paste and dates. Bring it to a simmer, cover and reduce the heat for 30 minutes.  
    You can add salt and pepper to taste.

Vegan Mozzarella Sauce

4 Yukon gold potatoes

6 TBSP nutritional yeast

6 TBSP Tapioca flour

1 TBSP salt

¼ cup white wine vinegar

1 TBSP lemon juice

¼ tsp smoked paprika

¼ tsp Tabasco

Salt water to boil the potatoes

Peel and boil the quartered potatoes in salted water for 40 minutes. Save 2 cups of the starchy water.  In a separate bowl mix the dry ingredients together to prevent clumping. Put the potatoes, 1+¼ cups starchy water and all the wet ingredients in a blender. Pulse a few times to chop it up. Add the dry ingredients and  puree until completely smooth.

Pour it back in the pot from the potatoes. Over medium heat stir constantly with a wooden spoon until it thickens for about 15 minutes. Add a little more starchy water if it gets too thick. Set it aside to set up.

Vegan Ricotta Cheese

1 lb extra firm tofu

6 TBSP nutritional yeast

¼ cup white wine vinegar

2 TBSP starchy water

1 TBSP salt

1 TBSP basil

¼ tsp ground pepper

2 TBSP parsley flakes

2 cloves of minced garlic

Press the water out of the tofu. Crumble it up in a bowl using a fork. Mix everything together. Set aside.

1 box of Lasagna noodles of your choice cooked per package directions in salted water. Do not overcook. Drain and lay it flat until cool enough to handle.

Line a 9 x 13 inch lasagna pan with parchment paper. Put a double layer of noodles in the bottom of the pan. Cover evenly with the marinara sauce. Sprinkle evenly with Ricotta then cover lightly with Mozzarella. Put a single layer of noodles on top of that and repeat the layers of marinara, Ricotta and Mozzarella Sauce making the outer layer thick enough to cover smoothly.

Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour. Cover the top with thin tomato slices and sprinkle with a mixture of minced garlic, dried parsley, Oregano, basil, rosemary and thyme. Put it back in the oven under the broiler for 5 to 10 minutes to cook and brown the tomatoes.  Let it cool for 20 minutes and cover with foil. Refrigerate over night because lasagna always tastes better the next day. Slice it. Reheat it and serve.

Three Years a Vegan TODAY!!!! Pictures! #eattolose #foodismedicine

01/01/2014

01/01/2017

Happy New Year and Happy Anniversary to me! I started my vegan plant base whole foods diet on New Year's Eve 3 years ago at age 58. That picture of me on the left was taken the day I started my New Year's resolution. The picture on the right is me today at 61. 

I achieved my goal and lost over 100 lbs keeping it off for a year.

If I could do this anyone can.

How about you? Ready to look and feel better without medicine, surgery or strenuous exercise? 

Get started now !!

Try www.pbnsg.org for more information.

There will be a meeting next week.  Are you ready to change for your family's sake?

Before and After pics PUBLISHED!! #eattolose #vegan #wholefoodsplantbased

I wrote a "Three Things You Can Do Now" article and it got published with my before and after pictures! Click the above link to read it.

Veganized Sephardic Spinach and Chickpea Casserole #vegan #Kosher #pareve

Spinach and Chickpea Casserole

    Our son is flying in from Seattle tonight for the holidays so I made him his favorite dish that he's never tasted. My wife and I were watching a PBS documentary, "Hugs and Knishes", discussing Jewish cooking from different parts of the world.  This spinach casserole captured my attention.  I watched the ingredients including oil, eggs and multiple cheeses come together and I was thinking: "I bet I can veganize that!"

So I did. No oil, high fiber, tons of protein.

Recipe

2 boxes of frozen chopped spinach
or 1 pound of fresh spinach - cooked and drained
1 can of chickpeas - drained
1 box of extra firm tofu - drained
2 cups of nutritional yeast
1 large onion chopped
2 cloves of garlic chopped
0.5 tsp allspice
1 tsp salt
2 pinches of ground pepper

In a non stick pan caramelize the onions. Add the spinach and garlic. Cook until most of the moisture is gone. In a blender combine the tofu, 1.75 cups of nutrtional yeast, allspice, salt and pepper. Put the chickpeas in a mixing bowl and stir all the ingredients together.
(I prepared my baking dish wth a little canola oil then wiped it out with paper towel, but you can use parchment paper.)  Put it all in a 9 x 13 inch baking dish, spread it evenly and sprinkle the top with 0.25 cup of nutritional yeast. Bake it at 350 for 1 hour. Put it under the broiler for 5 minutes. Let it cool. I cut it in half and stacked it then refrigerated it to let it firm up. Then, tomorrow when your son gets in, you can heat it up and feed him something healthy that he didn't know he'd love (I hope).

35 Months a Vegan! Beans and Rice Noodles tonight #EatToLose #EatLikeAGorilla #PlantsRule #glutonfree #Kosher #pareve

      It's been 35 months already since I got away from all the foods that were making me fat. What a difference! All I had to do was start eating my veggies along with fruits, grains, seeds and a few nuts a week.

All I had to stop doing was eating meat, chicken, eggs, milk and anything else derived from an animal. It was way, way easier than I imagined. Getting away from all the olive and vegetable oil in my salad dressing and cooking seemed counterintuitive since they come from plants. I learned how calorie dense and nutrient poor all oils are and how terribly damaging they are to your arteries. That convinced me. Don't eat oil or any processed food.  Just whole foods, unprocessed and strictly plants.

Here's a simple meal. It was my dinner tonight.

Steamed green beans, sweet peppers, onions, rice noodles sprinkled with nutritional yeast.

Ingredients:

Green beans, onion, sweet red and orange peppers, rice noodles, nutritional yeast, salt and spices

Slice up the onion and peppers. Put them in a pot with the green beans using one of these inserts to keep the veggies separated from the water. I went Simon and Garfunkel with the spices adding parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme with a little garlic salt and turmeric sprinkled over everything. Bring the water to a boil, cover tightly and steam it for 10 to 15 minutes depending on the degree of tenderness you like. I found millet and brown rice Ramon noodles at  at Target.  I strained the cooked vegetables and used the broth to cook the noodles. Either plate them side by side or mix them together and sprinkle with nutritional yeast. What you see on my plate along with a glass of water was my dinner at 6 pm. A large Apple was my dessert. It's now 11:30 pm and that's all I ate tonight.

So to recap, I had a filling, nutritious, high fiber meal of vegetables and grain with some spices and a fruit chaser with no animal products and no oil that kept me satisfied for over 5 hours. I forgot to mention that beans and grains combined include all 9 of the essential amino acids covering my body's requirements for a source of complete protein.

2013

2016 - down 110 lbs

     Eat well, eat smart and stay healthy.  A good plan for the New Year!

Start Spreading The News! #forksoverknives #vegan #eatlikeahorse

   

Vegan Brownies!!!!!

      Let's all start spreading the word about the health benefits of eating your fruits and veggies.
I found this Youtube video with a well done short version of the movie Forks Over Knives. I know its hard to expect someone who has health problems to sit and watch a 90 minute movie when they don't even understand where I get my protein. This video is about 15 minutes long. Here's the link. It may whet their appetite so to speak! I know this blog is read over most of the world. Lets see how much good we can get out of it. Copy the link and spread it around using your social media pages. Who knows? You just may save a life!

     One round of holidays is over and we all survived that! Now comes the next one. This month has a special challenge. All month long people bring over goodies. There are cookies, cakes, chocolates and all kinds of tempting treats brought to the office by patients and reps from different manufacturers and suppliers. Sometimes I get a fruit tray as a gift. I appreciate the thoughtfulness.
     As a vegan, what do you give someone at this time of year? Fruit and vegetable trays are nice, but how about something you can make yourself with love as the special ingredient? Here's a link to my recipe for whole food plant based chocolate brownies!!! Chewy and delicious with no added oil. Have a wonderful, healthy holiday season everybody!