Harvest Cheddar Apple Potato Soup

For me, fall weather means a few things: time to start base training for next summers racing, time to be cold for a few months, and time to start making soup! I love eating soup when there's a chill in the air because it helps me combat the second truth of cold season: that I will be cold. This morning was just gorgeous for a ride, with my fingers and toes bundled up, of course! With temperatures expected to be in the 60s today, today was pleasant. Tomorrow a cold front comes through, so I'm preparing by making this soup!

This soup combines a smoky cheddar flavor with apple and potato to make an unforgettable fall soup! Potato cheddar soup is a classic, but I decided to add in granny smith apples for the contrast of their lovely tart flavor. White potatoes have been getting a bad rep these days, but actually they have a ton of worthwhile nutrients, including vitamin C, vitamin B6, iron, and potassium. Additionally, they make a wonderful creamy base for a soup without the cream. Hope you enjoy this soup!

Harvest Cheddar Apple Potato Soup

3 medium potatoes
4 medium apples (I like granny smith for their tart flavor)
3c water
1 vegetable bouillon cube
1/2c nutritional yeast (or you can use real cheddar cheese)
garlic
black pepper
smoke seasoning

1. Skin and cube all 3 potatoes and two of the apples. Cut into small cubes and put in a pot of water. Bring to a boil and let cook until potatoes and apples are soft.
2. Cube the remaining two apples.
3. Drain potatoes & apples. Food process until smooth.
4. In a large pot, combine water, bouillon, pureed apples and potatoes, and nutritional yeast/ cheddar. Add uncooked apple chunks and garlic, black pepper, and smoke seasoning to taste. (This is also great done in a crock pot for a few hours, to really let the flavors come together.)
5. Serve warm, using extra apples as a garnish if you please!

Just passing by Mystic Lake on my ride this morning...

Classic Rice and Beans

Happy Monday! After an exciting weekend seeing old friends at the Head of the Charles, things are winding down and hopefully soon returning to a normal pace. Besides the Charles, lots of other exciting things happened, including my very first cyclocross ride and my first recipe featured on findingvegan.com!

To help slow things down, today I'm sharing a vegetarian classic: rice and beans. Kidney beans are a complete source of protein, and rice is deficient in lysine but that deficiency is made up by the addition of corn. Rice and beans are a weekday go-to for me, but this is the version I make when someone's coming over or I just want something a little bit more flavorful. I hope you enjoy this classic as much as I do!

Remember the old saying, "variety is the spice of live"? Well, there was something to that! Unlike meat, most vegetarian proteins don't contain all of the essential amino acids (explained here) in one source, so several protein sources should be eaten together (or throughout the day or week) to make sure you're getting enough of all of the amino acids. Often, vegan sources of protein are low in lysine which is critical in building and repairing muscles.

Classic Rice and Beans

1/2 green pepper, diced
3 scallions, diced
1 vegetable bullion cube
pinch garlic (and chili pepper if you like it spicy!)
2T taco seasoning
1 cup brown rice
2 1/2c water (or whatever you particular package suggests)

1 can red kidney beans

1 cup corn

Sautee scallions, green peppers, and garlic in a little bit of vegetable broth. Add rice to the pan and toast it for one minute, then add the water and bullion. Cook the rice as usual, letting the spices and flavors be absorbed. Once the rice is cooked, turn down the heat and add the corn and beans. Stir until everything is is warm and it looks delicious. Enjoy! 

Head of the Charles

It's Head of the Charles weekend, aka "Rower Christmas." It's the one weekend per year that rowers of all levels from all over the world flock to Boston for a race that spills onto the banks of the Charles in the form of a weekend-long party. The atmosphere is very festive, but in the past two years this regatta has triggered a wide array of emotions for me. I competed in the Head of the Charles every year since I started rowing in 2005 through the end of my rowing career in 2011. In 2010 and 2011 I raced even though I was horribly injured and it was still a blast to compete. These past two years, I've only been able to look on from shore as my friends row on, continuing to grow stronger and faster. Rowing was truly my passion and I miss it very much. Here's a picture from my last good race before I got injured in 2009, taking the infamous Eliot bridge turn. (Photos today courtesy of my friend Igor over at Sculling Fool. Check out his beautiful daily picture blog here.)

Rowing brings back wonderful memories: the thrill of pushing your body harder than you knew you could, victories beyond my wildest imagination, and relationships that will last a lifetime. Unfortunately my last two years of rowing had more to do with chronic pain and inflammation than with these magnificent memories. It was actually as a result of these chronic injuries that I decided to take an interest in nutrition, and started to (roughly) follow Dr. Weil's Anti-Inflammatory Food Pyramid. While I don't believe in the supplements he sells (supplements are poorly absorbed by the body, whole foods are better sources), the basic idea of eating more vitamin-rich whole foods, less meat, and more "healthy" fats has really resonated with me. Within a few months of making these dietary changes, I really started to feel better and after a year, I was able to return to purposeful training-- this time on my bike! It's been a whole year since I spawned a new overuse injury, and all of my old ones are continuing to heal so I think I'm finally doing something right. Onwards and upwards!

One of my last sunrise rows before hanging up my oars. Love that dirty water!

Gluten Free Oreos

Happy Friday! I'll admit... I've been holding out on you guys. I made these gluten free oreos two weeks ago, but am only sharing the recipe now! That's mostly because I have been wanting to talk about amino acids, micronutrients, and all of that other good stuff that powers your workout and day. This post contains none of that type of information and simply was created because I really wanted oreos (Trader Joe's GF Joe-joes to be precise), I wanted to share them with my gluten-intolerant roommate, I didn't want a ton of fake ingredients, and I did not want to shell out the $4 that the box would have cost for the good stuff at TJ's. Thus the recipe was born!! Consensus is that it's a keeper. The cookies are softer than traditional chocolate sandwich cookies, more like a delicious hybrid between oreos and whoopee pies. As usual for my gf treats, the recipe uses an oat flour base and is vegan. (Reminder: flax seeds > eggs. They also keep longer.)

Gluten Free Oreos

Chocolate Cookies

1c oat flour (I explain how I make it in this post.)

1T cornstarch

1/3c cocoa powder

1/4c brown sugar

1/2t baking powder

dash cinnamon

1/2c vanilla almond milk

1/4c canola oil

1/8t vanilla

Preheat oven to 375F. In a large bowl, mix oat flour, cornstarch, cocoa powder, brown sugar, baking powder and cinnamon. Add the wet ingredients and mix thoroughly. Drop spoonfuls onto a grease baking sheet. Bake for 10- 12 minutes, until cookies are crispy around the edges.

Vanilla Icing

2T Earth Balance soy-free buttery spread

1/8t vanilla

1 1/2 c powdered sugar, plus 1T

2T vanilla almond milk

Cream earth balance and vanilla. Add sugar in half cup increments. After last 1/2 cup is added, add the almond milk to thin it out. 

Put it Together: Don't be impatient... let the cookies cool! Then spread one cookie with a generous amount of icing and top with a second cookie. Enjoy immediately, or wait a few hours to let the icing set.

Spicy Cilantro Black Bean Hummus

Today I present the next installment of my Laudable Legumes series with a feature on black beans. In 1/4c dry, you can find 7g protein, 9g fiber, and 15% of your daily value of iron. As if this isn't enough, black beans are complete source of protein, meaning that they have sufficient amounts of all 9 essential amino acids. (If you're new to the blog, I explain what an essential amino acid is here.) Black beans are also a good source of folate (vitamin B6), thiamin (vitamin B1), magnesium, phosphorous, potassium, copper, and manganese. Additionally, beans are amazing at stabilizing blood glucose levels, which explains why I haven't had any hypoglycemic episodes since I became vegetarian!

Today's recipe is a favorite of mine and makes a great high protein snack when generously smeared on a tortilla chip. It's far superior to store bought black bean dip-- I add no salt or oil and if you use dried black beans, you can make a whole bowl for about $0.50! In fact, I like it so much that the picture is just of one chip... because I ate the rest of the batch before I had a chance to take a picture of in the bowl! This black bean hummus can also make a great base to a sandwich topped with avocado, tomato, and spinach. That recipe will be shared in due time...

Spicy Cilantro Black Bean Hummus

1c dried black beans (or one can)
3T sriracha chili sauce
1/2T garlic
1T dried cilantro (or fresh if you really want to make it potent!)
1t apple cider vinegar (this will help it keep in the fridge longer)

Wash black beans, then cook in crock pot for 8- 9 hours on low covered with ample water. Drain and thoroughly rinse beans. Transfer all ingredients to food processor and food process until a hummus consistency is achieved. If you black beans are a bit dry to begin with, you may need to add some water  to get the texture right.

PS. I remade it and restrained myself and some hungry friends from eating it until after I took a photo :)

Curried Spinach and Barley

The next grain to be featured in my great grains series is Barley. Barley is not a gluten free grain (This is a correction to the original post! Barley is not gluten free, so beware. I'm very sorry for the misinformation. I'd try the recipe with buckwheat if you are avoiding gluten). Most people have heard of barley, but have no idea how to cook with, beyond grandma's barley stew which was good... but not too exciting. But barley is worth your time! For every 100 calories of barley, you get 3g of protein and 4g of fiber (compare that to quinoa and whole wheat). Barley protein is low in lysine, but that is addressed in the recipe below, which couples it with giant lima beans and spinach (both complete proteins). Additionally, barley is a good source of selenium, which plays an important role in regulating inflammation and immune response.

Today's recipe combines some interesting ingredients to give a new flavor to barley that you might not have expected would work. It also freezes super well (you can see in my picture... that's the recipe revived from 3 weeks in the freezer for a quick lunch at work). The barley is paired with spinach, tomatoes, and giant lima beans, which round out the amino acid profile of the protein and add potent anti-oxidants. The whole medley is flavored with a mild curry sauce centered around turmeric, which is known to be potently anti-inflammatory.

Curried Spinach and Barley

1 cup dried barley
1 cup dried giant lima beans (or 1 can white beans)
1 can light coconut milk
vegetable broth (or bullion and water) as desired
1 can diced tomatoes (no salt added)
1/2 package frozen spinach
1T turmeric
1T cumin
1/2T garlic
1/2t ginger
dash red pepper flakes

1. Wash dried lima beans and place in crock pot with ample water. Let cook on high heat for ~6 hours. Once soft, drain and wash.
2. Rinse dried barley and place in a pot with ample water. Bring to a boil for 40 minutes, until barley is soft. (Alternatively, both the barley and beans can be made in the crock pot, but both take several hours, so you would have to think ahead and perhaps make one overnight the night before, and then the other while you are at work for the day.)
3. Once barley and beans are ready, making the curry sauce is pretty quick. In a large saucepan, combine coconut milk, spinach, tomatoes, and spices. Bring to a simmer. (If you feel like you need more liquid, add some vegetable broth to thin it out.) Once spinach has cooked through, add beans and simmer for an additional few minutes so that the beans can take on the flavor.
4. Serve over barley and enjoy immediately! Alternatively once it cools, you can package into ziplock bags and freeze to enjoy later.

Protein-Packed Pumpkin Granola

This post reminds me of a time when I was about 8 years old. I've always been very creative and felt very comfortable experimenting and making "substitutions" in recipes to suit myself. In fact, in high school each of my friends had a different type of cookie that I had designed for them and would occasionally whip up a batch and bring it into school for them. Anyways, I tried to make ice cream for the first time when I was 8. I found the recipe in a Highlights magazine, which said I could make it in a coffee can rather than an ice cream maker so I decided to give it a go. I basically had nothing that the recipe called for and had never made ice cream before so we ended up with skim milk in a cup with ice cubes, sugar, raisins, and salt. My infamous "raisin ice cream." Needless to say this still provides my family with a good laugh. Although I do think that maybe I will have to make a delicious raisin ice cream some day for retribution...

Just like the raisin ice cream, this was my first attempt at making my own granola. And I chose to throw the recipe out the window. I like granola, but I've always been leery of it since I found the fat to protein ratio skewed too far in the wrong direction. I finally worked up the courage to make my own when I realized that a cereal that I had been buying was sneaking high fructose corn syrup into the ingredients! To be clear, there's nothing wrong with high fructose corn syrup on occasion. It's just that I was eating this cereal every day and I feel strongly that less refined sugars (maple syrup, brown sugar, molasses, ect) are way better for you. (Also, note how artsy I am putting my granola by fall leaves! I make no claim to be a food photographer... I'm just trying to make my food look palatable while delivering some recipes and information.)

Unlike the raisin ice cream though, this recipe is a spicy, crispy, pumpkiny success! For a 200 calorie serving, this granola hits you up with 10g of protein and only 5g of fat, as opposed to the 5g of protein and 10g of fat in regular granola. Success in turning that ratio around! I think I could further improve the ratio, but this pumpkin granola tastes so good that I definitely had to share. Couple that in with the nutritional profile of pumpkin and whole oats, which deliver a ton of fiber, iron, and vitamins and you know why I couldn't wait to share.

Protein-Packed Pumpkin Granola

1/4c vanilla almond milk
1/4c pumpkin puree
1/4c vanilla protein powder
2T brown sugar
cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice, ginger to taste (add more than you think you want!)
2 1/2c quick cook rolled oats
1/2c nuts (I used a combination of almonds, walnuts, and sunflower seeds)
~1/4c maple syrup

1. Preheat the oven to 375F.
2. Combine pumpkin, protein powder, sugar, almond milk and spices in a bowl to make a paste.
3. Add in oats and nuts. Stir until coated.
4. Grease a baking sheet (or several if your large one is currently preoccupied like mine...) Spread granola mixture evenly. Drizzle with maple syrup.
5. Bake for a total of 30 minutes. Stir you granola at 15 minutes and at 25 minutes, adding an extra drizzle of maple at these time points if you desire.

Enjoy and feel good about the vitamins, protein, and omega-3s you're eating!