Kitchen Wars

I had big plans for today… No they didn’t involve curing cancer or bringing down international criminals… but nevertheless still important…

So with my big plans for the day ahead of me, I set forth only to find I am trapped… Trapped in the KITCHEN!!!!

Cooking all meals from scratch is a never ending job, and when I think about how many hours I spend in the kitchen per day I realise I am an unappreciated, unpaid chef for angry midgets!!

So things are-a-changing around here… In the words of Arnold Schwarzenegger in the terminater movies “the machines are taking over” (I’m not sure if he said those exact words, but you know what I mean)

I have turned to any form of time saving implement that I can get my hands on, the following is a list of my favourite time saving machines, that will hopefully get me OUT of the kitchen.

So the holy grail in time saving kitchen equipment would have to be the cooking husband/partner, who whips up dinner while you pop your feet up with glass of chardy… Hmm, yes, moving right along…

Coming in at a close second would have to be the Thermomix. This whiz banger of a machine claims to do all sorts of amazing feats in the kitchen with a flick of a switch, from ice cream to muesli in moments.  Coming in at around the $2000 mark, it is a serious kitchen investment, and is unfortunately not on my  necessity list for now.

I would place my bench mixer next on the list. Cakes, biscuits, bread doughs etc are all easy peasy with the mixer. Whack in the ingredients, flick on and job done… Only down fall is that you don’t burn the calories from physically mixing the calorie laden cakes and biscuits etc.

Next up the old trusty bread maker… Our bread maker is older than time itself, but still manages to lure us in to the kitchen via our noses, for a fresh bread laden breakfast, time after time. Bread cooks overnight & you can get creative with a variety of flours and grains without spending $10 a loaf.

Last but not least is the slow cooker. Perfect for rainy autum weather, you can cook beautiful porridge with pears and cardomon overnight, then re-load for a delicious spicey lamb stew with barley for dinner. Sweet delicious comfort food.

So these little gems have allowed me to escape the kitchen today, long enough to… Well write this post… I’ll start on world peace tomorrow.

Megan Georgoulas

Making some Dough

Today was yet another rainy Sunday spent indoors, so while the kids destroyed the place, I decided to take the opportunity and get organised for the week.

I donned my apron, cranked the oven, and got baking!

First off I started with some home made bread. I have started to become very suspect of commercial breads of late for a number of reasons…

I have not long finished reading the book ‘Fed up’ written by Sue Dengate. This is the book I should have read twenty years ago. It covers how food affects behaviour, particularly in children.

I was astonished to read about the additive, Calcium propionate (282) which is used in many commercial brands of breads in Australia. It has been linked to a variety of behavioural problems in children. Brumbys and Bakers Delight supposedly do not use the preservative any longer. So the last time I was in the grocery store (it was Woolworths) I made a point of reading the ingredients on their home brand bakery bread. All of it contained 282. Also most of the so called ‘healthy’ flat breads contained it as well.

I have also been conducting a little experiment of my own with some commercial raison bread that we had been eating a lot of just recently… let’s just say I will NEVER eat that stuff again… the results and pictures of the experiment will be posted shortly…

So its back to the kitchen for me and time to dust off the bread maker.

Today’s loaf is a 4 seed white loaf

Ingredients:

2 1/2 cups of flour (I used Wallaby Bakers unbleached flour, which contains no preservatives or animal fats, as well as being GMO free)

2 tablespoons of butter or a dairy alternative

1 teaspoon of salt

2 tablespoons of honey or rapidura sugar

1 egg

3/4 cup of milk (I used soy milk)

2 teaspoons of yeast

1 tablespoon chia seeds

1 tablespoon poppy seeds

1 tablespoon sesame seeds

1 tablespoon flaxseeds

I’m not too fussy with my method of putting the ingredients together, basically I melted the butter, added it to the egg, and milk.

I then added all the dry ingredients including the seeds gave it a bit of a mix and set the bread maker to do the rest.

Ahh what could be better than four hours of rain on the roof, the smell of fresh baking bread… and stir crazy boys looking for something to break!

The results were delicious!

Megan Georgoulas

I’ve got a lovely bunch of Coconuts

The golden age of the coconut is upon us.

I had been suspecting this for some time, however now that I have seen that ‘Starbucks’ are offering a variety of coconut flavours with their infamous frappes, I know for sure that coconuts have gone mainstream!

Coconut based products are everywhere, and we seem to be making good use of the whole fruit… or is it a nut… for now let’s call it a ‘Drupe’

We are now commonly using the coconut’s milk, the flesh, the oil, even the juice or water. Perhaps next Summer us ladies will all be donning a coconut shell bikini? Now if this trend was to take off, I know who would start it…

The Victoria’s secret wearing, coconut loving, yummy mummy herself, Miranda Kerr. The rediculously hot supermodel caused quite a stir last year when she was misquoted as saying that her good looks were the result of consuming 4 tablespoons of coconut oil per day.

Shock horror, stop the press… a supermodel who actually eats and coconut oil no less…. why, isn’t coconut oil super high in saturated fats and feared by every ‘fat phobe’ who hasn’t left the 80′s? Could it be that oils are actually good for us? Well who better to listen to, then a chick in a bikini *

So just like the good little plebs we all are, without any further questioning we rushed to the shops to buy the latest and greatest by the truck load. Now at the time of Miranda’s coconut loving admissions, I just so happend to be working in a health food store, and the following is an example of every second conversation I had at said job for the next month…

Me: “Hi, how can I help you today?”

Customer: “I’m lookin’ for that stuff, you know, that stuff that supermodel eats, you know the one I mean?”

Me: “No, sorry”

Customer: “Urg, you know, that stuff she eats, to make her beautiful and skinny and stuff… Don’t you watch Today Tonight?”

me: “Sorry I have no idea what your talking about”

Customer: [Basically says the exact same thing perhaps with a slight variation]

me: “Oh, now I know what you mean… you’re talking about Miranda Kerr and Coconut oil…”

N.B. I did actually know what they were looking for from the get-go, but I was a weekend casual and getting paid by the hour….

Anyway, I digress…

With this sudden surge of coconut products one could become quite sceptical of the actual value of this tropical all-rounder. However, as a dairy-free household, we can’t get enough of it!

So on this balmy Queensland summer’s night, I decided to follow our Quinoa salad with my own take on a traditional Greek dish and crowd pleaser, Rizogalo or good old rice pudding.

I used 2 cupped handfuls of Aborio rice thoroughly rinsed. I then added one can or 400mls of coconut cream with 2 tablespoons of Agave syrup, 2 tablespoons of powdered cinnamon and a sprinkling of desicated coconut to really get in the tropicana vibe.

Stir over medium heat and continue to add extra coconut cream as it is absorbed by the rice. Just like a risotto, this dish requires a bit of attention to make sure it doesn’t dry out and burn… however with minimal ingredients, it is simple and quick to prepare.

Sweetness can be adjusted to taste. I also like to add some lemon rind to give it a bit of a zesty kick. Leave to cool and serve warm like a pudding, or my favourite is to refrigerate and eat like a scoop of coconut ice cream topped with a sprig of fresh mint. Crazy in the coconut!

* Meant with all due respect to Miranda who is actually educated about nutrition.

Megan Georgoulas

Requiem for Caffeine

Last night I dreamt of coffee.

Gloriously strong, smooth, dark, and did I mention strong, coffee. The smell, the ritual, the stimulation, ahh what a wonderful reason to get out of bed.

Today was my third consecutive day coffee free. Why would I play such a masochistic game I hear you ask? Well at 3pm this afternoon, I was asking the same question. I was actually asking this while rocking in fetal position in the corner, while my chilren threw sultanas at me.

So like any good addict, I caved and let the sweet caffeine, or trimethylxanthine, flow all over my adenosine receptors. Just like magic I am a functioning, albeit slightly hyperactive,  member of society.

Every now and then I make the decision to quit coffee. I do this mainly for health reasons, however I also like to keep tabs on the underlying addiction. The pain of withdrawal is a great reminder of why caffeine addiction is so insidious.

Some folks head into the desert with no food or water to find the truth, I think it is much easier and involves less sun damage, to simply stop drinking coffee. I like to watch the layers peel back and discover the true state of my nervous system and adrenals.

The exhaustion, lethargy, gloominess and outright bitchiness is quite overwhelming, along with the inability to remember the end of my …. ah … what’s that word … you know …. Sentences!

My other main reason for having a little holiday from my best friend coffee, is that… brace yourself for this… Coffee is a drug!

Coffee has positive and negative effects on the body, with many, often contradictory studies coming out recently. Some of the positive effects from these studies range from reducing the risk of aquiring alzeimers disease, to helping with headaches.

Were these studies credible? I do not know. Maybe they were being conducted by coffee starved individuals with raging withdrawal headaches, so yes, it goes without saying that coffee is going to help with that.

So it doesn’t look like I’ll be quitting coffee anytime soon. Maybe next time I take a ride on the coffee rehab bus a good adrenal tonic and a ‘kids-free’ week on the beach in the Maldives would help to ease the withdrawal pains….

mmm beach…

mmm Maldives…

I wonder if they do a good espresso martini there?

Megan Georgoulas

The next weight loss craze or have we bitten off more than we can chew?

Introducing Autom.

Autom is your own personal weight loss coach.

She is with you everyday, learning about your dietary habits and activity levels. She learns where you slip up and helps you stay motivated and resist temptation. She is the extra nugde you need to get you out of bed in the morning to go for that run. Some would say she is like a 24/7 personal trainer…

Oh by the way, she’s a robot!

The ‘wow’ factor of this robot really sucked me in, what a great gimick for all of those professional slimmers and perhaps even a life saving treatment for the morbidly obese. This robot really is impressive, however it got me thinking…

How far have we shifted away from nature, and when I say nature I mean eating to live and naturally moving and exercising our bodies. Are we that far removed from nature and what our bodies need, that we need to employ a robot to teach us?

That being said, I think this robot is a great innovation and will potentially change lives. However in an ideal world, I would like to see more focus on the root of our ever increasing obesity health related problems, such as teaching better nutrition in schools and throughout the medical system.

But if nothing else, what a perfect christmas gift for a computer geek, looking to lose a few pounds!

Seed Naturopathics: Open for Business

So after a three year hiatus, I am headed back to the consultation room. I am very excited to be practicing once again, and am looking forward to being a part of all the beautiful and challenging pregnancy and birth stories ahead.

I feel very blessed that even though I am technically returning to work, the ‘work’ I have been doing as a mother has prepared and humbled me to work alongside mums and their families during their own journeys into life and parenthood.

I will be focussing on the pre-natal health of both mum and dad in the lead up to conception, support throughout pregnancy and birth, including HypnoBirthing classes, and will also be providing post-natal support for both mother and baby.

Becoming a mum is one of the most transformational times in a woman’s life which requires patience, understanding, love and unconditional support.

Unfortunately new mums can slip through the cracks within our current society and health model. With the main focus being on the babies health and milestones, our own health as mothers can suffer.

With the help of herbal medicine, correct nutrition, exercise and counselling, this time can be a joyous celebration rather than extreme fatigue and isolation.

As a mum of two toddlers I understand how important it is to care for yourself so that you can be the best mum, physically and emotionally for your children.

I will be consulting from Healthy Life Carindale on a Sunday between 10am and 3pm, and am also availale for online and telephone consultations.

Please contact me at megan@seednaturopathics.com for more info or to book an appointment.

Megan Georgoulas