Roasted Peppers

I have been putting more roasted peppers in things and boy, are they tasty. After broiling the ONLY red pepper I had tonight to a black-roasted perfection, I had an epic cooking fail. The slimy pepper slipped out of my hands and right into the trash can. So I did what any self respecting cook would do. I used the five second rule, fished it out and rinsed it off. It was mostly covered with papery garlic skins. I actually learned something. It's easier to rinse the seeds off than to scrape them off.
Which brings me to another point - question, actually. I have been buying (for years) what I thought was a poblano pepper to roast and put in Mexican dishes. It gives a nice kick, but not too hot. They are dark green, about the size of a bell pepper, but pointy on the end. Now it seems the grocers call them pasilla peppers? Are they the same thing or have I been using the wrong pepper for years?
What ever they are called, they are tasty.

Now, after googling peppers, I think what I have been buying are poblanos. I think the grocers have been calling them Pasillas.

My new jacket

I finally caved in and bought the jacket I've had my eye on for four months. It is beautiful. Italian tailored, wool, black and white houndstooth. I'll probably have it forever and everyone will be totally sick of it. Here comes Janie in that jacket.... again.

Mourning in Song

I attended a funeral this weekend of a lodge member, who was a super nice lady. Joyce was always a hard worker at lodge and always had a positive, upbeat attitude.
It was a nice service with all of the usual remembrances, etc. There was the usual sniffing here and there, but when Harry played "Hils fra meg der hjemme" on his accordian, everyone just lost it. At least those of us who speak Norwegian.
I have often thought I wanted this song played when I die - which I hope is a LONG time from now. I hope I don't slaughter the translation too badly.
It's about a lonely sailor, away at sea, missing his family. He sees a flock of birds flying north and asks them to greet those at home from him. Greet my father and mother, greet the green pastures and the stark fjord. If I had wings, I'd fly home with you. Greet them, greet from me.

District Board Meeting

We had our District Board meeting at Camp Norge last weekend. I think it was a productive meeting and we saved the District a ton of dough by meeting at camp instead of a hotel.
I thought this would be a good opportunity to get a more casual picture of our board, so asked everyone to bring a Norwegian sweater. I really like this picture of us - it's more casual than the pic with bunads and suits and stuff, but it looks more "together" since we're all wearing similar sweaters.

Label reading

Since on this diet, I've been reading labels more carefully. On a box of supposedly healthy cereal..... "evaporated cane juice crystals". Um, I'm pretty sure that's a fancy name for sugar.

Unbelievable

My only concern with this vegan diet is my hemoglobin level - the amount of iron in my blood. I donate blood about every eight weeks and sometimes my hemoglobin is too low to donate (it has to be 12.5 to donate). The last two times I tried to donate I was too low. 11.something and 12.4 - this was with eating meat AND taking iron supplements.
My Keller Williams office has the Stanford Blood Mobile come to our office a couple times a year as part of our community outreach. When I pulled into the parking lot this morning and saw the big van, I figured, 'what the heck, I'll see if they want my blood.'
After 2 weeks on a vegan diet and taking no iron, my hemoglobin was 13.1. Unbelievable.

Some "aha" moments

We picked a date to start the four week E2 diet - 3/16 - between two out of town board meetings. We decided to try a recipe or two to figure out if we could hack this diet for four weeks. No meat, eggs, dairy, highly processed grains or oil. It actually sounds harder than it is.
I've been on this for a week now and feel great. I don't miss anything I'm not "supposed" to eat. Oh, I've also dropped two pounds and I'm still continuing to enjoy my evening wine.
The aha here is - vegans are not freaks.

We traveled to Fremont today to enjoy our favorite close ride. 22 miles total, it's all paved and no worry about cars and mostly flat. You ride out 11 miles, the last third is along the bay. We saw a few Great Blue Herons, which I think are beautiful birds. There's a picnic table at the end where we eat our lunch, then turn back. On the drive to the trailhead I was marveling at how clear and beautiful the entire bay area was. We had a few miles of a very tough head wind that was not a lot of fun.
Aha here is, if it's crystal clear all over, it's gonna be windy out by the bay.

I made an enchilada casserole last night, of course, I found it in the E2 book. It had a lot of spinach in it and I was dubious, as when I was a kid I hated spinach. Pat declared the dish delicious and I could barely gag it down.
Aha number three - I hate spinach. Still hate it.

E2, again

Okay, I didn't intend for this blog to be about diet and nutrition, it just happens to be what's on my mind right now. Bear with me, I am NOT going to turn into a food zealot. You know like a reformed heathen turns into a born again Christian? We all know how annoying they are.
We decided to try a recipe out of the Engine 2 book last night to see how it was. Sort of a test run to see if we can do this for four weeks. The brown rice and black beans were smothered in yummy veggies, cilantro, onions, etc. It was delicious. It made so much that I had it for lunch today. Tonight we're trying the portobello mushroom burgers. Should be interesting.
Some of the stuff they recommend on this diet is hard to find. Safeway doesn't sell Bragg's Liquid Aminos, which is a soy based condiment. Guess I'll swing by Whole Foods and see if they have it.

Electrolyzed Water

I read a fascinating article in Sunday's paper. Apparently if you add salt to regular water and zap it with electricity it makes a super cleaning product that's ten times better at kiling bacteria than bleach. It's colorless, odorless and non-toxic.

Well, shucks. I can't figure out how to put the link here, even though I'm using the insert link function. What a spaz.

The possiblities are endless, you can spray it on produce to kill bacteria and create a longer shelf life, it's being used on burn victims, etc. I really hope this will become mainstream. It's very cool

Engine 2

Pat read somewhere about the Engine 2 diet, created by a firefighter in Austin, TX. I got the book and started reading it a couple of days ago.
I have no doubt anyone would lose weight and drop their cholesterol significantly while on this diet. While my cholesterol is fine, I could certainly stand to lose a few pounds.
This is a four week diet and you can go one of two ways, drop things a week at a time or do it all at once. Week one you stop eating all dairy and processed foods, white bread, pasta, etc. I could do that. Week two you just stop eating all eggs, meat, poultry and fish. I guess I could do that. Week three you stop eating any type of oil, butter, etc. If you go the hard core route you stop eating all of this stuff - cold turkey, so to speak. So I'm thinking - if I cut out bread in week one, what the hell am I gonna put butter on?
I start thinking maybe I could do this for four weeks. Then I got to the kicker. No coffee, no alcohol. Wait a tick! No wine, no coffee? I know for a fact that I would drop probably 10 pounds if I quit drinking wine, but I drink my coffee black, so what's the harm there?
This diet sounds very much like a vegan diet and I don't think I could hack that. The recipes in the book do look very tasty, so maybe I'll make a few here and there and start in very slowly. Or not at all.