Kid-Conscious Recipe of the Week

Here is a great gluten-free and healthy recipe for Mothers' Day Brunch, courtesy of Danielle Hunt.  Whip them up tonight and freeze/refrigerate them so that your kids can just pop them in the oven tomorrow while you sleep in. 

Buttermilk Currant Scones

1 cup sweet white sorghum flour
1 cup almond meal
½ cup tapioca flour
½ cup cornstarch
2 ½ teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
12 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup currants ( sub anything you want even  GF choc chips!)
several pinches of turbinado sugar

Combine all the dry ingredients together and stir them well. Sift them into a large bowl. Set aside.

Cut the butter into small pieces, dropping the pieces into the flour mixture as you cut. The pieces should be no larger than your thumbnail. Once you have cut all the butter, combine the butter pieces and dry ingredients with a pastry fork (or your fingers). Once they are all blended well, and the mixture feels like bread crumbs, then you are done.

Combine the buttermilk, apple cider vinegar, and vanilla extract together. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and pour the liquid in. Slowly, stir the liquid in a counter-clockwise pattern, from the center out, until all the dry ingredients have been incorporated into the wet. When everything feels combined for the first time, stop. Add the currants.

Put the dough into the refrigerator and chill for at least two hours. This is important.

Preheat the oven to 425°.

Take the scone dough out of the refrigerator. Divide the dough in half with your hands, and then divide it again, until you have a ball about the size of the palm of your hand. Flatten the ball, slightly, and shape it into a scone-like shape. (That might mean something different to each person.) Sprinkle the top with a bit of turbinado sugar, and put that scone onto parchment paper (or silicone mat) on top of the baking sheet. Repeat until you have finished with all the dough.

Slide the baking sheet into the heated oven and bake the scones for fifteen to eighteen minutes. (In our oven, it was more like eighteen.) The scones are done when you can put in a toothpick and have it come out clean, as well as when the top is warm and browned. Allow the scones to cool for about five minutes. Serve immediately.

Makes about eight scones.

Kid-Conscious Recipe of the Week

Yana Connors submitted this recipe that both her and other members' kids have adored.  Coconut flour is a wonderfully nutritious alternative to traditional grain flours.  It's great if your family has gluten/grain sensitivities or if you just love coconut like I do!

Raspberry Chocolate Coconut flour Cupcakes

makes 8-10

1/4 cup coconut flour
1/4 cup cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla (make sure your vanilla is gluten free, if needed)
1/2 cup of honey or coconut sugar paste (maple syrup would work too, I bet)
1/4 cup of coconut oil
1/2 cup of fresh or frozen raspberries
3 eggs
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

1-Grease muffins tins, or put in muffin papers.

2-Whisk together the dry ingredients in a medium bowl.

3-Add the wet ingredients (but not the raspberries) and whisk well, until all lumps are gone.

4-Fold in the raspberries, and fill muffin tins, 2/3 full.

5-Bake for 20-25 minutes, until the top if firm and a toothpick comes out clean, when poked in the middle of the muffin. Take out of the muffin tins and cool on cooling racks

Tagged as: Dairy Free, Gluten Free

May 4th Meeting: Holistic, Yet Frugal: Living Well on a Budget

As mindful moms shopping on a budget, making the transition to holistic living can seem like a monumental investment in time and money.  As our standards for quality and healthfulness go up, so, it seems, do the associated price tags.  With creativity and a like-minded community, the budget barrier to living well can be overcome.  Keeping your home and family healthy need not leave your bank account in the red.

Join us for our May meeting to learn the techniques of frugally financing a holistic lifestyle.  Co-leader and bargain finder extraordinaire, Jennifer Oh, will present her extensive bag of tricks and lead the discussion to follow.  Please bring your own ideas to contribute.  Bring a friend to this meeting -- especially the ones who are afraid to enter "Whole Paycheck" for fear of losing their life savings.  We can help!

**Please note that this meeting is taking place at the Rozenhart Family Chiropractic Offices since our Library Community Room is unavailable this month.

See you Tuesday!

Kid-Conscious Recipe of the Week

Since we have so many great cooks in our membership rolls, I am adding a new feature to the blog; Recipe of the Week.  Through this weekly feature, we can share our tried-and-true, family friendly, nourishing recipes.  I am always looking for a fresh approach to presenting nutritious food to my family. I would appreciate that you send your recipe submissions to my email at holisticfreckles@sbcglobal.net.  These can be family recipes, links from your favorite blog, excerpts from recipe books or your own creation.  When you find something that works, please share it with us!

I'll kick this off with something I've been talking about on the loop.  Fresh whole wheat sandwich bread.  When I first got my breadmaker as a gift from my in-laws, I wasn't exactly sure about it.  I liked the thought of less work in the kitchen, but breadmaking was one of the tasks I didn't see as a chore.  I enjoyed the mental and physical therapy that kneading the dough provided.  Taking something from a chaotically sticky mass to a smooth and manageable ball was so satisfying.  This was, however, when I made bread only on special occasions.  Once I started truly making bread on a daily basis, I embraced and came to adore the convenience of my breadmaker.

When I first began baking bread in the breadmaker, each and every recipe I tried turned out as a heavy brick.  Whole wheat?  Forget it.  I finally got a recipe from Co-Leader, Jen Oh, and had my first semblance of success. I used it for months before I came across a technique for a lighter loaf involving the additions of natural acidity, starch and gluten.  I began playing around with this technique and eventually developed this recipe.  The pictures I'll post show the amazing difference in rise and crumb between the two recipes using the same amount of flour and water.  If you like the flavor of wheat bread but loathe the heavy texture, you will love this bread!

Original, unmodified recipe (pictured left)
1 cup warm water
3 cups whole wheat flour (I used freshly ground,  
   sprouted white wheat) If you want a less dense 
   loaf, use half/half white to whole wheat flour.
3 T Coconut Oil (or your preferred oil)
2 T Honey(or 3T of your preferred dry sugar)
1 T Kosher Salt (or 1.5 tsp. fine sea salt)
2 1/4 tsp. active dry yeast

Mix all ingredients in breadmaker for 5 minutes, turn off machine.  Add yeast to top of mixture and set timer for machine to complete its "whole wheat bread" setting in 9 hours.  This will give the dough time to soak and absorb the liquids.


Christina's Light and Fluffilicious 
100% Whole Wheat Bread (pictured left)

I am writing this recipe for a breadmaker with a timer to delay the start of the dough/baking process. You can certainly make this recipe without the assistance of a breadmaker, but you may not get the same results due to not being able to soak the dough overnight without the yeast.  Experiment with the timing of adding the yeast and see how it goes.



Add to bread machine in this order:

1 Cup warm water
2 T Orange Juice
4 T Ghee or Butter or Coconut Oil
2 T Honey or Malted Barley Syrup
Heaping 1/4 Cup Dried Potato Flakes (or 2 T potato flour -- again Bob's Red Mill makes one)
2 T Buttermilk Powder (or nonfat milk powder)
1 T Kosher Salt (or 1.5 tsp. fine sea salt)
3 Cups Whole Wheat Flour (again, I used freshly-ground, sprouted white wheat, but King Arthur White Whole Wheat Flour is a good substitute)


*At this point, start the machine mixing.  Let the machine mix until all ingredients are moistened and well incorporated (about 5 minutes).  Stop the machine and reset.  I set the machine on "Whole wheat," 1.5 pound loaf with a light crust.  I then set the timer so that the finished bread will be ready at 8:00 in the morning, when I am up and getting breakfast ready. 


NOW, don't forget to add:


2 1/2 tsp. active dry yeast

I add the yeast at the end so that it will not activate during the overnight soaking process.  When the machine starts in the morning, the yeast will mix thoroughly into the dough and begin the rising process.  When the bread finishes baking, take it immediately out of the machine and empty loaf onto breadboard to cool for 30 minutes before slicing.

Enjoy!

Christina

Also featured on Pennywise Platter

April Meeting Recap: Emergency Preparedness

This month's meeting on Emergency Preparedness was so enlightening. With all of the earthquakes that have occurred in the last few months, the timing couldn't have been better. We had two representatives from the SJ Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) come to speak with us and go over what to do in the event of various emergencies and what to have prepared in case of emergencies.

We learned different emergency scenarios: fire, hazardous materials, earthquake, etc., creating a family plan and how to handle these situations.

Some really great quick tips:

• Know where your gas, water and power meters are and how to shut them off, if necessary.

• Discuss with your family what you would do during an emergency and create a family plan of action.

• Create emergency kits - GO Bags - for various places: work, car, and in your bedroom. These bags are not your entire emergency kit, but the supplies you need immediately: shoes, glasses, clothes, flashlight. Imagine if it were the middle of the night and an emergency happened. You'd need to be able to grab a bag and run. You won't have time to grab clothes, shoes, glasses, et cetera.  The "Go Bag" would be indispensable.

• Make sure your kids know what to do and how to react. A common reaction for kids is to hide and in an emergency, this would be the scariest thing for a parent.  Explaining and teaching them from a young age how to react and what to do during an emergency could save their lives.

• Have an out of state contact. This would be the point person that ALL family members could contact and let know they are ok. Most often, local phone service is cut off (to keep lines open for emergency personnel), it will be easier to call out of state than locally. Let your out of state contact also have copies of any vital documents: passport, drivers license, insurance papers, etc (scanned on a USB stick is great).

• Carry a photo of your loved ones in your wallet. In the event of an emergency, you will have a photo of your loved ones, in the event you need it. It is much easier to find someone when you have a photo for people to look at than just a verbal description. Cell phones may lose battery power, so an old fashioned photo is still best.

For a complete guide on how to create a family plan and what should be in your emergency kit, visit
http://www.sanjoseca.gov/emergencyservices/EHFDP/EHFDPCh2.pdf

One of the biggest concerns I have regarding an emergency is dealing with the aftermath.  An emergency happens and you are required to eat rations.  A majority of people survive actual emergencies only to get ill afterward due to lack of nutrition, stress, fatigue, et c etera. It is vital to keep the body as healthy as possible.  Most MRE's (Meal, Ready to Eat) are highly processed. Yes, they are fortified with vitamins and minerals...and lets face it, if it's all you have, you'd eat it...but they are not as nutritious as what most of eat day to day. The best thing to do is to dehydrate, store bulk grains, beans, etc, or to look for healthier MRE alternatives. Here are a few links to some options we have found on the internet.While most are expensive - they do give you a starting point and making your own kit will save substantially, but these links are a great starting point.
http://survivalacres.com/
http://www.blogcatalog.com/blog/emergency-disaster-preparedness-nutrition-survival-food-dehydrated-meal-mre-pack-supplies-kit
http://www.disasterstuff.com/

Posted by Jennifer Oh

March Garden Planning Meeting Recap

Tuesday night's meeting was a great one!  Not only did I get to get out of the house after a crummy, rainy, shut-in day with the kids, I got to talk gardening with some very wise women!  Everyone brought their favorite gardening books along with any other community info they had.  Some books that our members recommend are:

The Backyard Homestead, Carleen Madigan
Golden Gate Gardening, Pam Pierce
Turtle Tree: Biodinamic Seed Initiative
How to Grow More Vegetables, John Jeavons
Square Foot Gardening

First, the best news -- our official "frost date" in the Silicon Valley was February 23rd.  That means that we can begin planting with a reasonable expectation that our little seedlings won't freeze overnight before establishing themselves.  This is just a guideline, however, so don't hold me accountable if you go on a planting escapade this weekend and we have a cold snap!  Many of us have started our seedlings indoors and will begin "hardening them off," or, adjusting them to the great outdoors, in 4-6 weeks or so.  If you don't want to bother with seedlings, organic starts are available at several local nurseries and are safe to plant in the ground after the first week or two of April.

Everyone had some great ideas to share.  Jessica W. has had really positive experience with a local program in San Jose called "La Mesa Verde."  This is  a  non-profit organization that will assist San Jose residents in establishing their own organic vegetable gardens in their front or back yards.  Not only will they come out to consult with you on your prospective plot, this organization's volunteers (including the Master Gardeners of Santa Clara County) will help you build raised beds, irrigate and plan your garden for the season.  They provide free classes to grow your knowledge of gardening along with your vegetables.  Throughout the season, a Master Gardener will check in with your garden to monitor progress/problems.  I think that this is a wonderful way to bring home gardening back into the community's focus -- especially among those of us who believe organic produce to be beyond our budgets.  This FREE program (can you believe it?) is limited to 100 families, so if you or someone you know is interested in participating, please contact them at (408) 278-2160.

Another wealth of resources in our community is the Master Gardeners of Santa Clara County.   Click on the link to find some interesting -- and free -- classes surrounding gardening and sustainability. 

A favorite spot of mine is Common Grounds Garden Supply and Education Center in Palo Alto.  This is the little shop that supports the Common Grounds Research Garden at Stanford.  They have a fantastic selection of heirloom, open-pollinated seeds and starts as well as books, supplies and a very knowledgeable and helpful staff.  Click on the link for their schedule of classes and events.

I managed to finish building the Salad Table (click for construction plans) I had hoped to demonstrate on Monday night in about 4 hours.  I think that the salad table and pots are great options if you want to grow just a little something but don't have space or time to allot to a full-fledged garden.  I think that it will be well worth the minimal effort it took to build and I really am looking forward to having a beautiful and easy to access plot of greens right outside my kitchen door.  Check out the University of Maryland Professor who designed the table showing Martha how it's done on this video.

If you would like some ongoing help with your garden planning and maintenance, check out www.groveg.com.  They have a free trial period during which you may use their software to plan out your garden and get tips on planting.  

We spent the evening exchanging resources, ideas and seeds.  Our gardening goals for the season ranged from the simple "I wanna grow stuff" to the ambitious "retro-fitting the front yard for veggies."  No matter where we are in our gardening path, I hope that we all get the reward of at least one yummy veggie by summer's end.  Please post any tips or questions you encounter on the email loop as they come up. Thanks to Kimberly N. for bringing seeds to exchange I had been wishing I had bought this year.  I am excited about mini persian pickles and sweet peppers.  It was great to see faces that we know through the email loop but had never met in person.  We hope that you can all make it to a meeting soon!

Happy Gardening!

Christina

March Monthly Meeting: Vegetable Garden Planning

We have had several requests that we get together and plan our vegetable gardens for the springtime, so let's do it!

March is the perfect time to start our seeds and prepare our beds for the season.  We'll let you know about a wonderful program in San Jose that helps new gardeners get started growing their own fresh, organic vegetables as well as a demonstration on how to make your own salad table for growing greens outside your kitchen door. General discussion on what works and doesn't in the bay area and tips for gardening in small spaces.

If you are a seasoned gardener, bring ideas and resources to share.
If anyone wants to swap seeds, bring your extras and we can exchange. You can't beat your own yard for eating locally! 

When:  Tuesday, March 2nd, 7:00 p.m.

Where:  Rozenhart Family Chiropractic
              4620-B Meridian Avenue
              San Jose, CA 95124

Free Screening of the Documentary, "Food, Inc"

Holistic Moms Network of San Jose Presents
a free screening of
"Food, Inc."

Please join us for the screening followed by a discussion of the film!  Please note that we are holding the screening at a different location than our monthly meetings.  We have secured the community room at the Cambrian Branch of the San Jose Public Library (1780 Hillsdale Avenue, San Jose)
for this event.  The room's capacity is 100, so make sure to R.S.V.P. soon!

How much do we really know about the food we buy at the local supermarket and serve to our families?

In Food, Inc., filmmaker Robert Kenner lifts the veil on our nation's food industry, exposing the highly mechanized underbelly that has been hidden from the American consumer with the consent of our government's regulatory agencies, USDA and FDA. Our nation's food supply is now controlled by a handful of corporations that often put profit ahead of consumer health, the livelihood of the American farmer, the safety of workers and our own environment. We have bigger-breasted chickens, the perfect pork chop, herbicide-resistant soybean seeds, even tomatoes that won't go bad, but we also have new strains of E. coli—the harmful bacteria that causes illness for an estimated 73,000 Americans annually. We are riddled with widespread obesity, particularly among children, and an epidemic level of diabetes among adults.

Featuring interviews with such experts as Eric Schlosser (Fast Food Nation), Michael Pollan (The Omnivore's Dilemma, In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto) along with forward thinking social entrepreneurs like Stonyfield's Gary Hirshberg and Polyface Farms' Joel Salatin, Food, Inc. reveals surprising—and often shocking truths—about what we eat, how it's produced, who we have become as a nation and where we are going from here.

February, 2010 Monthly Meeting

 Holistic Moms Network of San Jose Presents. . .

LINDA S. TJIPUTRA, MBA, CFP

Money Management: A Woman’s Perspective

When:   Tuesday, February 2nd at 7:00 p.m. 

Where:  Rozenhart Family Chiropractic 
              4620-B Meridian Avenue
              San Jose, CA 95124

Please R.S.V.P. at the Evite

 

This is a topic that we all can relate to -- money management!  Our financial needs and priorities completely change when we become mothers.  Learn how to organize and plan your finances for the future.  Join us for a presentation by Linda S. Tjiputra, MBA, CFP followed by questions and discussion.  Hope to see you there.

A sample of topics covered in presentation:

1. The “What If” question.
2. Taxes: Strategies to minimize your taxes :
   
   
   1. Before and After-tax investing
   2. Tax-deferred vs Tax-free investment
   
   
3. Retirement Planning
4. Sending Your Kids to College: What you need to know:
   
   
   1. Funding Strategies
   2. Which Strategy is best for you?
      
   
   
5. Estate Planning: Beneficiary Reviews, Titling your Accounts, Deed of the House, Living Trust vs. Will.