Is Sodium Bad?

Cheeze Sauce

This is tasty and can be a base for your creations and modifications. Here’s an example in scalloped potatoes but you can use it for mac n cheese.

Ingredients:
1 large sweet potato cooked, skin removed, using your preferred method (I cook in microwave for about 13 minutes depending on the size)
1.5 cups of non-dairy milk (I used unsweetened almond milk)
1/3 cup of nutritional yeast
1 tsp garlic powder
2 tsp onion powder

Instructions:
Put ingredients in blender (I use Vitamix) and blend on high until smooth, just a few seconds usually using the tamper. If too thick add a bit more water or more non-dairy milk. If you want to use a regular potato throw in 1 or 2 cooked carrots as well.

Scalloped Potatoes in Cheeze Sauce

This is pretty tasty. Feel free to add more things to it but I always try to provide a least the basics to get you started.

Ingredients

5 Medium Potatoes (enough to fill a casserole dish), sliced. I use Mandoline slicer and yellow-fleshed potatoes.
1 medium onion, diced
1 cup spinach
Cheeze Sauce

Preheat oven to 375F. Slice potatoes with mandoline slicer. I slice them thicker than when I make potato chips, about 1/4″. Put layer of about 1/3 of sliced potatoes on bottom of casserole dish. Add 1/2 the onions and 1/3 the spinach. Pour half the cheeze sauce on. Put another 1/3 layer of potatoes down with 1/2 the onions, 1/2 the spinach and 1/3 the sauce. Put the final 1/3 layer of potatoes on top and pour rest of cheeze mixture on top to cover the potatoes. Cover (I use glass top) and bake for 1 hour. Take cover off and bake for another 15 minutes or until the top gets nice and crispy. Add salt and pepper to taste on your plate if desired.

New Brunswick Summer Savory Potato Stuffing

Bonnie’s recipe.

Ingredients:
1 yellow onion chopped
8 yellow gold potatoes boiled and cubed
1/2 chopped red pepper
1/2 chopped green pepper
1 stalk of celery chopped
2 cups whole grain croutons (I make them by toasting 2 pieces of whole grain bread and cutting into cubes.
1/3 cup Summer savory (you can use less if you’re worried it will be too strong)
1.5 tsp seasoning salt (eg. Lawry) (optional)

Instructions:
Mash potatoes with a potato masher and add in all other ingredients
Once well mixed place into a large ceramic baking dish bake for 60 minutes at 425 F or until edges on top are brown.

What To Eat, What Not to Eat, in Pictures

Saute Vegetables Without Oil, Chubby Will and What I Had for Lunch

Quick Pizza Dough Using Bread Dough No Breadmaker

As health conscious people we generally want to use whole wheat flour since it is less processed. But the sad reality is a whole wheat pizza dough is pretty dense. If you like it that way by all means stick to that. I recently tried a recipe that was quick and easy, no breadmaker, long waits or kneading required. Tasted incredible!

Be sure to try bread flour if you can as it’s different from all-purpose flour.

Ingredients
1 tbsp active dry yeast
2.5 cups of bread flour
1 tsp sugar
1 cup warm water (~110 deg. F)
1 tsp salt

Instructions
Preheat oven to 500F. Put water in bowl and add yeast and sugar. Let sit for 10 minutes. Yeast should bloom. If it doesn’t the yeast might be dead or water was too hot/cold.

Add the flour and salt. Mix until it forms a ball. It will be a bit sticky (was for me in a humid climate).

Lightly flour a working surface (my kitchen island) and put the dough on it. Add some flour to the dough and work it into the ball for a few minutes until it is a nice round ball without being sticky. Put the ball in a bowl and cover for 5 minutes.

Take the dough out of the bowl and put it on a pizza pan or stone. Spread it out and add your sauce and toppings. My favourite is my marinara sauce. Be sure to leave a ridge around the edge as the crust will taste amazing. Next time I will pre-bake my crust for 5 minutes or so as I like a lot of sauce and the middle wasn’t as crispy as I’d like it. I might need to get a pizza stone as well. Don’t bake too long, even though it gets crispier it loses some of that soft bread like texture if you bake too long.

Recap – Back to Basics – Starch Solution Lifestyle

White Bean Gravy

This gravy is an alternative to my chicken-style and brown gravies – substituting a can of no sodium added white kidney beans for the flour/water. Would be good for people with gluten issues as well.

Ingredients

1 can of White Kidney Beans (or cook your own beans and add water for desired thickness)
1 tsp onion powder
1/2 tsp garlic powder

For brown gravy also use:
1/2 tsp Kitchen Gourmet browning sauce (or use soy sauce)
2 tbsp vegetable stock powder

For chicken-style gravy also use:
1 square of ‘chicken style’ all-vegetable bouillon. Try to find lower sodium, no oil versions or use this spice combo from Fat Free vegan.
Black pepper to taste (optional)

Instructions:
Pour the can of beans with its liquid into a Vitamix or similar powerful blender. Add the remaining ingredients and blend on high speed until smooth. Add to pot and heat on the stove. This is pretty thick so you can add more water as desired for preferred thickness.

This is a super quick recipe. If you have more time, it’s always good to saute some onions, garlic, and even mushrooms in water to give it even more flavour if you prefer.

Thai Stir Fry With Udon Noodles

I’m loving this recipe! Years ago I used to eat ginger beef and noodles like this but they were covered in oil and who knows what else!

Feel free to add or subtract ingredients or quantities depending on your tastes. We often wing these recipes, the exact amounts don’t really matter.

This was enough for 2 of us as we love our starches!

Ingredients:

1/2 cup edamame (frozen)
1/2 frozen peas
2 medium size carrots peeled and chopped (we make short strips as seen in photo)
2 cups broccoli florets (frozen)
1 chopped yellow onion
1 cup chopped celery (optional we forgot to do this)
3 tbsp sweet thai chili sauce
2 tbsp sriracha (used 3 tbsp the first time, too hot! adjust to heat preferences)
1 tbsp soy sauce
Up to 1 package of precooked udon noodles (I use President’s Choice, contains 4 packs and is total 800 g, we used 4 the first time and 3 the second which was fine. You need enough starches for satiation.)
2 cups of bean sprouts
1/2 cup water
1/2 tbsp vegetable stock powder

Mix the water with the vegetable stock powder (or use 1/2 cup vegetable broth) and add to heated skillet on medium heat along with peas, onions, edamame, onion
Cook the carrots separately since they take longer (we use the microwave or you can steam them)

When veggies are soft add the noodles, bean sprouts, chili sauce, soy sauce and sriracha and turn up heat to high for about 3-5 minutes. Stir everything to make sure the noodles are coated and everything is distributed. The high heat will caramelize some of the sugars from the sweet chili sauce. Keep stirring so nothing burns. You’d swear the noodles are covered in oil as they are so slippery smooth!