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Pg 24 - FOODSTUFF
Good-For-You Greens
No matter how often we hear that we need a plentiful load of fruits and veggies to stay healthy, we still can't seem to find a way around busy schedules to get our daily dose. Amazing Grass Green SuperFood Chocolate Drink Powder provides an extra-nutritious boost. Each serving is packed with 3,000 milligrams of organic green super-foods, including wheatgrass, barley grass, and alfalfa, as well as spirulina, spinach, chlorella, and broccoli. Perhaps the most surprising, good-for-you component for some, though, is cacao. "Historically, chocolate has been at the top of the food pyramid, meaning it's one of the least recommended foods," explains Brandon Bert, Amazing Grass co-founder. He points out that current research shows raw cacao and minimally processed dark chocolate have bountiful antioxidant and anti-carcinogenic properties. "In our Chocolate Green SuperFood, we've combined raw organic cacao along with Dutch cocoa to provide such a delicious dark chocolate taste, people can't believe they are drinking a healthy dose of green super-foods," he continues. You'll also find a few exotic ingredients in the mix; organic maca, the root grown in Peru's highlands, helps keep you mentally focused, while Sambazon Pure Acai Powder, from the nutritious purple berry that grows in the Amazon, offers a good source of healthy omega-3 fats.
www.amazinggrass.com
Florida Fresh
After a day at the spa at the St. Regis Resort in Fort Lauderdale, you can indulge in delicious, nutritious spa-like cuisine at Cero, a luxurious restaurant with a focus on local and organic food. Executive Chef Toby Joseph is committed to using organic fruits and vegetables whenever possible, as well as to using sustainable seafood. Now that it's summer, Joseph is on the prowl for items like fiddlehead ferns, wild ramps, and peaches to give his menu a fresh spin. A typical lunch here might begin with organic tossed garden greens with chilled oven-dried tomato-and-citrus vinaigrette, followed by seared bronzini with grilled pineapple and glazed plantains. "Organic is a personal choice that we all can make," says Joseph. "I rely on my vendors to keep me on the cutting edge in seafood with weekly follow-up on trends, fishing lows and highs, and organic farming."
Peas of Mind
It's fine if you feel like skimping every now and again on a proper meal (after all, it's the lazy days of summer), but when it comes to the kids, you need to make sure they're well-nourished. It doesn't get much simpler than popping a Peas of Mind Puffet into the microwave. These frozen, fully cooked mini-casseroles (recipes were concocted by founder Jill Litwin with the help of a nutritionist) are loaded with wholesome organic ingredients. Litwin was horrified when she watched a friend serve her son green beans from a can a few years back. "I thought, no way am I going to let your son grow up that way," she recalls. But, she had no idea her penchant for healthy cooking would lead to a new career. Northern California-based Litwin, then living in Burlington, Vermont, put her kitchen skills to the test to find more nutritious, but simple alternatives to canned vegetables and other convenience foods that often tempt moms who are short on time. "My friend just didn't have time to make her son a well-balanced meal," she reveals. "I wanted to find something that was all-encompassing, so she wouldn't have to whip up a side of this and a side of that to give him a full meal. I wanted to get as many of the four food groups as possible represented via a casserole dish." The result is the Puffet. To date there are four classic varieties: Black Bean Polenta; Eat Your Greens (with spinach and broccoli); Carrot Risotto; and Nanna's Banana. New dishes are on the horizon.
www.peasofmind.com
Dinner and a Movie
An evening of film and food has always been a quintessential pairing, even if it means parking yourself on the sofa with a pizza and popping in the latest Netflix arrival. But, at Foreign Cinema in San Francisco, dinner and a movie is a far more glamorous event. On a summer evening, the patio buzzes with diners who look up now and then from their seasonally inspired meal to watch a few minutes of say, The English Patient, projected on a cinderblock wall. As chef Gayle Pirie likes to point out, Foreign Cinema isn't a theater. The film is the charming detail of the restaurant, not the focus, and guests should come to enjoy the food first. Considering how fresh and beautiful it is, there's really no contest. Pirie and her husband, John Clark, who cooks alongside his wife, have been on the scene for 30 years, brought up in the San Francisco Bay area Food Revolution days. "This is what we are about. Our farmers bring us carrots pulled that day, or greens just plucked the night before," she notes. For summer, one refreshing dish on the menu is a healthy, composed salad featuring tomatoes, figs, and fromage blanc. "This is a vibrant taste and visual display of summer," Pirie says, suggesting that the best tomatoes and figs are key to this simple dish. "If you are able to, choose tomatoes, figs, mint, and oils at your local farmers market. You will find the best quality, and the products will appeal to all of your senses." Pirie uses locally produced Cowgirl Creamery cheese for this recipe, but if you can't get your hands on any, fresh goat cheese will show off just as well. Here's the recipe below (serves four).
Tomato, Fig & Fromage Blanc Salad
Ingredients
Instructions
Rinse and dry the tomatoes and slice approximately 1 centimeter thick. Arrange the tomato slices on your favorite large serving dish. Next, place the figs on and around the tomatoes, as if you were painting a picture, showing off the ruby colored interiors. Use two spoons or your fingers to crumble the soft fromage blanc over the fig/tomato composition in irregular small bits, covering evenly. Drizzle the olive oil over the salad to coat; sprinkle the vinegar over the top. Pick the mint leaves into smaller pieces and garnish the tomatoes and figs thoroughly. Finally, sprinkle with sea salt and serve immediately.
Tasty Take-Out
Sometimes you just don't feel like getting the grill revved up for a steak. Or, maybe you're not really sure what to whip up with all those great looking greens at the farmers market. In the progressive Park Slope neighborhood of Brooklyn, those who crave a healthy, well-balanced dinner but can't commit to being chef for the night, stock up at the quasi ready-made meal haven, Get Fresh. Inside this ecologically friendly storefront, designed with locally sourced bamboo, cork, and energy-saving appliances, essentially, dinner is served. First, customers come in and see what seasonal offerings they can easily pluck from the fridge or freezer, from poached chicken salad with pine nuts, tarragon, and olive oil, to Tunisian-style grilled eggplant, zucchini, onions, and tomatoes, to a local Berkshire pork chop with roasted corn and brioche pudding, all ensconced in recyclable or biodegradable packaging. Then, they bring it home, and at most, pop it into the oven, following the easy-as-pie directions. "We are a wholesome and affordable alternative to take out and many of our customers love this. It tastes better, is better for them, and costs the same or less," says Kelley Roy who owns the shop, along with partner Caroll Lee. "Customers also love that they feel like they are part of a movement, a food revolution. Our customers see that they are doing something good for themselves, for local farmers, and for the planet." Those who still aren't thrilled about turning on the oven for even just a few minutes can grab a container of tangy gazpacho, perfect to enjoy in nearby Prospect Park.
www.kitchenliteracy.org
Green Dining Guide
Michael Oshman is a pioneer. Back in 1990, when Al Gore was still a Tennessee senator and the words "global warming" didn't induce panic, Oshman was a young college graduate who started the Green Restaurant Association (GRA) in Boston. Throughout the past 18 years, the GRA has helped restaurants become more environmentally savvy through education, consulting, and community organizing. "You had a small demographic of people who were looking at these issues since 1970, or so. Now we have a language for this, but it took many, many years for it to catch on," says Oshman. To strengthen GRA's presence, Oshman created dinegreen.com, a site that attracts a few hundred thousand people a year. Here, readers can find information about which restaurants in the nation are green (currently there are about 150, a number Oshman expects to double by the end of the year.) "After the past year, everybody's starting to listen. A top burger company recently got in touch with me. If that had happened ten years ago, I would have fallen off my seat." Look for a new and improved web site with attractive graphic interfaces, an educational component to acquaint readers with relevant issues, and more specific details about member restaurants' sustainability practices.
www.dinegreen.com
Coffee with a Conscience
Even though you've sworn you'll never drink a calorie-clogging Frappucino, you have to admit that if there was a healthier alternative on the market, you just might go for it. Enter Adina, the San Francisco-based company that has created a few healthy, sustainable versions of its own. No more than 110 calories, each bottle of the creamy organic coffee (and tea) beverages is made with Fair Trade certified ingredients—whether it's coffee beans from Guatemala for the Mayan Iced Mocha, or dark-roast heirloom beans from Ethiopia for the Ethiopian Iced Espresso. Indian Iced Chai Latte, with masala spice, uses black tea produced from South India, while the Sumatran Iced Vanilla Latte features pure vanilla extract and shade-grown coffee from Indonesia.
www.adinaworld.com
Alia Akkam is a New York City-based lifestyle writer whose work has appeared in Bon Appetit, Delta Sky, and Time Out New York, among other publications.