toxicity - Root Vegetable Broth

Last night I learned a great deal about how to maneuver on this site by accidently erasing my blog twice. Two hours of writing.



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O.K. It's morning and I will try again.

I have been musing about why, in spite of walking more this past two months than I have in years, and in spite of not eating much differently than usual, I have had such a rapid increase in weight. I believe there are two contributing factors in addition to too much food - Stress and Toxicity. Probably cortisol levels are higher than normal due to no kitchen counter space or breathing space. The relationship between higher cortisol levels and weight gain has been established.

The second non-food contributor may be toxicity. We live in a toxic building, and I have not yet saved enough money for a good air  purifier for this little apartment. This building is Doug's antiques store and houses a large workshop which is loaded with paints, thinners, etc. and also thousands of beautiful old moldy books. Doug has the liver of Hercules and doesn't seem to be bothered by these conditions - or at least he doesn't notice.  But I am the canary in the mine shaft and fall over dizzy if I breathe in too much poison.

I often refer people to The False Fat Diet by Nelson Haas, M.D. who has written several books about health. This particular one teaches an elimination diet to determine what foods we are sensitive to and which are creating inflammation. One of the tenets of the book is that when we are inflamed or toxic, the body holds extra weight in the form of water, and weight gain due to toxicity can be rapid and erratic. All this reminds me of poor beset Tucker.

TUCKER

My daughter Chloe used to have the largest cat I have ever known. He was truly enormous and evoked humor in whoever saw him, although he was a very dignified cat - not an easy thing to pull off at his weight. A few of you who attended cooking classes at my house back then still remember his waddling presence and how he used to fill the kitchen armchair from arm to arm when he sat in it. people still ask me about him. He was quite a presence.

The thing is, (except for the few surreptitious attempts by my  young teenage son to feed him bacon in order to attain the world record for fat cat) his eating was seriously monitored. But he just kept getting bigger and bigger until he died at an early age weighing around 23 pounds.  He was approaching the world record.

He was toxic. Very toxic.  When he was just a rambunctious teenage cat, he was kidnapped by a drunken neighbor of Chloe's who painted Tucker's whole body with blue paint. Since she was at work and didn't know his fate, he remained coated for several hours until she found him. I believe it poisoned his liver. He was never really able to release much from his body after that and just continued to balloon for the rest of his life.

I have seen this happening in many peoples' lives, the wildly fluctuating weight related to water retention. Water retention is always the sign that thing are awry. Although the toxins in this building aren't to olfactory levels most of the time, it is definitely not clean air in here yet. Detoxification is in order.

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So back to 33 foods, 33 days.  Since I am going to California for over two weeks in March and the mini kitchen is presently under some construction, I will not be able to fully undertake the experiment until I get back, but I can begin by adding things daily. This way maybe I won't overwhelm you with too much information at once and lose you before I start.

Yesterday I started with root vegetable broth.  This recipe is an instant alkalizer and remineralizer, and made well, it is deeply satisfying.  It is one of those foods that can instantly ease an unsettled feeling of craving. People who eat it for the first time are usually surprised at how much they like it.
The body likes it deeply, but so does the tongue.

I always make a lot of the base broth and keep it in the refrigerator to pull out and quickly heat up when I need it. If you are ill or feeling run down or just don't know what to eat - which mostly happens when you are needing more minerals - this recipe is a blessing. It is one of the most common foods in my diet.  Please try not to be immediately intimidated by the unfamiliarity of these ingredients*. They are great foods to have in your arsenal of healthy foods.

The base broth consists of:

• Kombu Seaweed (Kelp)
• Dried Shiitake
• Burdock Root
• Fresh Ginger
• Carrots
• Rutabaga
• Daikon Radish

Every One of these foods is a healing food in its own right. I will elaborate in the future.

There are only approximate measurements for this recipe. Not only do several of these ingredients resist containment, (ever try to put dried seaweed into a measuring cup?) but it is very important to begin to cook by instinct - especially when it comes to healing foods, or medicine foods, as I like to call them.  Let me explain.

Today your body might need a little extra iodine, and so if you let your hands and eyes do the cooking rather than mentally belabor the process too much, you will add a little more seaweed today than you did last week. Maybe today three shiitakes instead of two. But here is a rough draft:

• 1/2 Gallon of Water
• 3" piece of dried Kombu 
• 2 dried Shiitake Mushrooms
• 2" or 3" piece of Fresh Ginger, cut into very small matchsticks**
• 6" piece of Burdock, also small matchsticks

Place the above ingredients in the water and simmer for at least a half hour.  Then add:

•  1 medium carrot, julienned
•  1 cup of Rutabaga matchsticks
• 5" piece of Daikon Radish, also matchsticks

Let these simmer another twenty minutes, then add

• Tamari to taste

That is the base broth. Now you can refrigerate it and just reheat a cup or two at a time when you are hungry and add anything to it - tofu, leftover fish, chicken, beef, greens - always greens, even if it is just a little parsley or a scallion. No rules that say you can't eat it plain, actually.
I reccommend making this at least once a week . It keeps for three or four days refrigerated.

I ate this twice today.

  * A word about buying unfamiliar foods. Just do it. Get in the habit of trying new things. People pride themselves on being picky eaters sometimes, but probably that probably doesn't apply to anyone who has lasted this far into this blog.

** The way to make matchsticks out of clunky roots is to slice the roots as thinly as  possible on the diagonal, then lay the slices flat and cut them into little thin strips. Viola!

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Breakfast today: an sliced apple with the very best kefir in America (Swallowtail), lots of pumpkin seeds, a couple of pecans and a few raisins.