Dr. Ritamarie’s Thanksgiving Day Celebration and Recipes

Each year, we celebrate Thanksgiving Day with my husband’s family.  This year there were 37 of us present, ranging in age from 14 months to 97 years.

I wish I could say that the past 26 years I’ve been involved in the celebrations has influenced the food choices of the group, but sadly it has not.

The majority of the food served is loaded with processed grains and sugar.

Each year, up until this year, I would make a sweet potato dish, sweetened with dried apricots and topped with pecans.  Each year there has been so much left over as our guests opted for the sugar sweetened yams instead, that this year I opted not to make them.  They were not missed.

I have also made a cranberry dish each year, using fresh cranberries, raisins, pears, and oranges.  Each year there was a huge quantity left over as people favored the sugar sweetened cranberries,  and I would get tired of eating them for days to some.  This year I made a small quantity only and there were still leftovers.

Next year I may opt out of the cranberries as well.

Personally I’m happy to eat the veggie appetizers with garlic dill dip,  salad with a yummy dressing (sesame garlic ginger this year), and some steamed or sauteed vegetables.

My desserts are usually a big hit, but this year all I made was a low-glycemic coconut carob mint “candy”  because I’ve been avoiding sweets.  I didn’t make enough to share, just enjoyed them myself because I figured they were no match for all the store bought sugar drenched pies served along with a homemade marble cake, my mother-in-law’s recipe.

As I watched my family members fill their plates with all the sugar, starch and meat with fatty gravy (store bought, not even home made), I wondered HOW can I make a difference.  The vegetables were eaten in tiny amounts by most.  My husband, kids and I ate a lot more vegetables that everyone else in the room combined.

How do I reach the masses with the message that this food is destroying their health?

Maybe I’m naive, but I thought it was common knowledge that sugar and white flour are harmful, cause hormone imbalance, diabetes, heart disease and cancer?

I’m scratching my head, and thinking.

I care about these people and hate to see them suffer.

In the meantime, I want to share with you ideas for creating holiday celebrations that focus on the people connections and offer foods that delight and nourish.

Here are a couple of delicious recipes I made for Thanksgiving this year , including a sugar-free cranberry gel.

Thanksgiving Raw Food Recipes

Garlic Dill Dip

(variation of recipe in Healthy Holiday Traditions)

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup cashews
• 1/2 cup macadamia nuts
• 3/4 cups water
• 1/8 cup lemon juice
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon dried dill
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder

Directions:

1. Blend nuts, lemon juice, water and salt
2. Put mix in a bowl and stir in dill and garlic.
3. Add more dill and garlic to taste if needed.

 Sesame Garlic Ginger Dressing

Ingredients:

• 2 tablespoons sesame tahini
• 1/2 cup water
• 1/8 cup lemon juice
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 slier of fresh ginger
• 1 clove garlic

Directions:

1. Blend all ingredients.
2. If too thin, add extra tahini, if too thick add water.

 Cranberry Orange Relish

(variation of recipe in Thanksgiving Feasts)

Ingredients:

• 2 cups fresh cranberries
• 1 orange, peeled
• 1 pear
• 1 cup raisins

Directions:

1. Process everything in a food processor until smooth
2. Add extra raisins if you prefer a sweeter relish

Spicy Cranberry Blood Sugar Balancer

Ingredients:

• 1 cup cranberries
• 1/4 cup coconut cream (Artisana)
• 2 teaspoons konjac powder (http://www.konjacfoods.com/product/1.htm)
• 1/4 cup water
• 1/4 teaspoon almond extract
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/8 teaspoon cloves
• 1 sliver ginger

Directions:

1. Process all in blender or food processor until smooth
2. Add stevia if desired for sweetness

Leptin and Ghrelin: Two Powerful Hormones to Heat Up Your Holiday Fat Burning Furnace

Deceptive Advertising in Children’s Snack Foods

Knowing what to feed hungry kids that’s satisfying and nutritious is a dilemma faced by many parents.

While there’s lots of really good information on the web and in the bookstores, there’s also lots of misinformation that’s confusing and downright dangerous.  And just because someone has initials after their name, like MD or RD or CCN or PhD I does not mean you can blindly trust their information.

In preparing for my next blog post “Healthy Snacks for Hungry Kids” I decided to see who else is writing about the topic and how what they are saying fits into my world view.

I was shocked by what I found.  One nutritionist is promoting a product called Bagel Bites®.  There were many links throughout her site for these, and everything I could find (advertising) touted them as healthy wholesome whole grain pizza snacks foods for kids.

This particular nutritionist referenced Bagel Bites® in one of her tips for healthy snacking called “Don’t Forget the Whole Grains.”  In essence she said that kids don’t eat enough whole grains and we should look for ways to incorporate whole grain with each snack so they reach the target of 3 whole grain servings per day.   She goes on to say that one serving of Bagel Bites® provides 1/2 serving of whole grains.  To reach the target she suggests of 3 servings of whole grains, you’d need to eat 6 of these.

It took a lot of digging and I was finally able to locate the ingredients.

Turns out that each serving contains 190 Calories, 45 %  of the recommended Daily Value for Fat, 2.5g of saturated fat and  370mg Sodium.

So let’s take a look at what’s inside these “so-called” healthy snacks, Bagel Bites®.

Bleached Wheat Flour, Water, Mozzarella Cheese (Milk, Cultures, Salt, Enzymes)Tomato Puree (Tomato Paste, Water)Pepperoni (Pork and Beef, Seasonings [Salt, Spices, Dextrose, Oleoresin of Paprika, Flavoring, BHA, BHT, Citric Acid]Water, Cure [Salt, Sodium Nitrite]Lactic Acid Starter Culture)Green Bell Peppers, Red Bell Peppers, contains 2% or less of the Following: High Fructose Corn Syrup, Salt, Romano Cheese (Cow’s Milk, Cheese Cultures, Sat, Enzymes)Soybean Oil, Parmesan Cheese (Part Skim Milk, Cheese Cultures, Salt, Enzymes)Yeast, Modified Corn Starch, Nonfat Milk, Methylcellulose, Citric Acid, Oregano, Garlic Powder, Spice, Natural Flavor, Dough Conditioner (Ascorbic Acid)Enzymes.

Am I missing something?  I don’t even see the whole grain at all!  Bleached wheat flour is NOT a whole grain.

Even if Bagel Bites® do contain ½ serving of whole grain, as our nutritionist suggests, they are still a poor way to get whole grain servings, in contrast to ½ grain serving of quinoa or brown rice which is about ¼ cup cooked and contains  about 55 calories, no fat and only 3 grams of sodium.

Bagel Bites® are a prescription for disaster for anyone who’s gluten or dairy intolerant and contains pepperoni, a processed meat from factory farmed animals.

The concept is great.  Kids love pizza so why not give them a snack of pizza bites. And in all honesty, these are much better than many other commercially available snacks for kids, but I believe you can do much better.

In our class Kids in the Kitchen , we teach how to make similar snacks in a jiffy, from whole organic fresh foods.  There are several possibilities for a quick wholesome crust,  including, in order of “wholeness”,  jicama slices, polenta slices,  flax crackers, rice cakes, brown rice crackers, and gluten free whole grain English muffins.  There are even commercially available gluten free pizza crusts.  Our family favorite is one we get at whole foods that contains nothing but whole brown rice and potatoes.

For cheese the best choice is a home made  dairy free nut or seed cheese.  We offer several quick and easy recipes in the Kids in the Kitchen class  and more sophisticated fermented versions in our Dairy Free Raw Cheese Class.  For sauce, the quickest is a jar of organic tomato sauce and the most wholesome is a raw marinara, made in minutes in your food processor.

Here’s a review I wrote on the site that had the Bagel Bites® ingredients:

http://www.drritamarie.com/go/bagelbites

Here’s a copy of what I below, just  in case they took it down!

“This is a prime example of a product that claims to be a healthy snack and is NOT.

The first ingredient is bleached wheat flour. This is white flour in disguise. Not good for anyone even if they are not gluten sensitive. They claim to contain whole grains. I don’t see any listed.

This product is just another attempt at clever marketing designed to steer unsuspecting and trusting parents to continue the devastation of feeding junk to kids and expecting them to be healthy.

There is nothing healthy about pasteurized hormone laden cheese, pepperoni, white flour, soybean oil, BHA and BHT, and high fructose corn syrup.

As a doctor who sees the effects of nutrition, good and bad, on kid’s health, I am appalled that such a product can be called a healthy snack for kids.

I teach my parents and children to make pizza using a base like jicama, rice cake or flax cracker topped with organic jarred tomato sauce or fresh from whole ripe tomatoes. The “cheese” we top it off with is made from organic raw nuts, bursting with high quality fats, protein and minerals. We teach them to discriminate truly health enhancing food from deceptive advertising.

At www.drritamarie.com/go/kids we teach kids to make their own healthy choices and give them the tools and recipes to make delicious nutritious easy to make foods.”

If you’re disgusted with all the misinformation and would like to teach your kids to make healthy choices, join us for the Kids in the Kitchen class .

We’ve set it up so if you join us in person, your kids will get to make their own food, with your assistance if need be.

Online, we set it up so that you can purchase the ingredients in advance (you’ll get a shopping list as soon as you register) so your kids can make the food during the class or afterward.

This is the 4^th time I’ve done a class like this over the past 5 years and it’s always been a big hit.

So whether you have kids or grandkids, nieces and nephews or family friends,  It pays to learn to feed them right and to empower them to make the best possible choices.

If you can’t make the class live,  if you sign-up now you’ll get the videos at the pre-event investment of just $19.95 and can watch at your own pace.  In fact, you can create some summer  activities days by planning a recipe making session.  Make a full learning experience out of it, and even ask your child to invite a friend.  You can take them shopping, then watch the lesson together and then head to the kitchen to make food.  You can replay as often as needed for them to get what to do!

Creating Healthy Kids is your responsibility as a parent and what you feed them and the choices they make for themselves are critical to their success.

For additional resources related to kids’ health, we’ve posted three radio show recordings on the Dr. Ritamarie Radio Blog.

Kids Health Month Radio Shows

Creating Healthy Children with author Karen Ranzi

Join Dr. Ritamarie and Karen for a lively and informative discussion on the importance of food on children’s health and hear about her son’s miraculous recovery from lifelong asthma within weeks of adopting a raw food diet.

Put Your Kids In Charge of Their Meals

It can be a challenge as a parent to make sure your kids eat wholesome and nutritious food. In this show, Dr. Ritamarie discusses how to  empower kids with information about the effects of food on their body and shares fun ways to teach them to make delicious meals and help them to make wise choices.

How Gluten Effects Kids Behavior, Focus and Concentration

Teachers report lack of focus in classrooms. Parents notice hyperactivity, mood swings, depression, and many other emotional behaviors. What is happening that is causing such issues in our kids? The answer may be a simple ingredient present in just about every meal…gluten!

Reversing Dyslexia with author Dr. Phyllis Books

If your child has been diagnosed with dyslexia, take heart.  A dyslexic diagnosis is not barrier to success.  Join Dr. Ritamarie and guest, Dr. Phyllis Books, author of “Reversing dyslexia: improving learning and behavior without drugs”  and find out what you can do to help your child reverse their dyslexia

With Love and Gratitude,

Dr. Ritamarie

Raw Food Recipes for Gluten Free Diet and Healthy Holidays

Eating a gluten free diet and making raw foods recipes during the holidays need not be difficult.  You especially need not feel deprived.

Here’s one of my favorite  raw food recipes for gluten free gingerbread cookies, taken from my book Healthy Holiday Traditions.  Before I switched to a gluten free diet, high raw foods and greens, I would bake gingerbread cookies and have lots of fun shaping them into people of various sizes and shapes.

This recipe results in raw vegan gluten free cookies that taste even better than the baked kinds.

I’ve given you two versions to try.  If you have a food dehydrator, I recommend you try the first recipe.  They come out warm and fragrant.  If you don’t have a dehydrator yet, the freezer cookies are great too. I’ve even included a recipe for a creamy frosting to top the cookies with and decorate as you choose.

Additional gluten free raw foods recipes for healthy holidays are in our new book “Dessert:  Making it Rich Without Oil”, Sweets for the Holidays online videos and Healthy Holiday Traditions e-book.  All are available for immediate download.

Enjoy and have a happy, healthy  holiday.

Gingerbread Cookies – Dehydrated

Ingredients:

• 1 cup almonds, soaked overnight and rinsed
• 1 cup walnuts, soaked overnight and rinsed
• 1/4 cup raw date paste (see recipe below)
• 2 teaspoons ginger
• 2/3 teaspoons nutmeg
• 1 teaspoons cinnamon
• 1/3 teaspoons cloves
• Pinch sea salt
• 1/2 – 1 cup shredded coconut

Directions:

1. Combine almonds, walnuts,  and date paste with salt and spices in food processor until well combined.
2. Knead the coconut a little at a time into dough. Use between ½ and 1 cup – as much as it takes to result in a rollable dough.
3. Roll or press dough onto paraflex sheets and use cookie cutters to make into desired sizes of gingerbread people.
4. Dehydrate at 105 degrees for a few hours until the cookies are firm enough to remove to mesh sheets.
5. Flip onto mesh sheets and dehydrate for another 8 hours or to desired texture.
6. Make a variety of colored frostings and apply using pastry bag and various tips.
7. You can also decorate cookies with dried fruits, nuts, seeds, or coconut.

Variations:

• Eliminate spices and use raw cacao powder to make chocolate cookies.
• Use a variety of cookie cutter sizes and shapes.
• Form cookies into rounds instead of using cookie cutters.
• Shape cookies by putting dough into a cookie press.

Creamy Cookie Frosting

Ingredients:

• 1 cup raw cashews or macadamia nuts (or half and half)
• 1/3  cup water, or coconut water
• 1/3 – 1/2 cup date paste
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions:

1. Combine all ingredients in a high speed blender until smooth and creamy.
2. If  too thick, add just a tad more liquid
3. Use dehydrated fruit powders and spirulina to pigment the frosting.

Date Paste

Many recipes that use liquid sweetener can be made with date paste instead.  It’s easy to make and keeps in the refrigerator for at least a week, if not longer.

Ingredients

• 1 cup dates, pitted
• ½ cup water

Directions:

Blend ingredients in a high speed blender until smooth.

Alternative:

Soak the dates in water for 20 minutes.  Then blend the dates and the soak water in a food processor until smooth.  You may need to add a little more water.

Gluten Free, Dairy Free Raw Foods Recipe for Holiday Cookies

It’s an exciting time of year.  In our home we celebrate both Christmas and Hanukkah as well as the winter solstice.  Blending the customs of the various traditions is fun and allows us to experience a rather full holiday season.

I was out of town last weekend through late Tuesday night and arrived home to find a tree in my living room!  My boys were busy at work while I was gone!  It’s such a joy to see how fully my husband Scott, raised Jewish, embraces my Christmas traditions.

There is so much joy and connection this time of year!  Regardless of which holiday you celebrate, its likely you have traditions around connecting with people you love and giving gifts.

The downside of this time of year is the focus on food.  At every corner is some new temptation  – cookies, pies, candy, hor dourves!  Unfortunately, most of it is high in sugar, fat and refined flour and does nothing for your health and has a knack for expanding your waist-line, zapping your energy and exacerbating inflammation.  So instead of feeling at your best and really enjoying your connections with people, you may find yourself feeling foggy headed, over stuffed and more depressed about the state of your body that you’d ideally like to be.

I have a favorite cookie recipe I learned from a Betty Crocker cookbook shortly after I moved out on my own in my early 20′s.  I made these cookies every year and they were LOVED BY ALL.  Then something happened, and I “changed my diet”.  You may already know the story, as I’ve shared it on many a teleseminar.  The first Christmas after I changed my ways, I reinvented the cookie recipe.  I substituted the white flour for whole grain, substituted the butter and eggs with almond butter and psyllium and the cookies, while tasty, were not as popular as the originals.

Over the years I refined the recipe, and I now have a raw dehydrated version that knocks people’s socks off.  And I’m sharing it with you today.

Raspberry Filled Almond Cookies

Ingredients – Cookie

• 1 cup almonds, soaked
• 3/4 cup dates, pitted
• 1 dash sea salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Ingredients – Raspberry Filling

• 1 pint raspberries (fresh, or frozen and thawed)
• 1 tablespoon vanilla
• 1/4 cup coconut butter cream concentrate
• 2 large medjool dates soaked for 15 minutes in water.

Directions
COOKIE: Process nuts and dates with salt and vanilla in food processor until they are completely chopped. Mixture should be a little coarse and should hold together. If needed, add a tablespoon or 2 of water.

FILLING: Combine all ingredients in food processor or blender and blend until smooth. If too thick, add more water. The mixture should be thick and creamy.

PREPARATION:

1. Form 1-inch balls with the dough. Place the balls on a paraflex sheet to make the bottoms. Use a cookie cutter to form shapes or press gently with the bottom of a small drinking glass to make uniformly sized, circular cookie shapes.  On half of the cookies, cut a small circle in the center to make the tops.
2. Dehydrate 12 to 24 hours until fairly dry.
3. Remove paraflex sheet and dehydrate for another couple of hours.
4. Remove from dehydrator and place on a cookie sheet.
5. Spoon the filling onto the cookie bottoms. Cover with the cookie tops.
6. Put in freezer for a couple of hours to set.

These are decadently delicious.