Pumpkin Surprise

I got this recipe from a friend and after changing it slightly, made these delicious pumpkin square/cake treats that the kids (and all their friends at the park), loved!! Pumpkin is rich in Beta-carotene, Vitamin C, Potassium and Magnesium, it is also low calorie food and high in fiber.

I'm a one bowl baker and simply dumped all the ingredients into a big bowl, put into a cake pan and roughly 30 minutes later at 350F....done and delicious!!

3/4 cup grapeseed oil
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp salt
1 egg
2 tsp vanilla
1 cup pumpkin puree (I roasted a pumpkin and then pureed it in the blender but you could use canned organic pumpkin puree).
2 cups flour (spelt, whole wheat or gluten free option)
1/2 cup chocolate chips (I use dairy free)

before going into the oven

Done!

Prepping for the season

It has been way to long since I have posted. We moved Sept. 1st and with all the things needing to get done in the new house and trying to find our rhythm here, blogging has been a hard thing to do. I thought I would get back into it with something simple today.....remembering the importance of vitamin D. With winter approaching and days getting shorter, I thought I would share this recent journal article on the benefits of vitamin D for the immune system and how effective it is at warding off the flu virus (and viruses in general).

The kids get 1000 IU per day once fall hits and I up it to 2000 IU if someone in the house it sick. About a month ago I exposed Aidan to chickenpox with a 2 + hour playdate indoors with a friend that was in quarantine and full of active pox. Well, a month has nearly passed and no such luck here.......maybe it was too much vtm D? (As an aside if anyone knows of anyone with chickenpox let me know!!). Here is the article.....
http://www.naturalnews.com/029760_vitamin_D_influenza.html

Apple Crumble

we went apple picking today and a perfect thing to make with them is apple crumble.

7 large apples. (i used cortland)
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tbsp lemon
2 tsp cinammon
2 tsp vanilla
Mix the above ingredients and let stand for 20 min.
1/2 cups steel cut oats plus 2 tbsp, uncooked
I grinded a 1/4 cup in my coffee grinder (it's actually my flax seed grinder since i don't drink coffee!). and mixed the 2 parts all together
1/4 cup organic butter
1/4 cup brown sugar
2 tbsp whole wheat flour
Mix these together and then I added the oats
Place apples in dish, cover with oat/butter mixture. Cook at 400F for 35 minutes covered and then uncovered for 20 minutes. Voila!

Enjoy!

I Hate Carpets.....

Aidan had an ashtma attack last night. I heard him wheezing Friday morning and my radar was on. The problem is both his room and Bella`s room are carpeted. On top of that we are doing some reno`s to his room so it is a bit more dusty from his closet being taken apart. Looking back he should have not been sleeping there at all. Well last night at 3 am the wheezing started. I actually had to give him a puff of Ventalin and coupled it with a dose of Spongia and Hepar Sulph (he always does well with this remedy).
The kids were off to their Papa`s for the day and we certainly got a lot done with them gone with the first project being ripping out that carpet! Not sure why people lay carpet on hardwood. Carpets collect dust, dirt and dust mites. Cutting down the number of dust mites in your house is really important for people that have allergies and asthma and these little buggers love to live in carpet! When we lifted the carpet and looked at the underpad we were disgusted and this carpet was only put down about 5 years ago! It was a really easy job and within 2 hours the room was back together and Aidan`s bed was moved in. We are trying to convince him to share a room and I thought he would love the idea but he seems a bit put out. Well until his room is all cleaned up and de-carpeted, these 2 are bunking up.

cutting up the carpet into strip to roll and remove

removing the hundreds of staples that holds the underpad

after a number of sweeps and mops, shiny new floors!

hers

his

All things new....

We moved to our new house on Sept. 1st and as much at it is great being here, I do miss our old house. We had a great house that we made our own and the most amazing next door neighbour that anyone could ask for but all that being said our new neighbourhood is wonderful!
September marks the end of summer and with that comes all things new to our household. Aidan had his first day of 'regular' school, Bella had her first day of preschool ever (that's big change even if it is only 2 mornings per week!), we moved to a new house and the Jewish new year rang in a new year.
We decided to host the festivities, I needed to start collecting memories in the house to start making it our own.
Here are a few shots of all things new.....

1st day of 'school'
sweet wine, eggplant salad, gefilte fish

apples and honey to bring in a sweet year

pomegranate

Vegetarian Delight

I've been a vegetarian since I was 15 yrs. old. My husband, well he's a carnivore. If he cooks dinner he spends an elaborate amount of time cooking the chicken, basting the chicken and then barbequing the chicken. It is a good 2 hour ordeal which he couples with rice and peas. My dinner consists of the rice and peas. The other day I made a delicious vegetarian dinner that had him saying he might have a heart attack from all this 'healthy' food(oh my!). The kids licked their plates clean as well.
Chickpea Salad (I never use recipes just sort of throw everything into a bowl)
1 can of chickpeas (but I boiled for 5 min. to get them to be a little softer)
1 red pepper diced
2 carrots grated
1 tomato diced
1/4 cucumber diced
1 handful of sunflower sprouts
1 tsp of sunflower oil
1/4 fresh lemon
1 tbp of olive oil
pinch of sea salt

I coupled this with a orzo salad with peas and fresh parmesan and candied sweet potato. It was all delicious and animal free!

Fresh Picks

This week's market buys. Fresh, local, organic.

Sprouts have great nutritional properties. Just take the case of broccoli sprouts, it is better than a full-grown broccoli because it contains more of the enzyme "sulforaphane" that helps protect cells and prevents the body's genes from turning into cancer. I bought sunflower sprouts, rich in lecithin and vitamin D, sunflower sprouts have the power to break fatty acids and lead to easy digestion. I used to have a sprouting factory in my kitchen and with moving to this new house in just 2 days (eek!), I plan to get my operation up and going. Stay stuned for more on sprouting......