~~~ Above is a baby Zucchini from the Garden taken with Fujifilm S1000 ~~~

~~~ Right now there are only a few ’recipes’ so just scroll down to read ~~~

OK these aren’t really recipes and they aren’t really French but they are for your health, and animals and also to get your children trained to eat properly and maybe you too. Being a man, these are overly simple but contain discoveries that I have made myself and use regularly for my own health. As they increase in numbers I will put them in a easyread file. If you have any recipes that are health oriented please send them and I will give you credit for them.

Grapefruit- This is one of the best things you can do for yourself for a variety of reasons but be sure it’s allowed with any meds you might be using, if not use this recipe with orange juice or any other. Juice out of the commercial package is not really juice because it has been boiled (pasteurized) but it’s a good idea to buy some anyway and add real juice from squeezed grapefruit for yourself and your children. Use a glass hand juicer and get as much pulp as you can off the skin. Rinse the juicer with water into the mixed juice and add up to 50% water altogether. This makes a much less sour drink and you don’t even need sugar but it’s much better to dissolve honey in hot water and add that if it still isn’t good enough for the kids. Get them hooked on it early and you will be doing them a big favor. Pop is pure poison and your kids deserve better. Grapefruit juice is good if you get back pain from working long hours at a counter or computer, it has natural calcium and other nutrients plus mega vitamin C.

Cat Food- This will probably work with Dogs too but my experience is with Cats. While you are busy thinking about your children and their nutrition do yourself a favor and save money on cat food and give them a regular boost that will pay off in a fine coat, good health and fewer vet bills. (My cats never go to the vet and usually live a long healthy life, although I live in the country and they have their own door to go in and out) Cook carrots, potatoes and cabbage (or anything else) sliced and diced not too small and make a bed of them in their plate. While cooking these you can also add pot barley or dry green peas so the water turns to thick soup and the nutrients of the veggies are somewhat captured. They will start by chewing on the cooked cabbage and then licking up the soup but if you begin this when they are young they will be accustomed quicker. Just leave everything there and keep pressing their cat food into the veggies. Most cats also like sliced cantaloupe (just stand a section of it on it’s rind or cut into chunks). Their commercial food is really lacking in things they get from veggies and you will see the results. Cook for them by just using a bigger pot for yourself. Another hint is to sprinkle grated raw carrots and chopped raw spinach right over their canned food. They won’t be able to avoid the best nutrition any cat can get.

Zucchini and Zucchini loaf- Lately things have changed for this wonderful gourd and it is still probably the most popular with kids, cats and people. The big problem is that the fad has become the cucumber size zukes and they are not the best at all but they work good in salads. Cook giant zukes with the seeds left in and the pulp too, done right in the skin it’s a treat that can rival steaks. I do them in butter in a fry pan, cut to about 1" thick and cook them till they are brown on both sides and the seeds are slightly singed too. Unfortunately you must grow your own zukes or get them from a farmer’s market. They should be anywhere up to two feet long and you can also make zucchini bread out of them too. Grate the entire zuke, pulp, skin and all (take out the seeds if they are too big) and use a good zuke bread recipe. This and Carrot cake is much better for your kids at the birthday parties and it tastes much better too. Growing zukes is much like cucumbers and the plants look the same. You can pick some small ones for the salad and let other grow to full maturity.

Carrot and Apple Juice- Something that few people know is carrot juice tastes almost the same as apple juice as far as the sweetness is concerned and of course we are talking about fresh squeezed. Better to use a food processor so there is no waste but a juicer is Ok if you save the pulp and cook it for the cats or soup (carrots only). I use half carrots and half apples and it’s a natural energy drink that has no rivals for absolute nutrition and health giving benefits. Start your kids off on this and if necessary you can bulk it up by adding commercial apple juice from a waxed or glass container. Make it up especially for them to take to school and they will never miss the pop or commercial fake juices. Overall the buzz they get from carrot juice is much better than sugar but they will only feel it subconsciously and will slowly gravitate to the real McCoy. Carrots are very good for your eyesight and fight off all diseases as do apples.

Spinach- Cooked spinach is quite good for you, easy to grow and tastes great with melted butter on top but there is an even better way to use it. Don’t use as much lettuce as you used to and introduce raw spinach in the sandwiches, hamburgers and especially in your salads. I just chop it up and add a bit of onion, pile on the blue cheese dressing and that’s my salad. Also grow beets in your garden because they are just as easy to grow as spinach and the tops taste almost the same as spinach when cooked. I haven’t tried chopped raw beet tops but they might be Ok if the beets were quite young. Spinach has much more of almost the same kind of vitamins and minerals as lettuce but is more concentrated and contains other really good things too.

The Best Blue Cheese Dressing- Find a three cheese commercial dressing that you like or you can use Ranch or any cream dressing including Blue Cheese itself. Buy a container of blue cheese curds or chop a wedge very tiny. Remove the contents of the dressing from it’s bottle and put that and the blue cheese in a mixing bowl and mix well. Put what you can back into the dressing container and use the rest for your next meals. Once it has sat overnight it will loose almost all of the other flavors because blue cheese is incredibly strong. It would even be better if you made your own dressing from scratch but this so called recipe is if you want as little trouble as possible and are as gimped, as I am, with complex recipes.

Making Coffee extra Good for you- I just make the coffee normally and pour it into the cups, I leave a bit of room at the top and add Coconut Milk from a can (concentrated) then I slice about 4 very thin slices of fresh ginger, squeezing the ginger might even be better because you won’t have to pick out the slices while you are drinking (leave them in for three minutes or so) I just leave them in and drink around them. For sweetener I add honey instead of sugar. The honey is very good for you as opposed to any other sweetener (you should be aware that artificial sweeteners are very dangerous and not made of foods) The Ginger is a good anti-oxidant and the Coconut milk is an energy food and all good essential oils for your system. Now if you replaced the Coffee with Green tea or White tea you would have the drink of the Gods and live long and prosper. This is a mega weight loss drink too providing you don’t overeat and get the heck off the couch.

Pomegranate and cantaloupe breakfast. If you have eggs and bacon for breakfast and are even one pound overweight you should stop that awful habit. Teach your children when they are very young to eat raw fruit for their breakfast and try to learn the habit yourself. Lately I have been feeling really great about midday because I have a slice or section of cantaloupe and also a large wedge of pomegranate first thing in the morning. No toast (gluten is not a good thing unless you happen to be starving). The way to eat a pomegranate is very simple but they tend to be slightly sour near the skin. Let your kids pick out the fruit one by one if they want and it’s ok for them to swallow the seeds but the best way to eat it is to stand outside and bite it like a wedge of apple, chew it till the seeds are all broken and the juice is freed then just spit the pulp out. If you find the sourness to be a bother then crush the pome granite to get the juice and add a bit of water or honey. Remember that packaged juices are not good for you and not really juice anymore. Grapes are also a good breakfast item.

Nsoar