Dear Kamut (Khorasan),
In my glorious book Periods, Poo & A Glorious You I spelt your name wrong on several occasions. I do get it right on page 34 but the other pages say Kumut. To make matters more awkward, I instruct people to pronounce your name Koo-moot instead of Ka-moot.
Continue reading An Open Apology to Kamut (Khorasan)Spirulina is a blue green algae with perhaps one of the most elegant sounding names in the foodie world. I reckon the name alone is reason enough to give this funky green character a whirl. If you start small and build your dose up over time, Spirulina is a delightful and mega-nutritious addition to your morning smoothie.
It’s rich in protein, containing 67g per 100g. That might not sound like much, but compare it gram for gram to most other protein rich foods and you’ll notice that it contains more than double the amount of protein. I realise that we aren’t likely to eat 100g blue-green algae in one sitting – what an adventure for the bowels that would be! That said, even 15g (3 teaspoons) contains 10g protein and is easily added to a smoothie for a gorgeous green hue.
It is loaded with Beta-carotene which is converted to active Vitamin A by clever enzymes in our glorious livers. Vitamin A is an antioxidant vitamin that is vital for cellular repair, immune function and tip-top cognitive health. Put simply, we love Vitamin A.
It can create an anti-inflammatory terrain in our gastrointestinal environment. We know on a common sensical level that gastrointestinal inflammation feels unpleasant and research is now indicating that when the gut is inflamed, the brain, endocrine organs, liver and immune systems tend to follow suit. This ain’t a groovy state of affairs! My Motto? Spirulina the eff up.
Spirulina contributes to our daily iron needs offering 6.6g in 3 teaspoons. I know, I know. It doesn’t compare to grass-fed lamb or beef or – dare I say it – organ meats such as liver and heart. Whether you agree with meat abstinence or not, vegetarians and Vegans exist and the likes of Spirulina can help them meet their iron quota. They may need to consider iron supplementation as well but that’s a discussion for them to have with their doctor and/or nutritionist.
Spirulina has an earthy flavour that pairs well with creamy, sweet flavours and is a beaut addition to your favourite smoothie. I don’t crush on green smoothies that are all veg, zero sweetness. I like them to still taste indulgent. I suggest adding Spirulina to a creamy salted caramel smoothie (dates providing the caramel) or a raw cacao and coconut milk shake. The dream! The Green Ecstasy Smoothie in Periods, Poo & A Glorious You is my all time fave Spirulina recipe, but if you’re yet to adopt this hilarious paperback companion, the number below has got you sorted.
Ingredients
Add all ingredients in a high speed blender. I love my Vitamix, but do the best you can with what you have. Even a regular blender will do. Maybe skip the ice cubes if your blender is on the cheaper side. I’ve actually destroyed a cheap blender by trying to crush ice in it.
Blend on the highest setting until smooth, thick and frothy. This will take about 1 minute. Pour into a glass and enjoy this super-nourishing and orgasmic-tasting creation.
Notes
For a probiotic boost, use half coconut milk and half coconut yoghurt. For a chocolate or carob variation, follow the recipe above and add 3 teaspoons raw cacao or pure carob powder.
My favourite brand is Green Nutritionals. This isn’t sponsored – I just reckon their Spirulina tastes the best of all the brands I’ve tried.
Where to buy Organic spirulina is available at all health and bulk food stores and most organic shops. It is also to to order online if you simply google ‘buy organic spirulina online’.
Okay, maybe not my hoo-ha specifically.
I’m talking about the lessons my book baby – who just happens to sport a gloriously happy va-J-J on her front cover (hence the hoo-ha aspect to this posts cheeky title) – can teach us. The lessons extending beyond the delicious information in her eclectic chapters. Holy Guaca-foodgasm-mole! Not yet a week old and my papery darling is already wiser than most.
Lesson #1: Kiddlets have minds of their own.
Indeed. As I mentioned in my last post, my papery offspring decided that she wanted to create a game that you could play as you devoured her glorious pages. She’s called it Where’s Whoopsies? It’s like Where’s Wolly? – minus the stripes. I combed through her meticulously. My editors and publishers and designers did too. Even her Grandmumsy (my snazzy Mamma T) came to the party in the final editing stages. We toiled to iron out even the most minor of kinks. Yet my sweet girl decided to play hide and seek with a few minor corrections. You (the reader) have two options;
This brings is to lesson # 2
Lesson #2: Our bodies truly are astonishing
Okay, so I’ll admit that my heart sank when I initially noticed my baby’s grammar whoopsies. Then she looked at me with her endearing, happy eyes and said “but Mamma, look how clever your brain is. It corrected the words in your mind’s eye”. She’s right. As much as our snazzy ‘override’ mechanism makes the editing process a challenge, our in-built autocorrection is something to behold.
Lesson #3: Life wasn’t meant to be airbrushed
My girl is an old soul. Despite being born in the age of insta-filters and photoshop, she champions old school realness. The days where we took photos and hoped for the best because we couldn’t edit or delete. Recycling unwanted snaps post-development was as ‘airbrushed’ as it got. Before autocorrect most things were written by hand on the fly and mishaps were an inevitable part of the process. We’ve come to expect perfection and thus chase elusive ideals. My book baby is pretty darn special. Pretty darn close to perfect. Yet she comes with a small handful of oversights as if to say “I’m keeping it real”. Bless her rectangular papery pages.
Lesson #4: Let it Go.
I’m not going to tell you what the errors are or where they’re located. In all honestly I hope that your glorious brains override these insignificant boo-boos. That said, if you do win the game of Where’s Whoopsies I trust that it won’t mean any more to you than it does to me when I find typos in my favourite books. Never does a minor error take away from the good value and overall message. I trust that the compassion I have for my favourite authors will come back to me with my glorious audience. That or they’ll miss them altogether. Either way, I’m letting all recently discovered (and yet to be noticed – if there’s still a few silly buggers lurking) slide and instead focus on the beauty of what I set out to and have achieved. Health, Happiness and Humour for myself and the world.
This wise little girl can’t wait to befriend you. Adopt her below.
Holy Heck she is finally here.
I was reluctant to become a book Mamma. To spread my legs and let the literary gods impregnate me with the drive to create a unique and non-cliched publication.
Thankfully I felt the fear and got pregnant (with paper) anyway.
My baby knows what she likes and told me what she needed to be. She refused to be free of typos. No matter how many times I lovingly combed her pages, she’d sneakily play hide and seek with minor corrections. “Mamma” she whispered to me last night before I put her down “now our glorious audience have a game to play when they read – where’s whoopsies?”. Isn’t she a delight? She is challenging my deep-seated perfectionist tendencies and I love her for it.
She insisted on being playful, lively, honest, candid, and, well;
G-L-O-R-I-O-U-S.
Hence her title.
Despite her front cover sporting a delightful Va-J-J, she is a uni-sex read for all ages and stages. If you have a body and sense of humour she was made for you. Periods was such an ace pairing for Poo that we rolled with it. Again, we emphasise as a mother-daughter duo; SHE IS NOT ALL ABOUT PERIODS. Lads gather ’round. What she’s on about is health … but not in a way that you are likely familiar.
She is a collection of my personal anecdotes (mostly surrounding my path from borderline-dead to robust health), orgasmic recipes (start salivating now), jokes and cheek (so much cheek) and health information imparted through cartoons, analogies and a whole lot of heart-felt humour. My baby is ready to play.
She loves;
She refuses to;
She’s already a social media tart.
Check her out below – she cannot wait to meet you.
Soft plastics. Unlike fallen leaves, decomposing bodies and mineral stones, soft plastics neither break down nor healthfully assimilate with the natural environment. This is a pickle for Mother Nature.
I love Mother Nature.
Here’s a cute snap of me hanging out in one of her glorious trees.
She has asked me to have a word with you about ending your long-term love affair with soft plastics. She’s also asked me to use lots of F-bombs to emphasis the seriousness of her plea. I have altered the spelling to protect sensitive eyes. To be clear, it’s pronounced ‘far(k) and far king’.
Continue reading Soft Plastics? No Way!In this post, we talked rituals that nourish the skin from the outside in. Now we flip the bird. Not literally – keep those middle fingers in check. Let’s go from the outside in to the inside out.
Here’s a budget-friendly truth bomb; as fun as face masks, naked backyard body scrubs and pissing your cat off by taking the time to cleanse your face before you feed them brekkie can be, the simplest way to foster glowing skin is to up the antioxidants and beneficial fatty acids in the diet.
Continue reading Skin FoodsLet’s have a quickie.
Calm your farm, not that sort of quickie – I meant a quick blog post.
A short and sweet (like me) post about skincare. Heck Yes!
The skin is our largest organ. That’s right – an organ. It absorbs topical applications quicker than the digestive tract absorbs ingested substances. It pays to invest in chemical-free skincare products and show the skin some R-E-S-P-E-C-T.
This is not an affiliated post. I do namedrop Twenty8 and KORA organics but only because I’ve been using them for yonks. KORA since I was 15 and Twenty8 since 18. Both are organic, Australian companies that combine the magic of aromatherapy with plant medicine to create ethically natural personal care products. I may also have a girl crush on Miranda Kerr (who doesn’t?) and Kim Morrison (Twenty8 founder) is a friend and mentor of mine and I enjoy helping an amigo out with a candid plug. Anyhow.
I find it frightening that between artificial fragrances and the plethora of chemicals in hair products and cosmetics, the lay person is exposing themselves to thousands of artificial ingredients daily – before they even step out of the bathroom in the morning.
What pacifies this chilling reality is that it’s stupendously easy to make a few simple swaps and displace these thousands of chemicals. Organic products are potent and end up lasting you twice as long as the regular stuff. While it may seem like an investment initially, you aren’t spending extra money overall. Winning!
Below is my regular skincare regimen + some tips on how to save dollars and still have glowing skin. I know I’m only 22 – but I still manage to look like a sweet 16 year old – minus the ‘problem skin’ -so I must be doing a few things right skincare-wise.
First thing every morning – no matter how much my dear sweet Carly Cat is screaming at me for her brekkie – I take a few minutes to cleanse and moisturise. I cleanse with my Twenty8 cleanser, pat my face dry and then spritz my face and neck with Twenty8 toner. I have had the same toner concentrate for 4 years and I’ve still got plenty! How? It’s a concentrated solution that you dilute in water, a wee bit goes an extraordinarily long way. I then moisturise my damp face and neck with KORA organics soothing moisturiser. I only use the tiniest little pump and which is all I need. This cream lasts me at least 4 months. I then finish with the tiniest smear of Twenty8 firming eye cream. I use this morning and night – right before bed. This tiny jar lasts me about 6 months – sometimes longer. Ok Carly Cat, time for brekkie – thanks for waiting. Meow. Scratch, scratch. Meow.
A few times a week I’ll grab one of my smooth finished crystals and massage my face and neck with it in circular motions. Not only does it feel relaxing, I dig the ritual of taking the time to give myself a crystal facial. This is a great one to do on a short stroll in the morning (two birds, one stone) or even when having a conversation with someone. It can be pretty mindless. A simple act of self-care. Plus, once you’ve invested in the crystal, it’s free. Every time.
I try to do a mask once or twice a week. At the moment I have the twenty8 clay mask but if I’m opting for the DIY option, I’ll simply combine some tahini (ground sesame paste) and raw cacao. I buy both in bulk from The Source Bulk Foods – so it’s a dirt cheap option. It is a bit messy, so I’ll apply it starkers (yes, naked) and just pace back and forth on my back lawn (or lie down and listen to some tunes) while my skin soaks up the oils and antioxidants. Then I hope in the shower and wash it off. My skin feels like a baby’s bottom afterwards – minus the poop smears. Glorious.
Holy Effing Heckballs do I love to cook?!?
And eat – especially the eating part.
That said, I like to whip things up in a jiffy, especially if I get home-mid-arvo and haven’t eaten lunch, or get home from work after 8 and want dinner pronto.
Last year I was doing 18 hours of placement a week in a nutrition clinic, teaching yoges 7 days a week – sometimes multiple classes daily – and editing my book ready for publishing.
If I desired regular fuel, I needed to embrace super-human organisation. Not once did I succumb to takeaway – I must be the only spud muffin on the planet who is yet to use Uber Eats. Nor purchase pre-prepared meals from the supermarket – too much plastic packaging and usually cooked in canola oil. How could I even entertain skipping a meal – did I mention how much I like eating?
I may have eaten homemade cupcakes, self-saucing chocolate pudding and chocolate-chip cookie dough for dinner a few times, but that was for ‘work’. I was recipe testing.
These days I work from home or at least close to home and have more leeway when it comes to foodie organisation. That said, I still love meal prepping on Weekends so that I have easy options at the ready for the first half of the week.
Below are some of my fridge and pantry staples and how I use them.
Happy Pantry Perving – may you find inspiration amongst my cluttered shelves and random culinary pairings.
Smoothie Staples
I love to have a range of powders and spices on hand for my smoothies. Think cinnamon, vanilla bean, raw cacao (raw chocolate powder is stupendously high in magnesium – very important for a yoga teacher), matcha (green tea) powder, green stevia (a sugar-free, ridiculously sweet-tasting herb), cardamom pods, Spirulina (pictured below) and novel items here and there to change things up. At the moment I’m loving red velvet latte powder (beetroot-based), maca powder, carob and blue Butterly pea powder. Then all I have to do is add filtered water ice cubes, coconut water, frozen organic spinach, fresh zucchini and sliced ginger and whizz – smoothie magic a-go-go.
Oats and Banana Flour
Man I love working with organic oats and green banana flour. I use them to make these bread roll muffins, and pretty much all other baked goods, including the chocolate cupcakes and self-saucing pudding in my upcoming book baby ‘Periods, Poo & A Glorious You’.
I also use oats to make savoury risottos, chickpea-based cookie dough (also in my book baby) and stirred through coconut yoghurt that had been blended with banana and vanilla and layered with crunchy ground flax seed. Yummers. Me gut says Hells to the Yeah!
Aussie Olive and Organic Coconut Oil
My fam and I can’t do without these two beauties. I love olive oil for dressing veggies and risottos and coconut oil in my nut butters. I also love the flavour of coconut oil with roasted veggies.
Homemade Nut and Seed Butters
Nut and seed butters changed my life. I’m not being dramatic spud muffins. I mean it. You can add them to just about everything and they’ll provide protein (see-ya animal flesh), creaminess (so-long moo-juice), vitamins and minerals (move over chicken embryos) and fibre (your welcome bowels). Here’s how I nut (and seed) butter;
Fresh Fruits, Veggies and Ginger
With help from your pals nut (or seed) butter, seasonings, olive oil, ferments (see below) and either a muffin (see below) or serve of resistant starch rice (cooked and cooled rice – for a specific recipe check out the Poop-promoting Resistant Starch Rice in my upcoming book baby) you can easily make a meal of veggies.
On nights that I teach a yoga class from 7-8pm, I like to enjoy a muffin (below) with 3-4 Brazil nuts plus a generous tablespoon (HEAPED) of nut or seed butter with a simple serving or fresh fruit such as an apple or berries. This makes a light yet satisfying dinner if you eat later than usual – like I do several evenings a week.
Fresh ginger, zucchini and spinach are a dream base for an easy smoothie. Just add ice cubes, coconut water and all of your favourite shelf-stable powers i.e. raw cacao, carob, Spirulina, cinnamon etc. and you have yourself a meal. This works well as a standalone brekkie or as a ‘starter’ before a ‘second course’ of apple or banana with homemade nut or seed butter. I’ve been know to have a snacky smoothie dinner like this when I arrive home late feeling thirsty, hungry and in need of both hydration and easily-digestible energy.
Ferments
These take any savoury meal to the next level and deliver digestive-aiding enzymes to boot. They also offer a whopper dose of friendly probiotics to supplement the ‘forest in our gut’. A little goes a long way. I stir a dollop though veggie and salad creations or eat with ripe avocado and turmeric resistant starch rice for a colourful meal.
Roasted Veggies
Another bomb diggity bomb bomb. Add roast veggies – think pumpkin or sweet spud, regular spud, capsicum, red onion, eggplant, zucchini, beets … WHATEVER FLOATS YOUR GROOVY BOAT – to salads or steamed veggies with freshly cooked chickpeas (see below). It’s also no secret that I love pumpkin and sweet spud with nut/seed butters. You can even snack on roasted veggies. Add homemade guacamole and ferments to make a light meal. Drooling!
Slow Cooker Chickpeas
I buy chickpeas dirt cheap at the local bulk store and soak them overnight in salted water. Then I drain, rinse and pop in the slow cooker covered with more water. They cook on high for 4 hours. Then I drain and rinse again. Once cooled, they keep for 5 days in the fridge in an airtight container. I use them in salads, veggie creations, this bowl and Orgasmic Cookie Dough (recipe in my book baby).
Profound Plantain Muffins
Forget the infamous Fat Bomb Muffins of best-selling cookbooks gone by, these muffins are their plant-based, fibre-bomb cousins. They add satisfaction and loads of gut-soothing fibre (nothing harsh about these intestinal brooms) to any meal and because they are the best-ever vehicle for homemade nut butter, they make upping proteins and fats in the diet a cinch. In my nut butter-obsessed opinion it would be a crime to eat these babies without nut or seed butter. Or at the very least creamy coconut butter if nuts and seeds send your immune system haywire. To be truthful, I often make these delights with green bananas, as I don’t always get to the markets to snag a bunch of plantains. They still work out swell.
There you have it kiddlets. This is why I’m such a happy banana. Look at all the delicious and soooooo freakin easy peasy lemon squeezy foods I get to enjoy. I hope you’ve found inspiration in all, some or a humble few of my everyday suggestions.
If you’re wanting even more foodie inspiration, kitchen clarity or nutritional coaching, check out my list of services to see if working together sounds like something that would make you happier than a bright little Vegemite. I am a qualified nutritionist who acts more like a foodie fairy godmother than a white coat health professional.
When I completed placement in a nutrition clinic as part of my university degree I felt uncomfortable in telling people what to do.
Prescribing supplements wasn’t my jam – unless someone was severely deficient or the supplements were food based.
I would cringe at the idea of prescribing a certain ‘diet’ – other than one based on whole foods, organic where possible and including lots of brightly coloured plant foods.
Continue reading Nutrition With a Difference
