Eat

Feeling a bit festive? Try these gram flour fritters with Indian chutney for a spicy evening indeed…

We all like to eat healthy for sure, but that doesn’t mean you can’t spice up your menu once in a while! This “cheat” meal is still balanced out by enough veggies to keep you on track! Sure, the oil will add in calories but count the benefits of vegetables, the raw chutney and the gram flour as well as the sheer comfort of biting into something hot, crispy and juicy – and the fritters win hands down.

The first day of autumn is quickly approaching and the smell of pumpkin spice will soon be lingering in the air before you know it.

With this in mind it is a great time to tell you about my Pumpkin Pie Puree. I love pumpkin pie, cake, bread, cookies, pancakes, and many other pumpkin based treats of autumn. After harvesting what our garden’s pumpkin patch has to offer, I like to make bulk batches of this Pumpkin Pie Puree. When I am ready for baking, the puree is ready to go no matter what the treat I’m baking.

Plain Puree

As the days get cooler and the mornings get darker, I start to crave more warming and hearty breakfast foods. As a runner, fall is typically a time of peak preparation; many large races occur in the fall months, and my training season is no different. About 4 weeks ago I started training for my second big race of the year: the California International Marathon, affectionately called CIM. While the race is known for its world-class organization and net downhill course, it is anything but easy.

Driving through Dateland, Arizona, we had to stop at the travel center and get a date shake. With soaring summer temperatures and a long day’s drive, it was a much needed break from the road. The creamy, sweet shake got me thinking about the origin of dates and why an area would be so inclined to pride itself on a single crop. After investigating, I began to understand what makes this fruit so sought after and how its nutritional benefits have been enjoyed for thousands of year.

Goodbye, summer; hello, autumn. It really did sneak up on us, huh? I’m ready to be able to close my windows at night, and bundle up instead. I know it’s still September, but we’ll be carving pumpkins and drinking hot cocoa in no time. In the meantime, it’s time to think about all the warm and delicious foods that we tend to eat when the air becomes chilly. That’s right. I’m talkin’ about comfort food.

Roses may bloom in summer, but their rosehips will serve you well past the warm months. These little red gems contain 50% more vitamin C than an orange! Unfortunately, many people don’t seem to know their benefits (or even what a rosehip looks like). While I was out collecting rosehips from local rosebushes (they grow in a park in my neighborhood), people were looking at me like I had five heads. That didn’t stop me though, and it shouldn’t stop you! If you have your own rosebush, or know of local rose bushes, here are 3 ways to use their versatile fruit.

Need something colorful, warm, healthy, and hearty this fall? Try this scrumptious sweet potato pumpkin soup recipe! Sweet potato is high in vitamins A, C, and E —which is awesome for supporting a healthy immune system. Pumpkin contains a great source of vitamin A for aiding in eye-vision, as well as potassium for helping out the body’s nervous system. This soup is not only good, it’s good for you!

Takes 30-45 minutes

Serves 5-6 bowls

Ingredients:

In plain English, a chapati, roti or fulka is pan-roasted unleavened bread. It has been made the same way for hundreds of years and is easy to make, good to eat, full of health benefits and goes with just about everything. Made out of whole wheat flour, a chapati can be made even more nutritious by adding different kinds of flours to the wheat flour dough like gram, soya, millet, barley, sorghum and rye.

There is a myth surrounding acorns that states Acorns are poisonous and can’t be eaten! Acorns can be eaten, but you wouldn’t want to just pick one up and eat it. There’s a leaching process that must be done in order to make the acorns edible.

My first encounter with Egyptian street food was in the most unlikely of places: the Minnesota State Fair. Strange as it may sound, among the corndogs and cheese curds, there is a popular Middle Eastern food stand at the fair serving things like falafel, gyro meat, dolmas, and my favorite, koshari. As it happens, koshari (also spelled kushari, koshary, or kosheri) is the national dish of Egypt and a popular street food item. The dish consists of rice, lentils, macaroni, chickpeas, fried onions, and a delicious spicy red sauce.