Easy Pickles!

These were a real hit at Paul Pitchford's Healing with Whole Foods intensive in New York. Probably because they were so garlicky and pungent with apple cider vinegar!

Since garlic fosters desire, perhaps the appeal for these grew deeper the more you ate them?

In an attempt to rid some cucumbers, Sharla quickly sliced them on a mandolin along with some spices and garlic, and then topped up the jar with half water and half apple cider vinegar.

That's it!! Use raw/unpasteurized apple cider vineger, and it will ferment the vegetable so that it will keep for quite a while. Healthy, crunchy, tasty and desire-y!

Food for yer yin-yang

Aduki beans and well cooked rice. Need I say more?

Shooting peas with flying ninja stars

Food can be so simple. It really should be. This post will be a reflection of this concept:

Cook peas in a little water, and add something fun to dress them up, like carrots shaped like ninja stars. Add a little space if need be, like black pepper, and enjoy!

Tatters

Stove-top Sharla, and oven-Mike. Did you know that sauteeing and stirring your food gives an invigorating effect to the food, and thus the person, where as long, patient cooking in the oven gives a patient quiet quality to the food, and thus person? Perhaps Sharla's cooking is a source for her upbeat energy, and Mike's oven dishes are a source of his... what, am I just going to flatter myself in a blog because I cook in the oven? Whatever, yes, it is a source of my good looks and robust figure. Just kidding... it just makes me really really smart.

I LOVE potatoes, perhaps because this was the staple food growing up for me, and for my parents too, coming from a German background (might be pronounced 'Cherman' at my grandma's house, and washed down with a bratwurst and pint of beer) anyways, I do potatoes, that is my thing. Especially in the colder weather because of the warmth they bring to the body when out of the oven, yet they are one of the best yin-builders known to the Asian (the West still deems this food as unnecessary because of the high starch content, which is ridiculous, just stop eating sugar and crap, and you'll realize potatoes are so nourishing and a far better 'sweet' than any granola bar or any other sweet garbage on the grocery shelf). Yin-building = immune boosting and hormone supporting by the way. Did you know two German lads survived during the war for THREE years on just potatoes alone? JUST potatoes, no health concerns. Or was it three guys for two years? Whatever, that's a long time for just potatoes. I digress...

If cooked for a long period of time, potatoes require almost no seasoning - the time will bring them to life. I cooked these with onion and cumin I believe, and then slipped into the oven for an hour at 350F. Grease is not necessary, just use water.

Crawckers

Rawesome. Just rawesome. I mispelt crackers as 'crawckers', cause well, they were raw, but can be done in the over too. Leftover kamut sprouts, soaked flax seed, soaked buckwheat, and variations on all of the above, made some incredible crackers that we enjoyed with nut milks, or with cheese, or just plain. The students made these in our cracker workshop, and of course, they sweet-starved students made ALL sweet crackers and almost no savoury!! haha... carob, cardamom, orange juice, stevia, yacon, vanilla, and anything else non-Dampening yet sweet they could find! They were good, I'll admit, and were gone pretty fast!!

To learn how to make these, you pretty much need to attend one of our workshops or retreats. Bo! Really, they're easy, but so much easier to teach in person than blogging about it. Maybe we should make a video about it. Yeah, that's what we'll do... stay tuned.

The Kefir Queen

Clouds from the gods? A gift from Allah? A miracle food made in heaven? Yes to all of the above. Kefir is a culture made up of yeasts and bacteria, and the cloud looking picture is my baby kefir when I first got it, and because they grow, it is now the size of my fist! Time to give some away, and sharing with your friends (and students) is what you're supposed to do!

We made 1L of kefired goat milk with it daily, which resembles yogurt, but so much more sour and bacteria rich, and of course Sharla - the Kefir Queen made aged cheese from kefir laban, and I'm sure we'll more about this in posts to come, as I hear she's working on making a bridge for the city of Chicago using kefir and some cheesecloth. She can make anything. Not only did she kefir goat milk at the intensive, she kefired coconut milk, almond milk, ginger water, and pretty much any other fluid sitting unused in an open vessel. Yum! Luckily, we had enough to give to most of our hungry students to take home and spread to their loved ones too.

Raw, Fermented, Sprouted bread

Because our guests at the intensive ate almost a full 1L of oatgurt everyday, it was necessary for us to make enough rejuvelac (used in oatgurt) to do so, and as a result, we had ample sprouted and fermented kamut grains leftover to do whatever fun things we wanted to!! Here Sharla is making sprouted bread dough using a juicer (only use the masticating kind!), and then season (if you wish) and form into loaves and either bake on low for a long period of time (2+ hours) or dehydrate over night, however you wish. That is it! Very simple! We have a video on how to make this sprouted bread if you click our videos link in the main menu or from our homepages. Sprout grain, blend/mash it, form it, dry/bake it. Easy peasy.

Crocky Breakfast

How to make breakfast delicious and fast - prepare the night before!

Pictured here, is an oatmeal dish with blueberries and vanilla bean. All things in time are better than all things rushed, so why not spend all night making your breakfast! The flavours deepen with time, so a lot of seasoning is not required, which is usually required with instant foods. Just add the vanilla, or maybe some cardamom and fruit, and let it cook all night for you!

We ate a full pot of this every morning at the intensive - and rightfully so, it was delish!

Sideways Recycled Bean Burgers

What do you do with leftover beans? Burg them!! Keep any leftover beans aside, even if they have veg and grain in them, and mash them up to make beans.

At the retreat, we continuously made bean burgers by adding chopped onion and carrot to the leftover beans, added bread crumbs, oat flakes, or even best - flour (we used fresh ground whole kamut). Play with the quantity of grain to get them tough enough to form balls in your hands - if they do, place them on a baking sheet (with parchment paper is best), and bake them at about 375F for 20 minutes or so, as per your desired firmness of burger. Pictured here, is a baking sheet for a giant oven, forced into our little home-sized oven - it worked just fine, but there were a few wonky burgers from it. Also - you can add seasonings to bring them to life, like ground cumin and black pepper - or curry powder etc. Easy as pie!.. actually, easy as bean burgers!

Sourdough, Recycled Brown Rice bread!

Throughout the retreat, we started to get a little burdened with leftovers. We weren't sure how to use 2 servings of rice, or a tiny bit of left over vegetables, so we started finding creative ways to use them in our cooking. Here's an application for left over grains, especially non-glutinous! Since we had a celiac person in our retreat, I felt a little bothered that all of our bread had gluten in it (kamut) and so began making brown rice sourdough bread. However, as grains ferment in the process, it doesn't really matter what grain it is, and if it's cooked or not. So I began putting grain leftovers in a large bowl to ferment, and would make them into bread. The first morning I made it, I didn't think it was really anything special, as was kinda weird... however, that same morning I happened to drop an entire scalding hot crock pot full of cooked brown rice congee on the ground while carrying it to the dining hall, and it smashed all over the place (including my bare feet, which gave coincidentally gave me a lovely little liver moxibustion treatment), anyways - I felt so bad that I thought I'd better serve this strange congee bread, and low and behold, they ate all of it - 2 full loaves. They loved it, and I continued making it throughout the retreat from then on.

As it really is a tactile thing to make, and working with leftovers really offers no quantifiable, measurable methodology to making it, I just simply add brown rice sourdough starter to the leftover grains (about 1 cup) and then add fluids to bring it to a batter like consistency, maybe a little wetter. For fluids, I would use leftover, starting to ferment homemade brown rice milk, or some left over vegetable cooking water - as it was a little starchier to help the bacteria nosh on the soon-to-be dough. After a day of sitting, or when I see it rise, I add fresh ground brown rice to bring it to batter consistency, and again, add a little fluid if need be. I think some dry ground grain is necessary to make it tough enough to bake, as the cooked grains were too wet and soft to make a loaf unto themselves. As a batter consistency (maybe slightly firmer than batter) pour into loaf pans and let them rise (you can rise as many times as you like, but it MUST rise in the bread pan before baking), and then when risen (usually in the morning) bake it at 450F for at least an hour. It will be extremely wet and doughy when you take it out, so it MUST cool and set IN the pan for at least 1/2 hour or so, and even still, it might pull apart a little, so be sure to grease your pans and get them out carefully. You can check to see if their done without taking them out of the pan simply by inserting a chop stick and checking to see if any doughy residues remain on the stick. You'll know, and it does take practice to get it right. It took me a whole year to get this down, but then again I didn't know what I was doing when I started! Good luck, and email Whole Foodies for questions if you have them!

Masters of Breakfast.. and the Universe

Twenty-two breakfasts and a whole lot of snacks. Whole Foodies Michael and Sharla answered their calling by attending Paul Pitchford's three-week intensive entitled "Healing with Whole Foods" in New York for the month of August, and had the honour of teaching 11 hours of workshop classes, but also preparing all breakfasts and snacks, plus special foods for the entire duration. YAY! We'll try to capture some of the meals on the blog here, but as we were producing almost 10 dishes per morning, and flying by the seat of our pants most of the time, we rarely had time to document what is was we made. Pictured here is Paul Pitchford spooning up some goodness, and a picture of what might have been a typical breakfast (and our lovely faces).

Tempeh-tation!

Tempeh is one of those magical foods that is very healthy but also satisfying.  A little bit goes a long way in satiating the appetite.  Tempeh is like the cheese of Indonesia, cooked soybeans are inoculated with a bacteria starter and it is left to get "funky" as in moldy and fermented.  The end result is a dense cake that has a nutty taste and 'shroomy aroma.  Vitamin B12 forms as result of fermentation and is one of the only vegetable sources of natural B12.  Fermentation breaks down the proteins and natural sugars in the soybean, eliminating digestive issues with other soyfood products. Tempeh is relatively inexpensive and can be found at most health food stores, try different grain varieties to see which is the most tempeh-ting!

Miso Mustard Tempeh

8 oz tempeh

1 Tbsp oil

1 cup hot water

3 Tbsp sweet white miso

1/4 cup Whole grain dijon mustard

2 cups thinly sliced leeks or or a combination of leeks and shallots

2 garlic cloves, chopped

1/2 a zucchini, sliced

2 carrots, peeled and sliced thin

1/2 lb cremini mushrooms or shiitake

1/2 cup dry white wine or stock

3-4 leaves of kale, collards or cabbage

salt and pepper to taste

Cut tempeh into 1/2 inch strips, lightly coat each side with oil.  place them in a skillet and brown on all sides.  Remove to cool and then cut them into blocks..

Make the sauce by combining the mustard, miso and water.

Heat the oil in a skillet over medium heat, saute garlic and leeks and or shallots until cooked through, about 4-5 minutes, add the reserved tempeh, zuchhini, mushrooms, carrots, and mustard/miso sauce.  Bring to a boil, cover and then lower the heat to simmer for 10-15 minutes, until vegetables are crisp tender.

Add the white wine or broth, stir in the greens and cover and simmer for an additional 10 minutes.

Voila, fini!  Serve this with fresh chopped chives or tarragon.  Place atop cooked quinoa for a complete meal.

*experiment with different in season produce and adjust the flavors for maximum intensity.

Random Veggie Burger

The picture doesn't do the burger justice - it was out of batteries, and I got in just one shot before the camera cakked out on me. So I have a picture of a tomato with a blurry burger in the foreground.

So it's time to go grocery shopping, very badly, the fridge is almost empty, but surely there's lots to eat in the house! So I took the following ingredients (without measuring! I'm very sorry! I just put things together and see what happens.. but food's food, so you really can't go wrong eating something that doesn't "work out"!)

First I ground up into a coarse flour:

-buckwheat groats (I'd say 1/2 cup?)
-lentils - about 1/4 cup

.. and added some salt, spelt flour (1/4 cup), thyme, black pepper

Then I diced up and then pureed in my grinder:

-remains of an eggplant

-zucchini

-carrot

-onion

Add the two together, wet your hands, and plop balls of this batter onto a buttery cookie sheet. I baked them at 350F for about 35 minutes, and they turned out delish!

We ate them with an Ezekiel brand hamburger bun, slice of tomato, slices of naturally fermented picks, and Grandma's homemade mustard!.. and Anna got to take some with her to lunch the next day! I bet these burgers cost a whopping $.50 cents to make, which is astonishing considering you pay almost $7 for good real-food (and whole food!) veg burgers in the health food store. I smell as business plan... and another batch of veg. burgers in my oven.

Creamy Quinoa Porridge

This was my breakfast, along with miso soup. It felt so good I had to blog about it!

• Grind quinoa in a grinder to a course flour (you can toast it first to remove the bitter saponins, but I couldn't be bothered this morning as I was multi-tasking)
  
• Add to water (as it's warming up to a boil) and stir in!

You can add sweet - but I chose:

• finely diced carrot
• fennel and dill seed

Bring to a boil, stirring, and then simmer. It's ready then, but letting it sit does some good to it!

It's really that simple.... 5 minutes, tops!

As-close-to-normal-but-healthy Pancakes

I made these everyday this week. Firstly, to see if I could perfect them, and secondly, because they were so good and there was something about them that made me hum like a.. I have no cliche for that. I just hummed when I ate them. (I mean felt harmonious and wonderful).

They can be made without soaking the flour - but soaking it gave it the hum factor I was looking for. Soak for an hour or so:

• 2 cups whole grain spelt flour, with a little salt
• 1 cup goat milk (I didn't try water, but I'm sure that would work too

Then stir in:

• 1 egg beaten, and a bit more milk if the batter got too sticky from soaking
• 1 Tbsp baking powder (please get aluminum free!)
• any seasonings you wish - I used almond extract and pomegranate syrup, it was great!

Brush a pan with butter/ghee on LOW heat! Once hot, laddle in the sticky batter and spread out the cakes with a wet utensil or your hands dipped in cold water (batter doesn't stick that way)

Let them cook slowly, on low-medium heat (like 4 on an electric stove) and then flip once the first bubble on top becomes solid.

Cook on the other side for about half the time of the first, and then transfer to a warmed toaster oven or directly to your mouth.

I topped these with flax oil and stevia, but you can use your imagination on how to top! They make nice little lunch snacks too, like muffins, because they are good on their own!

Indian Lentil Curry

Goodness me, I've really got to start writing down recipes for my entries! The reason is because, well, recipes ruin my appetite. I'd rather smell and taste my food to gauge what needs to go into the pot, rather than consulting a check list of ingredients! This way, you can just make stuff from what you've got, and not have to go into town to buy a list of ingredients to make an exquisite meal.

So here is what got put into this curry:

• oil
• cumin, coriander, mustard seeds
• cardamom pods, garam masala, ground cumin
• onions, garlic and ginger
• veggies (leftover chunks of veggies got put in, like eggplant, zucchini, etc)
• cooked lentils, and some left over tofu
• diced tomatoes and a splash of yogurt or something creamy (but sour is best)

When making curry - always carefully bring the oil in your pan to heat (not too hot, please don't let your oil smoke!) and then briefly sautee your seeds and spices (not herbs) for just a moment. Put in your chopped or pureed garlic, onion and ginger (to taste) and cook until aromatic, brown, or how you like it. Next, cook your veg until soft, add meat or beans, and cook in. Then this Korma-ish dish had diced tomatoes (or tomato paste) and a bit of yogurt put into it. The longer you let is simmer, the more delicious it becomes! Serve with rice (we made Indian rice to go with it, using turmeric and some other fun things, but won't blog about that right now).

Pear and Tofu Pudding

I made this when I lost my voice last year. I ate so much of it that I did get my voice back, but I also got the scoots, as this lovely treat is super moistening for the body, which often results in moist bowels as well.

In a blender, add pear, soft tofu (not firm!) - and really, that could be all, but I also added almond extract, fresh and dried ginger, and a little green stevia.

It was really refreshing and can quench an insatiable thirst 

(*Note - if you have an unsatiable thirst, it is better to eat fruits and moistening foods (like tofu) and even sea vegetables as oppose to continuously guzzling water, which can actually exasperate thirst when water is over drunk!)

Snacks for Your Stool

Oh yeah.. these are good. Try to get the imagery of gigantic stools out of your head first tho, because it makes these less appetizing.

The reason I called them Snacks for Your Stool is because it's mostly ground flax. I put flax in a grinder, and then added tahini, flax oil and molasses. That's it - spread it on something snacky, e voila! A Snack for Your Stool 

(I used at least 1/4 cup of flax seeds for this, plus I added some sesame seeds too, and I think pumpkin seeds got in there sometime too.. I like experimenting with something over and over to see what comes of it, and so I tried different seeds, and I'm sure nuts would work well too - but they're a little too rich for me right now, so I'm eating few of them).

KILL YOUR YEASTS!

Yeast, or more specifically Candida Albicans, is a bacteria that should normally be 15% of your intestinal flora, however, with antibiotics, poor dietary habits, poor chewing habits, and excessive sweets or alcohol, candida tends to thrive and be the "man in charge" in your gut - which isn't good because candida is also a malicious fungus that can bore holes through you intestinal lining and make its way through your body tissues, plaguing your other nearby body parts with infection and fungus (such as a yeast infection) but also can be localized in the ears, mouth, liver, etc.. AND can sometimes be systemic, which means your entire body is filled with it, greatly taxing your immune system as it's ALWAYS cleaning up this culprit. 

The candida bacteria have the job of cleaning up your waste foods, typically unchewed food, undigestible foods (such as maltodextrin and other zero-carb sugars), but otherwise eats leftover carbs in the body.

The resulting effects of a yeast (candida) overgrowth is 

• itchiness (ANYWHERE, nose, anus, feet, face, hands)
• foggy headedness (as the metabolic byproduct of yeasts is ALCOHOL.. which means, you actually have alcohol in your blood stream, leaving you feel drunk and stupid!)
• sluggish digestion and weird bowels
• insatiable appetite, easily feel like you are overeating
• edginess and inflammation (which go hand in hand)
• moodiness
• decreased energy
• decreased immunity, and a host of other symptoms. 

Basically, this fungus is like a parasite, constantly taxing your body, and as long as you've got it, you've got an infection festering inside of you - leaving your body sick and at war for as long as you've got it. Antibiotics are given to kill this baddie off, but it also kills the bacteria that check and balance the candida, giving you NO immune defense, which means the candida have an even easier time coming back. I really don't think there is a remedy that a doctor can give that will totally get rid of it that will last. Really, I believe that most people have this to some degree (more so the younger you are, because of the worsening of our diet and increase in antibiotic use) but remember that we should have some of it - but our healthy bacteria should be the majority party ruling our intestines, which keeps the bad boys in check. We're obsessed with sterility and anti-bacteria. But really, our ancestors have grown up with bacteria all their lives, its all around us, heck - we actually have more bacterial cells in our body than human tissue cells.. isn't that amazing? A forest floor has bacteria to help decay and breakdown to renew life, and so do we! I've always got something fermenting in the kitchen, whether on purpose (sourdough, sauerkraut, rejuvelac, etc) or unintentionally (leftover rice, beans, veg... these can sit out for quite a while, as long at the food is still 'sweet' and not foul, you're game for good bacteria!). We've got this same lovely fermenting bacteria in our gut (the good ones) but when you have candida, everything just molds and turns to fungus. But really, must we sterilize EVERYTHING!? Our food is so sterile, not even bacteria can survive from it - but it is this good bacteria that we thrive from!! Did you know that US almonds are ALL sterilized with a toxic chemical, so that NO bacteria can thrive from them? Gees, we've got pasteurized nuts now too!! 

What do we suggest to get rid of this enemy inside us?

1. Don't overeat!.. and for heaven's sake - chew your food!! Especially carbs
2. Raw foods easily rot in the body, making it easier for the candida. "Rot" (breakdown) the food by cooking it first (therefore, eat mostly cooked foods)
3. Exercise, as fungus can't survive in an oxygen rich environment (picture hanging a mildewy cloth out on the line to get sun and air, and the mold disappears!)
4. Eat little salt, and ABSOLUTELY NO SWEETS, of any kind. Natural or refined (and definitely not artificial!! Stevia is tolerated however)
5. Avoid preservatives and other non-foods
6. Eat fermented foods, as they contain lots of GOOD bacteria (like acidophillus)
7. Don't eat cold foods or drinks, but drink tea and room temperature water moderately
8. Don't worry - worry worsens any damp condition, and don't force it, because you'll worry
9. Eat chlorophyll rich foods (green!) as it neutralizes toxins in your body and heals our tissues
10. AVOID bad oils, packaged foods, anything refined, overly floury foods (please, just eat a whole foods diet for goodness sake!!)

As I felt the onset of yeast last week (starting with an itchy nose), I started delving into sweets and ignoring it. It really started to bother me when my food didn't satiate me, which DRIVES ME NUTS!...  So I did this therapeutic plan for three days and seriously kicked its ass.

(From Left to Right in the photo)

1. Dandelion tea/coffee - which cleanses the blood (especially effective if systemic)
2. Lavender essential oil - please be cautious, use 100% botanical and only do ONE drop every three days to start.. if you get a headache, you're using too much (cleansing reaction)
3. Oxygen - which just destroys yeasts on contact. Good for systemic as well, please don't overdo this as well (remedies 1-3 are HIGHLY cleansing and should be moderated) 20 drops a day to start (I did 100 drops a day, but I also had no cleansing reactions)
4. Sauerkraut (in back) - a bacterial supplement for the body, which helps check and balance the yeasts, takes their place when they die, and is rejuvenating for the tissues (HIGH in vitamin C!). An acidophillus supplement is advised as well, but I had already spent too much money on the remedies and needed low cost bacterial support. This sauerkraut is locally made, is raw (unpasteurized), and NO SALT - which is preferred for killing candida or any infection
5. Garlic - nature's antibiotic!! This KILLS any pathogenic microbobes BUT leaves the good ones standing, giving them a favourable place to proliferate!! Seriously, antibiotics kill life, good and bad, but garlic just kills the bad.....  One clove eaten raw before a meal, sometimes best eaten with an apple slice, yogurt (another fermented food!) to soothe the digestive lining if the garlic burns too much. I ate a head in under 3 days! Too much!! Garlic is known in the East by sages to create emotional desire. This actually happened to me!! Desire arose, and I became very emotional. I stopped the garlic, and the desire went away - interesting lesson. (Sweets create desire as well... which just leaves us perpetually shackled to the things we desire!! Not good!)
6. Flax oil - healing for the digestive lining (to reduce inflammation), and rebuilding. Also satiates when you are in an "unsatiable mode"! Repairs the tissues that were aggravated by infection, and cleanses the liver (the body's filter) of junk while healing. Good stuff!
7. Aloe juice from inner fillet (not GEL - and NOT the WHOLE LEAF!!!). This stuff is magic. The sour flavour of the juice just gives away its healing and restorative properties (the sour flavour is healing to the liver as it is like soap, or a solvent to toxins, fatty residues, and all the other crap that is stored in the liver). It is also BUILDING!! Isn't this amazing!! It cleanses and builds at the same time!? It's an antimicrobial, like garlic, but builds the immunity, heals tissue and reduces inflammation, while keeping us cool and refreshed. This is a great pair for when using lavender oil or oxygen, as it "protects" us from the harsh reducing nature of the aforementioned remedies. Oxygen alone can create a feeling of light headedness and poor stability, but when combined with oxygen, keeps us centred, but clear as a bell. Drink 2-3 oz. a day to start (with 20 drops of oxygen) but up it if you can handle it and want to specifically heal short term. I drank the whole bottle of juice in 3 days, accompanied with larger doses of oxygen - but treated it acutely.

Typically, if the "infection" is acute, an short term and aggressive remedy is effective, however, if you suspect that you've had it for a while, and is chronic, it is best to do long term (.5 - 2 years?) and start with the dietary changes, while doing some remedies at a very low level for a longer period of time. 

* NOTE: These are NOT to be taken as a daily preventative medicine, and we are not trying to replace the efforts of the medical system, and this is NOT a prescription. We are simply offering information, and what you do with it is up to you, and we will not be held liable for any healing effects or symptoms that may arise from it. Understood!? Any questions can be directed to Whole Foodies Michael and Sharla at foodies@wholefoodies.org

Oishii miso shiru (Delicious miso soup)

If you've never tried cooking with miso before, I advise to go to your local natural foods (or Asian foods store) and pick some up RIGHT now..... go on.... I'll wait.

Miso is one of the best things period. How it tastes, what you can do with it, and what it represents. 

I included a few pictures of when I was in Japan.  One picture was inside a miso shop, and the other was the line up to the store because everyone wanted to buy miso. You could buy handmade miso locally, and this particular shop sold a lot. This lovely couple had prepacked bags available (shouldn't really be sold in plastic, because it does absorb), but you could also buy it out of the barrel (shown in front.. the man is looking at it). It was amazing!

Soy beans are fermented in these barrels along with koji - which is a bacteria created from rice used for soya sauce, sake, and amasake (literally sweet sake, which is the goop at the end of the sake barrel). The older it is (ie. more than a year) the saltier, darker and dankier it will be. Sweet, light coloured miso is sometimes only fermented for a few months or less. 

Miso is 13 - 20% protein, has a profile similar to meat, contains plant sources of B12, (making it excellent for new vegetarians) is teeming with lactobacillus (same as yogurt), is alkalizing despite its building and high protein profile, neutralizes poisons in the body and effective at preventing radiation. This would be helpful for food poisoning as well! Awesome food? I think so.

It can be used for soups, sauces, seasonings, and you can find many recipes using miso in our blog. Here is a basic soup, often eaten for breakfast daily by the Japanese.

NEVER BOIL MISO - this kind of behaviour is punished in Japan (just kidding.. but not really)

Boil water and add veggies to soften them. Add seaweed, like wakame. Once veggies are soft, add tofu. At the very end, even when the soup is off of the burner, you can add miso. About 1 Tbsp per person or cup of water suits well. Stir and serve!

For plain miso, just add miso to boiled then slightly cooled water. That's it!! Easy!

Miso. It's what's for breakfast.. in Japan. 

By the way, although the lineup picture was taken in front of the miso shop, those kids weren't really in line to buy miso, I just thought it was a beautiful picture of the street and store front of where we bought it from.