While I’d be the first to agree that as Americans, we all live in a toxic food environment, I’m not convinced that its the only reason we hold onto unwanted weight. There are other reasons, and not all of them are caloric!  Let’s take a peek at a few.

Lights Out! A book about sleep and weight gain

Poor sleep hygiene- research shows that lack of sleep and/or inconsistent sleep can put on the pounds. When we are up at all hours, our bodies become programmed to think its summer, which is the time that bodies store weight for the winter. For a more detailed explanation, check out one of my favorite books, Lights Out! Sleep, Sugar and Survival by T.S. Wiley

Speaking of light and dark, there is a new movie out about our lack of darkness in our lives. It’s called City Dark: a search for night on a planet that never sleeps.  Watching City Dark, you might be surprised to learn about the connection to lack of darkness and cancer, the film will be on PBS this summer, check your local listings.

Mindless eating is something Americans do all to well. Most often we do it with processed packaged food, not with the good stuff. Make a point to eat real food and make a commitment to eat at a table. Not on a couch, not in a car, and not while walking or working. Be with your food! Being present means looking at your food, tasting it, chewing slowly and mindfully.  Click here for an article that will dig deeper into mindfulness and health.  Also check out Brian Wansink’s clever website on Mindless Eating, www.mindlesseating.org

Mindfulness around eating and all aspects of life is one strategy for stress reduction. I’m convinced that chronic low level stress is the biggest factor in why we hold onto unwanted weight.  Stress results in biochemical changes in our blood: increased adrenaline which kicks in cortisol, the stress hormone. Cortisol directly impacts fat storage and weight gain. Chronic stress can lead to insulin resistance, a pre-diabetic condition that includes abdominal weight gain.

Humor can help reduce stress

Stress in our lives will not go away, one way or another stressful situations will always be part of the deal. Our response to stress is what we need to focus on. Taking significant time each day to cultivate strategies to be in a low stress/ no stress state.  That can take on many forms.  Meditation is a proven way to reduce stress, Jon Kabat-Zinn’s Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction has a long track record of success.

Meditation can take many forms. I spent a month at the Osho Meditation Center in Pune, India back in 2001. Osho has many many many varieties of meditation. His active meditations are specifically designed for busy people.

There are also other ways to reduce stress that are not meditation per se. Taking a walk outside, soaking in a tub with warm water and low lights, putting your legs up the wall in a yoga pose can all be effective in lowering our stressful states of being.

Letting go of weight includes focusing on eating real food, which I hope you’ll  find some inspiration here. Feel free to enjoy some of the 60+ recipes on this blog to help you find your way on the food journey. But remember  the other pieces to good health that matter just as much as food include addressing stress and getting good sleep!

The topic of the second week of my Recipes & Strategies class at Gilda’s Club in Westchester is often at the top of peoples minds: dieting.

My e-book on the topic of diets.

Its easy to lose weight, but extremely hard to keep it off on a long term basis. Many folks spend years and years journeying from one diet to the next, most of the time with limited success. Research has shown that more than 80% of weight lost via dieting is eventually regained. I’ve been promoting the concept of dumping the diet for many years now.

As a country, we’ve been steadily gaining weight for some time now, 68% of Americans are currently overweight or obese.  80 million of us go on some sort of diet each year spending $30 billion dollars annually on products, programs. That’s a lot of moolah that could be better spent on real food, in my humble opinion.

Before dumping the diet mentality altogether, its essential that we explore the myths surrounding dieting that pave the way towards weight gain instead of weight loss.  Here is my list of five diet myths that keep us stuck in the diet rut.  Take a good long look at them, and come up with your own list of myths that cause you to choose food and eat in a certain way.

1. Eat less, exercise more
2. FAT makes you FAT
3. Counting:  calories, carbs,  fat grams
4. Fasting, de-tox plans and “cleanses”
5. Magical powders and potions, meal replacement plans and bars

Most of these diet myths work. For a short while. And then, for some reason or another, they backfire. Whatever weight you lost finds you again, sometimes with a vengence!

Remember, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is!

None of the strategies above lead to consistent, lasting, sustainable weight loss. As a matter of fact, many of these strategies lead to long term weight gain.

Stay tuned for part 2: about what causes us to hold onto unwanted weight.

Planting peas with kids in the after school program at Mount Kisco Child Care Center

Right now, I’ve got a dream job working as a food/garden consultant at Mount Kisco Child Care Center for their Feed Me Fresh garden to table curriculum. What makes it so special is the fact that I had worked there close to 10 years ago, developing the food piece of their curriculum. Back then, I pushed a little cart into the classrooms and cooked with the children. These days, the teachers are completely invested in cooking once a week with the kids. Nothing floats my boat  more than seeing young children enjoying kale, green pea soup and freshly sauteed asparagus.

In my years of school food advocacy, I learned that the earlier you get kids enjoying real food, the better. The Feed Me Fresh program has toddlers and preschoolers growing, preparing and enjoying fresh local food. Alice Waters would be so impressed if she were to visit this edible pre-schoolyard!

This year the center is diving deeper into the garden piece thanks to the addition of an amazing little greenhouse. Made possible by grants from both IBM and the local Slow Food chapter.  Fortunately, I’ve gained some good gardening experience over the years working with the SunRaven Mindful Gardening project,  the garden at Camp Ballibay and my own little spot in the Chappaqua Community Garden. While I’m not a master gardener or anything fancy like that, I know enough to help inspire you to get your hands dirty and grow some food of your own.

Mother’s Day weekend marks the unofficial start to the gardening season. Many local Garden Clubs are holding plant sales this Saturday.  These sales can give you a jump start on your veggie garden.

Unless you’re a hard core gardener who likes to start seeds indoors in February or March, its a smart idea to buy some of your garden plants as seedlings.  Here’s some ideas to help you decide which ones to choose for your garden.

Yellow squash- easy to grow.

Super Easy-to-grow vegetables: If you plant these in the next two weeks or so, these vegetables are almost foolproof: broccoli, bush beans, cucumber, eggplant, lettuce, squash, Swiss chard, and tomatoes.

Heat-loving vegetables: These vegetables will do exceptionally well if we have a hot sunny summer like last year: beans, corn, eggplant, melons, okra, peppers, tomatoes, and watermelon.

Vegetables for shadier gardens: If you have a garden plot that receives fewer than six hours of direct sunlight, try these vegetables: beets, carrots, kale, lettuce,  radishes, scallions, spinach, and Swiss chard.
Kid-friendly veggies: The following vegetables are fun, easy-to-grow plants, kids love to harvest and eat them – sometimes without even leaving the garden! Try carrots, cherry tomatoes, pole beans on a teepee, pumpkins, seedless watermelons and Swiss chard.
Herbs are easy too. You can start with a small plant it will take off and provide you with with abundant amounts of fresh herbs all spring, summer and fall. There are lots and lots of varieties of basil,  but don’t forget rosemary, parsley and cilantro.

squash on the left, carrots on the right

Other veggies do best when started from seed.
Radishes are great to start from seed. They grow very fast – if you’re the impatient type, this one veggie that will give you great satisfaction. For an added bonus, if you let some go to flower, you will find lots of new beneficial insects coming to your garden. Radishes grow well with carrots or beets, which will take more time but are worth the wait. Plant a few rows of these seeds in your garden, they don’t take up too much space!
Beans are another no brainer that do best by putting the seed right in the ground. You can choose between bush beans or pole beans, ones that like to climb.
Squashes are easy to get going from seed or you can buy a few seedlings. You won’t need too many because they take up lots of space and you’ll get lots of squashes per plant when they are growing happily in the sun. Choose from  summer squash: zucchini, yellow and patty pan squash are easy choices. Winter squashes include butternut, acorn, kaboocha and of course, pumpkin.

Give it a try! Either seedlings or seeds. You’ll be amazed at what Mother Nature brings you. Get your hands dirty! Stay tuned for more garden tips as the season progresses.

Soup is ideal for those with health challenges

Thought you might like to learn more about  the meal I’m making for my Recipes & Strategies Class this week at Gilda’s Club Westchester.  I’m always on the lookout for the right combination of dishes that are easy to prepare, highly nourishing and that won’t cost and arm and a leg to buy the ingredients.

I always like to include a soup. Soups have warming, relaxing properties. Many people, especially those in chemotherapy treatment, have lost some “digestive fire”,  soups can come in really handy in this situation. They’re also a great way to pack in some veggies that can be easily assimilated.

Second on my menu planning list is greens. Green leafy veggies are powerhouses of nourishment.This one group of veggies needs to be a regular feature in your daily diet. In most cases, I prefer to steam or lightly saute them instead of eating raw, due to the digestive fire piece. When it comes to greens, the darker the better: you can’t go wrong with kale, chard, or spinach.

Here’s an easy 3 step method to prepare kale: #1 dice an onion and saute in olive oi until translucent. #2 strip the kale leaves off the stems, dice up the smaller stems, add them to the onion saute #3 rip the leaves, add them last. Put a lid on it for a few minutes until it turns deep green. Serve.

Quinoa, my most favorite grain.

I also include grains in my menu planning. Keep in mind when I say “whole grains”, I mean whole grains!  Quinoa (pronounced “keen-wah”) is my most favorite grain, its high in protein, iron & calcium. Its easy to prepare, it plays well with other grains so if I want to blend them, I can easily do so.  Quinoa is super flexible, it can be a side dish, it can be a veggie filled salad, you can even eat it for breakfast as a porridge!  I’ve got loads of other recipes with quinoa on this blog, here’s one for a summer salad.  If you want even more quinoa fun, simply type quinoa in the search box on the upper right of this page!

Today’s meal will be a miso soup loaded with veggies and mushrooms, served with some steamed kale and some quinoa.

When you eat like this, focusing on great ingredients, you don’t have to get sucked into the dieting insanity. This meal could never cause weight gain, its naturally designed for maximum enjoyment and nourishment. That’s how food is supposed to be. No hype, no ingredients that you can’t pronounce, no mass marketing/ PR plan, no toxins. Just delicious.

Veggie Shitake Miso Soup

Serves 4

Shiitake stock lends an especially rich flavor to this hearty soup. Other vegetables or ingredients such as tofu may be added or substituted, but if shiitakes are omitted, it is best to start with vegetable or kombu stock rather than water.

Ingredients:

6 cups water
5 dried shiitake mushrooms
1 carrot, sliced
1 ½ cups chopped greens (such as kale or mustard greens)
¼ cup barley or brown rice miso

juice of 1 lemon

1 bunch scallions, thinly sliced

Procedure:

Soak shiitake in the 6 cups water overnight or for at least two hours.

Remove shiitake, cut off and discard tough stems, thinly slice the caps, and place in a pot with the soaking water.

Bring to a simmer, add sliced carrot, and cook for 5 to 10 minutes.

Add greens and cook for 5 to 10 minutes more.

Turn off heat.

Dilute the miso in a little of the broth, then add to soup.

Adjust flavors with juice of 1 lemon.

Allow to steep briefly before serving and add scallions.

Enjoy

Note to reader: this is part of a 5 week series I am presenting at Gilda’s Club Westchester. I thought everyone could benefit from this information so I’m sharing it here.

Knowing Your Ingredients  is key to healthy eating. It can be overwhelming to those of you new to this. So lets start with some definitions so we all know what we’re talking about

Organic is a term defined by the USDA. You can get into big trouble saying something is USDA certified organic if it is not.
Organic food is defined as grown without synthetic pesticides and chemical fertilizers. No GMOs, (genetically modified organisms), no irradiation, industrial solvents or chemical food additives are permitted in organic food

Note: that some farmers at farmers markets are not USDA organic certified but they use organic methods in growing their food.  Its very expensive to get certified, many small farmers cannot afford to do so.

Natural is a widely used term in food labeling and marketing. The term is assumed to imply foods that are minimally processed and do not contain manufactured ingredients, but due to the lack of standards, the word natural means basically nothing. Do not get sucked into believing that a product is good for you because the word natural is used!

GMOs - genetically modified organisms- are defined as an organism whose genetic material has been altered by means of genetic engineering. The problems with GMO ingredients are that there are no long term studies proving they are safe. It gets even creepier from there. Here are links where you can find more info.  80-90% of all corn and soy in the US is GMO, your best bet is to choose organic corn or soy. Click here to learn more about the problems with GMO

Dirty Dozen & Clean Fifteen

The Dirty Dozen and the Clean 15 are useful downloadable shopping resources offered by the Environmental Working Group. you can download a PDF for your wallet or even an app for your smart phone. Click here for more info.  The Dirty Dozen are the 12 fruits and veggies with the highest pesticide content- those 12 fruits and veggies you will definitely want to invest in organic over conventional. The Clean 15 are the ones with the least amount of pesticide residues, those you can save money and buy conventionally.  By the way, “conventional” produce is grown conventionally: with petrochemical fertilizers and pesticides. Its the opposite of organic.

3 “shoulds” for food. I have always had these little “food rules” under my belt as part of my food philosophy. I strongly recommend that you take some time to come up with your own personal food rules
1. Food should have pronounceable ingredients. You should not need a degree     in chemistry to be able to read the ingredient list!

2. Food items should be recognizable by previous generations: Your parents and your grandparents didn’t have insane items like Vitamin Water and neon pink yogurt in a tube.

3. Food should not have a massive PR /advertising budget. Chances are its not food but some edible foodlike substance. this is true for our parents generation too, remember Tang? That wasn’t a real food, it was a chemical powder that astronauts took with them on trips to space! Remember, if it sounds too good to be true it probably is!
To read more food rules, check out Michael Pollan’s book, Food Rules

Here’s something that Michael Pollan forgot to include in his many books:

SuRu’s Top 5 toxic ingredients to avoid

#5 Artificial sweeteners- are of no benefit. These chemicals may taste sweet with no calories, but they co-opt your taste buds, causing you to crave artificially sweet ingredients. That’s how people become addicted to diet soda and gum. Some have been shown to have neurotoxic properties and have other health risks.

#4 Hydrogenated anything!  This is the technical term for “trans fats”. Our government was under pressure from the food industry, so they made a loophole. Some labels can say “zero trans fats” per serving when its not. Just look for the word “hydrogenated oil” in the ingredient list, and put it back on the shelf. Don’t allow this crap in your home.

#3 HFCS- high fructose corn syrup or “corn sugar” or whatever the corn industry wants to call it. This ingredient is not found in nature, is manufactured with GMO corn most of the time.The food industry loves this ingredient because it makes you not feel full so you will eat and drink more. Large amounts of fructose in the absence of fiber raises your triglycerides/ LDL cholesterol.

#2 Soy- this ingredient was never intended for human consumption. It was grown between food crops to replenish nitrogen in the soil, then tilled under. Asian cultures didn’t eat it until they learned to ferment it into things like miso, tempeh and soy sauce.  Here in the US, it is our #2 crop, we feed it to animals (not a good idea) and more than 80% of it is GMO (an even worse idea). Stay far far away from things like soy protein isolate, soy powders and “bars” containing anything with the word soy. Miso, edamame, tempeh and soy sauces are ok, just make sure they are organic.

and…….drumroll please……
the absolute top #1 toxic ingredient

the one ingredient to avoid at all costs

is
are you ready for it?

#1 COTTON!  Cotton is not a food, never was, never will be. Cotton is the world’s most toxic crop. 25% of all the insecticide in the world is sprayed on cotton crops, polluting water, soil and air and endangering the health of those who live nearby.  These poisons are not approved for human consumption because cotton is a fiber crop, not a food crop. Cotton ends up in our systems in the form of cottonseed oil which is used widely in processed foods, and as cottonseed feed for cows, ending up in meat and dairy products. The pesticide residues from these cottonseeds concentrate in the fatty tissues of these animals, and in turn are passed on in meat and dairy products to us, the uninformed eater.
In addition to the highly toxic pesticide residues, the inflammatory nature of cottonseed oil is really tremendous. The ratio of Omega 6 to Omega 3 is of the order of 259:1. If you have been supplementing with Omega 3 oils or flaxseed to help with inflammatory health issues, just one little Girl Scout cookie containing a small amount cottonseed oil will undo all the good work you’ve been doing. Yes, it is that toxic. Its also super duper cheap which is why the food industry loves it.

The bottom line is never ever eat food containing cottonseed oil. To learn more about this most toxic of ingredients, visit one of my blog posts from the past: Cotton is Not a Food.

Note: in addition to the Ingredients class, Gilda’s participants got to enjoy a Japanese Omelette Salad and a Curried Butternut Squash Soup, proving that real ingredients can be good for you and so, so so delicious.

Edgar Rubin, simply irreplaceable

For the past few months, the Rubin rodeo has been on a quest to find the right dog for our family. Edgar’s sudden death last October left a void in our family that is impossible to replace. It’s been clear from the beginning of our search that we would not be buying a puppy from a store. More often than not, those dogs are from puppy mills, large-scale breeding operations that produce large numbers of puppies for profit. Most puppy mills are filthy, the dogs live in inhumane conditions, the more I learned about the more upset I got!

We chose to go the rescue route, because it felt like the right thing to do  and it was a way to honor Edgar’s memory. Edgar had been rescued from a hoarding situation in NYC, but no doubt he was born in a puppy mill and bought at a high priced puppy store in Manhattan.

Beckham, one of Edgar's "brothers"

Soon after we decided to start looking for a rescue dog, I received a phone call from Tara at Pawfection. Tara was instrumental in Edgar’s rescue and adoption. She had news that some of Edgar’s brothers were in need of a home. My heart skipped a beat and I brought hubby and one of my daughters up to Pawfection to visit the Yorkies. They were all on the tiny side, Edgar had been some sort of Yorkie mix, he was 10 pounds, these little guys were 5 or 6 pounds, but full of spunky energy. The biggest little guy had a bit of a hop in his walk. Tara advised that we wait until she checked out his knees at the vet.

It turned out his knees were not in good shape, he would need two surgeries and some rehab so he could fully use his legs. Tara became a foster mom for the little guy, her boys named him Beckham after the famous  soccer player.  I visited Beckham at Pawfection whenever I was in the neighborhood. After ongoing negotiations with family members, I had to give up my dream of adopting Beckham. He was too much of a reminder of Edgar for some, too tiny for others.  Tara found him a great home after she nursed him back to health during the two knee surgeries.

We spent hours and hours searching for an adoptable dog online. We used PetFinder and Adopt a Dog looking for small terriers within 100 miles of where we lived. We quickly learned that these online resources were like internet dating or searching for an AuPair online. The good ones were swept up quickly.  In addition, every organization with dogs available for adoption was different. Some were shelters, some were transporters, others were breed specific rescue groups.  We missed out on lots of dogs because we didn’t have applications in and approved.

Captain America

Captain America was a special guy, he was a Biewer Yorkie in a foster home through  Save A Yorkie Rescue . Everyone in the family agreed he was a possibility, even with those ears that looked like Gizmo from the Gremlins movie. I spoke with his foster mom, she said Captain America was one of her favorites. I could not go and meet the little guy until I was approved by the Save a Yorkie gang. In addition to filling out  an application and an  interview over the phone, they had to call my vet and my references, I also needed someone to do a home visit to show that my home was a safe place for a Yorkie dog. Fortunately a small rescue organization nearby, New Chance Animal Rescue, was kind enough to come over and do a home visit for us. I was thrilled to meet Sophie and Sharon Silverman, a mom and daughter team who regularly travels south to rescue dogs. I especially enjoyed talking to Sophie, a sophomore in high school who proves that you don’t have to be an adult to make a difference in the world. She’s learned lots about dogs and about poverty in her work as a dog rescuer.

By the time I got all of my ducks in a row for the Save a Yorkie people and my application was approved, Captain America was adopted by his foster family. I never got the chance to meet him.

Hubby and I continued to search online, emailing each other photos and links to dogs day in and day out. It made for interesting discussions, because everyone in our family seems to have strong opinions about which dog will work. We filled out applications all over the place. Our vet and Tara had to field many many phone calls from rescue organizations. Fortunately,  they put in a good word in for us as potential dog owners.

Snickers, happily adopted somewhere in NJ

Timing is everything with adopting a dog. We missed out on countless dogs due to bad timing. Snickers was one. He was a Yorkie Dachshund mix living in a foster home in NJ. I was a half day too late.  Someone else emailed the rescue group earlier and now Snickers is happily living somewhere in NJ.

When I got wind of a major adoption event happening in White Plains, this weekend, I scrambled to fill out applications and seek “pre-approval” before the event.  The Carolina Poodle Rescue seemed to have a number of nice looking doggies on their site that would be headed to NY for the big adoption event. I reached out to them with application and positive vibes. After my phone interview, I was approved, they were friendly folks from South Carolina.  I was super psyched to meet 4 possible dogs on Saturday morning: Nutmeg, Checkers, Mabel and Hutch. Mabel, a cockapoo, didn’t make the trip due to a cough, Hutch had become aggressive so he stayed in South Carolina too. That left Nutmeg, a terrier mix and Checkers, a Shih Tzu/Lhasa Aspo mix. Hubby and I were one of the first in the door Saturday morning to check out Nutmeg, Checkers and hundreds of others at the event.

Nutmeg, from South Carolina. I hope he finds a home

Nutmeg was mellow, but distant and not cuddly, Checkers was a barker. We didn’t feel a great connection with either one. The County Center was filled with hundreds and hundreds of dogs needing homes. After spending two hours looking at all the dogs, most of them Pit Bulls and Chihuahuas, we left deflated and dogless.

Keep in mind that we could quickly and effortlessly end our dogless suffering by going to the puppy store in the town just north of us. But by doing so, we would be feeding into the cruel and inhumane system that is part of the problem.

When buying food and clothing, we really need to ask the questions about where things come from.  Dogs and cats are no different. Most people don’t think that way when making a purchase, they look at price and convenience above everything else.  We really must dig deeper  no matter what it is we’re getting, even if it means more work or more money to do the right thing.  That’s why I shop local and at farmer’s markets. Its why I buy many of my clothes pre-owned from Green Eileen.

Nutter

Next on the list of potential dogs is Nutter. He is in a foster home in NJ, part of Sheryl’s Den, the group that had Snickers. This time, I was first in line, so I’m off to visit Nutter, a seven month old terrier mix, tomorrow. My fingers and toes are crossed that he’s the one.  He doesn’t look a thing like Edgar, who is irreplaceable, his photos indicate that he has the right combination of spunk and mellowness.

Stay tuned for updates on our dog adventure!

Spring is here and that means its asparagus season. I have fond memories of going out in my mom and dad’s garden and cutting asparagus for dinner. It doesn’t get fresher than that! This year I ordered some asparagus sets so hopefully my kids can have that same experience in a few years from now.

In the meantime, I’m grabbing whatever asparagus I can find at the local farmer’s market. Its easy to make. Sometimes we toss it on the grill with some teriyaki sauce, other times just a quick simmer in some water, and finish it off with a squeeze of lemon. Tonight, I had leftover cooked asparagus that was looking to find its way into a quiche so I went searching on Food52 to see what I could find.

I plugged “asparagus” and “eggs” into the search box on the upper right corner and found 83 results. Its fun to browse the recipes and see  other people posted comments on the recipes too. I discovered an Asparagus, Zucchini and Ricotta Tart and since I had most of the ingredients, including some puff pastry in my freezer, I decided to give it a go.

The recipe was a bit more complicated than ones I typically whip up. But the result was worth the work.  Here’s the recipe from the Food 52 site:

Serves 6

1 sheet of frozen puff pastry, thawed

1 pound zucchini – grated

1 1/4 teaspoon salt – divided

1 bunch asparagus – trimmed

2 tablespoons butter

2 teaspoons extra virgin olive oil

1 medium onion – finely chopped (1 cup)

1 garlic clove – minced

1 teaspoon lemon juice

2 teaspoons grated lemon zest

1 cup ricotta cheese – drained for 15 min.

1/3 cup plus 1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese

1 egg

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1 egg yolk mixed with 2 TBL water for egg wash

Place grated zucchini in colander set over large bowl. Sprinkle with 3/4 teaspoon salt and toss to coat. Let drain at least 30 minutes. Working in batches, squeeze zucchini in kitchen towel to remove as much liquid as possible. It’s important that the zucchini is dry.

While the zucchini is draining, blanch the trimmed asparagus spears in boiling water for 3 minutes. Plunge into ice water to stop cooking, cool, and dry thoroughly on paper towels.

Melt 2 tablespoons butter with oil in heavy large skillet over medium heat. Add onion and sauté until soft and translucent, about 7 minutes.

Add garlic and sauté until fragrant, about 30 seconds.

Add zucchini and lemon juice; reduce heat to medium-low and cook until zucchini is tender, and mixture is dry, stirring occasionally, about 12 minutes. Cool to room temperature.

Whisk ricotta cheese, 1/3 cup Parmesan, egg, lemon peel, 1/2 teaspoon pepper, and remaining 1/2 teaspoon salt in medium bowl. Stir in cooled zucchini mixture.

Preheat oven to 400°F. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper or Silpat. On a lightly floured surface, roll out 1 pastry to a 10″ x 15″ rectangle, 1/8-inch thick and transfer to baking sheet.

Trim 1 inch of pastry from each edge of the rectangle and set aside next to its edge. Wash the rectangle along each border with the egg wash, and then top with the piece of trimmed pastry, creating a raised edge. Overlap the corners.

Spread zucchini filling evenly over pastry, filling the pastry box.

Arrange the asparagus spears decoratively on the top of the filling.

Apply the egg wash to the raised borders, sprinkle with the remaining 1/4 cup of cheese and some fleur de sel or kosher salt.

Bake for 30 – 35 minutes until puffed and golden. Let rest at least 5 minutes before serving. Can be made ahead and reheated.

People start pollution, people can stop it.

My connection with Earth Day goes back to the very first one in 1970. As I explained in yesterday’s post, Crying at the Movies, I was very concerned about the “P” word: pollution when I was a youngster.  My girl scout troop picked up lots of litter along the side of roads for Earth Day, 1970.

Even though my dad didn’t let us watch too much TV, he called it the “idiot box”, I still remember the TV commercial with a tearful Indian standing by the side of the road.  As he watched trash tossed out of the window of a speeding car “Keep America Beautiful” was the tagline.

I was shocked and dismayed to learn just recently that the Keep America Beautiful campaign was the first corporate greenwashing campaign.  Heather Rogers, author of  Gone Tomorrow: the Hidden Life of Garbage explains that the packaging industry created a well funded non profit organization called Keep America Beautiful. By focusing on our “bad habits” of littering, it helped to keep laws from regulating industry. KAB help to encourage laws that  would  crack down on litter bugs, but not giant corporations who were making an even bigger mess. Corporations like the American Can Company and Owens-Illinois Glass Company, inventors of one use cans and bottles, funded this lovely sounding campaign. Others include the Dixie Cup Company, Coca Cola, and the National Association of Manufacturers. Corporate green washing at its finest.

Today, industries role in waste remains hidden. They still work as hard as ever to keep regulations at a bare bones minimum. As a result, for every ton of consumer waste, industry creates 70 tons.

Frustrating, huh?

Anyway, enjoy Heather’s short film about garbage. You’ll enjoy the historic footage.

Here’s the link if the movie didn’t pop up. Its only 19 minutes, very very worthwhile!

In the dark auditorium, I found myself awash with tears streaming down my face. Fortunately, this part of the movie was loud enough that the kids sitting nearby couldn’t hear my uncontrollable sobs.

Stop kidding yourself! Recycling is not cleaning up the mess we're making.

This was not some romantic comedy chick flick. The movie that made me sob so strongly was Bag It, a movie about plastic bags. Our school’s PTA environmental committee set up a community wide screening. The deep grief had come bubbling up as I watched endless images of floating plastic swirling around in the ocean. I’d seen these images before and I was more than well aware of the carcases of birds  at Midway island filled with pieces of plastic. If you haven’t seen photos of these birds, I strongly suggest you click here to see some.

Somehow I was now face with close to 50 years of abuse that we had brought upon the earth. In less than one lifetime, we created so much of a mess that I truly don’t know if the plants and animals including us humans, will recover from the destruction that our industrial civilization has wrought upon our planet, our only home.

As a kid, the word “pollution” packed a big punch for me. My brother and I used my grandpa’s old wind up Super 8 camera to try to make a pollution movie. I remember tossing garbage on the ground in the woods for my big brother to film.

Bell Labs in Holmdel NJ, where my dad worked. When I was a kid, I thought the scientists would solve the pollution problem.

I scoured my dad’s TimeLife book series for more information on pollution and learned about something called “smog”, a type of air pollution in a far away city called Los Angeles.  The more I read in the TimeLife series, the more concerned I became about air and water pollution. My mom assured me the scientists would take care of it. My dad was a physicist and electrical engineer working at Bell Laboratories. We’d visit him at work and see giant computers that took up entire rooms, we saw laser beams and fiber optic cables.

Somehow science and innovation would fix whatever needed fixing. That was the myth that helped me sleep at night as a kid.

But here I sat, 40+ years later, watching a movie about plastic and how it is killing life on the planet. No amount of innovation, no new found magical plastic eating fungi was going to undo the mess we’ve made.

The giant swirling patch of plastic garbage floating in the Pacific Ocean, 2 times the size of Texas continues to grow. A plastic soup in which plastic outnumbers  plankton by a factor of 40 to 1. For animals in the ocean that feed on plankton, there is 40 times more plastic than food.

In less than one lifetime, mine, we’ve seen pollution grow to the point that our continued existence on this planet along with millions of other species is now in question. The guilt I fee being part of this pollution making system is tremendous.

As a culture, we’ve made quite a mess out of things. Happy Earth Day

I spent last night at a Food & Sustainability expo in a nearby town. I brought my composting worms with me for a kid friendly demo, one of my pals brought herbeekeeping equipment, there were also local farmers and environmental organizations supporting clean food, water and land.

The keynote speaker was an upstate farmer- an inspiring story of a college teacher who took the leap, quit his “day job” and is now growing food for hundreds of families in a CSA format. I love to hear stories like this, but that was where the happy story ended. In addition to farming, this fellow and many many others are devoting huge amounts of time and energy to fight fracking in NY state.

His slide show shifted from bucolic photos of trees and farmland to ariel photos showing the annihilation of forest and farmland in nearby Pennsylvania. I had a chance to see the destruction that fracking creates first hand when I spent two summers working in a camp in Bradford County, PA, which is now the epicenter of fracking in this part of the country. I’ve kept my eye on the many accidents small and large that have happened in this county since I was last there in the summer of 2010.

Sadly, it looks like fracking will be coming to upstate NY in the not too distant future. Our governor is not a fractivist by any means. He and many others are enticed by the alleged economic benefits, aka “jobs”, with out considering what’s at stake- clean safe water.

As the farmer showed slide after slide of drilling rigs and containment ponds, a sense of hopelessness and despair enveloped the audience. PS you can see some of these photos on environmental artist, J Henry Fair’s site, click here. His book, The Day After Tomorrow: Images of Our Earth in Crisis,  sits prominently on my coffee table for everyone to see.

Because I’ve known about fracking for a few years now, I’ve done all the advocacy/ activsm stuff. I’ve called Governor Cuomo, his # is in my speed dial, to remind him that fracking is not safe. I’ve signed petitions, written a million fracking letters, and I’ve watched GASLAND more than once.  Quite frankly, I don’t know if any of it can make a damn bit of difference.

I don’t know what WILL make the difference. How many people need to know about fracking, home many people need to CARE enough before we hit the tipping point? Are letters, petitions and phone calls enough?  Should we be showing up en masse, physically blocking gas drilling rigs? Or will that just get us put in jail and labeled as an eco-terrorist?  Actually you might be labeled an eco-terrorist without doing anything overly radical, the Washington Post reports that the FBI has increased heavy surveillance of environmentalists including anti-fracking protesters.

Fracking and Farming do not mix

I learned this morning that President Obama has issued an executive order forming an “unconventional gas interagency working group”. Since the American Petroleum Institute is applauding his actions, I can only assume that this move will benefit the petroleum industry and not people who care about clean water.  This turn of events is frightful beyond belief.

When it comes down to it, everyone cares about clean water, many of them just don’t know it yet. Once their clean water is gone or once a family member has a health crisis due to contaminated water, they often wake up to how important clean water is.

By the time enough people wake up, will it be too late?