SOUL Food

breast Ca whole foods

About a year ago, I found this book:

I grabbed it up for a couple of reasons. One, I like to read and learn from others and their whole food perspective. Two, I knew it would come in handy with clients.

I have recommended it several times over the past year.  Recently, I was again recommending it and I decided to check out the authors. Who are these people that wrote this book?  I can't believe it took me this long to be curious!

So I find that Edward Bauman is the founder and director of a holistic nutrition college, a whole food oasis, in California!

I love his acronym for remembering healthy eating habits that balance human health: SOUL.  What a perfect way to remember how to feed and heal mind, body, and soul.  I have been teaching this same concept for 20+ years, without using the SOUL acronym, and am glad to now have this fun way to remind people.

  • S:  Seasonal
  • O:  Organic
  • U:  Un-processed (Un-refined, Un-packaged... my words!)
  • L:  Local

By Dr. Ed Bauman

eat for health

The Eating for Health model (Double click on above picture to enlarge image) provides a palette from which we can select the most health supportive foods. Eating from the inside out will provide a building diet for times when we need to build up our nutrient reserves. Eating from the outside in will set the scene for cleansing the body of impurities and toxins. The goal of the Eating for Health model is to provide a diverse selection of whole foods to sustain health and promote recovery from illness and injury.

Tell me your story in the comments:  

What are your favorite foods to heal your mind, body, and S.O.U.L?

Gluten Free Apple Pie

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Whole Grain Gluten Free Pie Crust

  • 1/3 cup butter* from pasture raised cows
  • 1 cup whole grain, gluten-free flour**
  • 1/4 tsp. unrefined sea salt
  • 1 - 2 tbsp. cold water (I use my local milk)

When making a whole grain pie crust, I have found it much easier to make it in a food processor.  The pie dough melds together really well and rolls out nicely.  I have tried many methods: fork, fork and knife, pie pastry hand blender, etc.  The best whole grain pie crust, for me, is made in a food processor.

I put in the flour, sprinkle the salt in, add butter in cold slices, and put the lid on. Turn the food processor on and drizzle the water or milk in through the top. When the dough balls up and is rolling about inside the canister, shut off the processor.

To roll the dough I sprinkle a bit of oat flour onto my pastry cloth and use the cotton sleeve on my rolling-pin. I bought my cloth pi making set at Evan's & White's Hardware store, Potsdam.

pie cloth

Roll out the pie dough and put it into the pie plate.  I make a second recipe for the top crust.  I have found it works best, for me, to make one crust at a time in the food processor.  If I am going to make a lattice top, like the pie above, I just make a little extra dough and make one batch only. (Approximately 1 1/3 cup flour plus maybe and extra tbsp., 1/2 cup butter, 1/4 tsp. salt, and 2 tbsp. cold milk.)

Apple Filling

  • 4 very large, organic Braeburn apples, or whatever your favorite flavor of organic apple.  I prefer Pink Lady apples... but they are expensive so I save them for eating and buy a cheaper apple for pies.
  • Slice into thin pieces, leave the nutritious peels intact on the apples
  • 1/2 cup unrefined sucanat sugar
  • 1 to 3 tsp. pure Ceylon cinnamon
  • 1 tbsp. vanilla
  • oat flour, say 1/4 cup, to thicken the apple juice so the pie is not runny.

Mix apples with rest of ingredients.  Fill pie crust and top with 2nd crust or lattice top. Pop into the oven and bake for approximately 50 to 60 minutes at 350 F.  Apples should be gently bubbling inside the pie, not running liquid all over the oven.

*I have been using Kerry Gold Butter from Ireland.  I am not thrilled about using something transported from so far away. Local food is better!

I wish we had a farm cooperative in Northern NY that produced butter from pasture raised cows.  However, I received a "tip" from Jessica Prosper of Prosper's Farmstead Creamery!  I just ordered (from Nature's Storehouse Wholeshare) 5 lbs of pasture raised butter from a farm cooperative in New York State:  Kriemhild's Dairy.  They are not in Northern NY State, but hey, they are not in Ireland either!  Thanks for the tip Jessica!

**I use mostly gluten free oat flour in pie crusts.  This one also had millet, quinoa, teff, and amaranth flours.  Then I added in a 1/4 cup of dark buckwheat flour.

The oat flour will make a smooth crust.  Add in the millet, quinoa, amaranth, and teff and the crust gets textured... grainy.  If you are not used to this in whole grains, I am just warning you!  The buckwheat flour has a very strong flavor.  Very yummy, but again, if you are not used to this flavor it is a big leap from refined, white flour pie crust pastries.  I find them flavorful, a true taste sensation as compared to white flour crusts that to me taste like baked wall paper paste. Enjoy the yummy, new flavors on your taste buds.

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The pie is very yummy and full of whole-cell regenerating, healthy, whole foods. No refined flours and sugars depleting the health of the body cells in my home!   I encourage you to read and learn about feeding your body cells with whole food to prevent and heal lifestyle related diseases.  It is nature's plan!  

Medicinal Herbs ARE Food

Dandelion: the flower, leaves, & roots are all used for liver healing nourishment. The part used depends on the season and strength of medicine desired.

 

Burdock Root: a powerful liver nourishing & healing herb.

"One of the biggest tragedies of human civilization is the precedence of chemical therapy over whole food nutrition.  

It is substitution of artificial therapy over natural, of poison over food, in which we are feeding people poisons trying to correct the reactions of nutritional starvation." -Dr. Royal Lee

Herbs are Food

Herbs can be used in tea, tinctures, oils, poultices, and some eaten whole as food.  

A common message heard from main stream media and western medicine is Do NOT use herbs as they are potentially dangerous.  

As an Herbalist, I am here to remind you what we have known as humans interacting with the Nature: Herbs are plants with body cell nourishing capabilities.

When we know, or work with someone who knows, the nourishing and medicinal benefits of herbs we can use them to support our health and healing. Many factors are considered to help guide the decision as to which herb, or combination of herbs, would best support an individual’s health and healing.

Historically, people learned from each other which plants support which body organs and systems. We learned from our elders which plants supported the nourishing and healing of an individual’s needs.

Herbs are a plant: leaf, root, stems, bark, berries, seeds. Herbs are plants, similar to plants we eat as vegetables.

The individual herb has nutritional and healing properties with affinities for certain tissues. Some examples:

  • Hawthorne berry for the heart

  • Saw palmetto for the prostate

  • Red Raspberry leaf for the uterus

  • Rhubarb root for the colon

  • Milk thistle for the liver

  • Nettle as a general nutritive herb

  • Dandelion and burdock root for liver cleansing

The list of herbs and their benefits is as long as the list of plants we share this Earth with.  

The above herbs are a few example of herbs and the tissue / organ they have affinities for healing. Healing happens because the herb adds whole food nutrition to your body cells.  Plants we eat as food serve the same physiological process of nourishing our body cells.

Recommendations for working with herbal plants:

  1. Read up on the herb you want to take.  Learn about the herb and its healing affinities before you make the decision to take it.

  2. Contact an herbalist for help in choosing the right herb, or blend of herbs, to add to your plan for health and healing. The herb or blend of herbs for one person may not be the best blend for another person with the seemingly same “symptoms presentation.” Healing is not a one size fits all experience.

  3. Eat a whole food diet. Your body cells require whole food nutrition to function properly in each moment, replicate as normal & healthy cells, and keep your being whole for vital longevity.

  4. Herbs are amazing nutrition for the body but they cannot make up for a refined, processed, junk food product diet.

Herbs are whole foods.  Use them wisely for whole body healing.

Stinging Nettle, below, are one of my favorite herbs. Nettles are a powerhouse of nutrition and healing energy for the whole body.

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