Archives: August 2010

Last night I had the honor of attending a cooking class at the Natural Gourmet Institute. It was a gluten free and vegan baking class – right up my alley!! The space was beautiful and it was SO much fun.

If you take one of their classes that are targeted for certain people with allergies, you are bound to meet people who have similar interests like you. Yes, that was the case here and I met some really nice women who all spoke my same health conscious language – it was fantastic!

It’s not everyday you spend 4+ hours talking about different flour combinations, types of sugar and so on… It was a really great experience.

I recommend you search through their public class catalog and get yourself to a class. It seems as though most people who attend their classes are quite health conscious, ready to learn something new and really excited to actually be there!

Give yourself a gift of taking a class there, you definitely won’t be disappointed. It really is a special place; Annemarie Colbin must be SO happy- her dream is definitely a success.

Natural Gourmet Class!

Natural Gourmet Class!

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From L-R: Vanilla blueberry crumb cake, Chocolate chip strawberry scone bites, Cherry pineapple upside down cake, Raspberry peach cobbler, Coconut chocolate chip bars, Orange creme cupcakes with orange scented whipped topping - All GF and Vegan amazingness

For all of you out there who might be skeptical about trying sea veggies, let me tell you that they are SO healthy for you that it’s worth it to suck up the taste and eat up the nutrients. My favorite sea vegetable is Dulse, which is a red seaweed that grows along the northern coasts of the Pacific and Atlantic oceans.

Dulse is becoming widely popular due to its high fiber and protein content. It also contains lots of vitamins and minerals, most importantly vitamin B and iron. This is a great snack for anyone on a vegan diet, or just anyone looking to add some extra nutrients to their diet.

I eat mine raw and right out of the bag! SO yummy. Sometimes I sprinkle mine on top of salad or add it to soup.

Don’t be afraid of the sea veggies, they have a lot to offer nutrient wise, all you have to do is experiment and know what you’re working with.

Another one that is truly magical is kombu. Kombu is high in a wide range of trace minerals and amino acids, including potassium, iodine, calcium, and vitamins A and C, as well as B-complex and glutamic acid – that’s a whole lot of nutrients right there! In my eyes the most effective way to use kombu is to cut off a one inch strip and stick it in any boiling water, whether you’re making a grain, soup or veggies. The great thing about kombu is that it doesn’t alter the taste; it simply adds the nutrients and then gets discarded at the end.

Magical right? Who knew that these sea veggies could be so nourishing?! You can usually find them in the Asian section of your health food store; just ask until you find the right product.

I didn’t know about these veggies until I was shown what they were and how to use them. I don’t blame you if you’ve never even heard of them but I hope you can explore and be open to new experiences. There are lots of other sea veggies to choose from, these are just the ones that I enjoy the most.

I’m headed straight for the dulse right now…

This past weekend I had a small accident with my foot – I accidentally dropped the top of my ottoman (which was HEAVY) on the top of my right foot and WOW was it painful. I thought I was fine until I went to bed, then the real pain kicked in. You can say that I didn’t sleep much that night, in fact I was quite a crybaby and Chad wasn’t the happiest. The most interesting thing happened to me though – I was having a lucid dream at around 6:15 am about my grandmother who recently passed away 2 and a half months ago. I’m always hearing stories about how people had a “visit” from someone who has died and I can never understand what this means, and how it can possibly feel.

Well, here I was, crying on and off all night about my foot and all of a sudden, I’m dreaming about my Omi. In my dream she was sitting in a chair across the room from me, legs crossed, sitting straight up, completely pain free and wow did she look great. My immediate instinct (in my dream) was to go over to her and hug her – so I did and all of a sudden the hug turned into this warm, real feeling hug – then I left the dream and came back to the reality of sleeping in bed. I was turned on my side in bed and you wouldn’t believe it, but I felt a hug from behind me (no it wasn’t Chad, he was on the other side). Listen, I’m completely frightened when it comes to things like this – spirits, ghosts, whatever you want to call this, but I’m telling you this was real. I was really shaken up after this and I immediately woke Chad and made him turn the light on – I didn’t see anything.

After I’ve analyzed this to the best of my ability, I now know that she was only trying to comfort me in my feeling of discomfort and not scare me. I have so much love for her for watching over me, and I’m grateful that I was able to have one more hug by such a special woman.

For those of you who have had a “visit” from a loved one, I’d love to hear your story.

I’ve been really intrigued by one woman recently named Annemarie Colbin. She’s the founder of the Natural Gourmet Institute in NYC and has also written some books. I’m reading Food and Healing right now and agree with her in so many ways that it’s almost as if she’s reading my mind at times! Go figure… She believes that there’s no one diet for everyone! Perfect, that’s right in line with my thoughts exactly. She’s learned through time that one person’s food is another person’s poison and I’ve been exposed to that exact same thing. What a completely knowledgeable woman who offers GREAT advice and wisdom. I highly recommend her books and am actually going to be attending a class at the Natural Gourmet Institute next week, which I will clearly write all about. I look forward to sharing more info that I learn from her. Stay tuned.

Dear friends,

My mom always told me how much I wanted to be in this world as a baby, meaning… I was born a month early and when she was giving birth, I literally flew right out – literally… the doc caught me (thank g*d!!) I always thought that was the main reason she used to say this, but low and behold there is more to the story. My mom decided that I was officially of age, being 24 and married, to know what really went on back then. It all started with my conception of course, but this wasn’t just any story of hey… we’re pregnant. No, my mother had an iud placed in her uterus, which is said to “have one of the lowest failure rates of any contraceptive method.” Picture that! My mother, using birth control with a very tiny chance of getting pregnant and BAM there I was growing in her belly. Then the dr. said she had to remove the iud to actually have a safe pregnancy and that she had a 50/50 chance of losing me. Clearly here I am, safe and sound.

Have you ever wondered what your mother was going through when you were growing inside of her? Was she happy, stressed, anxious? What was her relationship status? Were you breast-fed? Gosh, so many things start while we’re in the womb and we don’t even know about them until we’re old enough (whatever age that really is anyway.)

My point is this, do you really know who you are until you know all the factors that went into making you? Maybe this is a far off idea… or maybe not. It’s something to look into if you have the opportunity to do so. Maybe you’ll learn something about yourself that you never even knew. Ask questions until you feel satisfied – you deserve to know!

Good luck, and please write back if you find out anything that totally shocks you.