Another helping of delicious, please.

I HAVE to tell you about this because OMGIAMSOEXCITEDABOUTIT!!!!

I am not an adventurous cook, generally. I very diligently pick my recipes every week and stick very closely to what they tell me to do. I don't usually pull out measuring spoons and sometimes not even measuring cups, but I generally don't mess around with ingredients. If it says red bell pepper, I buy a red bell pepper - no substituting something I already have in the fridge. But for the first time, really, on Tuesday night I thought outside the box and prepared a dinner using NO RECIPE AT ALL. I can sense some of you yawning - "ho, hum - what's the big deal." This was a huge deal for me because 1) it turned out to be one of the most delicious things I've ever made, in my opinion and 2) it means, to me, that I am starting to graduate to that next "level" of cooking, where you just start to instinctually know which foods go together and taste great together. Believe me, it's taken many, many moons to get to this point and, frankly, I'm pretty darn excited.

So anyway, without further ado, I would like to share with you the "recipe" for what I am going to call: "GREAT BIG BOWL OF DELICIOUS". I will acknowledge that I'm sure this recipe has been made a million times and can probably be found in countless cookbooks, but in my mind, I have invented it. Please let me continue to believe that.

I started with a TJ's bag of mixed grains - Israeli couscous, orzo, red quinoa, and split peas. I cooked it in chicken broth according to the package instructions. Then I added minced garlic, chopped roasted red bell peppers, olive oil, chopped green onions, garbanzo beans, and chopped parsley. I crumbled goat cheese over it and called it done. Oh, it was so easy to make and so flavorful and, for a really professional description, yummy in my tummy! And SUPER healthy to boot. All those grains and beans and herbs and olive oil and a hint of cheese. Perfect. And I found that it takes a lot longer to chew a mouthful of really small different grains, which lets your stomach relay the message that you're full before you overeat. In short, it helps you eat a little less. But really, it was all about the taste. I had leftovers for lunch today and it almost tasted better - like the flavors had melded even more over time. I hate to toot my own horn, but by golly was I excited about this one. For a little more protein in there, you could add tofu or shredded chicken.

The thing that inspired me to think about the whole foods that I had in my cupboard - grains, legumes, vegetables, etc. was another book that I want to share with you. I know, I keep pushing all these books at you. I'm a book-pusher. Shameful. But I just get so excited when I read about these things - it's like whole new worlds are opening up to me. This one is called, "The Jungle Effect" and it's written by a doctor who started studying 5 "cold spots" for chronic diseases (cancer, diabetes, heart disease, depression and bowl trouble), meaning that there are very low instances of these diseases in very specific parts of the world. For instance, in certain parts of Mexico they are relatively few occurences of diabetes in populations that still eat the indigenous diet. In all of these cultures/geographical locations, the health of the people can be tied pretty directly to their traditional diets. So the author traveled to these locations to research the diets, analyze why they are so beneficial and then snag a few recipes to bring back to her patients. It seems that our ancestors spent thousands of years developing diets that were optimal for our health in so many ways. Through centuries of trial and error, they discovered what worked and why. Even if they didn't know the scientific reason for why it worked, they knew that it did. Then the industrial revolution came along and we threw all of that out the window and replaced it with fast and highly processed foods. Genius. Now the grocery store is just a giant land mine and we have no memory of what we traditionally ate to know what we should return to. It's especially difficult for Americans who are usually "mutts" and have no cultural heritage to speak of anyways. I have no idea where I come from, really, and so even if I wanted to return to eating the way my ancestors did, I wouldn't even know where to look. Anyway, the author explains it so much better than I could, so it you're at all interested in the history of food, check it out. Even if you don't use the recipes in the book, or follow her recommendations, I found it a extremely interesting account of what we all used to eat before we could just walk a block to the corner market.

Have a lovely weekend everyone!!