What to do with a Jicama?

In my neighborhood this one involves a serious run to Chang Li Supermarket... and in fact this is often how the process starts: when I see a vegetable or a fruit there that I do not already know, I start looking up what you can do with it.

The first time I bought a Jicama, I just used it in another salad, and that was not convincing, but it got my curiosity started. The nutritional qualities of Jicama seem to be impeccable, so more experimentation was called for.

I ended up making a creamy salad dressing with silken tofu, and mustard, and chia seeds. The end result was finger licking good.

Like with any salad, you can throw anything plus the kitchen sink in there once you figure out the tastes... I could see adding adding raisins or craisins, and you can keep on experimenting.

Here is the basic recipe I ended up with:

This one started from a recipe on epicurious, here. My problem with that one was that it uses dairy, so instead, I made my own creamy dressing with silken tofu instead of cheese. 

• Peel the Jicama (note, the skin reportedly is actually poisenous, so do a good job of it!) 
• Grate the Jicama with a mandoline to matchstick size. 
• Peel ca 5-8 Clementines, and cut the slices in half 
• Grate a small red onion to match stick size. 

Mix the ingredients.

Tofu/Mustard Dressing: 

1. 16 Oz package silken tofu, drained 
2. 1 cup seasoned rice vinegar, or apple cider vinegar 
3. 2 garlic cloves, peeled 
4. 1/3 cup coarsely chopped fresh cilantro 
5. 1/4 cup scallion thinly sliced 
6. 3 table spoons honey 
7. 2 teaspoons toasted sesame oil 
8. 2 teaspoons low sodium tamari, or Braggs Liquid Aminos (1/3rd the sodium level of even low sodium tamari) 
9. 1/2 teaspoon hot chili flakes (to taste... I could use 2-3 teaspoons) 

Blend with any good blender, food processor, or Nutribullet, and create a rich, creamy dressing. 
For this Jicama salad, I like to add in about 1-3 table spoons of mustard. 
You can add raw green pumpkin seeds, or chia seeds, or wheat germ to the eventual salad.

Read More http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/recipe/3738280/2?nc=1&autosave=form.info.autosave#ixzz3xQyJv3Xx

The Business of Salads

Salads get a whole different meaning when you're seriously going vegan. In my direct neighborhood, one of the best places for salad ingredients is the Pioneer supermarket at 1345 Castle Hill Avenue. This store carries good quality (in many cases organic) salad ingredients, typically, here is what I can find:

• Organic salad mixes from Earthbound Farm
• Organic salad mixes from Organic Girl
• Vidalia onions (Pioneer seems to be the only store in my area that has Vidalia onions all of the time)
• Organic carrots

I like using some red leaf or green leaf lettuce, and mix it with some of these salad mixes, sometimes arugula or baby spinach, or a spring mix.

Some peppers and tomatoes, and onions are basic, beyond that you can add olives, roasted peppers, artichoke hearts or whatever else tickles your fancy in that area. You can add broccoly cooked, or raw, cooked green beans, a handfull of cooked beans, mushrooms raw or cooked, etc. Good things to enrich it are chia seeds, wheat germ, sliced almonds, and many a time grated organic carrots are a great addition.

 

To make it creamy, you can make a dressing with silken tofu, here's a basic recipe from myrecipes.com:

Sesame Tofu Dressing

1 package (12 to 16 oz.) water-packed soft or aseptic-packed silken tofu

1 cup seasoned rice vinegar

2 cloves garlic, peeled

1/3 cup coarsely chopped fresh cilantro

1/4 cup thinly sliced green onions (including tops)

3 tablespoons honey

2 teaspoons Asian (toasted) sesame oil

2 teaspoons low-sodium soy sauce

1/2 teaspoon hot chili flakes

In place of the low-sodium soy sauce, you can also use Bragg's Liquid Aminos. Optionally, depending on the salad mixes, you may add some mustard to this type of a dressing.  

Good salads become a way of life. Don't leave home without having eaten one. Light, refreshing, and with lots of energy.

The Herbal Toothpaste Post

Say that three times fast... the Herbal Toothpaste post, the Herbal Toothpaste post, the Herbal toothpaste post. In any case, living in what is supposed to be the most ethnically diverse district in the Bronx, with 180,000 residents and 72 ethnicities, many wonderful shopping options arise. Starling Avenue has become a little Bangladesh, intermingled with african, and many other influences.

Herbal Toothpaste on Starling Avenue

I recently discovered one of the benefits is great choices for herbal toothpaste. If you go to the main stream drug stores, there are hardly any fluoride-free choices, usually maybe one or two, but on Starling Avenue I found a long list of options, excellent herbal toothpastes at stores like Friends Grocery & Halal Meat at the corner of Starling and Olmstead, and Banglatown Supermarket at 2169 Starling Avenue.

Most of these toothpastes are based on either Peelu, or Neem, both of which are excellent, some are a bit more complex. You will find a few that have fluoride, so you have to read the labels.

The story with fluoride is becoming more gruesome by the minute, and if you want the latest, check up on the story at FluorideAlert, The Fluoride Action Network. The bottom line is fluoride in drinking water causes more problems than it solves, and should be avoided at all costs. Theoretically, fluoride might be beneficial to teeth by topical application, so putting it in toothpaste and mouthwash might be justified, but overall we are getting too much of it, and many smart people buy fluoride-free toothpaste for that reason. Here is some more good info about fluoride alternatives,

Here are some of the toothpastes I found recently, including two of my favorite toothpastes:

1. From India: Neem/Miswak Complete Refreshing Dental Care, 100% Vegetable based, based on Black Seed, Baking Soda, Neem leaves, Mint leaves, and Cloves. It tastes great. You can get it online at Essential Palace. This is a great toothpaste, it leaves your mouth feeling fresh.
2. From India: Vicco Ayurvedic Medicine for Gums and Teeth. This is another one of my faves. It is based on a whole raft of Ayurvedic herbal ingredients. I picked up my most recent tube at Banglatown. From Vicco Labs.
3. From Pakistan: Miswak, Hamcard Peelu Toothpaste.
4. And three more from India, from a company called Dabur International, another maker of Ayurvedic products:
1. Dabur Herbal Toothpaste, Neem.
2. Dabur Red
3. Dabur Meswak Toothpaste.

In short, choices galore, try one or try them all, something to feel good about.

Here is a comment from Declan Waugh, the famous Irish fluoride researcher, posted on 1/26/16:

It appears to me that fluoridated toothpaste is a lot more dangerous than people realize and more hazardous than the toothpaste industry want anyone to know. Its quite alarming how much fluoride can be ingested/swallowed and absorbed through the oral cavity, particularly in infants and children. Considering the availability of fluoridated toothpaste and that it represents approx 98% of all toothpaste sales, it is absolutely INSANE that any government would further compromise public health by putting fluoridation chemicals in public water.

Seitan, Kao Fu, and more in the Parkchester area

There was a time when I had to go to Chinatown for my vegetables, but then Chang-Li Supermarket olpened up on Benedict Avenue (across the street from St. Helena's Parish), and we got a green market on Fridays all summer long at Virginia Park (next to the Parkchester subway station).

More and more choices are arriving close to home. One of my favorites is Kao Fu, or baked seitan - a form of wheat gluten. Kao Fu is really the chinese name for this form of seitan. The name seitan goes back to George Ohsawa, the promoter of macrobiotics. It is available intermittently at Chang-Li Supermarket, usually comes in on Friday. Like any seitan product, it is a great protein source - meat substitute if you will - and it has the great property that it is spongy so it works great in soups and sauces, because it absorbs the liquid and with it the flavor.

Kao Fu or Baked Seitan

You will find this product at Chang-Li next to an array of Tofu products, and there are also some other forms of seitan in that refrigerated section. It pays to experiment with all of them. One word of caution: Kao fu does not last long, you generally need to use it within a week, so stocking up makes no sense.

Here is an interesting Chinese recipe, intended as a cold appetizer, Hong Shao Kao Fu, which looks pretty interesting, and what's more, easy to make. 

All in all, this stuff is very versatile, and easy to adapt to many different recipes. Recommended.