Healthy food

I've re-discovered my love for runny yolks. Especially when it's dark orange from a truly free range, pastured chicken.

My kimchi experiments are finally proving fruitful. My favorite addition for flavor? Lemon thyme. I might also pick some dandelion greens from the yard for my next batch.

Speaking of lemon, this is a perfectly fresh, perfectly healthy indulgence for your sweet tooth. Honey sweetened lemon curd on top of a soaked nut crust with lots of grass fed butter. Yum.

Healthy food. It all seems a bit relative these days, and the words themselves make me think of a rendition by Wyclef Jean on an episode of Sesame Street. What does it make you think of?

I recently hit the 30 pounds lost mark. It feels good. I'm back to where I was before my last pregnancy, but still have a long way to go before I'm down to where I was before the pregnancy prior to that one (a mere 9 months earlier, but a good 40 pounds).

The amazing thing about this, however, is that I've never been able to lose the weight while breastfeeding before, and I'm not exercising beyond yoga and weight lifting, AND I'm never hungry. In fact, I feel better than I have in years. I attribute all of this to the quality of the food I've been choosing more consciously lately. I mean, we've eaten technically organic, with loads of fruits and veggies, and minimally processed for years now, but I still can't believe how much relative junk I was allowing before. A processed, sugar laden cereal bar is still a cereal bar no matter how "natural" is is, and contrary to popular health lore, it is NOT good for you! I still excused way too much sugar in the name of health food, and ate way too much wheat and dairy that was not in the proper form for healthy consumption. It actually blows my mind the things that I had allowed to become part of my family's daily intake.

But much of that has changed. No, we're not perfect, but our diet today looks so much different than that of even 6 months ago. And I can speak for my whole family when I say that we're happier for it. Aside from one case of the sniffles and a mild tummy bug (that hit the baby and toddler the hardest) we've hardly been sick. We have more energy and I for one find it easier to manage stress. The kids are trying new foods and liking them to a degree that never ceases to amaze me. And we're supporting local agriculture, sustainable farming, humane animal treatment and just a better food economy to boot!

For those of you who think this all sounds ridiculously hard and out of reach, let me assure you it is not. I make almost everything myself that I can lately. No more store bought convenience if I can help it. And I seriously am not in the kitchen all day either! Some days I don't know how I do it in truth, but it all works out. It IS doable, and it's absolutely worth it.

I'm going to start posting some recipes for some of what I've been doing and discovering. Some with my own twists, some from other sources, but all essential to living a truly nourishing life.

And I don't even think about weight loss anymore. I just know that by continuing to truly feed myself and treat my body with respect, it will eventually normalize without my having to stress about each pound. And if you've ever tried to lose weight purposely, that's a big deal.

So here's to a high fat, raw where it counts, pastured, grass fed, chemical free, cultured and all around delicious way to live!