#not pictured are the salad and soup and side of cabbage my meal came with

[starlightxvstarbright]

xavier is two maple syrups cups tall

[formeryelpers]

Haifa Restaurant, 8717 W Pico Blvd, Los Angeles (Pico-Robertson), CA 90035

Humble Haifa Restaurant might be the oldest kosher restaurant in the Pico-Robertson neighborhood? The restaurant opened in 1979 and is still family-owned. They serve Glatt Kosher homestyle Mediterranean & Israeli fare, including kebabs, shawarma, schnitzel, hummus, salads, appetizers, pita sandwiches, soups, fish, and sides. The menu is in English and Hebrew.

They were nice enough to allow for substitutions and also provided recommendations.

Salad combination with 6 falafel balls ($17.95): This came with hummus, tabuli, eggplant & tehina, tehina, Israeli salad, cabbage salad, pickles, and 2 thick Israeli pitas. Mr. Froyo liked it though he said the hummus, while thick and smooth, was bland. He really liked the pickles, tahini, and falafel. The falafel were moist and green on the inside (made with fresh parsley and herbs) and not oily on the outside. The Israeli salad was simple but fresh.

Turkey shawarma plate with majadra, mushroom with vegetables ($25.95). This also came with one thick Israeli pita, pickles, cabbage salad, and two kinds of schug. The shawarma is chicken even though it says turkey on the menu (they told me this before I placed my order). The shawarma did not seem to be carved off a meat cone. It had no char. While it had plenty of shawarma spices, it was too salty. I didn’t like it. However, adding schug and pickles and mixing it with the rice and sauteed vegetables helped. The vegetables were simple prepared; sauteed mushrooms, onions, bell peppers, and zucchini. The rice had onions and lentils. The portion was generous (two meals worth).

The restaurant is small and no frills, with pictures of Israel on the walls and a TV tuned to the news. There is outdoor seating but not much of it. Reservations are not accepted. Service was very friendly.

3.5 out of 5 stars.

By Lolia S.

[dinneratsheilas]

Chicken Marsala (Cooking my way through the Pandemic)

Throughout  this pandemic I have prepared all our meals without ordering takeout or pickup once so far.

I do it not only because of the threat of the virus, but because I find solace, comfort and joy in the process of cooking and baking.  And at this time we all need that.

My husband and I  shop for groceries and produce while taking the necessary precautions (masks and gloves).

I am grateful for our grocery stores, markets, and employees who have in turn provided a safe environment in which to shop by adhering to the restrictions in place.

I am making fewer trips to shop these days, but buying larger orders, enabling me to make extra of one dish for leftovers for a second meal. 

We brought along our refrigerator/freezer when we came from Maryland almost 7 years ago so we could have an extra fridge in our garage.  It’s proved to be a good move.

In addition to cooking extra for additional meals I focus on buying items from which I can make various dishes.

For example, boneless, skinless chicken breasts can become chicken stir fry,  chicken parmesan, chicken piccata, or the chicken marsala pictured above to mention a few.  

Ground beef can provide grilled burgers, tacos, meatballs, meatloaf or    Sheila’s hearty meat sauce.

Fresh vegetables can become salads or many can be tossed with olive oil, kosher salt and pepper and roasted for a delicious side dish. A favorite combo of mine is roasted carrots, fennel and onions.

Half of a large head of cabbage will make a lovely slaw, and the other half is delicious roasted as a side dish for another  meal.  

If I buy too many apples I’ll make applesauce. Too many potatoes, potato salad!

We’ve gone through leftover soups from the freezer including chicken soup with matzoh balls, sweet and sour cabbage soup, veggie chili, and mushroom barley  soup. 

I regularly rotate tuna salad, egg salad, and chicken salad for lunches, sometimes dinner.  Waldorf salad is another favorite (apples, celery, nuts and raisins always around).  Got leftover chicken? Chicken Waldorf Salad!

And of course, there’s pasta!  Here’s a few to consider...Mac and Cheese,  Pasta with Fennel and Sausage, No Fuss Garlicky Farro, Couscous with Almonds, Parsley, and Lemon, and Pasta with chicken and Summer Vegetables.

I’ve done my share of baking during this time as well. I’ve baked my first challah!

I’ve sent chocolate chip cookies and peanut butter cookies to my kids in LA and San Francisco (twice), and also dropped some off at my neighbors’ doorsteps. 

 I’ve baked a cherry pie,(my husband’s favorite) a chocolate cake, (another of his favorites), a  French pear tart, and a  blueberry almond lemon cake,

I made a classic NY cheesecake with a fresh raspberry topping, and dropped some off for friends.

Since I’ve always kept a fully stocked pantry I’ve had plenty of time to work through the overfilled shelves, and I’m not done yet.

Tonight’s dinner is spaghetti with meatballs and sauce. The meatballs and sauce have been defrosting in the fridge most of the day.  Time to make dinner!

[turkeyfeet8-blog]

Reader Food Diary: Jennifer & Family’s Success Story

Welcome to our 2019 Reader Diary series where we are going to be sharing success stories + what people ate for a week! We are still accepting entries, and those who are featured will receive $50 in groceries from Thrive Market, 2 of my cookbooks, and a free Prepear meal planning program membership for a year. Get all the details (and share your entry with us!) on this page. 

Hello! We are the Brees Bunch, and we live in Southern California. We have three children ages 17, 15, and 9. Both my husband and I work full time, but with opposite schedules. He’s a professional musician, and I’m an instructional coach. We have a lot of food concerns in our family, so we’ve been slowly introducing real food since January 2017, but really started committing to it in September of that year when our daughter was diagnosed with ADD.

My husband has Type 2 Diabetes and needs to eat lower-carb. He detests any type of seafood. My 17-year-old is a vegetarian but will eat fish occasionally. She has also been diagnosed with depression and anxiety. She has relied on heavily processed meat replacements instead of making vegetarian meals. My 9-year-old has severe ADD and functions better eating lots of healthy proteins and eliminating processed or sugary foods. My 15-year-old son has grown a foot this last year and is constantly hungry and usually turns to junk food to satisfy his hunger. And then there’s me—I’ve suffered from severe migraines for years and am always exhausted. Plus, I need to lose a significant amount of weight.

Photo Credit: Sarah Tolson

We knew what was best for our family but felt that our tight food budget and busy schedules prevented us from doing that. However, there was a point last year when we realized how much we were relying on processed food or take out for the majority of our meals. Not only were we spending way too much money, we just didn’t feel well. Our house felt tense all the time.

Success Story

One evening, as I went up to bed feeling sad and frustrated, I made the decision to commit to purchasing and preparing food that was beneficial, not harmful. I began looking for ways to do that and still stay within a strict budget. I came across the 100 Days of Real Food site and began to read and implement great ideas, like using only whole wheat products and adding fruit and veggies to every meal. I’m also a big believer in making food ahead of time and doubling recipes to have food to freeze. It was a bit slow at the beginning, and some of my family members resisted. But the benefits have been awesome.

So far…

I have lost 25 pounds from May – September 2017 (and an additional 15 lbs January 2018 to now!) and my migraines have diminished greatly!

My youngest daughter with ADD has shown increased attention after we transitioned to whole foods and cooking at home.

My husband has been able to maintain healthy blood sugar levels consistently for his diabetes.

My vegetarian daughter is able to find ways to make real food instead of always purchasing packaged, processed vegetarian items.

And, my son is able to satisfy his hunger by making snacks out of real food.

How We’ve Done It (so far)

We signed up for a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) box through a local farm and shop at Costco once a month for our bulk purchases. We also purchase a large box once a month from Butcher Box, which provides meat that is humanely raised without antibiotics or hormones. Then, we plan weekly meals together as a family. I ask for suggestions for dinners and breakfasts.

Our children are responsible for packing their own lunches. It used to be extremely difficult to plan lunches, since all 3 kids like different things. I decided to give each child a weekly set amount of money to purchase lunch foods—this would include an entrée, fruit, veggies, and a snack.

We shop as a family once a week, and it has been awesome to have the kids plan, budget, and shop for their lunches. It gives them more freedom and they like trying new things. Plus, they are much more likely to eat the food they’ve chosen because it was their decision. In addition, they can use anything from the freezer or fridge if they get tired of the same lunch foods for the week. Sometimes, they will plan together and share foods.

All 3 children help my husband, and I make meals at home, and our oldest usually cooks for the family at least once a week. Our meals are usually meat or protein-based, but we have side dishes that are hearty so that our vegetarian feels satisfied. We try to plan at least one vegetarian meal each week. In January 2019, we determined as a family that our next step on our real food journey would be to eliminate any added sugar for 40 days to see if we felt any better. We decided we could use small amounts of raw organic honey or pure maple syrup if needed.

We don’t have a lot of snack food—we usually have leftover breakfast items, homemade trail mix, fresh fruit, and nut butter, or hard-boiled eggs and veggies. For treats, since we’re eliminating added sugar, we splurged on Lara bars and fruit cups (in 100% fruit juice), just for this month.

We’ve cut out buying juices and sodas over the past year, so our beverages are very simple. I drink black coffee in the morning and peppermint tea later in the day. My husband occasionally has black coffee in the morning and black unsweetened iced tea in the afternoon. Our kids usually have water or unsweetened sparkling water with dinner.

For breakfast, 2 out of the 3 will drink organic whole milk, and the other will have organic unsweetened almond milk. We recently invested in glass reusable water bottles to encourage the kids to take a water bottle to school and hydrate! I had to have a chat with my 9-year-old when I kept noticing an empty juice box in her lunchbox. One of her friends was sharing her juice with my daughter every day. We had a great conversation, and my daughter shared she wanted something more than water with her lunch. She decided that a peach herbal unsweetened iced tea or sparkling water would meet her needs.

Our food diary is mainly what I ate throughout the week, but includes at least one lunch from each child, so you can see the variety and the choices they made.

Our Food Diary

Day 1

Breakfast: Chile relleno casserole, roasted potatoes and peppers, fresh fruit. Lunch: Tomato basil soup, grilled cheese sandwiches on sourdough bread. This is a typical meal after grocery-shopping. We usually try to have something simple since we shop after church and everyone is ready to eat by the time we get home. I freeze individual soup portions for lunches or snacks at a later time. Dinner: Beef taco bowls: grass-fed beef, organic black beans, roasted street corn, sautéed peppers and onions, organic romaine lettuce, sliced avocado, sour cream, salsa. Taco bowls are great for our family since everyone can customize them to fit their needs.

Day 2

Breakfast: Broccoli-cheddar quinoa egg bites, grapefruit or mandarins. With our early mornings, breakfasts need to be ones that can be taken to go! Lunch: Homemade Protein Box: Almonds, cheese cubes, hard-boiled egg, fresh berries. During my work day, I don’t have time to eat a whole lunch so I usually pack snack-type foods that are easy to eat on the go. Dinner: Pork chops with basil cream sauce, smashed potatoes, roasted broccoli. My daughter added Parmesan cheese to the broccoli. Treat: Lara bars and mint tea. This was the first day of cutting out added sugar, so I planned ahead to have something tasty and simple as a treat.

Day 3

Breakfast: Peanut butter oatmeal: rolled oats with natural peanut butter added while cooking, plus a drizzle of pure maple syrup, topped with apple slices (this is one of my kiddos’ favorite meals). Lunch: Homemade bento box: rice, egg sushi, sautéed spinach and garlic, quick pickled cucumber and cabbage, mixed veggies (this was the lunch my 17-year old packed today) Dinner: Spicy salmon cakes with homemade tartar sauce, garlic-herb roasted potatoes, roasted asparagus, and broccoli. My youngest is still not a fan of asparagus so the broccoli was for her. However, she knows that she still needs to try items she doesn’t like, even if it’s just a bite. Treat: Homemade hot cocoa sweetened with maple syrup and fresh whipped cream, homemade triple coconut cookies. It was a cold, rainy day and we were all wanting some hot chocolate. While making dinner, I made hot chocolate with dark cocoa powder, organic whole milk, vanilla, cinnamon, and maple syrup. I used organic heavy cream and some maple syrup to make fresh whipped cream. I also made triple coconut cookies with unsweetened coconut, coconut flour, and coconut oil. They were super crumbly but tasted delicious!

Day 4

Breakfast: Rustic skillet with leftover garlic-herb potatoes, scrambled eggs, sautéed spinach, and cheddar cheese. When I make roasted veggies and potatoes for a meal the night before, I try to make extra so I can make a skillet meal for breakfast. My family gobbled up all the roasted veggies so I added some spinach this time. I made breakfast and then went upstairs to finish getting ready. I came back downstairs to take a picture, and the food was gone! Lunch: Eat out with colleagues at Panera Bread: Greek goddess salad, turkey BLT with avocado. I rarely get to have a long lunch or eat out during the work week, so this was a treat for me. One of my friends is vegan so our restaurant choices are limited. Panera is a great fit for all of us. Dinner: Whole-wheat pasta with homemade marinara sauce, Caesar salad with homemade dressing. My daughter made this meal, and the kids ate before I was able to get home from work so I didn’t get a picture of the meal. Snack: I was hungry after dinner so I had an apple from our CSA box and a square of Parmesan cheese. The kids had homemade trail mix.

Day 5

Breakfast: Homemade granola, organic plain Greek yogurt sweetened with maple syrup, topped with berries. Lunch: Whole wheat organic sandwich thins mini cheese pizzas, popcorn, sliced cucumbers, banana, and mandarin oranges. This was my youngest daughter’s lunch for the week. We use the sandwich thins to make mini pizzas since it’s less bread and they get nice and crispy. They’re good even cold from the lunchbox! Dinner: Organic teriyaki chicken over coconut rice, sautéed baby bok choy, and radishes. We received the bok choy and radishes from our CSA box. I’ve roasted radishes before but have never sautéed them. They paired nicely with the bok choy. I like the flavor and texture better sautéed rather than roasted. My vegetarian daughter had mushrooms and cashews instead of chicken.

Day 6

Breakfast: Breakfast bars: I used the leftover dough from the coconut cookies earlier in the week and added mashed banana, walnuts, and chia seeds. I pressed them in a pan and baked for 20 minutes. My kiddos had the option to top with organic Greek yogurt and berries or have a hard-boiled egg on the side. Lunch: Uncured roast beef sandwich with Havarti cheese, pesto, and pickles, on sourdough bread, side salad, kiwis, multigrain tortilla chips (this is my son’s choice for his lunches this week). Dinner: Breakfast for dinner: Green chili egg bake, green salad, bacon, sweet potato home fries. This egg bake is adapted from a diabetic cookbook. It makes a 9 x 13 size pan, and we cut it up and freeze individual portions. You can add any cheese or meat you’d like. We usually make it vegetarian, but we had family over for brunch recently and made a bacon, gruyere, and caramelized onion egg bake that tasted very close to the bacon and gruyere sous vide egg bites I sometimes splurge on at my favorite Starbucks.

Day 7

Breakfast: Leftover egg bake and fruit. Lunch: Snack box: cheese cube, seedless cucumber slices, hard-boiled egg, blueberries, kiwi slices, mandarin, cashews. Dinner: Split pea soup topped with ham, Cobb salad, cheesy biscuits made with almond flour for lower carbs. The soup is made with vegetable broth so it’s vegetarian and then we top it with ham for all the meat-eaters! I replace whole wheat flour with almond flour for the biscuits, and it holds together fairly well. If there are any leftover biscuits, I save them for breakfast or snacks.

Final Thoughts

Our journey is far from over, but I think we’ve made great progress over the last year. The next step is to add another vegetarian dinner to our weekly rotation and to plan meals more efficiently so that I can double, or triple, recipes and have much more variety in the freezer. I think my advice to any family who would like to eat real food is to tackle one small area and do it well, then move on to the next challenge. I think that every day we try something new and beneficial, we should be proud that we’re making growth toward health!

Posts may contain affiliate links. If you purchase a product through an affiliate link, your cost will be the same but 100 Days of Real Food will automatically receive a small commission. Your support is greatly appreciated and helps us spread our message!

Source: https://www.100daysofrealfood.com/reader-diary-jennifer/

[citypillow2-blog]

Reader Food Diary: Jennifer & Family’s Success Story

Welcome to our 2019 Reader Diary series where we are going to be sharing success stories + what people ate for a week! We are still accepting entries, and those who are featured will receive $50 in groceries from Thrive Market, 2 of my cookbooks, and a free Prepear meal planning program membership for a year. Get all the details (and share your entry with us!) on this page. 

Hello! We are the Brees Bunch, and we live in Southern California. We have three children ages 17, 15, and 9. Both my husband and I work full time, but with opposite schedules. He’s a professional musician, and I’m an instructional coach. We have a lot of food concerns in our family, so we’ve been slowly introducing real food since January 2017, but really started committing to it in September of that year when our daughter was diagnosed with ADD.

My husband has Type 2 Diabetes and needs to eat lower-carb. He detests any type of seafood. My 17-year-old is a vegetarian but will eat fish occasionally. She has also been diagnosed with depression and anxiety. She has relied on heavily processed meat replacements instead of making vegetarian meals. My 9-year-old has severe ADD and functions better eating lots of healthy proteins and eliminating processed or sugary foods. My 15-year-old son has grown a foot this last year and is constantly hungry and usually turns to junk food to satisfy his hunger. And then there’s me—I’ve suffered from severe migraines for years and am always exhausted. Plus, I need to lose a significant amount of weight.

Photo Credit: Sarah Tolson

We knew what was best for our family but felt that our tight food budget and busy schedules prevented us from doing that. However, there was a point last year when we realized how much we were relying on processed food or take out for the majority of our meals. Not only were we spending way too much money, we just didn’t feel well. Our house felt tense all the time.

Success Story

One evening, as I went up to bed feeling sad and frustrated, I made the decision to commit to purchasing and preparing food that was beneficial, not harmful. I began looking for ways to do that and still stay within a strict budget. I came across the 100 Days of Real Food site and began to read and implement great ideas, like using only whole wheat products and adding fruit and veggies to every meal. I’m also a big believer in making food ahead of time and doubling recipes to have food to freeze. It was a bit slow at the beginning, and some of my family members resisted. But the benefits have been awesome.

So far…

I have lost 25 pounds from May – September 2017 (and an additional 15 lbs January 2018 to now!) and my migraines have diminished greatly!

My youngest daughter with ADD has shown increased attention after we transitioned to whole foods and cooking at home.

My husband has been able to maintain healthy blood sugar levels consistently for his diabetes.

My vegetarian daughter is able to find ways to make real food instead of always purchasing packaged, processed vegetarian items.

And, my son is able to satisfy his hunger by making snacks out of real food.

How We’ve Done It (so far)

We signed up for a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) box through a local farm and shop at Costco once a month for our bulk purchases. We also purchase a large box once a month from Butcher Box, which provides meat that is humanely raised without antibiotics or hormones. Then, we plan weekly meals together as a family. I ask for suggestions for dinners and breakfasts.

Our children are responsible for packing their own lunches. It used to be extremely difficult to plan lunches, since all 3 kids like different things. I decided to give each child a weekly set amount of money to purchase lunch foods—this would include an entrée, fruit, veggies, and a snack.

We shop as a family once a week, and it has been awesome to have the kids plan, budget, and shop for their lunches. It gives them more freedom and they like trying new things. Plus, they are much more likely to eat the food they’ve chosen because it was their decision. In addition, they can use anything from the freezer or fridge if they get tired of the same lunch foods for the week. Sometimes, they will plan together and share foods.

All 3 children help my husband, and I make meals at home, and our oldest usually cooks for the family at least once a week. Our meals are usually meat or protein-based, but we have side dishes that are hearty so that our vegetarian feels satisfied. We try to plan at least one vegetarian meal each week. In January 2019, we determined as a family that our next step on our real food journey would be to eliminate any added sugar for 40 days to see if we felt any better. We decided we could use small amounts of raw organic honey or pure maple syrup if needed.

We don’t have a lot of snack food—we usually have leftover breakfast items, homemade trail mix, fresh fruit, and nut butter, or hard-boiled eggs and veggies. For treats, since we’re eliminating added sugar, we splurged on Lara bars and fruit cups (in 100% fruit juice), just for this month.

We’ve cut out buying juices and sodas over the past year, so our beverages are very simple. I drink black coffee in the morning and peppermint tea later in the day. My husband occasionally has black coffee in the morning and black unsweetened iced tea in the afternoon. Our kids usually have water or unsweetened sparkling water with dinner.

For breakfast, 2 out of the 3 will drink organic whole milk, and the other will have organic unsweetened almond milk. We recently invested in glass reusable water bottles to encourage the kids to take a water bottle to school and hydrate! I had to have a chat with my 9-year-old when I kept noticing an empty juice box in her lunchbox. One of her friends was sharing her juice with my daughter every day. We had a great conversation, and my daughter shared she wanted something more than water with her lunch. She decided that a peach herbal unsweetened iced tea or sparkling water would meet her needs.

Our food diary is mainly what I ate throughout the week, but includes at least one lunch from each child, so you can see the variety and the choices they made.

Our Food Diary

Day 1

Breakfast: Chile relleno casserole, roasted potatoes and peppers, fresh fruit. Lunch: Tomato basil soup, grilled cheese sandwiches on sourdough bread. This is a typical meal after grocery-shopping. We usually try to have something simple since we shop after church and everyone is ready to eat by the time we get home. I freeze individual soup portions for lunches or snacks at a later time. Dinner: Beef taco bowls: grass-fed beef, organic black beans, roasted street corn, sautéed peppers and onions, organic romaine lettuce, sliced avocado, sour cream, salsa. Taco bowls are great for our family since everyone can customize them to fit their needs.

Day 2

Breakfast: Broccoli-cheddar quinoa egg bites, grapefruit or mandarins. With our early mornings, breakfasts need to be ones that can be taken to go! Lunch: Homemade Protein Box: Almonds, cheese cubes, hard-boiled egg, fresh berries. During my work day, I don’t have time to eat a whole lunch so I usually pack snack-type foods that are easy to eat on the go. Dinner: Pork chops with basil cream sauce, smashed potatoes, roasted broccoli. My daughter added Parmesan cheese to the broccoli. Treat: Lara bars and mint tea. This was the first day of cutting out added sugar, so I planned ahead to have something tasty and simple as a treat.

Day 3

Breakfast: Peanut butter oatmeal: rolled oats with natural peanut butter added while cooking, plus a drizzle of pure maple syrup, topped with apple slices (this is one of my kiddos’ favorite meals). Lunch: Homemade bento box: rice, egg sushi, sautéed spinach and garlic, quick pickled cucumber and cabbage, mixed veggies (this was the lunch my 17-year old packed today) Dinner: Spicy salmon cakes with homemade tartar sauce, garlic-herb roasted potatoes, roasted asparagus, and broccoli. My youngest is still not a fan of asparagus so the broccoli was for her. However, she knows that she still needs to try items she doesn’t like, even if it’s just a bite. Treat: Homemade hot cocoa sweetened with maple syrup and fresh whipped cream, homemade triple coconut cookies. It was a cold, rainy day and we were all wanting some hot chocolate. While making dinner, I made hot chocolate with dark cocoa powder, organic whole milk, vanilla, cinnamon, and maple syrup. I used organic heavy cream and some maple syrup to make fresh whipped cream. I also made triple coconut cookies with unsweetened coconut, coconut flour, and coconut oil. They were super crumbly but tasted delicious!

Day 4

Breakfast: Rustic skillet with leftover garlic-herb potatoes, scrambled eggs, sautéed spinach, and cheddar cheese. When I make roasted veggies and potatoes for a meal the night before, I try to make extra so I can make a skillet meal for breakfast. My family gobbled up all the roasted veggies so I added some spinach this time. I made breakfast and then went upstairs to finish getting ready. I came back downstairs to take a picture, and the food was gone! Lunch: Eat out with colleagues at Panera Bread: Greek goddess salad, turkey BLT with avocado. I rarely get to have a long lunch or eat out during the work week, so this was a treat for me. One of my friends is vegan so our restaurant choices are limited. Panera is a great fit for all of us. Dinner: Whole-wheat pasta with homemade marinara sauce, Caesar salad with homemade dressing. My daughter made this meal, and the kids ate before I was able to get home from work so I didn’t get a picture of the meal. Snack: I was hungry after dinner so I had an apple from our CSA box and a square of Parmesan cheese. The kids had homemade trail mix.

Day 5

Breakfast: Homemade granola, organic plain Greek yogurt sweetened with maple syrup, topped with berries. Lunch: Whole wheat organic sandwich thins mini cheese pizzas, popcorn, sliced cucumbers, banana, and mandarin oranges. This was my youngest daughter’s lunch for the week. We use the sandwich thins to make mini pizzas since it’s less bread and they get nice and crispy. They’re good even cold from the lunchbox! Dinner: Organic teriyaki chicken over coconut rice, sautéed baby bok choy, and radishes. We received the bok choy and radishes from our CSA box. I’ve roasted radishes before but have never sautéed them. They paired nicely with the bok choy. I like the flavor and texture better sautéed rather than roasted. My vegetarian daughter had mushrooms and cashews instead of chicken.

Day 6

Breakfast: Breakfast bars: I used the leftover dough from the coconut cookies earlier in the week and added mashed banana, walnuts, and chia seeds. I pressed them in a pan and baked for 20 minutes. My kiddos had the option to top with organic Greek yogurt and berries or have a hard-boiled egg on the side. Lunch: Uncured roast beef sandwich with Havarti cheese, pesto, and pickles, on sourdough bread, side salad, kiwis, multigrain tortilla chips (this is my son’s choice for his lunches this week). Dinner: Breakfast for dinner: Green chili egg bake, green salad, bacon, sweet potato home fries. This egg bake is adapted from a diabetic cookbook. It makes a 9 x 13 size pan, and we cut it up and freeze individual portions. You can add any cheese or meat you’d like. We usually make it vegetarian, but we had family over for brunch recently and made a bacon, gruyere, and caramelized onion egg bake that tasted very close to the bacon and gruyere sous vide egg bites I sometimes splurge on at my favorite Starbucks.

Day 7

Breakfast: Leftover egg bake and fruit. Lunch: Snack box: cheese cube, seedless cucumber slices, hard-boiled egg, blueberries, kiwi slices, mandarin, cashews. Dinner: Split pea soup topped with ham, Cobb salad, cheesy biscuits made with almond flour for lower carbs. The soup is made with vegetable broth so it’s vegetarian and then we top it with ham for all the meat-eaters! I replace whole wheat flour with almond flour for the biscuits, and it holds together fairly well. If there are any leftover biscuits, I save them for breakfast or snacks.

Final Thoughts

Our journey is far from over, but I think we’ve made great progress over the last year. The next step is to add another vegetarian dinner to our weekly rotation and to plan meals more efficiently so that I can double, or triple, recipes and have much more variety in the freezer. I think my advice to any family who would like to eat real food is to tackle one small area and do it well, then move on to the next challenge. I think that every day we try something new and beneficial, we should be proud that we’re making growth toward health!

Posts may contain affiliate links. If you purchase a product through an affiliate link, your cost will be the same but 100 Days of Real Food will automatically receive a small commission. Your support is greatly appreciated and helps us spread our message!

Source: https://www.100daysofrealfood.com/reader-diary-jennifer/

[donaldmckenzie13]

I’ve been making more use of the Millennium Library in the last little while, so I find myself traveling up and down the streets in that area a little bit more than usual. Recently, I saw signs for Izakaya Edokko, a new Japanese restaurant.

A delightful little salad served as a starter each time I visited Izakaya Edokko.

Located on the main floor of Place Louis Riel. Place Louis Riel was formerly a hotel, but now is a combo hotel-apartment building, and has closed it’s in-house restaurant. That space is what Izakaya Edokko has taken over. The space has been nicely redecorated. There main space contains a sushi bar, a few four seat tables, and along one wall a series of tables that can easily be turned into one long table for a large party. In the back there is another room with a bar and several more tables. I haven’t ventured into that section on any of my visits.

The restaurant is a new project for Chef Masa Sugita, the man behind Masa on Pembina, and Yujiro on Grant. While I’ve heard of both restaurants, I’ve somehow never gotten around to visiting either. So, I’m coming in with no experience of Chef Sugita’s work.

Checking up on the term Izakaya, it seems to me that it is something close to a Japanese Tapas Bar. The emphasis being as much on the opportunity to sample various drinks is as important as the food. Owing to the fact that my visits have been at lunch, I’ve only tried the Sake, which I found to be all right, but not much else.

Lunchtime Sake.

Black Garlic Ramen for Lunch

On my first first visit, the sign outside the restaurant was advertising the Black Garlic Ramen as the lunch special. I decided to go with that. When I placed my order, my server asked if I would like the California roll, which they were offering for additional $4.50. I added that as well.

The dish was listed as coming with a salad and I was pleasantly surprised when it arrived. There was a good mixture of crisp vegetables and the salad dressing is quite tasty.

The Ramen itself was quite good. The noodles had a good chew to them, the broth was quite rich in it’s flavour. The egg was thoroughly hard-boiled(I’m not sure that’s the most enjoyable way to eat it), and the pork was quite tender. Unfortunately, my picture of the Ramen didn’t turn out. One touch I did like was the crushed peppers in a shaker, which I added throughout as I ate the Ramen.

I’m not a big California Roll fan, but this one was quite good. The ingredients, especially the Avocado came across as really fresh.

A fresh California Roll for Izakaya Edokko

Shaker of hot peppers to complement the Ramen

Second Visit

The second time I stopped off at Izakaya Edokko it was towards the end of the lunch period. I was hoping to try their Edokko Special Makunouchi Bento, of which they only make ten sets per day. Unfortunately, I arrived just after they sold their last one for the day, so I was forced to look longingly on at the other tables to get some idea of what it’s like.

Instead of the Bento I ordered the Yakiudon. This combination of noodles, cabbage and pork had good flavours, but the portion size left a little bit to be desired.

Yakiudon

To supplement this, I asked for the menu again. I added a Spicy Ebi roll, and a couple of pieces of Maki. The Tako (boiled octopus), and the Tobiko (flying fish roe). The spicy Ebi roll was really good, I really appreciated the fact that spicy mayo didn’t overwhelm all the other flavours. The octopus in the Tako had a good chew to it without being rubbery.

Edokko Special Makunouchi Bento

As the Makunouchi Bento seemed to be a bit of a house specialty, I decided to make another visit to give it a try. Although it’s more expensive than what you might expect from a bento, this collection of dishes is definitely worth it. It might be the best value on the menu. As the picture below illustrates there are a diverse number of items to the platter.

Makunouchi Bento

There is a really interesting combination of items in this bento. Starting top left, Battered Tofu, Potato Salad, Sardines(or perhaps Mackerel), Savoury Egg Custard, fruit, miso soup, Shitake Roll, another roll whose name I didn’t get, and three piece of Nigri. One reason to not focus too much on each of the individual rolls, etc., is that I was given the impression by my server, that the contents of the Bento may be different on any given day.

The highlight, perhaps surprisingly was the potato salad. It was nice and light and not overly dressed. My least favourite item was the egg custard. The flavour was good, but the texture was of somewhat undercooked egg, and that’s something I don’t particularly enjoy. As with the other dishes I’ve tried the seafood tasted quite fresh. The fried tofu is quite good, although a challenge to my chopstick wielding skills. That’s me though, not the dish.

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The service here has been very good each time I have gone. The staff are friendly and they are efficient, but don’t rush. This allows you to enjoy your meal at a leisurely pace. The prices seem a little on the high side in relationship to portion size and quality, but only slightly so, and the Bento special is definitely worth the price. I’m sure I’ll stop in here again.

My latest post, check out, Izakaya Edokko- Downtown Winnipeg #winnipeg

I’ve been making more use of the Millennium Library in the last little while, so I find myself traveling up and down the streets in that area a little bit more than usual.

My latest post, check out, Izakaya Edokko- Downtown Winnipeg #winnipeg I've been making more use of the Millennium Library in the last little while, so I find myself traveling up and down the streets in that area a little bit more than usual.