A great many parts of our bodies rely on fat to perform their essential functions, and I’d like to review some of them here. The better you understand fats, their functions, and their structures, the less susceptible you will be to the advertising that influences consumers to purchase products made with industrially-modified fats. Today we’re talking about fat. For purposes of this essay, consider the terms “fat” and “oil” to be interchangeable. Continue reading
Author Archives: Dr. Sukol
Just Pure Tahini
This past February I attended a presentation about tahini by Dana Harary, a founder of SoCo Artisanal Tahini, and Doug Katz, a local celebrity chef. We learned about Dana’s longstanding search for the most flavorful tahini on the planet, about the nutritional profile of tahini, and about SoCo’s commitment to positive change and collaboration. SoCo, short for Seeds of Collaboration, is a supporter of Middle East Entrepreneurs of Tomorrow (MEET), a nonprofit that connects young Israeli and Palestinian students. Continue reading
YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Strawberry-Pecan Spring Salad
A quintessential springtime salad. Tiny sweet strawberries bursting in your mouth? Soft, gently flavorful leaves of spinach, fresh from the ground. A bit of bite from the onion and satisfying give from the pecans. And, finally, an inspired sweet and sour dressing filled with fresh fruit flavors. Continue reading
Mind and Body Connections Help You Grow
Western culture has long considered the mind and body as separate entities, one from the other. In medicine, for example, mental illness has long been considered separate and different from physical illness; many aspects of care, insurance coverage, and chronicity reflect this. In one of the most widely watched TED talks of all time, Sir Ken Robinson, a highly respected educator, described an academic as an individual who employs the body to move their head from one meeting to another.
On the one hand, we are contemplative, cognitive, spiritual, moral selves; on the other we are our oriented, balancing, turning, stretching, physical selves. Two sides of the same coin, we are each and we are both. Continue reading
YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Roasted Tomato Soup
Do you know that feeling when you have a dozen gorgeous tomatoes on the counter and you go grocery shopping, and you forget, and you come home with another eight gorgeous tomatoes? Yes, of course you do.
This week, I decided to make fresh tomato soup, which I had never made before. I have loved tomato soup since I was a kid. I especially loved my friend Mendy’s tomato soup when we were in graduate school, which was half a lifetime ago. I added white beans to this recipe, but no one will know unless you tell them. Continue reading
YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Roasted Cauliflower & Tahini
In 2020, during the pandemic and lockdown, my newly married daughter and son-in-law discovered that they could reduce their grocery shopping frequency from once a week to once every other week by thinking of their produce as “first week” items, which were likely to go bad quickly (e.g., berries and spinach) and “second week” items, with a longer shelf life (e.g., cabbage and apples). Continue reading
The Esselstyns & Plant-Based Eating
Going on ten years ago now, I had the pleasure of seeing Dr. Caldwell and Anne Esselstyn present on plant-based eating. The plant-based diet, which they began many decades ago, means eating only those items that belong to the category of “intact” carbohydrates, i.e., carbs with an intact fiber matrix. The plant-based diet is similar to the vegan diet, with several exceptions as enumerated below. Continue reading
YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Lisa’s Date-Nut-Chocolate Bars
My friend, Lisa, brought these date pecan chocolate bars to book club once and OMG they were pretty wonderful. Technically they are intended for dessert, but honestly there is no reason they wouldn’t be great for breakfast, too. Dates, nuts, dark chocolate. Why not? Frankly, they have a lot more nutrition and a lot less sugar than the standard American breakfast. So, yes, I would go for it. Continue reading
Mindfulness for All
A few words today on the “rest and relaxation” pillar, encouraging you to be mindful, to care for yourself, to be kind to yourself, and to help yourself remain centered, especially in the spinning vortex of ceaseless activity that continues to characterize recent weeks of change and chaos.
My word of the year is mindfulness. It’s the exact opposite of multi-tasking, which is not at all what it sounds like. To multi-task is not to get a whole bunch of different things done all at once, but rather to switch your attention incessantly from one project to another, giving none your full consideration. To multi-task is to invest heavily in attention-switching at the expense of your focus and goals. All told, it is a supreme waste of your precious energy. Continue reading
YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Chicken with Split-Pea Gravy
This recipe inspires an entirely new approach to gravy. It’s extremely flavorful, the texture is spot-on perfect, and it is impossible to mess up. You should consider it when cooking for company, Friday nights or Sunday dinners, Thanksgiving and other holidays, or any time you want something rich, flavorful, creamy, and cozy, with leftovers guaranteed to keep you satisfied. When my children were elementary school age, it was one of their favorite dinners. Continue reading