Last fall, I took a lunchtime walk in Larchmere, and passed Felice’s Urban Cafe.  It looked so nice on the outside, in a beautiful old Craftsman-style house with a huge front porch and a hand-painted sign, in a section of town that has been trying to become regentrified for 15 years at least.  Last night I finally had the chance to go.  Felice’s did not disappoint.  

We arrived in Larchmere as evening fell, and walked on the path alongside the house to a partially enclosed, outdoor patio behind the restaurant to await our friends.  Right away I knew I’d come to the right place.  How?  The restaurant’s owners had planted a large garden right alongside the house!  Many empty beds were covered in mulch, and paths of stepping stones were set between the beds to keep gardeners’ feet from compressing the rich dirt.  

Except for the beautiful stone paths, the garden doesn’t look like much right now, but pretty soon tiny green stalks will begin to poke their little heads up from the dirt.  By late summer there will be an abundance of fresh vegetables and herbs!!  I expect that the menu will begin to include loads of mixed greens from the restaurant garden any time now.  

The website metromix.com described Felice’s cuisine as “Mediterranean-inspired in a homey atmosphere.”  Okay, whatever.  What captured me was that everything was made from scratch and the chef uses tons of local ingredients.  That’s what I want no matter where I go.  I don’t remember what everyone ordered because I was so interested in my own plate that I didn’t think to look around.  The food was wonderful.  

Here’s what I had:  My appetizer consisted of a beautiful pottery cup filled with small chickpeas sauteed until dry and then sprinkled with crystals of sea salt.  They were an exquisite accompaniment to the glass of prosecco I was drinking.

My entree was grilled polenta (my favorite!), served on a bed of wild mushrooms and slivers of sauteed onion, and topped with a flavorful sauce of red pepper and ground almonds.  It was a little bit sweet from the onions, red pepper and corn meal.  It was a little bit earthy from the mushrooms.  It was a little bit salty, and nutty.  It had a little bit of a bite, so there was probably some hot pepper, maybe jalapeno or chipotle, in there, too.  Every bite was a little bit wonderful.

Today, in response to my question about what he ordered, Eddie reminded me that he had eaten an appetizer of four perfect asparagus spears, crisp and scrumptious, and then a fresh, green salad, and then salmon tacos, which looked to be homemade and came adorned with jalapeno peppers and limes.  He ate every last crumb.  I do remember having taken a quick glance at his plate last night when it arrived, and I can only say that his dinner looked really tasty.  

We finished our meals with cups of fragrant coffee and rich cream.  The company was fun, the food was divine, and I was so happy. 

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If you’ve been wondering what I mean when I say that my goal is to help
readers understand the difference between real food and manufactured
calories, then today’s post is for you.

When you make a choice
about what to eat, the question is, “Is this really food, or is it
an invention of the 20th century, i.e., manufactured calories?” 
Sometimes things in life can be divided into black and white, like the
coin toss at the start of a football game.  But sometimes it’s not that
simple.  Occasionally a coin lands on its side.  Between black and
white you find a spectrum of grays.  That’s what I want to talk about
today.  

When you talk about the difference between real food
and manufactured calories, you’re talking about a spectrum of items. 
To show you what I mean, today we’re going to talk about corn.

Corn,
like lots of other real food, originates in the earth, and you can eat
it straight off the cob.  As soon as corn is picked, the sugars in the
kernels begin to be converted to starches, which do not taste as sweet
to our palates.  So I’m not one bit surprised to hear from a friend
that he has fond memories of having eaten uncooked, fresh-picked sweet
corn when he worked on a collective farm years ago.  I’m sure that the
raw foodists would approve.  

One step removed, but still
“real,” as far as I’m concerned, is the same corn, purchased a few days
later from the supermarket, and boiled for a couple of minutes until
bright yellow.  Maybe it’s eaten as is, or maybe the kernels are sliced
off to make Heather’s Snazzy Salsa
or something else equally delicious.  Maybe those kernels are
flash-frozen or canned for consumption some months later.  It still
looks and tastes like corn as we know it, and it’s definitely corn, as
most any 5-year-old can tell you.  Little by little though, we are
moving farther and farther away from the date and place that corn was
picked.

Some of that corn is set aside and completely dried. 
It’s going to be crushed to become corn meal, or flour.  Some of that
corn meal will be made from whole corn kernels, and will retain the
germ and the outer covering.  Some will be “defatted” or “degermed,”
and have its fiber removed.  This process will result in a substantial
decrease in the nutritional value of the corn meal.  In order not to
cause nutritional deficiencies in the large numbers of people who will
consume this kind of corn meal, certain nutrients will be returned in a
process called “enrichment.”  Of course, the corn meal would not have
required enrichment if it had not been stripped in the first place. 
But that’s a conversation for another time.  Anyway, enriched corn meal
is bound, in extraordinarily large quantities, for commercial bakeries, and fast
food and snack food manufacturers all over the globe.  

Corn
meal is used to make corn muffins, corn bread, corn dogs, and other
corn-based products.  An essential ingredient in fast-food
establishments, it is dusted on the top and bottom of hamburger buns to
provide that extra touch of authenticity.  Or something.   And some
corn meal goes to the manufacture of corn chips, which I would venture
to call the mother of all manufactured calories.  Now we have moved pretty far away from the corn that was picked on that long-ago summer day.

[The
whole-grain corn meal, manufactured in comparatively miniscule amounts,
will end up in specialty stores, farmers markets, and the growing
organic food industry.]

Somewhere along the way, an additional
manufacturing stream will be diverted to generate high-fructose corn
syrup, which (since it is much cheaper than sugar) has extraordinary
value as an sweetener in the manufacture of edible products.  Corn syrup solids figure into this equation, too, though I’m not sure where.  I see it frequently on ingredient lists.  I don’t know anyone who keeps a bottle of it in their kitchen.  That’s a sign that we’re no longer in the realm of real food.

So
which products are real food, and which are manufactured calories?  And
which ones should we be eating, and which should we avoid?  

I’m not going to tell you that you can’t eat any corn chips at all.  It’s not like a handful of corn chips is going to
knock out your immune system or anything.  A little bit of enriched
corn meal isn’t going to give you a heart attack, or diabetes.  We can
all handle a little bit of this stuff.  Again, the problem is that
we’re drowning in it.  And that’s a huge problem, really. 

The more processed or manufactured the
item, the more “predigested” it is.  The more predigested, the easier it is to absorb.  And the easier it is to absorb, the more insulin we waste. 

So here are my recommendations: 
Eat more fresh corn and less canned corn.  Not that
canned corn is “bad.”  Just that fresh is better.  Frozen is almost as good, since fresh corn is frozen when it’s relatively newly picked.  Eat more whole-grain
corn meal and less “refined” corn meal.  Or don’t eat any refined corn
meal at all.  Unless of course you’re a guest visiting at someone else’s
house.  I’m a big believer in being
a gracious guest. 

I want everyone to eat
fewer chips and more real corn.  Not because I want you to eat
more corn, but because I want you to eat more real food and less manufactured calories.  Especially corn chips, which have little if any redeeming nutritional value.  Actually, if you need some help
kicking your corn chips habit once and for all, all you have to do is
read David Sedaris’s description of how his mother’s misshapen toenails
resembled the Fritos at the bottom of the bag.  That should do it!
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Even though today is the first of May, I woke up to 40 degrees and rain rain rain.  I’m glad that I went for a very long walk yesterday morning, when the sun was shining.  It’s true that the temperatures yesterday were a bit on the brisk side for the end of April, but I didn’t care.  I loved the sun shining on my face.

Sunshine makes it extra good, but it’s not a must-have when it comes to my walk.  I have a new strategy that I’m calling “get it while the gettin’s good.”  If it’s not pouring out, I’m going for a walk.  I have a raincoat.  I have rainboots.  I have a hat. So from now on I’m keeping my rain gear together, ready to go, hanging on the coat
tree by the door.  Farmers do it; and so can I.  When I was a little girl, we played outside in all kinds of weather.

I remember that when my now 24-year-old daughter was a child, she loved being outside in the rain.  From our living room window, I could see her outside on the driveway, stamping hard, over and over, in the puddles, for the sheer delight of feeling the water rise up around her and catch her inside a fleeting fountain.

I’ve noticed that they don’t cancel baseball games when there’s a threat of rain.  They start on schedule, and they play, and they keep on playing even when the water starts to drip off the fronts of the players’ baseball caps.  It’s only when the water starts to come down in sheets too heavy for the pitcher to see through that they finally call a delay.  A delay is really another way of saying that the field needs to be covered while they wait for the rain to let up enough to get back to it.  So I’ve decided that it’s time to take a page from professional baseball’s rule book.  If it’s not pouring, I’m going for a walk.  Rain makes a beautiful high-pitched rushing sound when you listen for it.

Now here’s the thing.  If the sun is shining, I’m still gonna get it while the gettin’s good.  No waiting ’til later in the afternoon after I’ve written my post.  No more finishing my cup of tea first, and one more row on the scarf I’m knitting.  When I see that the sun is shining, I am outside!  You hafta take advantage of the opportunity
when it comes.  You hafta strike when the iron is hot.  Opportunity favors the prepared.  Yea, all that stuff.  This is northeast Ohio, and the sun is not something to be taken for granted around here.

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Now, to switch topics, a few months ago someone I work with decided to buy some cupcakes and bring them into the office.  Very nice — I think.  I’m sure she had the best intentions.  But this is a good example of the fact that we are going to have to take responsibility for what we put into our mouths, because if we don’t, no one else will.  I grabbed the mind-boggling ingredient list, and have been holding on to it to share with you:

Sugar, water, partially hydrogenated vegetable oil (soybean, palm, cottonseed, or canola), mono & diglycerides, TBHQ (preservative), enriched wheat flour, bleached flour.  Contains 2% or less of high fructose corn syrup, dextrose, glycerin, egg white slids, nonfat milk, soy flour, calcium acetate, sodium probaking powder, sodium pyrophosphate, sodium aluminum phosphate, calcium phosphate, cornstarch, modified food starch (corn, tapioca, wheat), salt, corn flour, propylene glcol, mono & diesters of fatty acids, agar, soy lecithin, polysorbate 60, guar gum, xanthan gum, invert sugar, natural and artificial flavor, maltodextrin, sodium stearoyl lactylate, glycerol esters, sorbic acid, citric acid, sodium benzoate, phosphoric acid, malic acid, microcrystalline cellulose, titanium dioxide, carrageenan, tragacan, hydrated silica, sorbitol, propylene glycol, confectioner’s glaze, cocoa processed with alkali, pectin, turmeric, hydroxyl methylcellulose, chocolate liquor, natural tocopherol, sodium stearate, caramel color, coconut oil, artificial colors (red 1, 3, 40; yellow 5, 6; blue 1,2), corn oil, sorbitan, mono and tristearate, egg yolk.

Holy mackerel, is this for real?!  Yes indeed, that was the actual list.  Have a cupcake?  No thank you, I think I’ll pass today.  Instead, I think I’ll go for a walk, head for the grocery store, and buy the ingredients to make some cupcakes.

I spent this past Thursday morning at the Childhood Obesity Summit sponsored jointly by the Cleveland Clinic and Slate.com.  Lest you think that my sense of urgency about diabetes and obesity is overdone or misplaced, here are a few statistics I learned that might rocket you out of your chair:

Obesity rates in children have tripled in the past 30 years.  Stroke rates in children are up by one-third.  This problem has nothing to do with genetics.  Evolution doesn’t happen that fast.  

Twenty-seven percent of 17-24 year olds are now too heavy to serve in the military, and fully 47% of male and 59% of female military applicants cannot pass the military physical.  

In 15 school districts surrounding greater Cleveland, 8000 students had their BMI’s tested this past year.  BMI stands for body mass index, and you can calculate yours here.  In kindergarten, 26% were in the 85th percentile or higher.  By 5th grade, 40% were in the 85th percentile or higher.  

A child who develops diabetes before age 14 shortens his/her lifespan by 17 to 27 years.  

Meals prepared and/or eaten outside of the home contain at least 134 calories more than meals prepared and eaten at home.  

David Katz MD, Director of the Yale University Prevention Research Center and one of many terrific speakers at the symposium, spoke a message that hit home when he said that we face a terribly difficult obstacle in our attempts to overcome this public health crisis.  The fact is that public health has no face.  I can quote all the statistics I can find, but in the end they are just numbers. 

Dr. Katz urged us to turn the statistics into compelling human stories.  We need to help John Q. Public find a parking spot at the hospital where he is visiting his mother after her stroke, to videotape John Q. picking up his diabetes medications at the pharmacy, to see the look on Jane Q. Public’s face when the pediatrician tells her that her son’s blood sugars have risen into the diabetic range.  It’s time to give “public” a human face.  

I’ve shared in this blog stories about Mrs. Price and many others.  They are not just stories.  They are real.  They are about you and me and the people we love.  We cannot fix this problem without a lot of effort, but fix it we must.  I do know that if we are to survive strong and healthy, then prevention must become the backbone of the American health care system. 

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I’ve been very busy this week getting ready for Passover.  A few days ago I got an email from a neighbor asking if anyone knew where she could find horseradish.  Now, as I’ve written about before, I planted a horseradish root a few years ago.  So I happened to know the answer to her question.

This morning she showed up at 9 a.m. sharp, and soon afterwards another friend showed up with a whole bunch of children in tow.  We dug and dug, and then we dug some more.  When we were done, we had enough horseradish for everybody, plus some fragrant, green onions.

It was such a great way to get ready for the holiday.  Passover is also known as the Festival of Spring, and being in mud up to my knees was a fantastic way to be reminded of that.  When I came inside to write my post, all I could think of was how impossible it would be to eat that horseradish fast.  Not just that, but it would be impossible to eat any meal quickly at which strong, fresh horseradish is served.

Right now the horseradish is soaking in a big tub to get all the mud off.  Tomorrow I’ll scrub it well, and then I’ll place it right in the center of our Seder Plate.

Meanwhile, I came up with 9 more ways to slow down.  It’s one of the most valuable things we can do for ourselves.  Remember what Sue Monk Kidd says about slowing down and appreciating the world around us.

1. Dig it up yourself.
2. Put it in a crock pot.
3. Eat it at a table with your friends.
4. Use a cloth napkin.
5. Invite people over to eat with you.
6. Turn off the television, and the radio, and the computer.
7. Before you pick up your spoon, take a deep breath or say a blessing of thanks.
8. Put down your fork between bites.
9. Eat at a table, and not in a moving vehicle.
10. Chew.

Happy Holidays to all, and best wishes for wonderful meals prepared with care, and enjoyed at leisure surrounded by loved ones.