Healthy Habits: Roasted Garlic & Tomatoes

If you haven't tried a tomato plant in your container garden because you don't know what to do with that many tomatoes, here ya go. If you have an opportunity to purchase a case inexpensively from a local Farmers Market or they go on sale at the grocery store...stock up! Roasting them is easy, and fresh roasted tomatoes add incredible flavor to everything. A case of tomatoes does not last very long if you take a few to make fun, personal caprese salad, a few for homemade stewed tomatoes, a sheet of roasted tomato halves with basil and mozzarella cheese, and a sheet of roasted tomatoes for homemade pasta sauce. Oh yeah, don't forget to hold out a few for a couple different homemade salsas.


How to roast tomatoes...

What you need:

Tomatoes

Olive Oil

Salt

Pepper

Technique:

Core the tomatoes with a paring knife

Set them on baking tray (it's ok if they're touching)

If any is so lopsided that it won't sit straight, cut a very thin slice off the bottom (I rarely have to do this)

Drizzle olive oil over the tomatoes (it's ok if it collects in the holes)

Sprinkle with salt and pepper

Place in 400 degree (F) oven for 30-45 min. (depending on size of tomatoes and intensity of your oven)

Tomatoes will be very soft, slightly wilted and slightly browned on top when done.

Now, you're ready to cook with roasted tomatoes. Check back for homemade pasta sauce with your roasted tomatoes.

Many savory recipes start with garlic and onions. Using roasted garlic adds the kick of flavor that you can't put your finger on. It is the difference in taste of a typical homemade recipe and the same thing from a gourmet restaurant. And if you like garlic bread, you will flip when you have it homemade with your own roasted garlic.

Roasted Garlic...
What you need:
Whole Garlic Heads
Oilve Oil
Aluminum Foil


Technique:
With a sharp knife, cut the top off each head of garlic, leaving it sitting on the root end.
Set the garlic on a piece of foil. (I usually roast 4-6 at a time)
Drizzle a little olive oil over the garlic.

Wrap foil up around garlic, pinching tightly at the top.
Put it in a 400* (F) oven for 30-45 minutes. (You can set it on the tray with tomatoes if you are doing them at the same time. 

This is what it looks like after roasting it...soft and smelling like garlic heaven!

Pick up a whole head. Grab it at the base and gently (but firmly) squeeze the cloves out.

Keep squeezing until you get all the garlic out. Oh, it smells so good!!

It is now ready to use.
For Homemade Garlic Bread, just mush this up with a fork and then spread with a knife on your french bread (over the butter you have spread on the bread first).
For cooking, just add it to your recipe just like you would raw garlic.
I typically roast 4-6 heads at a time, depending on what I plan to cook over the next week. If I use one head that day, I wrap the rest of them back into the foil and just keep it in the fridge to use each day.


What recipe have you tried that you just can't seem to get to taste the same as it does at the restaurant?

Healthy Habits: Citrus Technique

In Arizona, winter months bring an abundance of oranges, tangerines, grapefruits and tangelos. I love to eat these sweet, juicy fruits. But honestly, before I started preparing them this way I didn't eat them very often. I just didn't like how long it takes to peel them and get them ready to eat. Since I've started preparing them this way, I eat them daily during the winter months when they are fresh and local.

Once you get the hang of this, it is such an easy way to pre-cut citrus. I do it once for the whole week. It doesn't take long to turn a whole bag of oranges and grapefruit into a big bowl of cut up citrus wedges and juice. In fact, it takes me less than 60 seconds to peel and cut one fruit. And if you think you don't like grapefruit, try PINK grapefruit, it's sweet. I even cut up "not sweet" grapefruit into my bowl, because it mixes with the sweet oranges and actually ends up tasting sweeter. When the juices mix, it makes an incredibly tasty citrus juice that doesn't taste exactly like orange or grapefruit  juice.

All you need is a bag of citrus fruit; any combination will work. The greater mix of fruit, the better it tastes.

We'll use a grapefruit for our example. Place it in the middle of your cutting board.

Turn it on it's side and cut both ends off. Cut so you are all the way into the fruit. You want a flat surface of fruit, not rind. You will have some fruit in the ends that you cut off. Before throwing the two ends away, squeeze the juice out of them into your bowl. (You will be amazed how much juice is in the ends!)

Now lay the fruit on one of the flat sides. Cut a section of rind off from top to bottom. Turn the fruit slightly and cut the next section off. Keep turning and cutting until you work all the way around the fruit.

Cut the fruit in half and lay the two halves out. Now just slice segments off as thick as you would like. (After cutting several slices I turn it on it's side and slice the center white off)

Once the fruit is sliced into segments just pick up the cutting board and slide the fruit (and any juice that has collected on the board) into your bowl (or square as the case may be). 

Now I have a huge bowl of mixed fruit and lots of juice to eat all week long. In the morning I will use a one cup measuring cup to put a big scoop of fruit and juice into my bowl. With a couple slices of whole grain bread you have a quick, healthy and tasty breakfast. Add a little nut butter to the toast for extra protein if you're feeling extra hungry.


Question: Do you eat fruit for breakfast? Using this technique will you eat more citrus?

Why Do They Keep Saying I Need To Exercise?

Seems like every time we turn around we're being told we need to exercise more. Do you ever think, "Why? What's in it for me?"

Here is a list of 15 reasons to exercise regularly. It is definitely not all inclusive. Is there anything on the list that surprises you-maybe #5, #12 or #15?

1) Exercise reverses detrimental effects of stress.

**Just 20 minutes of exercise can erase the negative effects of stress. Physical activity helps to release stress and helps you handle stress better.  Stress will manifest itself one way or the other. Either you use it as energy to exercise or the stress finds a place to settle internally and will eventually cause dis-ease.

2) Exercise helps burn more calories by keeping your metabolism up.

**When we exercise, our bodies require more energy and our metabolism speeds up to supply that energy. Cardio exercise speeds up your metabolism for several hours after your workout. Exercise also teaches the body how to produce more energy, making it more efficient at burning fat.

3) Exercise helps you fall asleep and get better quality sleep.

**A daily dose of exercise can deepen your sleep and shorten the time it takes to drift off. If you find that exercising late in the day makes you unable to sleep it's because exercise causes an increase in your body's energy. Try exercising earlier in the day.

4) Exercise helps you think better and faster and improves learning ability.

**The same blood that is pumping sluggishly through your body is moving through your brain as well. Cardio activities provide the biggest brain boost. Complicated activities also improve our capacity to learn by enhancing our attention and concentration skills, according to german researchers who found that high school students scored better on high-attention tasks after doing 10 minutes of a complicated fitness routine compared to 10 minutes of regular activity. Those who hadn't exercised at all scored the worst.

5) Exercise slows the aging process and helps you live longer and better.

**According to a study from the University of California at San Fransisco, stressed-out women who exercised vigorously for an average of 45 minutes over a three-day period had cells that showed fewer signs of aging compared to women who were stressed and not active. Studies have shown that regular exercise can actually add years to your life, whether you start exercising at 15 or 50.

6) Exercise makes you feel better/lifts depression.

**Studies show burning off 350 calories three times a week through sustained, sweat-inducing activity can reduce symptoms of depression about as effectively as anti-depressants.Studies show that exercise increases feelings of energy and lessens feelings of fatigue. Being fit includes keeping your muscles, bones, and joints as active and healthy as possible.

7) Exercise can prevent or decrease the effects of heart disease and stroke.

** Daily physical activity can help prevent heart disease and stroke by strengthening your heart muscle, lowering your blood pressure, raising your high-density lipoprotein levels (good cholesterol) and lowering low-density lipoprotein (bad cholesterol), improving blood flow, and increasing your heart's working capacity.

8) Exercise can prevent or cure noninsulin-dependent diabetes.

**By reducing body fat, physical activity can help to prevent and control this type of diabetes.

9) Exercise can prevent or cure obesity.

**Physical activity helps to reduce body fat by building or preserving muscles mass and improving the body's ability to use calories. Exercise alone is not enough to control weight, however when combined with proper nutrition, it can help control weight and prevent obesity. When you exercise regularly, your body burns more calories even when you're resting. Being active may also lower your percentage of body fat and increase muscle strength and tone.

10) Exercise can prevent or greatly reduce back pain.

**By increasing muscle strength and endurance and improving flexibility and posture and helping improve balance and coordination, regular exercise helps to prevent back pain or hasten it's departure.

11) Exercise can prevent or help osteoporosis.

** Regular weight-bearing exercise promotes bone formation and may prevent many forms of bone loss associated with aging.

12) Exercise reduces the risk for memory loss.

**Research has found an association between increased exercise and lower rate of functional decline in older adults. Aerobic exercise improves reaction time, perception and math skills. Exercise for 60 minutes a week  improves the physical and emotional well-being of patients who already have Alzheimer's disease.

13) Exercise reduces the risk of certain cancers.

**A direct association exists between higher levels of physical activity and lower cancer death rates; there's also a strong relationship between increased physical activity and reduced colon cancer and lower rates of prostate cancer. Physical activity after a cancer diagnosis can aid recovery and improve outcomes.

14) Exercise lowers your risk of catching a cold.

**Women ages 50 to 75 who did 45 minutes of cardio, 5 days a week, had a third as many colds as those who did once-weekly stretching sessions, a University of Washington study found.

15) Exercise improves your vision.

**An active lifestyle can cut your risk of age-related macular degeneration by up to 70%, according to a British Journal of Ophthalmology study of 4,000 adults. This incurable disease makes reading, driving and seeing fine details difficult, and its the most common cause of blindness after age 60.

And here's a bonus...

16) Exercise improves your vocabulary.

**Exercisers who ran just two 3-minute sprints, with a 2-minute break in between, learned new words 20% faster than those who rested. (University of Muenster in Germany study)

I suspect you already knew many of the benefits listed here. Were any of them surprising to you? Which benefits are most motivating to you? Is #5 enough to make you exercise more frequently?