Recipe For Tonight's Dinner

I was at the grocery store and I needed to buy chicken for dinner. My plan is to make 'Unfried Chicken with Cabbage and Apple Slaw' for two so I've included the recipe below.
The challenge was this however . . . finding non-modified (in some chemical way) chicken to use for my recipe. I finally settled on expensive split breast from Nature's Promise . . . by-passing the Perdue 'oh-so-cheap' antibiotic laden chicken.
While investigating the best chicken to buy I came across this link . . . http://www.eatwild.com/index.html. which will help out with my future shopping.

'Unfried Chicken with Cabbage and Apple Slaw'
Olive oil cooking spray
1 cup breadcrumbs
1 tbsp Dijon mustard
1 tsp chopped fresh parsley
1 tsp chopped fresh sage
1 tsp fresh thyme
1 tbsp kosher salt (I'm using Hawaiian)
1/2 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
1/2 cup buttermilk
2 whole bone-in, skinless chicken breasts, halved
2 tsp honey
2 tsp whole-grain mustard
2 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
2 Gala apples, thinly sliced
2 tsp fresh lemon juice
6 cups shredded napa cabbage
1 celery stalk, chopped

Heat oven to 400 degrees. Place a roasting rack on a baking sheet and coat with cooking spray. Combine breadcrumbs, Dijon mustard, parsley, sage, tyme, Old Bay, salt, pepper and cayenne in a shallow bowl. Pour buttermilk into another shallow bowl. Dip chicken in buttermilk turning to coat. Drain excess and dredge chicken in breadcrumb mixture, pressing gently to help coating to adhere. Transfer chicken to rack. Coat chicken with cooking spray and bake until crispy 30 to 35 minutes. Dressing: Wisk honey with whole grain mustard, oil and vinegars in a bowl. Toss apples with lemon juice in another bowl: add cabbage, celery and dressing; toss to coat. Season with salt and pepper. Chill slaw 20 minutes before serving with chicken.
306 calories per serving

Eat-Right (if it tastes good!)

I found a little blurb in a magazine the other day (SELF) and tried an idea they suggested that was food related. As we already know eating food high in fiber, vitamin D and calcium could decrease your risk for colon cancer (this from a study in The Journal of Nutrition). This is concerning chickpeas. if you've never tasted them they're actually quite yummy. Not chocolate ice cream yummy (!) but still very good. So munching on chickpeas could make you a better eater (this according to a study in Appetite.
People who added about 1/2 cup garbanzo beans to their diet daily ate fewer high-fat, low-fiber foods overall. And once participants stopped popping beans they were more apt to snack. Chickpeas offer about 6 grams of filling protein and 5g fiber per 1/2 cup.
This is where is gets interesting . . . add to pasta sauce rather than meat. I have to say it was remarkably good when I tried it. Yum!

This particular weekend is all about pineapple for me. That's a statement for sure because really, truly how important is pineapple in the scheme of things. But yesterday I took someone who had never eaten Thai food to a local restaurant called the Mint Cafe in Norwood, MA. My friends diet consists to a large percentage of pizza and fast convenience foods and he was very experimental . . . ordering a spicy Beef Panang while I order a seriously yummy Yellow Curry with Pineapple (see the pineapple relevance!)
He enjoyed it very much. I can't say that he loved it . . . this meal was so far outside his comfort zone that I was highly impressed with the fact that he DID like it enough to bring the leftovers home.
My feelings . . . score one for ethnic food vs. pizza.

Because of my classes I've been doing a lot of scary reading . . . basically the kind that wakes me up at night. Not because I'm having a nightmare but because it's so much information to process my mind is racing through the night . . . even in my dreams.
Four companies process more than 85% of U.S. beef cattle. Two companies sell 50% of U.S. corn seed. One company controls 40% of the U.S. milk supply. There is a petition to help break these monopolies. Go to Food & Water Watch www.action.foodandwaterwatch.org

Wishing I could change the world . . . one less twinkie eaten at a time.

So apparently I the other day had a teeny-tiny influence on two separate people concerning their food choices. Little decisions that make me strangely happy.
The first example was a matter of waffling over two brands of Mac n'Cheese for kids. The first was Annie's . . . you know the way this plays out, dual pouches of noodles and yellow cheese powder cooked in the microwave. It was this product which has minimal ingredients and no genetically modified additives VS. Kraft Mac n'Cheese that comes in one little dish and a sort of sticky noodle. Needless to say the list of 'added' chemicals is long on the Kraft package! I was able to influence the mom who was choosing between these products the value and taste quality of the Annie's Mac. Phew . . . chemically enhanced mac n'cheese disaster averted :)
The other example was a direct result of how verbal (and horrified) I've been about deconstructing the contents of labels on packaging. A friend of my subconsciously (and for the first time ever) read the back of the mustard he was about to purchase . . . and passed it up because it contained an additive he didn't want to have in his body. Ahhhhhh, it was a good day for being 'label conscious.'

Why I'm doing what I'm doing.

This is a forum for me to vent, rant and share my 'journey' through the discoveries I make in nutrional information. I want to post about the things that strike me in all things concerning our bodies and their wellbeing as I become a Nutritional Health Coach.