Gluten Free All Purpose Flour

Photo by Life as a Healthy Mom

I am new to this whole experience of being gluten-free, so prepping my kitchen to be a fully gluten-free zone has been quite the experience.  I am a baker.....I always have been, and I always will be; so the thought of converting from wheat flour to flours with names such as tapioca flour, sweet sorghum flour, brown rice flour kind of overwhelmed me at first. 

But alas, I found out there are many blogs on the web and books at the library with recipes using different mixtures of flours you combine to make an all-purpose mix.  The one recipe I have found success with in baking items such as cakes, muffins, pies, and cookies was found in the book, "Gluten Free Baking Classics" by Annalise G Roberts. So far, I have made chocolate chip cookies and cinnamon muffins with great success.  She also has recipes for bread making, but I haven't tackled that area yet. 

In her book, Annalise has measurements depending on how much flour you need.  I make a large batch of it, so I don't have to mix all the flours together each time I have the urge to bake. 

Photo by Life as a Healthy Mom

Here is Annalise's recipe:

6 cups brown rice flour (finely ground)
2 cups potato starch
1 cup tapioca flour

Mix all the ingredients together.  Store in an airtight container. Shake well before each use.

Enjoy!

Tips for Container Gardening Newbies



I am not a master gardener.............and I don't claim to be one.  I am a stay at home mom, who lives in suburbia, wants to begin growing her own food, and wants to teach her children that real food does not come from a grocery store shelf.  These suggestions are experiences that I have learned about gardening in containers over the past couple of years.



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This year, the plants in my containers have provided our family with quite the harvest, as you can see from this picture; and it's only the beginning of July!  I have been container gardening for a few years now....if you call the first year gardening.  I do, but expert gardeners may think otherwise; but I will get to the details later. 

Container gardener is all the rage now because people are looking to grow their own food but not wanting to dedicate space (or have space) for a full garden....and it couldn't be easier than popping a couple of plants in soil and watching them grow, right?  WRONG!  Expert gardeners make it look so easy.  I learned the hard way, and I want to share with you my struggles in starting my gardening adventures, so you won't have all the trials and tribulations I had.

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I container garden because our backyard pretty much sits on a rock shelf, and over the years the dirt has eroded away to expose the rock underneath.  Let me tell you, it is NOT a pretty sight. How weeds grow where grass and other plants don't is beyond my understanding!  And yes, I am one of those people who can and HAVE killed a cactus..........just sayin!


Now, I have containers dispersed throughout my backyard yielding delicious, nutritious, organic food.  Years ago, my husband built a deck over the sewer inlet to prevent our then toddlers from exploring and falling down that said sewer.  After years of the deck being used for playhouses and such, it lay barren; so I bought 9 of the same, square containers (did I also say that I bit OCD with organization?), and deck has now become my container garden oasis. 

Tip # 1:  Start Small

Depending on how many containers you have and how much you want to spend on buying other containers is totally up to you.  If you are new to gardening, I would suggest start small.  Pick a few of your favorites and easy to grow.....strawberries, lettuces, herbs, tomatoes, green peppers, or zucchini are all easy to grow. 

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Tip #2:  Fill the Container with Good Soil

I learned this tip shortly after starting my container garden.  I spent so much on the containers themselves, that I didn't want to spend too much money on the soil....and I bought a cheap top soil. That was definitely a blonde moment! 
I learned later that top soil for a garden in the ground is fine, but soil in containers need to be well aerated, well drained, and be able to retain enough moisture for the plant to thrive. My plants did not do well that first year.  Think about it..............if you eat the vegetables and fruits from your garden that came from bad soil with no nutrients, what are you getting when you eat that produce.....less that stellar nutrient dense food.

Today, at the beginning of the growing season, I take all the soil out of the containers, add more soil and compost to amend the soil.  I began composting during the same year that I began my container garden, so now I have access to rich, organic matter to help benefit my plants as they grow.  You can also purchase compost from local garden centers.  Again, when I began the container garden, I was too cheap to even buy the compost in a bag.  Lesson learned.

Tip #3: Be Sure to Give Your Plants Enough Water

I water my plants everyday, mostly in the morning.  Plants in containers tend to dry out faster because once the summer heat hits the containers, the water evaporates.  Be consistent with your watering.  During my first year, I did not dedicate every day to watering.  BIG MISTAKE!

Our tomatoes began showing black spots on the bottom.  I found out they had blossom end rot. If the tomato plants loses it's ability to absorb enough calcium for proper development, blossom rot occurs.  There are several factors that can cause blossom end rot, and one of them is fluctuations in soil moisture.  I am sure the depletion of nutrients in my topsoil didn't help either!  Needless to say, we did not get to enjoy the taste of a vine riped tomato from our garden that year.

A couple of years of ago, we went on vacation mid summer, and I handed the reins, or in my case the hose, to a neighborhood girl for a summer job.  It didn't help that during the week we were gone, the heat index was in the triple digits.  Add me not explaining fully how much water the containers truly needed and that is a recipe for disaster.  We came back from vacation to find all the plants in dire straits, and our growing season was cut short. 

Now, I water each container with a gallon of water daily.  They are doing well, even with the record-breaking temperatures we have experienced in the Midwest.   

Tip #4:  Don't Let Your Plants Drown

Plants need water, but they also need good drainage.  If the root system of the plants get waterlogged, they start to rot and then literally drown, which is what happened in my case.  I was so excited to bring my new containers home to begin planting my seeds that I filled them with the soil and forgot to poke a hole in the bottom of it for drainage.  Well, the first good, spring rain reminded me of my mistake....I had 9 mini container ponds on the deck!

After the downpour, my containers were overflowing with water, and my seedlings were drowning.  My husband drained as much water off the containers that he could by tipping the containers over as much as to not empty the soil that now looked like sludge.  Once most of the water was removed, he drilled holes in the bottom of each container.  I replanted the seeds after allowing the containers to drain and the soil to dry out for a few days.   

I still have the same containers, so I haven't experienced any waterlogged plants.  Another tip:  before you put your soil in, be sure to put a screen in the bottom to prevent your soil from falling through the drainage holes.  I have heard than some people put coffee filters in the bottom on the containers.

Tip # 5:  Plant in Season


Certain plants need to be planted during certain times of the year.  Have you ever heard of "eating in season"?  That means you are choosing to eat food during the time they are grown.  For example, tomatoes and peppers in summer, asparagus and greens in spring, root vegetables in fall. 

Gardenate has a great website to tell you what to plant in your garden based on your climate zone.  The site also allows you to click on each month to see what plants. You can also check with your local cooperative extension office website for other information, such as the hardiness zone your area is in.  

Tip #6: Know your Enemies

Plants have friends....and enemies in the bug world. Again, we learned of these little culprits during our second year of gardening. I came out to check on the cherry tomato plants on the patio to find small, black poop that resembled mini hand grenades all over the leaves of the plants. WHAT IN THE WORLD IS THIS?

I ran to my computer to look up what this could be. I literally googled, "poop that looks like hand grenades on plants" and information about tomato hornworms popped up. Isn't the Internet wonderful? I found out the Tomato Hornworm is the larval stage of hawk or sphinx moth, and they are voracious eaters...munching entire leaves, small stems, and even parts of immature fruit. Upon further inspection of the plants, we found a quarter of the plant's leaves were eaten, and many of the tomatoes that had formed on the plant. I was not happy!

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The next step was to look for the hornworm on the plant. Ewwww! They camouflage themselves VERY well on the underside of the leaves of the plant, so it took my husband and I some time to find it. When we found it, we were shocked at how big it was.  The hornworm in the above picture is attached to the stem on the underside of the leaf that my husband is holding.  If the excrement gave any indication of the worm, we were not dealing with a mini caterpillar...it was 4 inches long and fat, probably from eating all my leaves and tomatoes! All in all, we found a couple more hornworms throughout our growing season and removed them promptly by squishing them. My husband did the squishing, not me. I read that you can also dispose of them by putting them in a bowl of soapy water or throw them near the bird feeder as a treat to the birds. We also learned if you see a hornworm covered with white egg sacs, leave it be. The egg sacs are those of a parasitic wasp called the Braconid wasp. Let the eggs hatch, and you'll have an army of wasps ready to defend your garden against all types of pests. Nature is so cool!

Our next insect infestation was squash bugs on our zucchini plants, during the same summer as the war of the hornworms. Again, I thought nature would take it's course and all the plants would be protected by beneficial bugs overtaking the bad bugs....then I took my rose colored glasses off! One morning, I was doing my daily rounds on the garden deck to find the leaves of the zucchini plants were turning brown....and there were ugly bugs all over it. I went to the Internet again to find out these flat, brown bugs were aptly named, squash bugs. These vampires of the bug world suck the juices out of the vines causing them to wilt and die....and wilt and die they did. 

Since I am a bit squeamish about bugs, as you can tell from the hornworm incident, my wonderful husband began picking them off the plants and putting them in a bowl of soapy water. But we didn't get to them fast enough. Within a couple of days, our zucchini plants died.

Squash Bugs-- 1 Humans--0.

This year I was ready for them. Each morning, I checked the underside of each leaf to look for little yellow eggs, and I SQUASHED them (with gloves on).  No eggs, no squash bugs. I learned that if you kills the eggs, the plant will be strong enough to combat these bugs later in summer if some squash bugs find it. This year has been a good year for our zucchinis, and we have already harvested 4 zucchini and more are beginning to grow.

Tip #7 Plants have Friends too!

Have you heard of companion planting? I didn't either until I began my container gardening. Apparently, certain plants help each other to prevent pests or diseases. Just as a person what to be around friends, plants want the same.  Since I choose not to use chemical warfare on my plants and choose to go the organic route, I elected to companion plant. Seeds of Change has a wonderful chart to show which plants show be planted together and the effects the plants have by doing this.

I have marigolds surrounding the cherry tomatoes, green bell peppers near the other tomatoes, lettuce near the strawberries, and so on and so forth.

And Finally..............Sometimes Mother Nature Provides You With a Surprise!

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Since we have been composting, we put all of our veggie food scraps into the compost.  Once day my husband comments that something was GROWING in the compost.  Upon further investigation, we found this 6 pound cantaloupe growing. 

This plant must has sprouted from the seeds and pulp I threw into the compost while cleaning out a cantaloupe that I bought at the market. We couldn't wait to slice into this wonderful find.  My husband cut it off the vine and we brought it into the house, only to cut it open and find it had not ripened.  We found out later that if you have to cut the fruit from the vine, it isn't ripe; if ripe, the fruit will fall off the vine.  Again, lesson learned.  Even though we didn't get to eat the cantaloupe, we are amazed as what nature can do and the surprises it provides.

So there you have it.......................Hopefully, this information has help you so you don't have many bad experiences as we have in starting our gardening adventures.  Although we are planning on redoing some of our landscaping to help with the rock issue, hopefully adding some raised garden beds, I will continue to container garden.  Happy Gardening!

Homemade Hummus

 

Photo by Life as a Healthy Mom

I used to buy hummus in the grocery store.....used to.  I would throw the tub into my cart with no thought as to what ingredients were in it.  So to look at an ingredient list of processed hummus now, it makes me glad I have changed my ways--items such as natural flavor (MSG anyone?), potassium sorbate, soybean oil (I am sure it is not GMO free), and seasonings are the ingredients.  Add chickpeas and tahini to the mix, and that was what is in the popular brand I bought.

Now I realize how easy it is to make it at home, and delicious!  If you have a food processor or blender, you are good to go.  Hummus has become a staple in our household....it's an easy snack for the kids to dip carrot sticks, cucumbers, or red pepper stick in.  Whenever my daughter eats it, she always says, "hummus, hummus, hummus.....hummus is goooood!" 

You can make this with either canned or home cooked chickpeas. If you’re using canned, I recommend using organic beans. 

Homemade Hummus

2 cups chickpeas
6-7 garlic cloves, roasted
1 tbsp tahini
1/3 cup olive oil
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp lemon juice
1/4 tsp cumin
5 Tbsp water

Add all the ingredients into the food processor or blender.  Blend until smooth. 

Enjoy!

Coping with My Child's Anxiety

I am a pretty organized person when it comes to being prepared, but this time I admit.............I failed.  We were leaving to attend a wedding in Tennessee in one day, and I had a child on my hands who was experiencing great anxiety about the trip. 

Frankly, my daughter likes to sleep in her own bed.  Not a bed in a hotel....not a bed at Grandma and Grandpa's house.....her bed.  Period.  She is even a bit apprehensive spending the night at friend's houses now even though they tend to stay up all night.  It has been the past couple years that we have been experiencing this type of anxiety.  We used to go on many trips to the lake, with no problems whatsoever.  Now, we hardly go on trips because we know there will be alot of crying and sadness in her heart.  We had an instance when she was supposed to spend the night at my husband's parents house, only to have her grandma return with her, suitcase in hand, by the end of the evening......because my daughter began crying and wanted to go home.  And bless her heart, Grandma tried everything to convince her to stay! 

Truthfully, my husband nor I understand why she would be feeling this way, but I compare it to a child being afraid of thunderstorms, or dogs, or anything else for that matter.  I reminded him that he was deathly afraid of thunderstorms when he was a child; to the point of his father having to come pick him up from school because he was so upset.  There is no explanation for the feeling of fear, and it only rears it's ugly head when the situation is there.  If it was a feeling that effected my child's functioning on a day to day basis, I would be consulting our pediatrician for guidance. 

So, here I was thinking  (one day BEFORE the trip mind you) that we had to do something to help her.  I called my friend, Lori, who uses alot of alternative remedies for her children.  She said she  uses Native Remedies Triple Complex Calm Tonic for herself,  but wasn't sure if it was safe for children.  So she suggested Bach's Rescue Remedy.  And ironically, Dr. Oz mentioned the Bach's Rescue Remedy on his show this week for anxiety because his family uses it. I normally order all my health products online, but I didn't have that kind of time, so I called our local health food store to check to see if they had it in stock.......and they did.

I decided to purchase the kid's formula because it did not contain alcohol (thank you Lori for mentioning to me to look for this).  When I got home from the store, I explained to my daughter that we were taking this with us on our trip, and if she felt that feeling she gets that makes her start to cry and want to go home, to let me know.  I was a bit afraid that she would ask for it when she really didn't need it, but upon the first dose, she said it tasted a bit like cough medicine so I knew she wouldn't just say she was feeling sad just to get the medicine.

Within the first few hours of the road trip, we stopped for a bite to eat, and we were faced with her first crying spell. She felt nauseous, wouldn't eat, and said she wanted to go home.  I suggested she take the drops, and she said okay.  I then suggested she get something in her tummy, and she did.  Within about an hour, she said "I feel so much better.  I think those drops are working." Not sure if it was a placebo effect, but I'll take it.  The trip to the hotel after that was uneventful.  We ended up using the drops a few times on our two day trip when her sadness was becoming to much for her to handle, and it seemed to do the trick in curbing her anxiety.   

I admit...our family's lifestyle has changed to a healthier lifestyle in terms of the food we eat and the cleaners we use;  I have even dabbled in natural remedies with positive results and began seeing a holistic doctor, but we hadn't jumped in feet first in terms of exclusively using homeopathic remedies to treat all common ailments. My children hardly get sick, have no allergies that warrant OTC medication for relief, so they rarely are given any medication anyway; this kind of change has been on the backburner for some time.  We have been using Montana Arnica as a pain reliever for my daughter's braces after my daughter experienced a  horrendous side effect from Children's Tylenol (that is another story in itself).  After these two episodes in a year span, I have truly become serious in preparing a homeopathic first aid kit so I am prepared with what lies ahead.  

And, we are planning a lake trip in a few weeks, so you better believe this little bottle will be packed in the suitcase........just in case.

   

Meet Lisa

Hello. My name is Lisa and I live in Missouri with my husband of 18 years. We have two children, ages 11 and 13. I became interested in living a more mindful life after I began my research on trying to improve my health. I say "mindful" because I feel I was on auto-pilot and wasn't aware that the choices I was making for myself and my family could be harming us and the environment. So I changed my ways...and changed them in a big way!

By taking baby steps, I was able to introduce a healthier way of living, and it now has become part of everyday living. I started this blog because many of my friends were asking me about different things regarding their health and about how to live a healthier life. They didn't want to abandoning their current lifestyle, but they knew some of the choices they made were not friendly to the health or the environment.

I hope you enjoy reading Life as a Healthy Mom and hope you find the resources you need to make the change.

It's All About the Compost

It's All About the Compost!

I grew up as a suburbanite: living in a subdivision where house upon house was connected by the chain link fences lining the backyards. As an adult, I am still living life as a suburbanite, but now I live in a subdivision where the houses are spaced a bit wider apart, and trees separate the backyards; so every time you walk outside you are not coming face to face with your neighbor. And tucked right behind our fence, is my beloved composter. Actually I have two; one is a bin that my husband, Todd, lovingly built me for Mother's day one year, and the other is a turnable one that he bought me for this Mother's Day. Most women would not think a composter as a Mother's Day gift is considered a gesture of love; but I did, and I was ecstatic!!!

I didn't have my first contact with compost until I was a teenager, and began dating my husband. One day during the summer, we went to visit his grandparents. They had property up on a hill that had a huge garden. Although they are both gone now, I can still remember the blue overalls Grandpa would wear. When we arrived that day, we made our way up to the garden to where Grandpa was standing. He began talking about how the sheep manure was done (whatever that meant) and ready for the garden! And then he did the unthinkable......he grabbed a handful of this brown soil-like stuff from the pile, shoved it under my nose, and said, "smell it, it doesn't smell like anything!" Well, being a girl that thought gardens were only on farms, having a handful of sheep manure shoved under my nose is not what I called fun. Why would anyone want to smell decomposed animal droppings was beyond me!!! But respecting my elders and saying a little prayer, I took a little sniff. And you know, he was right. It didn't smell. My husband still talks about the look on my face the moment composted manure was put under my nose!

Not only did Grandpa use sheep manure to feed his gardens, he also had a worm bin that he dumped his morning coffee grounds in each morning. I am sure somewhere near the garden was a pile of scraps that was decomposing nicely under the summer sun. Fast forwarding to today, I began to really think about how many pounds of fruit and vegetable peelings, coffee grounds, egg shells, and anything else I was throwing away in a day could be composted. I decided to make my own science experiment. For an entire month, I weighed the scraps to see how much I would accumulate over a month. When the month was over, I added my daily totals, and to my surprise and excitement, the total came to 50 pounds! Yes, 50 pounds of scraps a month was the total just our family threw away that could be composted. Then I did the math; if just our subdivision composted their scraps, it averaged over 5,000 pounds in a month! If even a quarter of the American households composted, just think how many pounds of wastes we could prevent from going into a landfill while at the same time using this wonderful material to enrich our soils.

Composting is basically nature's process of recycling organic material, and the resulting rich brown soil can be used to add nutrients back into the earth. There are many ways you can compost. Some people just have a pile in the corner of their garden or backyard. If your interested in a slightly neater appearance, you can purchase a compost bin or make one yourself. Many people use worm bins to compost. Now once you decide what type of compost method you will use, you will need to make sure there is an equal amount of nitrogen and carbon. Nitrogen comes from the "green" material: grass clippings, coffee grounds, fruit and veggie peelings, tea bags, crushed egg shells, and such. Carbon comes from "brown" sources: dried leaves, straw, dried grasses, or wood ash from untreated wood (but not too much). Things you need to avoid at all cost in putting in your compost are weeds that have gone to seed, dog or cat feces (which can carry parasite diseases), pesticides, fats, oils, grease, and any bones or meat scraps coming from an animal.

So start saving those scraps from the kitchen, and begin enriching our Earth. You can check with your local Department of Natural Resources for more information to get you started on having your own nature's recycling plant right in your own backyard.

Almond Meal

Photo by Life as a Healthy Mom

Each time I make almond milk, I make almond meal.   It is the final step of "milking the almonds" as my husband says.  How is  almond meal and almond flour different?  Almond meal tends to have the skins of the almond intact and has a coarser grind than almond flour does. 

I freeze the almond meal after I make it, so it doesn't go rancid, and there are many uses for it. 

You can:

• add it as a filler in meatloaf
• use it as a coating to baked chicken
• substitute it for flour in muffins and other baked goods, such as cookies
• add it into my morning smoothie for a touch of nutty flavor
• add it to my morning oatmeal
• add it to soups and stews to thicken it
• sprinkle it over yogurt and fresh cut fruit

See my post about how to make almond milk.  You will be making the almond meal from the almond mush left over. 

1.  Scoop the almond mush out of the strainer and spread it onto
     the fruit roll up tray of the dehydrator.

2.  Set the dehydrator setting to the nut setting.

3.  Dehydrate overnight or 10-12 hours. 

4.  After the almonds are dried, process it in a food processor until 
     fine.

If you do not have a dehydrator, you can spread the almond mush on a baking sheet and dehydrate it in the oven at the lowest setting (with the oven door ajar) until the almonds are dry.   

There you have it.  Easy peasy lemon squeezy (as my son would say).