Reflecting on My Health & Diet in 2012

I can't believe it's already a new year! 2012 seemed to go by so quickly. I spent the first half of the year totally focused on my trip, fundraising, shopping, daydreaming, you name it. After I got back from Europe and had finally accepted the fact that I live in America and not a beautiful city in the Mediterranean, I began to spend most of my free time researching nutrition and plant-based diets. Up until this summer, I was still eating Oreos, Ritz Crackers, and all junk food that can technically be classified as "vegan". I had never heard of seitan and spinach was my least favorite food (which is a shock, considering I eat it at least two times a day now). There were a few things this summer that sparked my desire to try a true plant-based diet. While I was overseas, I do remember the food being one of the most fascinating aspects of the trip. Everything we ate was so pure, whole, organic. I had always hated tomatoes, but in Greece and Italy the tomatoes tasted like an entirely different food. And so did the cucumbers, potatoes, peppers, apricots, cherries, plums... When I got home, I knew I had to find those flavors again and that was when I discovered I can get equally delicious fruits and vegetables at farmer's markets and farm stands. All of these exciting new ingredients challenged and inspired me to eat differently.

 

Another reason I started a plant-based diet was to get my health in order. Rewind back about a month or two before my trip. I was finishing up all final preparations to travel (I had my suitcase packed weeks ahead of time of course) when, in a matter of days, my entire body broke out in an awful rash. It didn't itch or hurt or anything, it was just there, and it was the most traumatic thing I could imagine as I was preparing to leave for three weeks on a trip where I had hoped I could truly be myself and make new friends. I rushed to a dermatologist who said I had developed psoriasis as a reaction to the Remicade I was on for Crohn's disease (which is awfully ironic, considering Remicade is often used to treat psoriasis). He prescribed some lotions which certainly reduced the patches, but it became a battle of chasing the psoriasis around my body, as it would come and go in spots but never truly go away. I had the most difficulty treating it on my scalp, and I began losing hair - lots of hair; eventually, I couldn't even go out in public without wearing a bandana or spending an hour trying to cover each bald patch with bobby pins. Anyway, this summer, as I dealt with the realization that I had been diagnosed with a second chronic auto-immune disease, I knew it was time for me to do something on my own.

My dermatologist and my GI doctor didn't get along. He wanted me to go off the Remicade, she didn't. My Crohn's had been in remission for two years, ever since I started the medication (also when I originally went vegan..hmm), so I definitely understood her viewpoint; but it was making me go bald, and as a fifteen year old girl I knew I couldn't stay on it. So that was when I started really getting interested in health, nutrition, and various diets. I watched about a billion health documentaries on NetFlix, dabbled in macrobiotics and gluten-free, and finally decided on a plant-based diet: vegetables, fruits, whole grains, beans, nuts, seeds, and healthy fats. Originally I had thought this diet would restrict my food choices even further, and I suppose it technically has, but it doesn't bother me at all because I no longer consider the things I don't eat as food. To me, animal products are not food - they are a sentient being's flesh, they are products belonging to the creatures who created them, they are not my food. Processed and artificial substances are not food - they look like food, they taste like food, but they are not food. This change made me fall in love with the vegan lifestyle all over again. Cooking became my favorite hobby and I even started a food blog to share my thoughts and recipes. :-)

After a few months of eating whole plant foods and feeling like an entirely new person, I had a endoscopy/colonoscopy, and my GI doctor said that my colon was basically as healthy as a colon could be for a Crohn's patient. She gave me her full permission to stop using Remicade (at that point I had actually not had a Remicade infusion for about four months, so it was pretty much completely out of my body). For the first time since I was ten, I was finally able to go off Crohn's medications. It has been so liberating. But at the same time, it's terrifying, knowing that if I ever mess up my diet significantly enough, I could send my body into a flare up. Since then, I have been working so hard to make sure I eat well, and my diet is improving every day. My psoriasis has been gradually improving too; around Christmas, I noticed that I could wear my hair loose without having any bald patches show for the first time since summer (which was odd since only a few weeks before, the hair loss seemed to be at it's worst). I only have a few patches now, and they are so minimal that I hardly notice them. I don't know if my psoriasis will ever go away completely, but I hope that as I continue to eat better food and improve my lifestyle, my symptoms will continue to diminish. Through these experiences over the past year, I've learned to willingly accept the challenges life presents me, and instead of letting them build up and overwhelm me, to face them head on and give them a challenge of their own.

Pictured above (my favorite things I cooked this week!):

Chickpea Romesco served on Garlic-Saffron Rice from Veganomicon by Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Hope Romero

No-Bake Brownie Bites (sweetened by dates, best tasting things ever actually) from Vegan Junk Food by Lane Gold

Hamburger Buns from this recipe, using vegan versions (so far this is the best hamburger bun recipe I've tried but it was much more dense then your typical store-bought hamburger bun..it was more like a roll)

Black Bean Burgers also from Veganomicon, served with those fancy hamburger buns and some homemade baked french fries

VeganMoFo Day Fourteen: Multigrain Bread

I haven't made bread many times in my life (or anything requiring yeast really), but lately I've been becoming a pretty pro baker. The only bread sold at my grocery store that meets my standards costs far too much money, so making my own has been a nice alternative. I usually make two or more loaves and just freeze the extras until I'm ready to use them. This recipe is originally found here, but I modified it a very small amount (and I basically plagiarized the entire recipe though, so I am not taking any credit for myself!). If you don't have the exact types of grains this recipe calls for, that's fine - you can use poppy seeds, sesame seeds, flaxseeds, sunflower seeds, millet, quinoa, or basically whatever you want and happen to have on hand. If you don't want to use three types of flours, that's also fine. You can use just whole wheat or just all-purpose if you want; I would recommend at least making sure you use the 2 cups bread flour though, because it really is much better with it.

Multigrain Bread

• 1 2/3 cup nondairy milk (I used soy)
• 2/3 cup quick-cooking oats
• 1/3 cup wheat germ
• 1/3 cup yellow cornmeal
• 2 cups bread flour
• 2 packages active dry yeast (or about 4 1/2 tsp)
• 1 cup warm water
• 1/4 cup canola oil, or other mild-tasting oil
• 1/4 cup dark molasses
• 1 tbsp brown rice syrup (or other liquid sweetener)
• 2 tsp flaxseeds
• 2 tsp poppy seeds
• 2 tsp sesame seeds
• 2 tsp sunflower seeds
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 cup whole wheat flour + extra 1/2 cup for kneading

Topping: 

• 1 tbsp non-dairy milk
• 1 tbsp ground flaxseed
• 3 tbsp water
• 1 tsp poppy seeds
• 1 tsp sesame seeds
• 2 tsp sunflower seeds
• 1 tsp quick-cooking oats

1) To prepare dough, cook the non-dairy milk in a saucepan over medium-high heat to 180° or until tiny bubbles forn around edge (do not boil!). Remove from heat.  

2) Combine oats, wheat germ, and cornmeal in a large bow. Stir in scalded milk. Cool until warm. 

3) Combine 1 1/2 cups bread flour and yeast in a separate bowl, stirring with a whisk. 

4) Add to milk mixture and stir well to combine. Immediately add water and next 8 ingredients (through salt). Stir until well blended.

5) Add 1/2 cup bread flour, all-purpose flour, and 1 cup whole wheat flour to milk mixture; stir until a soft dough forms.  

6) Turn dough out onto a floured surface and let rest 5 minutes.  Knead dough until smooth and elastic (about 8 minutes), adding enough remaining flour, 1 tablespoon at a time, to prevent dough from sticking to hands (dough will feel tacky).

7) Oil dough and place in a large greased bowl. Cover and let rise in a warm place, free from drafts, for 1 hour or until doubled in size (Press two fingers into dough.  If indentation remains, dough has risen enough). Punch dough down; cover and let rest 5 minutes.  

8)  Divide dough in half.  Working with one portion at a time, roll each portion into a 13- x 7-inch rectangle on a floured surface.  Roll up each rectangle tightly, starting with a long edge, pressing firmly to eliminate air pockets; pinch seam and ends to seal.  Place each roll, seam side down, in a greased 8- x 4-inch loaf pan.  Cover and let rise for 1 hour or until doubled in size (Press two fingers into dough. If indentation remains, dough has risen enough). 

9) Preheat oven to 375°. 

10) To prepare topping, combine milk, water, and ground flaxseeds in a small bowl; brush over loaves.  Combine poppy seeds, sesame seeds, sunflower seeds, and oats in a small bowl, then sprinkle mixture over loaves.

11) Bake at 375° for 15 minutes. Reduce heat to 350° and bake 20 minutes or until loaves are browned on bottom and sound hollow when tapped.  Remove from pan; cool on wire racks.

VeganMoFo Day One

I've always had this slight knowledge of VeganMoFo hidden somewhere in the back of my mind, but it wasn't until today when I saw several people online mentioning it that I decided to actually look it up. Now that I understand what it is, I'm totally intrigued! I had a bunch of friends who used to do NaNoWriMo (I even tried myself once...emphasis on tried) and have always been interested by these sort of challenges. So I'm definitely going to participate in this, even though I'm a bit late. I am not following a specific theme, as it seems most people are, but I will still try my best to post every day (and since I'm not prepared at all, it'll probably end up just being a summary of what I cook every day, hopefully more than that though). I'm too late to be on VeganMoFo's official RSS feed, but oh well.

I feel like I spent a majority of my day cooking. After about 30 minutes of doing school, I got bored and decided to make some multi-grain bread instead. I used this recipe, making it vegan by replacing the milk with soy milk, honey with brown rice syrup, and egg with 1 tbsp ground flaxseeds mixed with 3 tbsp water. Also, I didn't have millet so I used quinoa and sesame seeds instead (I left out the flaxseeds on the topping, as it was included in the "egg"). I haven't eaten it yet, but it looks beautiful.

For dinner, I made corn fritters with a peanut dipping sauce and Indonesian fried rice, both recipes from the book Meatless Gourmet: Favorite Recipes from around the World. It was a fantastic meal and turned out much better than I had thought it would.