"Eating is complicated," says Dr. Annemarie Colbin. Or maybe it's just us. Colbin, CEO and founder of Natural Gourmet Institute understands that. "Human beings are complex creatures. We have many levels, many details, many of which are contradictory."
One diet doesn't work for everyone. Or even for one person during a whole lifetime. What we want and need to eat is constantly in flux. "It changes," says Colbin, author of the seminal book Food and Healing. "It depends on the time of your life, how your body's made up, how it changes, your emotional ups and downs."
Natural Gourmet Institute follows that kind of sanguine, sane approach. You can take classes relating to food and health, like the new Cooking for Kids (and Adults) With Allergies or go for the culinary gusto with a class on Indian cuisine or go pro. The school, the oldest of its kind, is the only natural foods cooking school to offer an accredited chef's training program. NGI grads include The Conscious Cook author Tal Ronnen, who cheffed Ellen and Portia's vegan wedding reception, Alex Jamieson, who detoxed her husband Morgan Spurlock after he made Supersize Me, and Amanda Cohen chef of New York's meatless mecca, Dirt Candy. They've taken plant-based cuisine far beyond the lackluster steamed vegetable plate -- about the only restaurant menu option available when Colbin opened NGI. They've made it delicious. NGI's stellar instructors include Peter Berley and vegan pastry queen Fran Costigan. With over 250 public classes, Colbin's school offers something (meatless) for everyone.
The health aspect comes first for Colbin. It always did. The full name of her Manhattan academy, launched in 1977, is Natural Gourmet Institute for Health and Culinary Arts.
"I grew up with the understanding that food has something to do with your health," she says. "Even as a girl, I was interested in eating healthy." What especially interested her is how broadly that's defined.
Born in Holland, as a child Colbin understood healthy eating to be "garlic, parsley, yogurt, whole grain bread" -- the European model. When she married, she and her husband followed a macrobiotic diet, in which healthy means "brown rice, miso soup, azuki beans, seaweed" -- the Asian model.
So which is right? All of the above.
Colbin began the school in her own kitchen, teaching "how to make delicious, healthy and well-balanced vegetarian meals." She had no business plan, no money. Friends thought she was nuts. But her timing turned out to be good. After years of people on meat and processed foods, "everybody became more and more unhealthy and looking how to help themselves." They started turning to Colbin. Focusing on food for healing, she'd teach half a dozen students at a time and feed them lunch, too. "It was like I had a party every week."
NGI is still a party, but now with 200 students, it long ago outgrew Colbin's apartment and moved to its current location. At 70, she's still a vital part of the school she began in her kitchen, and is on campus several days a week. And still interested in how what we eat affects how we are.
"One of the things that interests me is the issue of balance. I did my whole doctorate on food and systems theory, rather than food as nutrients, which is chemistry. It's complicated," she says, but then again, so are we.
"Our worst problem is having to choose," she says. "The question isn't what do you eat but how do you live your life and is the machinery working so you can contribute properly."
Black Bean SoupColbin leaves it to talented NGI grads like Tal Ronnen to create dishes like artichoke and oyster mushroom rockefeller. Colbin is into basics. "It's the grains and beans I found interesting," she says. "If you eat grains and beans a basis for vegetarian eating, you don't go looking around trying to stuff yourself."
Here's a protein-rich black bean soup for you, Dr. Colbin. And for everyone else, too.
2 cups dried black beans
5 cups water or vegetable broth
6 cloves garlic, divided use
a few peppercorns
1 bay leaf
2 onions
6 carrots
4 stalks celery
2 peppers (I used 1 poblano and one red pepper)
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon cumin
1 teaspoon chili powder
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
28 ounces tomato puree
2 tablespoons sherry
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
sea salt and pepper to taste
chopped cilantro for garnishPresoak beans overnight -- pour them into a large pot and cover with water.
The next day, rinse and drain beans. Return to large pot along with water or broth, 2 garlic cloves, the peppercorns and bay leaf. Bring to a boil over high heat.
Then cover and reduce heat to low. Let black beans cook for about an hour, or until they become tender.
Using a food processor, briefly pulse remaining 4 cloves of garlic plus onions, so vegtables are finely chopped, but not mushy. Then in the same way, pulse carrots, celery and peppers, doing so in batches if necessary.
Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add chopped vegetables. Cook for 5 minutes, or until vegetables start to soften. Add cumin, chili powder and smoked paprika. Stir in tomato puree. Reduce heat to low and continue cooking, covered for half hour.
Gently pour the tomato and vegetable mixture into the beans. Stir and cover, letting soup simmer for another half hour. At this point, everything should be nice and tender and the flavors starting to melt.Splash in the sherry and vinegar, season with salt and pepper.
Garnish with chopped cilantro.Serves 6 to 8.
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As a researcher, I took a different approach to finding answers, using nature as a template. Some of you may remember her - she evolved us. My 20 year study ignored the contradictory research from the nutrition industry, and instead took me into such fields as anthropology, zoology, paleopathology, primatology, zoopharmacognosy, and ethnobotany.
What I found bears little resemblance to what others offer as a healthy diet. Lo and behold, there is a diet that does fit all, and it has been proven by the largest “clinical trial” in the history of our species.
http://www.MontecitoWellness.com
Also, you can use Google Books, search for "The Original Diet - The Omnivore's Solution." and "The Wellness Project" and read most of it for free.
That's probably why people started eating meat in the first place. Plants are like chemical factories. Plants resist predators using chemicals.
Animals don't poison their own meat, because animals can run away or fight. Plans can't run away or fight, so instead they make chemicals that interfere with some function of their predators like reproduction or immune response. Plants make poisons, in other words. That's they only kind of defense they can wage.
The soybean has mounted a very effective chemical defense against me and so have other beans and nuts. Those plants defend themselves so well against me, I can't eat them. Lamb chops don't have the same chemical defenses. They go down just fine.
Doctors who are part of this go-veggie movement need to be more conscious of the fact that this is going to make SOME of their patients sick instead of healthy.
http://www.chili-everyway.com/meatless-monday.html
[Loved feijoada in Brazil but they only served it for lunch on Saturday because afterward you'd have to sleep ... very rich!
I have eaten a lot of brown pinto beans, though. My recipe for brown beans is either olive oil or bacon grease (I know). and garlic and onion salt and pepper. I now serve them with cornbread and spinach. In my thinner days I always had fried potatos with them. I like a salad or coleslaw with beans, too.
Something soft and something crisp should always go together,
And something hot with something cold no matter what the weather;
The poem is from the older cooks in this country.
Foods like this or French lentil soup or the perennial favourite of baked spicy sweet potato fries never fail to get the kids' attention. They love the taste and the nutritional information I share makes them feel good about eating, which is a rare experience for many of them who eat out at least two meals a day. I feel like kids need to know what's going into their bodies, and they're always asking questions.
Reduce your intake of salt, sugar and fat.
Exercise a little every day even if it is only a short walk.
You will feel better and you will save money on those doctor visits and prescriptions.
I always had eggs every day. Sometimes I had cereal for breakfast but would eat eggs for dinner.
Anyway, over the past 4 years I have stopped wanting milk or eggs. I rarely have them and if I do usually is because someone wants eggs so we cook them. Same with milk.
Oddly I love lemon water. I put about one lemon amount of juice in a glass of ice water, then I salt the edges like a bloody mary. I love them! I keep adding salt as I sip on it. I know it couldn't be good for me, but my body sure wants the drink.
Yesterday I had fried rice with tofu in garlic sauce. The tofu was fried to a golden brown and looked like meat. I loved the idea that I was eating 'meat' that had never lived. Tofu is said to take on the flavor of what dish it is in.