Deviled Yuck

For snack today, I made some truly horrible deviled eggs.

Part of the problem came from under cooking the duck eggs.  Theo and I are allergic to chicken eggs, so we use duck.  However, the duck eggs are much  bigger and take longer to cook.  Out of fear of over cooking them, I continually fail to cook them enough. So the yolks ran out of the centers where I sliced them.  This made for gooey texture in our filling.

The other problem, though, comes from the recipe.  I'm using one from an old Joy of Cooking, but I don't think I've ever liked it.

Anyone have a beloved deviled egg recipe they'd like to share and save us from continued nasty snacks?

Again With The Pans

We still haven't changed our cookware.  I'm back on-line trying to determine the safety of hard-anondized aluminum.  And of course, on the internet one can find a million sites to support both sides of a question.  One study says there is no leaching, another says HAA leaches about 7mg per ltr of liquid cooked.

And then there are whole conversations about whether or not it matters, that the correlation between Alzheimer's and aluminum has not been proven or supported by further research.

Out of sheer frustration, I may just end up with a kitchen full of cast-iron!

May is Paleo Month

After years of weird food choices driven by weird hormones, I'm desperate to return to habits of old.  Habits that really worked for my body - giving me lots of energy, eliminating seasonal allergies, inflammation all over my skeletal system and menstrual cramps, and slimming me down to a trim and easily buffed state. Habits that worked for our ancient forerunners

Thus I've declared the month of May to be Paleo Month in the Barnacle household. And by declared I mean I closed the door to the office and elicited Bill's cooperation, and the proceeded to eliminate food from the pantry, pull out beloved yet dusty recipes, borrow several cookbooks from the library and almost completely change the food I present at the table at meals, all without saying a word about it to the kids.

You may be asking yourself what Paleo is.  The long name is the Paleolithic Diet, a lifestyle modeled after our Paleolithic ancestors.  They were the folks who lived 2.5 million years ago to about 10,000 years ago with the advent of agriculture.  Basically, we're going back to eating meat, veggies and fruit.  Fortunately we get to add in cooking and spices, healthy oils and some coconut milk and a few nuts for fun. As a lifestyle, this also includes getting plenty of sleep and a varied and a short but intense exercise regime.


I started us out May 1st, and promptly got a migraine that left me eating saltines and feeding the family pizza from the place around the corner.  Dang.

Still, we're now on day 6 and I'm noticing a huge difference in how my body feels and the children's behavior.  I feel lighter, less sluggish and my jeans were a bit easier to put on today.  The kids seems to be evening out emotionally some, and they aren't begging for snacks every 20 minutes.

Why didn't I update the kids? In my experience there is *nothing* like an announcement that food will be changing to elicit tons of anxiety and defiance about mealtime in my short people. Where as, if I don't mention it and tell and interesting story or joke as I bring food to the table, they fail to notice (or at least complain) about the lack of bread, pasta, cow dairy or dessert at the table.

In returning to healthy habits, I really, really didn't want to read through the 640 pages of Gary Taubes' Good Calories, Bad Calories to re-inspire myself.  Fortunately, my hold for Robb Wolf's Paleo Solution came through in late-April (after about 9 months of waiting!).  His book is full of good information, encouragement, meal plans, recipes and CrossFit workouts. He offers a challenge to try Paleo for 30 days and then decide where to go from there.  I always love a good challenge, and it fits my longer-term plan with the family, so I'm in. Thus the May thing.

At the same time, I borrowed one of Mark Bittman's books, Kitchen Express.  While in no way meant to be Paleo or low carb, lots of the recipes are or can easily to adjusted to work.  And his recipes taste like they were created by a foodie who loves good flavor, along with being fast.

Finally, one of Wolf's associates, Sarah Fragoso, just came out with her own cookbook, Everyday Paleo. As the mother of 3 kids, she gets the challenges of feeding a family against the grain of the standard American diet (hahahaha did you get the pun?). Again another book with lots of warm, practical advice, meal plans and recipes.

Wolf and Fragoso both keep helpful and inspiring blogs - I've put them on my Google reader and find it helpful to check in every few days to keep me focused.

I'm fascinated to see how May goes and what my body (and the rest of my family's) is like at the end of 30 days.  I'll keep you posted.

How about the rest of you?  What "lifestyle" do you choose?  Any you don't follow but *know* work great for your body?  Any other crossfitters out there? How do you get back on the health wagon when you've fallen off for a long stretch?

Putting It All Together: Adoption, Race and Family

Pact Camp 2011 is coming!!!  I'm really excited (witness the number of exclamation points).  The line up of speakers is phenomenal: Mary Sheedy Kurcinka! Jae Ran Kim!  Holly van Gulden!  These are the rock stars of my world.

I hope you'll join us - as I always say, Pact Camp changes our family's life every year.  I'm so looking forward to what we learn and become this year.

Register here! Now! You won't regret it.

Book Request: Warmth of Other Suns

Warmth of Other Suns comes highly recommended to me recently by someone I respect. So I've put it on hold at our public library.  Here is the message I got:

Hold requested on The Warmth of Other Suns. You are number 306 in line.


I hope the library considers getting second copy soon. I could die of old age by the time my turn comes around!

My Husband Went to Texas

....and all he brought me was this stupid cold.

Yuck.  Bill got back from a business trip last Friday and I promptly fell to whatever nasty virus he carried home. I tried to stick it out Saturday and Sunday, but Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday were couch days. Rosie joined me in my misery and together we watched PBS Nova videos and Cesar Milan episodes on Hulu between nose blowing, cough drops and cups of soothing teas.

Theo attended soccer camp for the first three days of the week, but he came home yesterday sneezing and blowing, a sure sign that his system is overcome.

Currently I'm at that awkward stage where nothing sounds good but I'm starving, my body aches for serious exercise from the stiffness of lying on the couch for 3 days (and 2 nights) but the 15 foot walk to the kitchen requires a 10 minute nap.

I spend 20 minutes trolling the web for more ideas of how to beat this virus.  Nothing I haven't thought of.  Here's my personal list:
- lots of ginger/lemon/honey tea
- lots of throat coat tea
- chicken broth soup (oddly the homemade bone broth made me retch, so I'm onto Pacific Natural Food broth)
- naps
- zinc
- herbal remedies for cold/flu and echinacea plus from Dr. Schultz
- tom kha gai soup from the local Thai restaurant
- baths with both epsom salts and sea salts

I suspect it will be a few days before I'm back to par.  Fortunately until then, PBS just posted a new series with Professor Henry Gates, Black In Latin America.  

I Can't Be Racist

Here's a fascinating post by JaeRan Kim about how people (I'm figuring really it is mostly white people) justify that they can't be prejudiced because they have a _______ friend.

It reminds me of my post a while back struggling with the word "friend."  And it brings to mind the challenge at Pact Camp every year - as white parents of children of color, who are we *really* friends with - who do we share dinner with, who do we worship with, who do we spend our leisure time with.

I really like JaeRan's point that we all grew up with and still carry prejudice.  What is important is what we choose to do about it.

We have our biases and our prejudices – the point is, when do we decide we are going to be responsible for what we say, and take ownership when what we say is based on stereotype and assumption? What do we do? Say, “I’m sorry you were offended” (which always blames the victim). Or do we say, “wow, I didn’t realize that what I said was offensive” and then take active steps to learn from that experience?

Taking stock of the reality of our relationships can be very challenging.  But really, isn't it worth it to look around and see who we're really telling ourselves and our children is worthy of our time, attention and love?