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Yes, the economy is tough, but you can’t let your Health suffer! So, here’s a recipe that has high nutrition and is reasonably priced — using fresh foods and stable, multi-use pantry items.
This is from my really adventurous friend, Meg, who is a great cook, too!
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Meg’s Asian Slaw
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For the salad vegetables:
1 package (12 oz) Coleslaw Mix – green and red cabbage and carrot – all shredded
1 baby bok choy, leaves julienned and stalk diced finely or shredded
1C pea shoots, washed and shaken dry, then chopped *
1 yellow mango (preferred) or regular type – washed, peeled and diced small
For Dressing:
3T warm water
3T agave nectar sytup
3T lemon juice
3T Asian fish sauce (Thai = Nam Pla)
1 clove garlic, smashed and chopped
1 – 2 t red pepper flakes
1T organic sesame oil
Dissolve eveything in warm water.
Topping:
2 oz. per person canned skinless salmon (preferably wild-caught, from Trader Joe’s)
OR
2 oz. per person tuna (can only use 2x a month and once a month for kids, and none for lactating or pregnant women — due to mercury levels)
AND
optional – add avocado cubes tossed in lemon juice, especially for vegetarians
Toss all the veggies together, and moisten well with dressing. Keep the fish separate and give each person their 2oz. as an estimate of the whole. Place fish on top or mix in.
Serve. Make sure the fish sauce and sesame oil are returned to the refrigerator once opened.
* pea shoots can be purchased at good Asian groceries. You can substitute any other sprouts, but pea shoots are relatively inexpensive.
Serves 4 – as a light meal
Add more, different veggies (or double the same ones) and double the dressing if you need more portions. It will work well for left-overs, too, for a couple of days in the refrigerator. It doesn’t just wilt, eventhough it’s already been dressed, in fact it tasted even better the next day.
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Notes about the ingredients:
Agave – a low glycemic, natural sweetener (doesn’t make blood sugar rise).
Lemon juice – Vitamin C source and an alkalizing food.
Fish Sauce – fermented anchovy base, and has many nutritious enzymes. Used for thousands of years in Asia and in Roman times. No fish is actually eaten, just the liquid rich in enzymes.
Garlic – anti-bacterial, anti-viral, blood-thinner – if fresh.
Hot red pepper flakes - stimulates metabolism.
Sesame Oil – an Omega-6 oil, so use with caution (there’s already way too many Omega-6s in usual diets), but in this dish, we are getting Omega-3′s to balance it (from the fish and avocado), so enjoy the great flavor.
You could also sprinkle the salad with white (and black) sesame seed — which are very high in calcium, if you grind them.
OTHER seeds: you could add more protein with hemp seeds or ground flax seeds, too.
Cabbages – red has lots more anti-oxidants. I like deep green savoy cabbage too, but it’s not in the mixes and has a short season. Cabbage can be used moderately, as it tends to depress the thyroid (and therefore metabolism), but we speeded metabolism with red pepper to offset some of this. Cabbages are very nutritious — good, inexpensive vitamin C source in winter. Cabbages are also helpful to your liver, and aid detoxification.
Baby Bok Choy – a deep green leafy vegetable with more of the goodness only deep green leafies have. Same botanical family as cabbages, so those benefits, yet again.
Carrots - Beta-carotene source to help eyesight. All diabetics need to protect their eyes. This will be made into Vitamin A in your body.
Mango – the yellow ones are more tart. The globular ones have more sweetness. I used the tart one, for glycemic reasons and flavor balance, but either is OK, and the red-yellow globular ones are easier to find. Mango is a great help to digestion (adding more important enzymes) and it adds more beta-carotene to turn into Vitamin A, as there aren’t as many carrots as I’d like in these coleslaw mixes.
Pea Shoots or Sprouts – incredible nutrition powerhouses, especially for enzymes, but also all vitamins and many minerals.
Fish – brain food from Omega-3s (and they also help many other body parts). Use tuna very infrequently, as noted above, due to high levels of mercury. If canned salmon is too expensive for you, then use canned mackerel, which is high high Omega-3 fish which is very inexpensive.
Avocado – optional – great value. High in healthy Omega-3 fats, for vegetarians.
This recipe will help with detoxification as you will learn when you see another version of an Asian Cabbage Slaw from Dr. Andrew Weil, MD at:
http://diabetesdietdialogue.wordpress.com/2009/01/15/diabetics-detox-your-liver-part-1/
This recipe is easy to prepare and even though 2 ounces of animal protein may not sound like much, you have to remember that all fruits and vegetables and seeds (and nuts) have protein, too. How do you think the largest animals on earth exist as vegetarians!
This is a perfect recipe to get your children involved in helping in the kitchen and if you pair this up with a movie your teens will like, later, then hopefully you can make some good quality family time making the food, sitting to talk at the table and then watching the movie. It’s important for kids of all ages to learn about the nutrition of their food as well as how to make food. Pre-diabetes is rampant in kids and even more so in teens. You have to be the teacher here!
And, this is a great diabetic recipe to take for lunch at work, too. Fill up on the healthy veggies and with a no-mayo based dressing, this is a lot safer to take with you, as the weather warms.
Fill up on a wide variety of veggies – aim for at least 16 different kinds a day, like the Japanese do. Most Americans don’t even get the 5 the government is encouraging. Is it any wonder so many people are ill?
Well, when you may lose your job or health insurance or you already have, then the best thing to do is put your money into healthy food. If you can better your Health, or at least maintain it, that’s the BEST thing you can do! I speak from experience on that.
You have to be bold in Life! Take control of your own destiny as much as possible. Be independent. Most importantly, think independently. I wanted also to acknowledge and honor the great rebirth and growth of Mandi’s independence on “The Biggest Loser”. She shows that each of us can find the will to endure, at whatever challenge faces us. Use the tools you have at your disposal, and make yourself a winner, in all that matters to you most.
Best to all — Em
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Thanks for the words of encouragement from several of you have written to me at About Me. And, there are a couple of people I need to respond to. Will try to soon.
(c)2009 Em http://diabetesdietdialogue.wordpress.com
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