ROSANNA'S NEWS AND VIEWS©

MAY 7, 1998

We are grateful for all those who took the trouble to write about our first letter and thanks for your praise and suggestions.  When we look through the comments of subscribers to our letter we are surprised to see that many are interested in Macrobiotics because of:

WEIGHT LOSS

This subject doesn't usually come up with those who are on the correct nutritional path, because if you are BALANCED in the food you select, you immediately find your correct weight.  Your writer, James, offers a perfect example.  Rosanna and I met less than a year ago.  I kept fit by jogging, biking and hiking, but my weight had crept up to 245 pounds which, at 6' 4", I could carry OK, but whom was I kidding?   Within a few months of eating macro (all I want, but always balanced) I was at the same weight as when a youngster in college, on the track team.  The weight is steady now at about 210, even though  flab is still melting away, but being replaced with slimmer, heavier muscle.  My waist size is down by four inches and heading for five.   Life is great as my 63rd birthday looms on the horizon.  When I asked Rosanna for five suggestions for people who are overweight, she gave these:

  1. Never eat within three hours of going to bed for the night.  It's best to digest our food and move it from our stomachs while we are up and active. 
  2. Stay balanced in your nutrition.  As we go deeper into proper nutrition you will see the incredible variety that Rosanna creates.  This variety is always achieved within the bounds of balance.  If something sweet is desired, Rosanna will serve green leafy vegetables with the sweet.  Yesterday, for breakfast, we had Strawberry Pancakes with maple syrup.  Rosanna served them with steamed Baby Bok Choy and carrots with a touch of soy sauce.  On one side of the spectrum is meat and salt (Yang to the Easterner) and the extreme opposites are sugar and soft dairy products (Yin).  It is little wonder that one who indulges in a huge steak will crave Ice Cream with Chocolate Syrup.  If we don't eat in a balanced way, our bodies will demand it.  Sweets require calcium and other minerals to assist with digestion.   Don't eat sweets without also eating green leafy vegetables.  Your body will take the required calcium either from the greens, or from your bones and teeth.
  3. Don't go hungry.  Eat three times a day and don't eat in-between. (James cheats on this rule once in a while and still lost...shhhh!)  When you sit down to eat, be sure there is balanced food in front of you.  In future letters we'll go deeper into balance and how to achieve it.  Eat all you want.
  4. Take a walk for at least a half hour every day.  We need to perk up our circulation and give our minds something natural to do.  Breathe deeply and consciously and walk as lightly as possible.  For anyone who is interested in going deeply into this subject, from the Universal Sufi perspective, see MEDITATION IN MOTION and BREATH.   Do Yoga, or another such discipline for the mind and body.
  5. Most of us eat more oil than we need.  To be lean, don't eat fat, especially with sweets.  Rosanna uses very little oil in her cooking.

Now, did somebody say

PANCAKES?

Macro purists might disagree that eating pancakes is macro, but Rosanna doesn't claim to follow the dogma of any way and doesn't feel her approach to nutrition is a religion.  Her uncanny ability is to balance the food that becomes who and what we are.  Rosanna has a little electric grinder in the kitchen and when she makes pancakes she grinds the grain fresh as she uses it.  They might have any kind of grain, use souring Amazake (a delicious drink made from sweet rice, we'll tell you how one day soon) to give sourdough flavor and they might contain fresh fruit.  Look carefully and you will see beans, too.  There we have it, Beans, Grain, Vegetables, that's the backbone of our diet.

How about the maple syrup?  Well sure, great music is defined by the silence, they say, and being macro, for us, involves a little indulgence here and there.  If we were sick, we would skip it or use Barley Malt or Rice Syrup.  Yesterday, they were made like this:

Ingredients:

Please note that using these recipes will usually yield enough for 4 or 5 servings, so adjust the recipe to suit your needs!

2 cups Brown Rice Flour

6 tablespoons Soy Bean Flour

1 cup Whole Wheat Flour  (if you can't tolerate Wheat, use another grain)

1 cup Corn Meal

pinch of sea salt

1 cup sliced Strawberries

1 tablespoon Baking Powder

Spring (or filtered) Water

Maple or Rice Syrup (optional)

 

Preparation:

Mix all dry ingredients.  Add water and stir until consistency is pour-able, but not too thin.  Add Strawberries.  Pour a very thin coating of Toasted Sesame oil on the pan (cast iron is best).  No more than a teaspoon should be needed in a well seasoned skillet, use a brush to spread it.  Spoon pancake batter into hot (if the oil smokes, turn it down slightly) pan in cakes of about 3 inches in diameter and cook until bubbles appear on surface, then turn with spatula and cook until done. YUM YUM.  We had ours with Toasted Green Tea.

 

MAIN MEAL

 

MISO SOUP

Ingredients

2 ½ Quarts spring or filtered water (or the water from blanched salad, see below)

5 Scallions cut in ½ inch chunks

1 Carrot cut julienne style

½ cup Daikon radish thinly sliced into strips

1 ½ cups of Broccoli (stems and florets) in small pieces

½ cup Butternut squash, diced

3 inch strip of Wakame seaweed, soaked five minutes and cut into small pieces

2 tbs. dark Barley Miso

Preparation

Put water, Carrots and Daikon in pot and bring to boil with medium flame. Boil for 10 minutes. Add Broccoli, Butternut squash and Scallions and keep on medium flame until mixture returns to a boil. Cook at slow boil for 10 more minutes. Mix Miso with hot water from soup in small cup to melt Miso, working Miso with the back of a spoon to make it liquid. Pour into pot, reduce heat to simmer and cook for 3 more minutes and serve.

 

RICE AND FRESH CORN

Ingredients

3 cups Medium grain brown rice

2 ears corn on the cob

4 ½ cups water

pinch of sea salt

Preparation

Wash rice thoroughly and cut corn off cob. Combine all ingredients in pot and bring to a boil with medium high flame. Lower heat to a simmer and place flame deflector under pot and cook for 45 to 50 minutes.  Rosanna uses various pots, which impart different energy to the food.  This time it was her favorite, cast iron.

 

PINTO BEANS

Ingredients

2 cups Pinto beans soaked overnight

1" piece Kombu seaweed soaked 10 minutes

1 large Onion, diced

3 stalks Celery with leaves, diced

2 Tbs. White Miso

Preparation

Put Kombu in pot (clay bean pot is preferable)

Add Onions, then celery

Drain and add beans

Add enough spring water to just cover the beans

Bring to boil, lower flame to simmer, cover and cook for 1 hour

Melt Miso in a few tbs. of broth and pour into beans, mix gently with wooden spoon and cook for another 15 minutes

BLANCHED SALAD

Ingredients

2 quarts water

2 cups Cauliflower, broken into pieces

2 cups Broccoli, cut into 1 inch pieces

2 Carrots, cut in chunks

1 cup Butternut Squash, diced in 1 inch pieces

½ Lotus root, thinly sliced (like a cucumber)

2 cups Cabbage, torn in large pieces

For Sauce

1 tbs. Umeboshi Paste

½ cup warm water

1 ½ tbs. Toasted sesame oil, heated in small pot

Preparation

Bring water to a boil in large pot. Add Broccoli and cook until water returns to a boil. Remove with slotted spoon. Continue this procedure with each vegetable, cooking Squash last because it will discolor the water. When cool, combine ingredients in a bowl and add sauce (see below) and toss.

Sauce

Melt Umeboshi paste in a little warm water. Add heated oil and mix.

PRESSED SALAD

Ingredients

3 Cucumbers, (if they are waxed, remove skin) cut lengthwise and remove seeds with a spoon. Slice thinly.

1 cup Red cabbage very thinly sliced

½ head Endive, torn into small pieces

½ head Escarole, torn into small pieces

3 tbs. Sea salt

Juice of 2 Lemons

Preparation

Mix vegetables in salad bowl with salt. Place a dish atop ingredients in the bowl (so it just clears the sides, but still slides) and add a heavy weight (a stone or what have you) to press for one hour.

Rinse thoroughly and drain. Add Lemon juice and serve.

 

STEAMED COLLARD GREENS

Ingredients

1 bunch Collard greens

Few drops of Soy sauce

Preparation

Slice greens lengthwise along the stem. Remove stem. Fold remaining greens in such a manner that the lines in the greens line up in the same direction. Slice thinly in line with the veins (diagonally). Thinly slice, also diagonally, the stems. Steam stems first for 1 minute and then add leaves and steam together for another minute. Add soy sauce to taste, easy does it!

 

Buon appetito!

Rosanna and James

 

SUFI WISDOM

excerpted from BOWL OF SAKI, a daily meditation May 6

 

UNITY IN REALIZATION IS FAR GREATER THAN UNITY IN VARIETY.

Inayat Khan

COMMENTARY BY-- Samuel L. Lewis:

This Unity is the greatest achievement conceivable. As a matter of fact, it is most difficult to find this unity in variety. There are sounds insects make that the human ear cannot hear; there are many vibrations of light and energy the eye does not appreciate and the instrument of one's ear cannot measure, for they are so delicate and they are continually being discovered. This shows that although there may be a unity in variety it is not always apprehended even when most appreciated.

As soon as the mind is quieted one finds the real cosmic vibrations which flow through the heart of man and are even touched by and in his bloodstream. When one finds the blood mentioned in the Bible and Upanishads and Koran, it is because there is a tremendous significance there. For it is the heart and blood that keeps the body a unity, and it is the love of God which keeps the Universe as a unity, which would otherwise be chaos. It is even said that when Parabrahm retains his breath the Universe is destroyed. This means that absence of God constitutes destruction -- true alike of the Universe, ourselves and our thoughts and emotions.