Vibrant Changes

Pizza Hut Power

Carissa — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 02:10:57 +0000

It was 5:20. Dinner, although planned, hadn’t been started yet. I had just finished cleaning up after making Jessica Seinfeld’s butternut squash coffee cake from her Deceptively Delicious cookbook. A playoff football game was on TV. And then came the Pizza Hut commercial. Thirty minutes later, we were sitting in the restaurant ordering a supreme cheese pizza, hand-tossed crust. It has been years since I’ve been in a Pizza Hut. We had a phenomenal locally owned pizza joint in the town we recently moved from, and College Town Pizza was the joint of choice when we visited Fairbanks from the bush. (Try their jalepeno and cream cheese pizza if you get the chance- addicting). So its probably been 8-10 years since I’ve been in a Pizza Hut, and the ad looked really good. I remember liking Pizza Hut, but tonight, I was disappointed, particularly in the crust which looked and tasted like cardboard. Maybe its because I’ve been spoiled by really good pizza in Fairbanks, Moose’s Tooth in Anchorage, Four Brothers in the Albany-area, and here, or maybe its because Pizza Hut has gone downhill. But I feel like we were lured in by that timely commercial. I think we’ll support the three other mom and pop pizza joints here in town from now on. To our credit, it was the first time we had eaten out in two weeks. But now I have heartburn.

Last night’s dinner: Cooking Light’s cassoulet from Dec ’09 issue. I used chicken thighs instead of duck confit legs, and completed the first half of the recipe in the crockpot. It turned out delicious, and made a ton.

Tomorrow’s dinner: Fish. Any suggestions?

addendum

Carissa — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 14:35:29 +0000

Don’t forget about soda cans. They, too are lined with BPA. Since they are acidic, they will also leach it into what you are drinking. Bummer.

Last night’s dinner: Orange glazed cornish hens (from Angelfood ministries) with rice pilaf, baked sweet potatoes, salad.

Tonight’s dinner: Bryan’s cream of cauliflower soup with homemade Italian Bread

BPA part II

Carissa — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 13:07:54 +0000

Are there any safe canned goods? A very few. Organic Grace has the most comprehensive list I’ve seen by brand name. Purchasing your products in the organic section is no guarantee of safety. Choose frozen, fresh, tetrapacks, or glass packaging whenever possible, and particularly for acidic foods. I did call Del Monte about a year ago about their canned fruit. They confirmed that the canned products are lined with BPA laden epoxy but the fruit sold in plastic single serve fruit cups, even though they are plastic do not. Also, StarKist Chunk Light tuna sold in the pouches does not have dectable levels of BPA, according to testing done by Consumer Reports. See their complete findings by clicking on the link.

Last night’s dinner: Pizza

Tonight’s dinner: fettucine alfredo with salmon, spring mix salad, home made italian bread

Tomatoes and BPA

Carissa — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 14:05:21 +0000

Dr. Mercola, who I occassionally read, recently posted an article titled Avoid These 7 Foods and You’re Off To a Healthier New Year. Topping the list was canned tomatoes, which can leach BPA into your food at a higher rate than other canned foods due to their acidity. My family uses a lot of canned tomatoes, especially this time of year. And beyond processed spaghetti sauces, tomatoes in glass jars are not exactly easy to find here in the middle of nowhere. According to Dr. Fredrick vom Saal, PhD, an endocrinologist at the University of Missouri, who is a leading expert on low dose BPA, you can get 50 mcg of BPA from a liter of canned tomato product. According to him, there have been 231 published studies on low dose BPA effects in experimental animals. Of these, 202 have found harm even at very low levels (less than 50 mcg/kg/day). 29 have found evidence of no harm. The shocking thing is, that the finding of no harm directly correlates with who funded the study, and poorly designed studies. As you may guess, studies funded by the chemical industry always find BPA safe to use. The FDA is currently reviewing the safety of BPA. It was supposed to issue a finding at the end of 2009, but missed this self imposed deadline. No updated statement of safety has been issued.

On the day I read Dr. Mercola’s article, I needed canned tomatoes. So I paid $1.59 , or nearly double the price of the store brand for a 14 ounce can for Muir Glen Organic diced tomatoes, hoping that the organic brand would not use BPA. I then came home and emailed Muir Glen’s customer service department since this informtion was noticably missing from the web page. (Wouldn’t it be nice if the can just said if they use BPA in their processing?) Here is the response I received from the General Mills (who I assume owns Muir Glen) customer service department:

Dear Mrs. Neubert: Thank you for contacting Small Planet Foods regarding bisphenol-A in food packaging. Bisphenol-A is a critical component of protective coatings used with metal food packaging and provides important quality and safety features to canned foods. Scientific and government bodies worldwide have examined the scientific evidence and consistently have reached the conclusion that BPA is not a risk to human health. Recent examples include comprehensive risk assessments in Japan and Europe and a review by an independent panel of experts organized by the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis. The can coatings used in Small Planet Foods packaging comply with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration requirements for use in food contact applications. These coatings have long played an essential part in food preservation, helping to maintain wholesomeness, nutritional value, and product quality. We work closely with our suppliers to ensure that all of the food ingredients and packaging materials we use are fully in compliance with U.S. Food and Drug Administration requirements and meet our high quality standards. We will continue to monitor this situation. If you have any further questions, please feel free to contact us. Your questions and comments are always welcome. For more information on the safety of metal food containers, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration press office may be contacted at (301) 436-2335. Sincerely, Leah Giovanni
Consumer Services
>Original Message From: carissa.neubert@gmail.com
>
>Originated by Consumer I am wondering if you use BPA in your packaging process for any of your products. If so, could you send me a list of which products contain BPA so that I may avoid their use? I love your products and hope that you avoid this harmful endocrine disruptor. Thanks, C. Neubert

Disappointing that it doesn’t say anything about the FDA’s indicision on safety, or offer ways to avoid BPA. This week, Tuttarosso tomato products are on sale at my local grocery store. $9.00 for a case of 12 of the big cans. Now this is almost too good to pass up. But before I ran out to get my winter supply of their wonderful peeled plum tomatoes with basil in tomato sauce, I emailed their customer service department, too, hoping for a different response. Here is their response, from Red Gold:

January 4, 2010

Dear Ms. Neubert,

Thank you for your recent correspondence concerning the use of Bisphenol A (BPA) in the lining of the cans used for tomato products produced by Red Gold, LLC.

We would like to note that BPA is not unique to the white can lining. All canned tomato products contain an enamel lining, whether it be white, clear or gold. Often times, consumers confuse the clear enamel for no enamel at all. Canned tomato products (regardless of the brand) have a naturally high acid content which require the use of a food-grade enamel can lining.

According to our container supplier, the cans supplied to Red Gold have epoxy-based interior coatings for maximum performance and shelf life of your product. Epoxy coatings are manufactured from Bisphenol A, and only extremely low levels (generally less than 37 parts per billion) of BPA have been reported to migrate into some canned foods. At these levels, a consumer would have to ingest more than 500 pounds of canned food and beverages every day for an entire lifetime to exceed the safe level of BPA set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). All of the coatings meet extraction limits set by the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as well as the European Commission Scientific Committee on Food, the United Kingdom Food Standards Agency, the Japan Ministry for Health and Welfare and other regulatory authorities worldwide. In fact all regulatory agencies have stated that there is no health concern associated with Bisphenol A at the levels in which it has been found in our food supply. We trust this is helpful to you and should you require additional information please visit http://www.bisphenol-a.org.

Red Gold is a family owned and operated company, which has been producing tomato products exclusively for over 65 years. Thank you for your inquiry and please feel free to contact us at (866) 729-7187 or by e-mail at info@redgold.com if we can be of any further assistance.

Sincerely,
Red Gold, LLC

Consumer Relations Team

I’m not sure where they get the data they quote, but probably from the webpage they direct the consumer to, which is sponsored not suprisingly by a group of Japanese, European, and American Chemistry organizations.

SO, what can we do about this? Please post your ideas in the comments section. Here are my best ideas:

Watch the 10 Americans video put out by the Environmental Working Group. This will take about 20 minutes, but it is so worthwhile. Donate to EWG if you can.
Can your own tomatoes!

Tonight’s dinner: leftovers

I’m back for awhile. With chocolate and cream

Carissa — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 16:59:57 +0000

After a year hiatus, I’m back. So we’ve made the move to a tiny town in the middle of NY state. I’ve been off work now for about 6 weeks, as I await approval of hospital privledges for my next job. I’ve been loving the time off with my two girls, now an independent 18 months and newly turned 4 year old. Both have made the transition well, and now that the holidays are over, its time to get back to blogging, at least till #3 arrives and takes up my time.

I’ve discovered this week that E. now knows her left from her right. Not sure how it happened, we have not been working on this. I figured it out because she always wants her left mitten put on first. She has OCD tendencies, and will melt down if you put the right on first. The funny part of this is that she calls her left hand her “chocolate” hand. And her right hand is her “cream” hand. She will correct you if you call her right hand the chocolate hand. This morning she stepped on a block, hurting her right foot. When I asked her which foot, she replied “the cream one!”

I’ve also been enjoying the library in our town. I’m currently devouring The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan after watching the eye opening Food Inc. documentary a few weeks ago. One goal of this blog will be to try to make some changes in the way our family eats, away from the industrial food chain. In Alaska we lived far away from this with one large freezer shelf of moosemeat, one shelf of salmon and 3-4 geese. We also had a garden that supplied some of our produce for a few months. Sure we had to import lots of other fruits and veggies, but very little meat. Currently I have a freezer full of industrially supplied chicken, sausage, pork, and beef products. I will have to use these up, and then we plan to seek protein sources from local suppliers. I hope to keep a log of this as we find out if its all financially and technically feasible.

In that light:

Last night’s dinner: Almond Chicken, isreali couscous with sundried tomatoes, and buttered peas. Joy of Cooking’s Oatmeal Cake with Broiled icing.

Tonight’s dinner: Baked Ham, scalloped potatoes, and steamed broccoli.

Stats

Carissa — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 18:20:00 +0000

The girls had their check-ups last week. E at age 3, is 25 pounds. A, at 6 months, is

15 pounds. How crazy is it that my 3 year old today wore the same set of snow pants that

she’s been wearing for the previous two years as well (Size 12 months). They were a tad short, but with

boots on, they were ok for sledding today in the 9 inches of snow we received last night.

More to come tomorrow! Guess it’ll be a White Christmas here in NY.

Happy Holidays!

Last night’s dinner: Lentil Stew with chicken sausage, and garlic rolls.

Tonight’s dinner: Mozzerella Chicken Spinach Bake, beer bread, salad.

E Turns 3 and woodstove woes

Carissa — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 13:43:54 +0000

Wow, my first baby girl is three years old today. We had a small party for her yesterday afternoon, with a train theme. She loves her Thomas and Fergus trains, and keeps track of them daily, playing with them as soon as she wakes up, and lying them on their sides in their garage before she goes to bed. We had ‘circle time’ in which we sang Down by the Station and of course I’ve Been Workin’ on the Railroad along with lots of other favorites. In between the songs, we read train stories. E. LOVED her circle time. She sang her heart out, and listened intently to the stories. She was into her presents this year, wanting to play with each one before going to the next. The kids, ranging in age from 5 months to 6 years, all played well together, and they were lots of fun to watch.

We had a fire in the woodstove for the party. The playroom is just cold without one, and yesterday was a cold icy/snowy mix outside, so we needed one. We had cut off the woodstove for the three days prior to this in an experiment to see if it helped E’s cough. E. was great all summer long, not needing any medication. Since October when we have increasingly been using the stove, we’ve also increasingly used nebulized pulmicort and albuterol with her. Sure enough, E’s cough was slowly fading away, even without pulmicort, until we fired up the woodstove again last night. A coworker who bought a pellet stove last week told me that running the woodstove was the equivalent of handing her a pack of cigarettes. She suggested replacing it with a pellet stove which burns far cleaner and is more efficient. Our stove is an efficient one, but something still is bothering E. I believe it is a catalytic burning stove, but it was produced in 1989, just as the EPA was implementing their new standards. She has an appointment with her pediatrician next week, so we’ll see what they think. Any ideas from parents of asthmatic kids who also burn wood in their home? What has worked for you? Having a fire provides so much ‘coziness’ to the room, its SO hard to give that up. Do we need to replace the catalytic part of the stove?

Last night’s dinner: Pizza, fruit tray, various finger foods, Thomas Carrot Cake.

Tonight’s dinner: Black beans and rice.

Book Review: Feeding the Kids

Carissa — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 01:34:03 +0000

Feeding the Kids, The Flexible, No Battles, Healthy Eating System for the Whole Family by Pamela Gould, and Eleanor P. Taylor, Mancala Publishing, 2007, MSRP $16.95. I had the pleasure of reading this book because it is in the stash of books the La Leche League left at my house between the November and December meetings which I hosted.

This eating system engages your family in a six week plan where you slowly make healthy changes in the way your family eats. It starts with integrating more fruits and veggies, then changing to the right kinds of dairy and whole grain products, and finally the right kinds of proteins. For families who have foodies writing their grocery lists, this book really doesn’t tell us anything we haven’t been hearing for years: eat more fruits and veggies, don’t eat trans-fats, and when you eat carbs, make them whole grain. And don’t drink 2% milk. But you know that already. It does have lots of information on how to make this work while traveling, and it has 40 pages of “mini-recipes” of easy to prepare healthy meals. This is potentially the best section of the book. The website also has a handy section that lists specific brands of products that pass their complicated field tests. If you’ve ever tried reading ingredient lists for the tell-tale words “partially hydrogenated vegetable oil” while grocery shopping with a toddler, this webpage will be invaluable to you. The book is definately geared towards busy families with lots of ideas on how to make this work in the real world.

Bottom line: 3/5 stars. Borrow this book, don’t buy it. Didn’t tell me much I didn’t already know, but I always appreciate decent kid-friendly recipes. Be sure to check out their website, too. Now go eat an apple.

Related titles:

Child of Mine: Feeding with Love and Good Sense By Ellyn Satter, Bull Publishing Company, 2000. The bible of childhood nutrition. This book details feeding your chid by age and stage. No recipes, and its dense reading unlike Feeding the Kids which is an easy read. One thing Ms. Satter points out is that kids should NOT eat a 100% whole grain diet when it comes to carbs. Whole grains tend to speed up transit times in the digestive tract, and so many vitamins and minerals are simply not absorbed if we feed them all whole grains.
Super Baby Food, 2nd ed. by Ruth Yaron, 1996. How to make your own babyfood. Yes, when I lived in the Arctic Circle, and I only had one child, I made the majority of her babyfood. I remember grinding millet (birdfood, as Bryan called it), and cooking it into a mush for her which she joyfully ate almost every morning. I also made lots and lots of pureed sweet potatoes, pears, carrots, peas, and other fruits and veggies at a fraction of the cost of the commercial babyfoods available in the supermarket. I will probably do the fruit and veggies for A, but not the cereal. Actually, we’ve started solids with A later than with E, so I really don’t expect to do much pureed anything. She’ll be able to grab a whole pea and put it in her mouth soon enough. (We plan to start solids at six months). Ms. Yaron also romotes a vegetarian diet, which can be tricky with kids. This book is so jam-packed with kid-friendly, healthy (though vegetarian) recipes, that its well worth the money.

To be continued: Next post: Mollie Katzen’s Salad People.

Tonight’s dinner: Pan-fried ribeye steak, Red-leaf salad with avacado and pinenuts, garlic dill red potatoes.

Last night’s dinner: leftover Chicken soft tacos, mexican rice.

Ticks

Carissa — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 19:47:11 +0000

Bryan got a tick the other day. It was a deer tick, though we found it before it was engorged. Deer ticks are notorious for carrying Lyme disease. In fact, this area of NY has one of the highest Lyme disease rates in the country. He got the tick presumably from carrying wood in for the woodstove. I’ve been seeing lots of Lyme this year in the ED, and lots of ticks right now. You have a much higher chance of getting Lyme if it is attached for greater than 24 hours, and it is engorged when you find it, neither of which characterizes Bryan’s tick. Still, neither of us want the girls getting Lyme.

Tonight’s dinner: Turkey stuffed cabbage and baked sweet potatoes.

Last night’s dinner: Bryan’s homemade Cream of Cauliflower soup with bread and butter and salad.

Holiday ’08

Carissa — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 20:13:46 +0000

A friend from a natural parenting group I have attended a handful of times sent me a letter that she sent to her family and friends for the holiday season. Here it is, modified for our family’s needs. Thank you, Linda.

Dear E and A’s Family and Friends,

We are sending out this “mass” mailing to connect with all of our daughters’ wonderful family before the holiday season. We plan on being in Delaware the first weekend of December to celebrate E’s birthday. While I have Thanksgiving off this year, I work the next day, so we plan on staying home for Thanksgiving. Since we spent Christmas with my family last year, we will be spending Dec 26-30 in Pittsburgh.

First- we want to thank you all for your incredible generosity over the last 3 years. Because of you, our girls have been clothed in style, read to from an extensive library, and play with great toys. We understand that this is a year of financial hardship for many. Please do not feel obligated to give gifts to our family this year. If your situation allows you to do so, please only buy for the girls. Bryan and I have what we need, and will be making this holiday simpler by doing the same for our families.

It has been our goal to set aside $1,000 a year each into savings for E and A. This was easy in Alaska with the PFD fund, but its harder here in NY. Every dollar that you and our extended family/friend network have sent them has gone into this account and we have been staying on target towards meeting our goal. Thank you for your help with this!

This holiday we would prefer gifts for their future funds. If you are considering a present, we ask that you keep the following in mind:

1. Please keep it small. If they each get just one thing from you they will be better gifted than most children in America. Don’t forget to check Craig’s List or Ebay for this stuff. It will still be new to the girls and its gentler on the Earth.

2. They already have an extensive collection of stuffed animals. Please don’t give them any more.

3. E would enjoy any of the “Melissa and Doug” wooden food play sets. Her imagination goes wild these days. She has a set of play pots and pans already. She would also love to add to her collection of Thomas trains for her trainset. This will be her birthday theme. I think they do make a few girl train engines. Her trains are all used, and show the signs.

4. E also loves puzzles, books, running, telling stories, singing songs, and playing outside. She would love a subscription to literary magazine “High Five” and other preschool age magazines would be a big hit (National Wildlife Federation and National Geographic both have one.)

5. Book ideas: Pretend Soup or Salad People by Mollie Katzen, (yes, the author of the beloved Moosewood Cookbook series writes vegetarian cookbooks for kids, too). Baby Danced the Polka by Karen Beaumont, Dear Zoo by Rod Campbell, Adele and Simon by Barbara McClintock, Pat the Bunny for Alex, any signing video for Alex, The Cow who Clucked by Denise Fleming, 1,2,3, Moose by Andrea Helmen. Check out http://www.joancarrisbooks.com/babies.html for more kids book reviews by age.

6. They both love dancing to music – from folk to hip hop. CD’s to add to their collection would be wonderful.

7. E could use some warm fall-winter clothes, size 3T for shirts, and 2T or 3T for pants. She LOVES to wear dresses, too, but doesn’t have any long sleeved play dresses for winter. If you buy pants, be sure they have an adjustable waistband. Since she’s now potty trained and a VERY tiny kid, most of her pants fall right off her. Size 18 month are too short. She doesn’t have any jeans that fit right now. Old Navy seems to run slimmer than most (I remember she couldn’t wear them with cloth diapers because they were too slim). She is 25-26 pounds, and JUST getting into size 3T for shirts. She probably won’t fit into a 4T for a year and half, so no larger than 3T. Alex is pretty good on clothes. She is an average kid size wise, and will soon transition to 6-9 month sized clothes.

8. Please consider the fact that toys (and other products) made from plastics and other synthetic materials (including cloth, electronics, and paint) have been found to contain chemicals that are damaging to the development of healthy children (in particular lead, PVC, phthalates, and bisphenol-A). We are trying to limit the number of synthetics the girls handle every day. It is very hard given our plastic centered world. But every new non-synthetic toy brings us one step closer.

9. Here are some resources for natural toys:

o “Melissa and Doug” toys are available in most stores that carry toys and they are certified non-toxic, with a strong safety inspection system.

o Maukilo – great variety and selection of non-toxic awesome toys (from puzzles, to books, to games, to toys). www.maukilo.com 866-628-5456

o Rosie Hippos “wooden toys, books, games, & music” www.rosiehippo.com 800-385-2620

o www.urthchild.com – organic clothes, organic skin care, organic bedding, and wooden toys

Please pass the word on to anyone you know who is thinking of giving the girls’ gifts this year.

We love you all. Thank you for keeping the health and future of our children and our planet in mind this holiday season.

Take care and see you soon.

Love,

C, B, E, and A

Tonight’s dinner: Salmon burgers (sadly, using store-bought canned wild alaskan salmon), quinoa-carrot pilaf, salad

Last night’s dinner: Spagetti and meatballs, italian bread

Wednesday’s dinner: Parmesan parseleyed tilapia, salad, quinoa