Mmm tasty vegetables.

I’m currently offering four kinds of appointments (more to come in the future!):

• First-time general assessment: $120*
• Regular follow-up appointments: $60*
• Label-reading and meal-planning program (4 sessions): $275*
• Sports nutrition session: $75*

Sessions include tailored information and free handouts to keep at home. Appointments can be conducted via e-mail or in-person, and the in-person sessions take place right in the comfort of your own home. Find out more at my Nutrition Consulting page!

If there’s one thing you’d like to change about your eating habits, what would it be? Share in the comments section below!

I was certain that life would become less crazy after our big local food launch, but apparently I was wrong. I’ve again been too busy for blogging! However, our launch went super well (CBC’s The National covered us and played our segment three days in a row!). If you want to learn more about the campaign I’ve been working on, click here. It’s super awesome and if you’re in Manitoba, you should sign up!

The launch was for our big five-month challenge, which begins on May 1st. So I think life is going to be pretty chaotic for the next couple weeks as everything kicks off. Blogging will unfortunately continue to be sporadic. But in the meantime, I received some awesome locally-made green split pea flour, and created a banana bread recipe around it. I used the recipe from Mr. Science’s sister’s absolutely AMAZING Christmas banana bread as the template and started tweaking from there, and this is what I came up with:

Ingredients
4 ripe bananas
1/4 cup organic cane sugar
1/4 cup apple butter or applesauce
2 tsp pure vanilla extract
2 eggs
1 tsp baking soda
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp sea salt
1 tsp cinnamon
3/4 cup green split pea flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour

Ingredients for crumble topping
1/4 cup oats
2 tbsp organic cane sugar
Sprinkle of cinnamon
2.5 tsp organic butter

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2. Place bananas in bowl and mash, then stir in sugar.
3. Add apple butter and eggs; mix well.
4. Add remaining ingredients and mix thoroughly. Pour into a loaf pan lined with parchment paper.
5. To make the crumble topping, combine all the crumble ingredients together and mix well until crumbly (add extra sugar, cinnamon, and butter to taste or to make the consistency to your liking).
6. Sprinkle the crumble evenly on top of the batter in the loaf pan.
7. Bake for 45 minutes to an hour, until a wooden toothpick comes out clean. Remove from oven and let stand in pan for about 10 minutes before removing from pan.
8. Enjoy!

This banana bread is super yummy and I encourage you all to try it out!

Have you cooked or baked with split pea flour? What’s your favourite unusual ingredient to add to recipes? Are you a local food enthusiast?

I know I’ve been MIA recently – there’s been a lot going on! Working in the noprofit sector is exciting and rewarding and awesome, but it also takes tons of energy. Since I’m preparing for the big launch of our local food challenge (taking place this coming Saturday – at the Forks – with an emcee from CBC – and presentations by local farmers – and a scavenger hunt for kids!), I haven’t had much energy outside of work. And then there was my final nutrition exam, which I took yesterday.

This exam was the hardest one yet. It was Nutrition for Fitness & Sport, so it also dealt with the chemical structure of nutrients and such. Very science-y. But I took my final exam, and I completed it with a high score… so now I’m just waiting for my diploma to come in the mail, which will give me the designation of Certified Holistic Nutritionist! So exciting. It took me nearly a year to finish all of my correspondence courses, and it feels amazing to have finally completed my diploma program through the Alive Academy. This means that I’ll be able to do nutrition consults and help others one-on-one to eat more nutritiously. Fun!

I let myself have about four hours on Saturday afternoon to be over the moon about finishing my program, and then I began another project: my next novel. I suppose I should really finish my current one before I begin another one, but… oh well. I need to always have several things on the go

Health update and the Raw Food Month

Eating mostly raw til dinner this month is so far going well. I’m quite enjoying it, and I find that I have more energy throughout the day when I eat raw. Very interesting! This week the weather is supposed to be a little chillier and it can be more difficult to eat raw when the weather is colder – but that’s what tea and heaters are for

I’ve been exercising on my own rather than going to the gym, but I haven’t been pushing myself as much as I know I could be. Exercise is super important to me since it’s such a great outlet for relieving stress (and it also energizes you even more!). So last week I sat down with the computer and searched for boot camps in the area. Unfortunately more boot camps are out in the suburbs, which is completely useless to me since I both live and work downtown, BUT I found a boot camp at Pro(Ag)gressive Fitness which is sort of on my way to the office. It’s really reasonably priced and it looks super awesome, so I’m doing my first class tomorrow! I haven’t done a boot camp in such a long time – and I’ve missed it. The first couple weeks are going to be very tough, but definitely worth it.

What have you been up to lately? Have you ever done a boot camp, or would you ever? What’s your take on eating raw until dinner? Share in the comments section below!

Anyways, this month is a transition to raw food! I’m using Natalia Rose’s book, The Raw Food Detox Diet. This month it’ll basically be eating raw until dinner. I’d like to slowly make the transition so that in May or June I’m eating all raw. Fun!

This is likely what April’s menu will look like:

Breakfast: Fresh fruit, homemade lemonade

Lunch: Salad with fruit and nuts or raw crackers/granola bar

Snack: Raw vegetables or fresh fruit or smoothie

Dinner: Any

Dessert: Hot chocolate or raw chocolate

This month we’ll likely eat usual items for dinner – pasta, rice, toast with eggs, the occasional meat and so on – but in May I’d like to make the switch to mostly steamed vegetables, salads etc. Don’t want to rush too much into it!

In addition to the book, I’ll be checking out some raw food blogs (Raw Radiant Health, Choosing Raw and others).

Will you join me in making the transition to raw foods this month? Do you have any recommendations for raw food books or blogs? Share in the comments section below!

Created by: OnlineUniversity.net

First we should differentiate between the two. For the sake of argument, we’re talking about organic certification and local small farmers when we refer to “organic” and “local” in this article.

Do you know where your produce comes from?

Personally, I go with local over organic if I need to make a choice, and here’s why:

• Organic doesn’t mean healthy. You can still get white flour cookies in a box shipped from thousands of miles away, filled with unhealthy ingredients, and they might be called “organic.” In that sense, “organic” isn’t very useful. “Local” is, however, going to be all natural ingredients; even if it’s white flour, you still know that it’s real food.
• Organic can create a bigger carbon footprint. There’s some debate over this one, because of the transportation required to go from a farm and then to drive to various local food stores in the city, but something tells me it’s still not going to add up to the immense miles that organic could potentially be associated with.
• Local contains less preservatives. As a general rule, local food is going to be pretty darn fresh. But just because organics don’t use pesticides, doesn’t mean that there aren’t going to be unhealthy ingredients in the packaging of the product. Something to think about!
• Local gives you the opportunity to talk to your farmer. I love that with local food, you can visit the farm, and talk to the farmer directly about how the food is grown and what their animals are fed and such. You can build a relationship with your local farmer and find out everything you could ever want to know about your food! You can’t necessarily do this with organic food.
• Organic certification is expensive. There are many small local farmers who cannot afford to get organic certification, but their animals are still free-range and they don’t use any pesticides. “Almost organic” small farmer local food is preferable to me than organic certified food shipped from far away that I don’t know much of the background about.

What about you? If you have to choose, do you go for organic or local? Why? Share in the comments section below!

The Leanwashing Index is a newly-launched project by EnviroMedia Social Marketing to rate the rhetoric and health claims of various ads based on a set criteria. It’s a really fascinating website which allows users to analyze ads themselves. I like that consumers can have a voice in this, but some of the “leanwashing” is actually overlooked (such as this post about Kashi. I’m with the commenter – Kashi is tasty and might be slightly better for you than other cereals, but it is not “healthy,” in my opinion). It’s really important to look at the entire product as a whole, and some of that is missing on this website. But that being said, it’s a great concept and you’re bound to learn something – or take part in an engaging debate! – by checking out the site.

In other news, life has been getting in the way lately, hence my lack of blogging! But I’m less than two months away from getting my certified holistic nutritionist diploma, and that is very exciting for me. I’ve also been busily launching the Dig In campaign, and trying to focus much more on The Food Label Movement. I might be posting more regularly on the FLM website soon as opposed to this one – just to give you all the heads up!

What do you think about leanwashing? Do you trust the health claims on your food? What health claims have caught your eye recently? Share in the comments section below!

You can learn more about National Sleep Awareness Week by visiting the Sleep Foundation.

And here’s an infographic to give you an idea of what happens when you don’t get enough sleep (click on the image to enlarge):

Via: Online Colleges Guide

Do you have sleeping problems? Do you feel that getting adequate amounts of sleep is important for day-to-day functioning? How does loss of sleep affect you? Share in the comments section below!

Altar Boyz at the Prairie Theatre Exchange

Since I took drama lessons at the PTE when I was in high school, it has a special place in my heart. I hadn’t been to the PTE in quite some time, and it was great to be able to go there since it’s been newly renovated – I have to say, it looks beautiful!

The performance itself was so much fun. The boys were hilarious and they played off each other really well. Jeremy Walmsley performed some incredible dance moves and Joseph Sevillo in particular stole the show with his expressive acting.

Altar Boyz tells the story of a religious boy band touring the country and saving souls with their music. There’s a lot of (harmless) poking fun at religion and a great deal of other things, brought out especially by the cleverly written lyrics – I wish I could have written down some of the lines during the show, but I guess this just means you’ll have to check out the show for yourself to get the goods

The Altar Boyz - high energy all around!

I brought the mother dear with me to see the show, and we spent much of it laughing along with the rest of the audience. Not only were the boys full of energy and really impressive dancers and singers, they also picked a few women right out of the audience and brought them on stage at various points – and the audience members were good sports about it! The music was also really catchy. Ultimately this show is all about having a great time, laughing together and enjoying an immensely fun boy band spoof.

Yes, there were puppets!

Altar Boyz is playing at the Prairie Theatre Exchange in Winnipeg until March 11 – if you’re in the area, you should definitely check it out! And if you’re a university/college student, be sure to show up 30 minutes before a performance with your student ID – any unsold seat will be up for grabs for just $10. You sure can’t beat that price for live theatre!

Do you enjoy the theatre? What shows have you seen lately?

This book really concentrates on proper portion sizes, which is probably my biggest challenge. I know what a portion size is, but I’m not very good at sticking with one portion! However, I think that because this cookbook has such a nice variety of meals and snacks, and since there’s a detailed 1-month diet plan at the back, it should be something I can really work with.

The book says to expect to lose up to 12 lbs by the end of the month, so I’m making it my goal to lose 8 lbs this month (and if I lose more than that, that’s awesome!). I haven’t done my measurements for February yet, but what with it being a very busy month and me not counting calories, I have a feeling that I’ll really need to up the ante for March!

GIVEAWAY! Leave a comment below if YOU would like to win your very own copy of the Carb Lovers Diet Cookbook. It’s a fantastic cookbook with super tasty recipes and beautiful photographs. Definitely a giveaway you want to win! Winner will be announced on Wednesday, March 7.

*Mr Science is happy to try my vegetarian, vegan and raw recipes, but he’d like to include some steak or chicken in our meals a little more often. He’s such a good sport!