My Darling Daughter now has her own blog. As a pastor's wife, she usually blogs about spiritual issues in the culture. However this week she posted a pumpkin recipe that is incredibly delicious. Those of you who have read my blog for a long time have watched DD grow up from her middle school years. I'm going to post her whole blog so you can catch a glimpse of the young woman she has become. The Pumpkin Pudding recipe is at the bottom.

I love the reactions people give when they ask what the "orange stuff" that I'm eating is. I reply "pumpkin" - and then wait. The response is always - "Like, pumpkin pie?" "No... just pumpkin." "Oh..." [followed by a really grossed out look].

What can I say... I love pumpkin!

Not only is it a delicious vegetable, but it is also a very nutritious vegetable. Pumpkin is rich in beta-carotene, a pro-vitamin that is converted to vitamin A in the body - which is essential for eye health and may be linked to preventing coronary heart disease. It is also a great immune booster. One cup of pumpkin has ten grams of fiber, four grams of protein, and only eighty calories. The pumpkin seeds are also good for you. They have protein, magnesium, potassium, and zinc. They have high levels of phytosterols which can reduce cholesterol and help prevent against some types of cancer.

1 Corinthians 6:19-20
Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.

To me, one of the best ways to glorify God with your body is by putting good things into it. If I nourish my body - the body that God designed uniquely for me - I am honoring Him. What I put into my body is important. Just as what I watch and hear affect my mind and heart, the food and drink I put into my body also affect me.

When my Heroic Husband prays for our food, he almost always says, "...and let us eat this food in a way that honors You." I love that! I want to live in a way that honors God - so why would I not want to eat in a way that honors God?

I was very blessed and fortunate to grow up in a home where health was important. When I was little, my Marvelous Mother fixed good food for me. As I grew older, she taught me to cook healthy food for myself. Today, we still love getting together and cooking delicious, healthy meals.

The other day, while I was looking at the benefits of chia seeds (and they are really good for you too), I came across a new pumpkin recipe. I decided to modify the ingredients a little and try it out.

As I was quickly mixing it together that night, my Heroic Husband asked, "What is that?" I said, "I don't exactly know, but it will either be really good or really bad." Let me tell you - it is really good!

Pumpkin Pudding
Ingredients
1/4 Cup Chia Seeds
1/4 Cup Pure Canned Pumpkin
1 Cup Almond Milk
1 Tablespoon Agave Nectar
1/2 Tablespoon Cinnamon
1 Teaspoon Vanilla Extract
1 Dash of Nutmeg

Directions
Combine all ingredients in a bowl. Make sure to mix them well - the chia seeds and cinnamon like to clump together - as does the pumpkin.
[NOTE: Your mixture will look NOTHING like pudding. It will be a watery substance. Do not worry! As the chia seeds sit, they will absorb the access liquid.]
Cover bowl and refrigerate overnight.

3 John 1:2
Beloved, I pray that all may go well with you and that you may be in good health, as it goes well with your soul.

Last weekend we had an early Easter with our family. DD and SIL came on Friday. They spent Saturday morning and afternoon doing income taxes with HH's help. Certainly a stressful start to the weekend! But after that it was all relaxed and fun. SS drove down in time for dinner.

I cooked a roast for the three Type Os, and had salmon patties for the two Type As. We also had rice, green beans, spinach, and butternut squash.

I wanted to tell you about the butternut squash. When I cook it for myself, I scoop it out of the peel one serving at a time. I sprinkle a little cinnamon on top and eat it. But I thought it should look nicer for a family dinner. I cooked the whole squash in the oven that morning. Just before dinner I separated the good part from the seeds and peeling. I mashed it with cinnamon, ginger, and olive oil. I put it in a casserole dish and sprinkled it with chopped almonds. Just before dinner, I warmed it in the oven. It was delicious.

Last Sunday morning we all got to go to church together. When the children were growing up, going to church together was such a normal, every week event. Now with SIL pastoring a church far away and SS active in a church less than an hour away, we rarely get to worship together. So this was a special time for us as a family.

Today is Palm Sunday. This morning we sang joyful praise songs. The service was exciting. Tonight we had a candlelight Lord's Supper. The service was serious and thoughtful. HH and I got home in time to watch "The Bible" on the History Channel.

A friend asked me what I thought about "The Bible." At first I laughed and said, "Oh you know me; I always think the book is always better than the movie." But seeing she was serious, I gave a serious answer. You can't possibly cover the entire Bible in five two-hour shows. Some things have to be combined or left out. There is some interpretation of detail where the Bible is silent.

However, I think they have done a remarkable job of accurately portraying the major themes of the Bible. It's certainly worth watching. Next week, on Easter Sunday, they will show the Resurrection, the growth of the church, and the Book of Revelation. I think we will have eggs for dinner while we watch!

This blog is not about what a great cook I am! I'm writing it to encourage you to be bold and innovative in your own kitchen as you live life on the BTD.

I am embarrassed to admit that I didn't buy just one package of the inexpensive cod that turned out to be half gristle and bone. There were two packages still in my freezer and I decided to get rid of one of them. HH loves New England Clam Chowder. Clams are avoid for him as a Type A and potatoes are avoid for him because of his history of high blood sugar. 
I wondered if I could make a healthy chowder with cod. I found a couple of recipes in the BTD recipe database. Some of them substituted sweet potatoes for white, but that wouldn't help things for him as a Type A. However it made me think that if I found an otherwise good recipe I could leave out potatoes altogether and serve it over rice. 

I liked the sound of one recipe on the BTD site and I found two other recipes on the Internet. Unfortunately I was out of a couple of key ingredients and I had already thawed the cod. 

While the onions and garlic were cooking, I started separating the edible fish from the garbage. I'm not sure whether I am an incurable optimist or really naive, but I was confident that somehow the meal would come together. I used almond milk instead of cream. I added parsley, a traditional chowder ingredient but it was still too bland. There was none of the heartiness I associate with chowder. 

I have a friend who served me split pea soup the other day. It was exceptionally good. When I asked her about the recipe, she said she had added cumin. 

I added cumin and fresh cilantro to the pot. Suddenly we had very tasty fish chowder with a Southwestern flavor. Sometime I will have to plan ahead and make a BTD version of New England Chowder, but in the meantime this version turned out to be a very good meal. 

What I want you to take away from this blog, is this: if your pantry is filled with beneficial and neutral ingredients, be bold in substituting ingredients in a recipe. Unless you are trying to copy a gourmet sauce or pastry with a very distinct texture, you will find that most recipes are very flexible. If a recipe calls for an avoid ingredient think of a beneficial or neutral substitute. If a recipe calls for a spice that you are out of, substitute something else. You have the potential to be an award winning chef when it comes to the happiness and health of your own family.

I am slightly out of breath as I type this blog, but I am smiling, because I rode my bike for almost an hour this afternoon and I didn't have to walk up any hills. I blogged a few weeks ago about my disappointment that I had run out of energy and had to walk my bicycle up the last big hill before I got home.

I had lots of excuses. We were out of town a lot last fall and I hadn't had time to ride. Early winter was unusually cold, and I wimped out about riding in the chilly wind. Of course, it's always easy to blame my age. Women nearing 60 lose muscle every year because of hormones, and it's a struggle to exercise enough to maintain the muscle I have, much less to build more. Whatever the reason, I had obviously neglected certain muscles in my legs.

I've ridden several times since that blog. Every time I have ridden farther and faster and up more hills. But today was the first time since last summer that I have ridden straight up the last hill.

I am smiling because I achieved a goal. I am smiling because I feel physically good after that kind of strenuous exercise. Most of all I am smiling because I have proved to myself that I can still build muscle. Now - I need to concentrate on building more of it!

On an entirely different subject, I made Kasha last night. I asked myself as I ate it with chicken and steamed vegetables, why I don't make it more often. Buckwheat is a good neutral grain for Type Os. Despite its name, it isn't wheat at all, and it is gluten free.

If you just cook buckwheat, it turns out with a texture sort of like oatmeal. But if you follow the Kasha recipe on the package and brown it first with an egg, then add boiling water, it turns out fluffy like rice. It takes less time to buckwheat on the stove than to cook rice in the rice cooker.

This afternoon I had Kasha with black currant preserves. It was as good as dessert.

It was late in the week, I was at the grocery store, and I hadn't tried a new recipe for the week. I was in the mood for salmon.

Though salmon is a good choice because it is beneficial for us both, salmon is not my Honorable Husband's favorite fish. Truth be told, his favorite fish is catfish, which is an avoid for him. I don't hassle him about catfish in restaurants, because I feel like any kind of fish is better for him than most meats. However, I don't buy catfish to cook at home.

I decided to buy salmon and see if I could find a different recipe when I got home. There was a long line at the fish counter. While I was waiting my turn I started looking through the complimentary recipe cards on display at the counter. The name Lemon Herb Salmon caught my eye. I especially liked the total preparation and cook time of 25 minutes.

The recipe called for olive oil and lemon pepper. I didn't think I would like that. This is how I made it:

Large salmon fillet with skin
2 Tbsp rosemary
juice from one lemon

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Put the salmon in a baking dish. Crush the rosemary in your fingers to bring out the flavor. Sprinkle over the salmon. Pour the lemon juice over the salmon. Cover the baking dish with foil. Cook for 10-15 minutes or until fish flakes.

HH said it was the best salmon I had ever fixed. I'm definitely keeping this recipe.

This week was our Strong Son's birthday. As I planned his birthday dinner I wanted to cook some old favorite foods, and I wanted to try a new recipe. The old favorites were chicken breasts with broccoli, butternut squash soup, and egg custard made with almond milk. I served the egg custard over blueberries to make it festive, but truthfully, I like it better plain.

SS is a Type O who loves pasta, so I wanted to try a new recipe with Tinkyada Brown Rice Pasta. I have bought many neutral grain pastas over the year, and Tinkyada is the only brand that is as good as traditional pasta. If you can't get Tinkyada in your local health food store, you can order it from VitaCost.

SS also likes Mexican food, and I wondered if anyone had tried Fajita Pasta. There was nothing close on the Blood Type Diet Recipe Center . Though I did see some other intriguing pasta recipes that I want to try. When I Googled Fajita Pasta, I found several recipes, but none of them were BTD friendly, and almost all of them relied on packaged seasoning mixes. I chose one recipe that came close to what I had in my head, and made a lot of adjustments.

Bell peppers are avoid for Type As, but they are neutral for non-secretors. There are several things that make me suspect my Honorable Husband is a non-secretor. Someday I need to get him tested, but I did not worry about his eating the peppers in this recipe.

Here is the recipe I came up with. I served it as a side dish without chicken for the birthday dinner. I'm going to make it again next week with chicken for a ladies' luncheon. My family gave it rave reviews.

Fajita Pasta

8 oz Tinkyada Pasta spirals or elbows
2 Tbsp light olive oil
1 white onion, sliced into strips
1 Green bell pepper, sliced into strips
1 Red bell pepper, sliced into strips
2 garlic cloves, minced
1.5 tsp cumin
1 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp cilantro
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup black beans
Optional additions: chicken breast cubes, chopped tomato, guacamole,

How to make it:
Cook pasta according to directions
Stir fry onion, bell pepper and garlic. When vegetables are soft, add seasonings. Stir and cook for 1-2 minutes to blend flavors. Mix pasta, vegetables and beans together. Add chicken if desired. Top with tomato and guacamole if desired.

Something happened his week that took me back to my college days. My roommate Alice and I had moved out of the dorm and into an apartment. Both of us copied favorite recipes from our Moms and we were excited about cooking in our own kitchen.

We were also both on a tight budget. One day Alice told me to come home prepared for a delicious dinner. She had found a great deal on chicken and was going to make one of her Mom's best recipes - Chicken Diablo. When I got in from class the apartment smelled wonderful. But when we sat down to dinner we realized the great deal on chicken had been on a package of wings and backs. We had a fabulous sauce but almost no chicken. Wings are mostly bone and skin. Backs are just bone. It was a poignant lesson for two young women.

At least I thought I had learned the lesson. I guess I needed a refresher course, because last week I found a great deal on frozen cod, and I bought it.

I decided to make my Mother's seafood Creole recipe. She made it with shrimp, but I was going to use the cod. I started the sauce first. It wasn't long before the kitchen smelled wonderful. I opened the cod. Oh my! I did not know fish could have gristle. I had a package that was mostly bone and tough connecting tissue. By digging and scraping I eventually found a respectable amount of cod, which I mixed in with the sauce.

I served the Creole over steamed brown rice. HH thought it was delicious. It was delicious...but it would have been so much better if I hadn't skimped and tried to save money on the fish.

Fried chicken is a Southern classic. Chicken Fried Steak is a Southwestern version of that Southern classic. Pre BTD I loved Chicken Fried Steak. I was never particularly good at making it, but I ordered it every time I could in a restaurant. After the BTD it became one of those foods like pizza - it wasn't really good for any blood type. The beef was bad for my husband, and the flour was bad for me.

I didn't miss it a whole lot, except when we would eat out with our Strong Son. He would smile as he enjoyed his Chicken Fried Steak and say, "Now Mom, you know I don't eat as much wheat as I used to, but I'm not taking this diet as seriously as you do." My mouth would water.

Last week I bought a package of turkey cutlets. Usually I cook the cutlets with barbeque sauce in the oven. I live in Texas so naturally there are 25 - 30 choices of barbeque sauce in my grocery store. Of those, 2-3 are free of high fructose corn syrup and other avoid ingredients.

Since my New Year's resolution is to try a new recipe every week that both my Type A husband and my Type O self can eat, I began to think what else I could do with the turkey cutlets. If Chicken Fried Steak was good, I wondered what Chicken Fried Turkey would be like. Back in the days when vegetables were popular and people ate at the cafeteria every Sunday after church, Luby's Cafeteria made some of the best Chicken Fried Steak. They had published a 50th anniversary cookbook, and I had bought one. Sure enough their Chicken Fried Steak recipe was in the cookbook. Here is the recipe - with my BTD changes.

3 large eggs
1 cup milk (substitute almond milk)
1 tsp salt
1 tsp seasoned salt
1/2 tsp pepper
3 cups flour (substitute rice flour)
2 1/2 pounds of round steak cut in pieces (substitute turkey cutlets)
Oil (I used light olive oil, but it smoked too much, next time will try grapeseed oil)

Whisk together eggs, milk, salt, seasoned salt, and pepper.
Place flour in a shallow bowl.
Pound the meat with a meat mallet to 1/4 inch thickness. Coat with flour. Dip into egg mixture, then again into flour.
Heat 1/8 inch oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Cook meat 3 - 4 minutes on each side or until browned and cooked through.

Except for the smoke from the light olive oil, this recipe was a big success. It tasted delicious. My Honorable Husband said, "Great dinner."

I will probably use less milk next time. There was too much of the egg milk mixture left over. When I warmed up the leftovers, the coating was not as crisp as it was the night I made them. Next time I will refry them just a little in oil so that the leftovers will be as good as the original.

I always read labels...at least I thought I did...but I missed one.

After I posted the Teriyaki Turkey recipe, Jane commented that Soy Sauce contained wheat.

My first reaction was that wheat was probably a minor ingredient near the bottom of the ingredient list. I walked to the refrigerator to check the bottle. No. Wheat was the number 1 ingredient. I couldn't believe it.

Why do they call it Soy Sauce if the main ingredient is wheat? It should be called Wheat Sauce...but that sounds terrible.

Jane recommended Tamari. At the grocery store I found 5 different kinds of Tamari. All of them were wheat free. Only one was low sodium. I bought that one.

While I was at the store I was also checking labels on soups. When my son was young he was extremely sensitive to MSG. Back then it seemed that all canned soups had MSG. Then Campbells came out with Healthy Request which was MSG free. Other soup makers followed their example and began eliminating MSG from their products. Finally Amys, Pacific, and other companies began marketing organic soups.

I began to buy more canned soup. My husband loves soup and salad for supper. Personally, while I like the taste of many soups, I don't find them filling enough to call a meal. I could warm a can of soup for him and have leftover meat and veggies for myself.

I do read soup labels carefully, even for favorite soups that I buy often. For a few years the trend seemed to be away from MSG. Now it seems to me that it is coming back to more soups. I've stopped buying several products that I bought a year or two ago.

I embarrassed that I missed the wheat in Soy Sauce, but I needed the reminder to stay vigilant. Even when I think I have read the label before, or when I think I know what is in a product, I need to take the time to check.

Last night's dinner was an adventure. I had a meeting with a client in the morning, and she served me some of the best beef tacos I have ever had for lunch. That put me in a fish frame of mind for dinner. Since I have resolved to try at least one new recipe a week this year, I began looking for something new I could do with cod. I found a lovely recipe, but when I went to get the cod out of the freezer, I was out. How did I let myself run out of something so basic? I was also out of salmon. The only fish in the house was canned tuna, and I was not in the mood to try a new tuna recipe.

I took out a pound of frozen ground turkey and a package of frozen vegetables. I could whip up a couple of quick vegetable bowls. It was far short of my expectations, but it would be healthy for HH and me. As I cut open the vegetable package, I noticed a box that said "serving suggestions". It said to top the vegetables with Teriyaki sauce. I realized that I had eaten Teriyaki flavored beef jerky, but I didn't have a clue what was in Teriyaki sauce.

On my computer, I called up the BTD recipe center, and there were two compliant Teriyaki sauce recipes. I combined them, because I didn't have the precise ingredients for either one. Here is what I did.

1/4 cup agave
5 Tablespoons low sodium soy sauce
1 1/2 teaspoons of ginger juice (I ran fresh ginger through my juicer)
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder.

First I started brown rice in the rice cooker. I warmed the Teriyaki ingredients in a saucepan while I browned the turkey. I added 2 Tablespoons of oil to the skillet where the turkey was cooking and turned up the heat to stir fry the frozen vegetables. I was watching the Teriyaki sauce to make sure it didn't boil. As soon as the vegetables were barely soft, I poured the sauce over them and the turkey. I called HH to dinner.

He took one bite and said, "This is really good."

Teriyaki turkey, where have you been all my life?

I have been in a rut. When I was a bride I was a, resourceful cook. When I was a mother, I was a creative cook. When I started the BTD, I was an experimental cook. But since DD left home, I've cooked the same things over and over. It's healthy. It's BTD compliant. But it's getting boring.

So my one New Year's Resolution is to try at least two new recipes a week. I'm off to a good start, because I tried two recipes today.

The morning of New Year's Eve, I started soaking a pound of black eyed peas. The evening of New Year's Eve, I was getting them ready for the slow cooker when I realized I was out of onion. I always cook black eyed peas with onion.

Don't panic, I told myself. How do most people cook black eyed peas? The answer is with bacon or salt pork. Obviously I was not going to do that...but I had a package of Buddy's chicken sausage in the freezer. If you are not familiar with Buddy's, it is a company that sells hormone free chicken. Their sausage is free of nitrites and other preservatives. I put the frozen sausage in the slow cooker with the beans and 2 cloves of garlic. Served with a spinach salad, it was a perfect New Year's Day lunch.

For dinner, I was going to cook beets. Normally I season beats with ghee, ginger, agave. It is delicious. But remembering my resolution to get out of my rut - even if it is a delicious rut - I got out a German cookbook that I've had for years, but never used. There was a recipe for beets with orange sauce. Orange is avoid for both Type As and Type Os. I decided to substitute pineapple juice for the orange juice. The recipe called for cornstarch, but that is also avoid. I kept it simple tossing the cooked beets with a Tablespoon of ghee and a heaping Tablespoon of pineapple juice concentrate.

HH was watching football and I was reading during dinner. As he took his plate to the kitchen, he said, "That was a really good dinner." I'm not sure that it was all that good, but it was different. The fact that he noticed, reinforces my resolution.

We celebrated Thanksgiving a week early! DD is still the newest employee in her department, so she has to work on Friday after Thanksgiving. SIL will be back at church preaching the Sunday after Thanksgiving. They have a very short holiday. However DD had a comp day, and they decided to take it last Friday. So we had our family Thanksgiving a week early.

DD and I cooked all day Friday. When SS arrived we drove downtown to look at the Christmas lights. Then we came home for a delicious, and mostly traditional, Thanksgiving dinner.

When you are on the BTD, you have three choices at holidays. At one time or another in my nine years on the diet, I've done all three.
1. Take a "holiday" from the BTD and splurge.
2. Tweak your recipes so they are a little healthier, but still traditional.
3. Convert all your traditional recipes to BTD compliant.

This year we did #3. Except for one dessert, everything was beneficial or neutral for us all.

I have posted my family's cornbread dressing recipe in other years, but here it is again: original version first, then the BTD version.

My Mother's cornbread dressing
4 cups of cornbread, 2 cups of biscuits, one onion diced, 3/4 cup chopped celery, 1/3 cup butter, 1 1/4 tsp sage, 1/2 tsp poultry seasoning, 3 eggs, 2 cans chicken broth. Cook the onion and celery in the butter until soft. Combine all ingredients. Bake in an 8x8 pan for 1 hour at 325.

My Daughter's compliant dressing
4 cups of crumbled millet cornbread
2 cups crumbled flax bread
1 chopped onion
1/3 cup melted ghee
1 1/4 tsp sage
1 tsp poultry seasoning
3 eggs
2 2/3 cups water mixed with 1/3 cup Braggs Liquid Aminos

Substituting Braggs Liquid Aminos for canned chicken broth was new this year. It worked beautifully.

When DD lived at home, she used to whip up a quick pumpkin dish that was delicious. The day after our Thanksgiving dinner, we were going to have leftovers. I asked if she would do her pumpkin as a side dish. If you are looking for something unique and very beneficial, for your Thanksgiving, you might like this. She didn't measure anything, so adjust to your personal taste.

DD's Pumpkin Side Dish
2 cans pure pumpkin
8 oz can of pineapple chunks, drained
1 apple chopped
Walnuts or pecans - chopped
Ghee
Craisins
Crystallized ginger
Cinnamon

Mix it together and heat until it is warm. It doesn't really have to cook; you just want the cinnamon and ginger flavors to have time to blend.

I had bought a bag of shredded cabbage for Cole Slaw before we left on our trip. When we returned, the cabbage was looking a little wilted. HH loves Cole Slaw almost any time, particularly with sandwiches or soup. So he was happy to be getting Cole Slaw every day. But I could see that the cabbage was going to go bad long before I could use it all.

I remembered wistfully a cooked cabbage recipe that I loved making before I started the BTD. At the time I was not a cabbage eater. I didn't like raw cabbage in Cole Slaw. I didn't like fermented sauerkraut. I didn't like watery cooked cabbage. I came across a recipe that said cook cabbage in a little milk and melted butter. I tried it and to me it tasted wonderful. Full disclosure - DD and HH who both prefer raw vegetables to cooked, did not share my enthusiasm. But I often fixed cabbage this way for myself when I was alone at lunch. I abandoned the recipe when I started the BTD because of the milk.

I was thinking about that recipe for cooked cabbage as I made Cole Slaw for HH. Then I thought of almond milk. I put some ghee in a skillet, added the last of the cabbage, added a little almond milk and began to cook. As the cabbage wilted, I added a few shredded carrots.

The result tasted every bit as good as I remember the original recipe tasting. I am happy to be enjoying cooked cabbage again. HH is happy because buying cabbage more often means more Cole Slaw for him.

SIL is a seminary student studying to be a minister. He has been called to pastor of a church in a rural community. There are many, many exciting things about this position. One is that the church members are so warm and encouraging to both SIL and DD. The other is that they have a parsonage!

The house has been vacant for about a year - since the former pastor moved out. So there were lots of bugs to be killed and lots of dust to wipe away. Because this will be their first home, they want to make it cute and special. They decided to paint...and to retile the bathroom...and to put shelf paper in all the cabinets. They had a very ambitious project list and not very many days before they had to be out of their apartment.

SIL's family came one weekend and got about half of the house painted. My Honorable Husband and I went last weekend. DD and I tackled the kitchen. HH and SIL laid the tile and continued painting. We worked hard, but it was fun because we were working together.

DD cooked for us Friday night. They have a George Foreman Grill, and she used it to make chicken. I was impressed. The chicken was tender and juicy. She used two salt free Mrs. Dash seasoning mixes on the chicken. One was spicy and the other was mild. Both were delicious. She also served curried green beans, turnip greens with ghee, a relish tray, and millet cornbread.

For lunch on Saturday she had tuna melts. She did a variation on a recipe I used to make which was popular with my children and their friends. She mixed tuna, cilantro, an herbal seasoning, and a neutral creamy dressing. I had always used mayonnaise, but SIL likes dressing better. You put the tuna mixture on top of slices of sprouted bread and top them with grated mozzarella cheese. You put them in the broiler until the cheese melts and starts to bubble.

Saturday night we were all tired and dirty. We drove into town for Mexican food. I had the second best taco salad I've ever eaten. On Sunday we got to hear SIL preach, then had lunch at an Italian restaurant. My chicken Caesar salad was outstanding. They are blessed to have at least two BTD friendly restaurants in their small town.

We worked a little more Sunday afternoon. At the end of the weekend when we looked around, we were amazed at how much progress had been made.

SIL will commute to seminary one day a week and take the rest of his classes on line. DD will continue to work at her job in marketing. She says, "I've been spending 30-45 minutes a day in heavy traffic. Now I'll be spending 45 minutes to an hour driving through the countryside."

In my last blog I mentioned several foods that I used to crave, but that no longer have a hold on me. I also mentioned several foods that I still fantasize about, though I don’t buy them or eat them at home.

One food that I really miss is popcorn. I like crunch, I like salt, and I like butter. Popcorn has all three. Plus it has a lot of fiber. But I rarely fix it because it isn’t good for either HH or me. It is avoid for Type O. While it is neutral for Type A, it is infrequent neutral for diabetic Type As. HH was pre-diabetic until he got serious about the BTD and dropped his blood sugar by 20 points.

Occasionally he can coax me into fixing some air popcorn with olive oil during a movie, but not often.

This week I tried something that satisfied my longing for popcorn.
I bought a bag of puffed millet earlier in the summer. I like it as a snack with a Tablespoon of carob powder and a little almond milk. HH likes it in the mini casseroles I fix him for dinner.

Tonight I put some ghee on top of a bowl of puffed millet and warmed it in the microwave for 45 seconds. I stirred it, salted it, and tasted it.

It’s not popcorn, but it satisfied the part of me that craves popcorn. I have a feeling I’m going to be making this Un-Popcorn a lot.

A facebook friend posted that she had a soup recipe that called for kale and she was looking for a substitution since she couldn’t find kale at the grocery store in our Hill Country town. I commented that I had never had any trouble finding kale locally. As far as substitutions, I said that any other green should work in a soup recipe, but that kale was worth looking for since it was a beneficial food for everyone.

By then I was hungry for kale. The next day I was in Wal-Mart, and there in the produce department were beautiful bunches of kale. Of course I bought one.

I soaked a pound of black eyed peas overnight, and yesterday morning I started them cooking on low heat in the crock pot with one chopped up onion and two minced cloves of garlic.

When the black eyed peas were just barely done - about midafternoon - I removed half of them from the crock pot. I tore the leafy part of the kale into bite sized pieces and put them in the crock pot. After turning the heat to high, I let them cook for another hour.

The first thing I noticed was that the house didn’t smell like kale. While I think kale tastes good, it has a bad smell when I cook it by itself. Whether it was the crock pot or cooking it in the black eyed pea broth, I don’t know, but there was no smell.

I gave my Honorable Husband the plain black-eyed peas. He does not like cooked greens. I ate the black eyed peas and kale together and thought it was delicious. I probably should have added a little sauce, but in my opinion this was a good combination. Our Darling Daughter was home for the weekend. She, like her father, prefers raw to cooked greens. But she ate the combination and declared it to be good.

The moral of the story is - there is no end to the ways you can cook beneficial vegetables - and - never underestimate what you might find at Wal-Mart!

Before I reposted the millet cornbread recipe (shame on computer hackers) I had gone to the health food store that has the best price on the spelt bread my Honorable Husband likes. They told me that they stopped carrying millet, because it wasn’t selling. However, they said they would order it if I bought 3 bags. I agreed and had just picked up the millet. In my mind I could already taste the cornbread.

That afternoon HH and I were hauling gravel around the yard. We needed to get to a certain point in our project because rain was in the forecast. As I worked I was thinking about what to cook with the millet cornbread. Suddenly I had a brainstorm. One of the things I loved in my pre-BTD days was tamale pie. I could substitute the millet cornbread and have an old favorite.

Coming in from the yard at dusk, already hungry and tired, I didn’t take the time to make the full tamale pie. I did a quickie version. It was delicious. HH paid me compliments.

Brown 16 – 20 ounces of ground turkey. Add 2 tablespoons of chili powder and 1 tablespoon of ground cumin. In the full version I would also have added cooked onion and cooked red bell pepper – but like I said, I was in a hurry.

While the meat was cooking, I ground the millet in my food processor and made millet cornbread batter. I put the seasoned meat in the bottom of a flat casserole dish and poured the batter over it. I baked it as if it was just the millet cornbread alone.

Substituting in recipes is beneficial. I have also been substituting in exercise, and that has not been so beneficial. We’ve had lots of yard work this spring. When I work outside for a couple of hours, I don’t come in and do another 30 – 45 minutes of exercise. The yard work makes my back and arm muscles stronger. It often gets my heart rate pumping and I definitely work up a good sweat. I thought this substitution was working.

However, this morning I went for a run – probably the first time I’ve run in 3 weeks. I could tell that I was out of shape. I need to make sure that I allow time for running, bicycling and other Type O intense physical exercise, even in the weeks that I am physically active in my yard.

Sorry if there is any confusion about this blog. A hacker gained access to the original post. Every time I logged in to the site Dr. D has set up for bloggers, the comment section was filled with junk messages. Only the sin nature of man can explain why people with brilliant minds waste all of their potential doing evil things. I deleted the original post and am reposting it here. I bought millet yesterday and plan to bake bread tonight.

I started out to blog about how circumstances forced me into a variation on one of my favorite recipes. Then I realized I had never posted about the basic recipe. So it looks like I will be writing two bread blogs in a row.

I have been blogging since 2004, and every November and December I have blogged about cornbread. I love cornbread of any type, but my favorite is moist cake-like cornbread. I like it best when it has the gooey texture of a brownie.

But corn is a problem. It is listed as avoid for Type Os.

On the GenoType diet it is a toxin for Gatherers and a black dot for Hunters. Since I mostly identify myself as a Hunter, I can justify having corn on rare occasions, but I know it isn’t really good for me.

Corn is neutral for Type As, but it is an infrequent neutral on the Type A diabetic diet. HH has Type 2 diabetes in his family and has elevated blood sugar if he doesn’t watch what he eats.

So we rarely eat corn at our house. Last year at Thanksgiving, I combined several recipes together and came up with a delicious cornbread that has just the taste and texture I like. I told myself it would have to be a holiday recipe, that neither HH nor I needed to be eating cornbread very often.

But the memory of that delicious cornbread haunted me.

DD had tried to make a loaf of bread with millet flour one time, but it was too heavy. She came up with the idea to grind millet and use it in my cornbread recipe. She and ESS loved it. I tried it. HH and I agreed that it was delicious. The texture was just like cornbread. The flavor was wonderful, not identical to cornbread, but close enough to be satisfying.

Millet cornbread is perfect with chili, tasty with any meal, and outstanding with ghee as an afternoon snack. It has become one of my favorite recipes.

Millet Cornbread
2 cups millet, ground into flour
4 tsp baking powder
2 eggs
1 cup milk
1/3 cup oil
1/3 cup honey

Mix dry ingredients together and set aside
Mix wet ingredients and pour over dry ingredients. Stir together
Bake at 425 degrees for 20 minutes in 9x9 pan.

I made a double batch of chili a few weeks ago, and froze half of it. The weather was cold and rainy last weekend, so I got the leftover chili out of the freezer. I was going to make millet bread - which tastes so much like cornbread that it goes perfect with chili, but I was out of eggs. Instead I made garlic toast with the ends of spelt bread for HH. I had rice bread with ghee. It was adequate, but not as good as chili with cornbread. There was enough chili left for one meal. I grocery shopped and bought eggs.

Wednesday I started warming the last of the chili, and began again to make millet bread…I was out of millet. I was so frustrated as I stared at the shelf. I had quinoa, amaranth, rye, and buckwheat, but no millet. Rather than have toast with our chili again, I ground 2 cups of buckwheat groats into flour.

I made the bread exactly like I would have made it with millet. The first hint of success was the way the bread smelled while it was baking. I knew it was going to be good.

The buckwheat bread was a little drier than the millet bread, but it was not too dry. In a way, the texture suited the different flavor of the buckwheat. However, I might add a little more milk or oil next time I make it.

The chili is all gone, but I’m looking forward to another slice of buckwheat bread this afternoon.

If you missed the millet cornbread recipe, here is the link: millet cornbread

We are staying with our friends DG and EG in Oklahoma. My Honorable Husband and DG served together in Vietnam. Our conversations are always lively because we all share the same views about politics in both the 1960s and in 2012. We also share the same love for Jesus. We laugh a lot and we solve all of the world’s problems…if only the authorities would listen to us.

The first night we were there DG grilled hamburgers. They were wonderful. HH had not had a hamburger in many months, so this was a treat for him. Not something he will indulge in often, but one hamburger will not hurt him.

For lunch yesterday EG fixed one of her Mom’s old favorite recipes. I’ll give you the original version. It’s not bad for any Blood Type as it is, but it can be tweaked to make it a little better if you are seeking a higher level of compliance. As with many recipes that are handed down, there are no measurements – just ingredients. Use your creativity. EG used a very small amount of dressing – so small that at first I didn’t think there was any dressing at all.

Mrs. C’s Salmon Salad.
Canned salmon, celery, English peas, green onion. Make a dressing with mayonnaise, soy sauce and lemon juice.

After lunch we went to the Oklahoma City Zoo to see the baby tigers. There were four of them, born 7 months ago. They are getting big, but they still play like kittens. We stayed for a long time watching them and laughing at their antics. This is a city zoo and there is an exhibit of wild animals native to Oklahoma. HH and I saw white tail deer and said, “But we have those in our back yard.” People around us looked up with surprise. A little further we saw wild turkeys. Again we said, “We have those in our back yard.” It is a peculiar feeling to see animals in caged habitats that you are used to seeing running wild and eating your landscape plants.

EG’s father was a pastor in India, and she grew up there. On previous visits she had introduced us to Indian food. Last night we went to Gopuram, an Indian buffet. I tried many delicious foods, but two stood out because they were new to me. One was fish curry. It was chunks of boneless white fish in a spicy curry sauce. The other was carrot pudding. This was on the dessert bar and I’m going to try to find a recipe. It was made of shredded carrots. EG thought it tasted like rose water was one of the ingredients.