2. Vegetables and New Year!
Happy New Year! I hope 2014 brings you health and insight, friends and forgiveness, Love and lots of laughter!
With the first week of the New Year almost to an end, how are you going with your New Year’s resolutions? Still going strong? Or waning, and not quite sure how to tackle certain obstacles?
I’ve been told (and to be truthful, it was an advertisement on television which gave me this insight…) that to keep your resolutions, it is best to focus on one thing and one thing only.
So let’s say, your list for 2014 contains the following:
- Eating healthy
- Lose weight
- Be more patient to the kids
- Be less cranky
- Be more active
So skip everything on this list after ‘Eating Healthy’. What does ‘eating healthy’ mean to you? More vegetables? Less sugar and additives? Gluten free maybe? No late night snacks? Hm. Let’s skip everything after ‘more vegetables’ as well, just to keep our focus.
What would ‘more vegetables’ bring us?
Beside the fact that vegetables are gluten free and contain no preservatives and added sugar, vegetables are also full of fibre. The fibre, especially in the skin will help you make you feel full quicker. And although I do not like to speak about calories, you have to eat an awful lot of carrots to equal the amount of calories in a donut. Needless to say, all this will help in losing weight. So, we can feel relaxed that we skipped no. 2 of our New Year’s resolutions list!
Fibre also regulates the blood sugar levels by absorbing glucose of food. Eating vegetables regularly and maybe even as a late night snack can help you balancing your blood sugar levels. Equal blood sugar levels equal a more balanced attitude – that’s number 3 and 4 of our list.
With our busy lives we all want to have more energy. Jam packed with vitamins and minerals, vegetables are just doing that: Being an excellent source of fuel for our body. And that is number 5…
And maybe it is not on your list (but it definitely should!) but vegetables are also full of phytochemicals, helping to lower our risk of cancer, decreasing oxidative stress and increasing our cardiovascular health.
This Saturday’s cooking class is all about the goodness vegetables bring us, and how to increasing our vegetable intake with handy tips and delicious recipes.
So to help you kick start your New Year’s resolution, here is a recipe with lots of vegetables in them. Broccoli is one of my favourite vegetables, and I think of all the vegetables, broccoli is the one most children like. This soup is lovely and easy. When the children were smaller, I loved giving them a big bowl of soup as lunch. Easily they would scoop up a large amount of all the goodness at a time that they still had energy. But with a nice slice of bread, this will do as a quick family dinner as well, enjoy!
Quick Vegetable soup
1 ½ cup of broccoli in chunks
½ cup of sweet potato in little cubes
1 small onion, cut
Bit of sesame oil
Stock
Stir fry the onion in a bit of sesame oil. Add a tiny pinch of salt, and stir fry some more. Now add the potato on top. Add water, so that it covers the potato. Boil for approximately 5 minutes, or until the potatoes are almost soft. Add the broccoli and more water for the last few minutes to boil. Add seasoning, some stock, and blend it into a smooth creamy soup. Done!