Good Links

Ok Yogis, I have a few good blogs in the works for you but right now I'm up to my 3rd eye in yogic cramming for my oral final on Saturday. Am I worried? not really but I REALLY like my teachers and I want them to be proud of me so I've been focusing more on my studies than my observation of daily life. As far as "off the mat and into life..." it's all mat all the time! So when I get back to my life I'll get some blogs up about the two.

In the meantime however here are a few of my favorite yoga and yoga lifestyle-ish websites that I dig and sometimes visit when I need a study break.

Foat Designs: This is a small independent business run buy the Foat sisters, two rockin' yogis who reign supreme in the upcycling, save the planet with good fashion realm. I  met them a few years ago at a yoga conference and picked up a pair of custom leg warmers for in between workshops to keep warm.

Heart Of The Sky Fair Trade: Y'all know I live in a tiny town in Wisconsin and how much I love my tiny town and the amazing Community here. Heart of the Sky is run by one of the amazing women in the amazing Community, Melinda. Melinda takes trips to Guatemala where she cultivates relationships with women's co-ops and small family businesses, she pays them fair market value for the goods and brings them back to sell not only to promote these women's and family's talents and business but also to help raise awareness for the Network in Solidarity With The People Of Guatemala.

Daily Cup of Yoga: DCY is a great blog (that actually updates regularly) the life and styles of yoga.

Joyful Belly:  If you are a reader of this blog you notice that I mention Ayurveda pretty regularly. If you are curious about Ayurveda or are a follower of the Ayurvedic lifestyle and looking for some good resources this is the place to check out!

Ok readers it's back to the books for me. I promise new and exciting things when I return as a dually certified yoga teacher. 

What A Yogi Eats...

...when she is on the mend.

Breakfast of champs, eh? Let me explain. See I don't really eat breakfast; I get up pretty early so my body isn't ready for food but I do need a little something.  What you see here, I like to think of as a nice balance of eastern and western medicinal treatments, are the following:

Coffee with cinnamon and cardamom

Rice milk

2 crackers

Chywanprash

Uber Vitamin

Antibiotics

One Half of an antidepressant

Let’s start at the start, the Coffee (western). I love coffee, straight up, strong brewed coffee. I could drink it all day, it's a like a comfort food for me and I don't even care about the caffeine, in fact I prefer decaf because I'm jumpy enough. However this coffee here has caffeine so it also has cinnamon and cardamom in it (eastern). It's an Ayurvedic was of lessening the effects the caffeine has on your system. Also it's a nice extra cozy flavor when it is cold and snowy outside. 

Rice Milk (eastern): I don't like milk, maybe a little in my cereal or to dunk an Oreo in but other than that no thank you. Really I just have the rice milk there because I don't like taking pills with hot liquids that I need something to help wash down the Chywanprash.

Chywanprash (eastern, on a cracker) is a sort of medicinal jelly you eat in the morning. it is chock full of good things like

Amla fruit, Indian kudzu root, Long pepper fruit, sandalwood, Mysore cardamom seed, Malabar nut tree leaf, Spanish pellitory root, arjuna bark, ashwagandha root, shatavari root, bacopa leaf, holy basil leaf, chebulic myrobalan fruit, Ginger, European grape fruit, Licorice root, Sacred Lotus flower, Jatamansi root, Neem leaf, Tribulus fruit, Bael tree fruit, Indian tinospora stem, Phyllanthus herb, Zedoary rhizome, Cyperus rhizome, Indian Elecampane root, Heart-leaf sida root,  Himalayan pistachio fruit, Leptadenia leaves, Boerhavia root, fig, Clove bud, true cinnamon, Indian Cassia leaves, Mesua flower, True saffron stigma with sugarcane, Ghee (clarified butter), Honey & Sesame oil

All good things but to me the taste is a little odd and the texture is that of a very thick jelly. I tried the first few times just eating the jelly but couldn't do it so to help with the texture I added some sesame seeds to the jelly to give me something to "chew." But by and large the best things I've found is the sesame mixed jelly made into a cracker sandwich, it’s almost enjoyable.

Mmmmm, Chywanprash!

Uber Vitamin (eastern). There is so much research out there about vitamins; they are great, they are crap, they have to be vegetarian, it’s fine if they are chemically produced. This is one area where I have stopped listening to basically everyone. I take a whole food derived vitamin that turns my urine bright yellow! It doesn’t make me puke which most vitamins do and I just feel better when I take them. Placebo effect or not there are worse things I could choose to believe make me feel better.

Antibiotics: Amoxicillin (western). I am on the upswing of a wicked flu virus that is sweeping the Midwest. It was killer; it started out like any old winter cold then it morphed into a 4 day long pressure headache, which lead to an ear ache which was actually an ear infection which decided to start bleeding out all of the side of my face. If you've never walked into the bathroom to see blood seeping from your ear trust me, it's TERRIFYING! and if you have or if you have ever had an ear infection that I would like to hug you because those things hurt, a lot! So I am on a high dose of medicine to get this nasty infection out and gone! even as a yogi I know sometimes we have to lean on western medicine to help us heal, that's why it's there, because it's valid. I can't imagine what kind of pain not to mention what kind of other fluid my body would have started oozing if not for those pink little (not so little) pills my Doc prescribed me. And speaking of leaning on western medicine...

Half an antidepressant (western). You might remember this post: 5 Things I Don't Like, when I talked about going on antidepressants. Well you can see there's only half a pill there which means *sounds of trumpets* I’m dosing down. I'm back on my mat and I’ve eliminated quite a few stressors from my life so my body is back producing hormones that make me happy again.

What A Yogi Eats...

...On Market Day!

I am fortunate enough that my tiny town is surrounded by beautiful organic arms. So here is a quick breakfast I whipped up from things I bought at the Farmers Market this Saturday.

Farm Market Veggie Scramble

Free range eggs

Scallions

Carrots

Zuccini

Tomato

How I cook them:

1. heat some in a large skillet

2. toss in Carrots and Scallions

3. while those are cooking break 6 eggs into a bowl and scramble with a fork

4. add Zuccini and any seasoning you like to the veggies and cook for a few minutes

5. add tomatoes, let a little of the water in the tomatoes cook off then,

6. add the egg mixture and scramble all ingredients together.

optional: because it's still pretty hot out and tomatoes can aggravate Pitta Dosha I added a hearty sprinkle of fresh dill to the eggs as they were cooking, to help balance the acidic qualities of the tomatoes.

Final product...

Farm Fresh Yogi Breakfast

What a Yogi Eats

PICKLES!

Delicious, delicious, fermented, dill flavored cucumbers. And I found the easiest recipe in the world for them! And I will now share it; sort of because I don't really follow recipes I just start tossing things into a pot.

First go pick some cucumbers. What?! You don't have any cucumbers growing in your garden? You have to try them next year, promise me you will. They are super easy, even in this crazy drought year this is what my cuc patch looks like:

Cucs Gone Wild!

Now before I go on, this is a recipe for Refrigerator Pickles, so they aren't water processed, they don't keep as long as "canned" pickles but they are so good you'll eat them before they have a chance to turn.

My first batched I made 3 pint jars which is the measurements I’ll share with you

Enough Cucumbers, thinly sliced, to fill 3 pint jars
3 Cloves Garlic
2 tsp celery seed
3 TBL dried Dill (fresh is better, you need less if you are using fresh, but I didn't have any)
1/2 tsp Turmeric (this is optional, mainly for color but it's very good for all 3 doshas if you are practicing Ayurveda)
1/2 cup Sugar (more or less depending on your taste)
1 1/4 cup White Vinegar
1/4 cup Salt, a scant1/4 cup or less if you are watching your sodium
1 1/2cup Water

In a pot combine all the ingredients EXCEPT the cucumbers. Bring to a boil and then remove from heat. While the brine cools to room temp slice your cucumbers and fill the 3 pints jars.

Note* this is more than 3 pint jars, this recipe is only for 3 pint jars.

After the brine is cool, strain the liquid into a bowl or large measuring cup, preferably something with a pouring lip. Pour the brine over the cucumbers.

Screw the lids on and place in the fridge. Let them alone for a few days until the dimple in the top of the jar goes down and then eat up!

From all the recipes I read online about fridge dills they all vary on shelf life so here is what I have to say about it:

1st I AM NOT A FOOD EXPERT! It is quite possible I have never gotten botulism by sheer luck. Fermenting food can be dangerous so please follow the recipes and suggestions of a qualified food professional.

2nd If it smells bad, it probably is.

3rd These are so good, if they come out ok, there is no way they will last long enough to turn. But I said that already so I’m going to stop blogging now and go eat some pickles. Yum.

What a Yogi Eats...

on Harvest Day.

Veggie Stir Fry

 

I love having a kitchen garden! I love food right out of the ground and this morning I harvested:

Carrots
Rainbow Chard
Swiss Kale
Green Beans
Paprika Peppers (ok just one pepper, but its early still)

Perfect for summer stir fry. Here's how I did it...

1st Get some water boiling for your rice, noodles or anything else you might like to serve your stir fry over, or if you are Paleo or Low Carb or just don't have anything you can eat the veggies on their own.

2nd toss a little oil in your skillet while it heats chop the Carrots into your desired shape, toss those into the heated skillet. Next, chop the Green Beans, toss them in. Next, slice the pepper and in with it.

Usually between the Beans and the Peppers the rice water is boiling, so add your rice, noodles, etc...Cover and get back to the veggies.

While those veggies are cooking, stem and chop your Kale and Chard. When the Carrots are just shy of soft toss in the greens.

CHEATER STEP (because I'm not good at Asian sauces), over the greens drizzle some of your favorite stir fry sauce. Instant flavor, no effort!

Optional Step: I like to pour about 1/4-1/2 a cup of water over the green and sauce before giving it a stir. I do this because it helps my greens to wilt and spreads the sauce more evenly, it also helps to soften the harder veggies if they aren't done all the way yet. I cook it back down so the sauce doesn't lose any umph.

Optional Step #2: Protein: Now I’m not a vegetarian but my Ayurvedic Consultant told me I should limit my meat intake, really I'm supposed to just eat chicken and fish but I'm terrible at cooking chicken in a skillet and I don't like fish in stir fry. So instead I used TVP, Textured Vegetable Protein, it has a great texture and no taste so you can season it however you want. It is a dehydrated product so I pour about 3/4 a cup into a bowl, sprinkle it with seasoning (for this I used a little turmeric and a 5 pepper blend) and let it sit, I do this before I even put the water on to boil, so by this point in the recipe it's fully rehydrated/marinated and ready to go. SO into the skillet with it!

Cook down till all the extra water is absorbed and serve over your rice, which should magically finish right when your veggies do.

I garnished mine with a few fresh cucumbers with dill which is very cooling for my Pitta digestion, just in case the sauce had too much spice in it, and sesame seeds which you don't see here because I forgot them. 

ENJOY!

What a Yogi Eats...

... during Panchakarma.

KITCHARI! Yay, Kitchari! for 5 days. All kitchari, all the time. yay...meh.

But seriously. Panchakarma (cleasning program) is an excellent way to balance your bodies digestive fire. Kitchari is a very baisc meal that is easily digested by the body, it is also a fairly flexible dish so you can spice (ok well not too spicy) it up and make variations. Here is the recipe I followed on my 5 day panchakarma:



Kitchari

2TBLS Ghee
1/2tsp Mustard Seeds
1/2tso Cumin Seeds
1/2 cup Yellow Mung Bean Dall (soaked overnight in water)
1 cup Basmati Rice
1tsp Ground Cumin
1tsp Ground Coriander
1/2tsp Turmeric Powder
3-6 cups Water
Vegetables *If you are unfamiliar with Ayurveda try CARROTS, ZUCCHINI, GREEN BEANS, SPINACH (if you are familiar with Ayurveda and your specific Dosha check the links below for dosha specific recipes)

Method:
1. melt the GHEE in a heavy bottom pan
2. add the MUSTARD and CUMIN seeds and toast until the begin to emit aroma and pop
3. drain excess water from MUNG DAAL*, add DAAL, BASMATI, CUMIN, CORIANDER and TURMERIC
*presoaking daal is not necessary but it aids in easy digestion
4. stir until well combined but do not burn the daal
5. add 3 cups of water*
*you can add as much as water as you like depending on how soupy or dry you like your Kitchari, experiment and find the best level for you.
6. add vegetables
7. cook until veggies are soft.

In the picture above I substituted Quinoa for Basmati because after a few days of basmati only i was having trouble...hmmm how to say this delicately...pooping. Yep I said it, also quinoa has more protein than basmati which is good for active people. Or people like me who teach yoga and have to say things like Utthita Hasta Padangusthasana out load (much harder to do with a hungry fuzzy panchakarma brain). There are about 1,000 different versions of Kitchari recipes out there, just do a search in any old search engine or if you already know your dosha you can try dosha specific substitutions from Joyful Belly or try one of there 3 dosha specific Kitchari Recipes.

DISCLAIMER: I am NOT an Ayurcedic practitioner nor am I a doctor, seek the advice of licensed professional before starting any health/diet program.

Oleation: a slippery slope

Do you know what it feels like to swallow a mouth full of oil? Now I don’t mean oily food like French fries or fresh bread dipped in oil I mean like go get a shot glass fill it with oil (in this case flax seed) and throw it back like it was Cuervo Gold. (insert the sound of a shuttering head shake here…). Well I do. Why might you ask, do I make it a habit of tasting fine oils of the world in the manner? Nope. I’m simply a yogi, a yogi on a wellness plan.

So 21 days of wellness, the first 21 days the Teacher Train that I recently began. But wait, don’t I already teach yoga, yes, but I initial training was a long time ago and I have been itching to be a student again for a few years, also I never registered with Yoga Alliance and I’d also like to go on for an advanced 500hr certification. But enough about me, on to the oil. The wellness plan that I’m on is based in Ayurvedic medicine, the sister science of yoga and a thousands of years old tradition of keeping the body balanced. One of the largest keys to keeping the body balanced from an Ayurvedic stand point is through your diet. But Ayurveda doesn’t want to just throw you off the deep end, nor does it want to start giving you medicine that your body isn’t prepared to absorb. So, to begin with you start observing yourself, then you start editing out certain foods and behaviors, then go you willingly jump into the deep end; you go on a 5 day mono-diet or cleanse. 

Since Ayurveda views food as medicine there are a few foods that they found have a neutralizing effect on most body types. So for 5 days you eat nothing but this balancing blend of basmati rice, splint yellow mung dal and a very specific spice blend. And if that doesn’t sound like fun (this is where the oil comes in) for 2 days beginning the diet you have to oleate the GI tract, as in, drink a shot glass full of flax seed oil. So if that wasn’t enough here’s a little tale about my first oleation:

First things first the training that I’m going to is 3 hours away from where I live, so I’m basically couch surfing my way through this program. On this particular occasion I was staying in a family member’s vacant studio apartment, might I emphasize vacant. The first hiccup in the oleation process was ghee or clarified butter, this is what you traditionally oleate the body with but because I was in a vacant studio apartment I didn’t have a pan to melt butter in; separating the milk proteins from the pure oil which is essentially what ghee is, the oil part of butter. Now because I’ve made ghee in the past and know how utterly simple it is I refuse on principle to pay $8 for a pint of it at the store and beside Trader Joes didn’t have it anyway, but they did have flax seed oil which is an acceptable substitute. 

The morning of the oleation: first thing you do is take your herbs and let those herbs do their work in your stomach for about 20 minutes. My herbs that morning seemed to be in overdrive and about 10 minutes after I took them I was ready for breakfast but nope, the oil must be taken on an empty stomach as well so 10 grumbly minutes later I marched into the empty kitchen open up the flax seed oil after a good shake, took a whiff and realized there was not a spoon to be found in the place, least of all a Tablespoon. Luckily, or perhaps unluckily, I had a plastic soup spoon from takeout the night before. If you’ve never done a side by side comparison of a plastic spoon to an actual table spoon I’ll just tell you, you have fit 3 plastic spoons into a table spoon. I was supposed to take 2 tablespoons of this stuff. But I’m tough, I’m a yogi so I poured my first shot into the spoon and gulped, before I lost my nerve I tried to get one more down but my gag reflex kicked in and  I only got about half of that spoonful in (insert full body shiver). As I began to pace around the apartment like a cat with peanut butter on its tongue my partner went in for his 2 table spoons. He remarks before oiling up his mouth, “it smells like paint varnish.” He got 3 down before joining me in the mini-studio-walk-a-thon. After a few minutes we walked back to the kitchen, my partner picked up the bottle of flax oil and told me as a matter of fact flax seed oil it the same thing as linseed oil which is used in varnishing and in treating dry wooden furniture also that he works with linseed oil so much in his job that he really did feel like he was “downing paint varnish.” Pour guy but enough science just give me the bottle before I lose my nerve. After watching him swiftly down his 3 spoonfuls I decide I can’t do that particular method again and decide just to take a big gulp and whatever I get down is what I get down. Know I appreciate my partner for many things, one of which being his Venus fly trap mind, anything he reads he instantly retains, which I find fascinating, but I wasn’t a little distracted by the thick, particle filled oil that was currently dripping down my throat and chin to care too much that an average size person’s gulp is one ounce (something he read about staying properly hydrating on long distance runs). But what it meant was that in one gulp I had thrown back my 2 tables spoon and could continue on to my walking marathon of the vacant Pilser studio apartment. 

So what does oleation have to do with yoga? A lot really, not just the Ayurveda stuff but trust and about being open enough to see just what your body can do. I may not be wise enough in the Ayurvedic tradition but I trust that this process has worked for thousands of years and helped thousands of people. And no I didn’t think I would be able to drink oil without projectile vomiting all over the place but I did and I have little flax seedy burps for the rest of the day to remind be to be proud of all the cool things my body can do.

5 Things I Don't Like

As a teacher and advocate of yoga every once and a while I get this unsolicited remark when I mention being a yoga teacher or just that I do yoga, “Yeah, I don’t really like yoga.” More blunt than the flat end of a meat tenderizer. My usual response is something non-committal, feverishly dancing around and suppressing the numerous sharp tongued responses that leap to mind quicker than Jack be nimble in his fanciful display of Hanumanasana over a candlestick. So instead of getting all yogi-rific on the ignorant, I mean the INNOCENT, non yogis here is my official response:

5 things I do that I don’t really like.

1. Jog. Ok so I don’t jog daily or even weekly but I do know how good it is for me so I am adamantly working on building a running practice. Of course I do yoga as my main exercise and of course I believe that it is the best thing you can do for your body and that a vigorous vinyasa class is not only great for muscle health and tone but a super cardio workout. However, I also know that I’m not the kind of person to push myself through such a practice on my own and given my tiny town location there’s not much else to offer in the way of yoga except for, well me. So I jog. I’m working up to 3-4times a week for about 15-30mins a day which is quite a challenge but for cardio and over all keeping calories in check running is the best thing out there. So do I like running/jogging? Not really but it’s good for me and I do because I like me.

2. Eat bananas. I don’t like bananas, I never have, they are weird and they have a strange texture and the moment you put them in any dish the whole dish taste only of bananas! BUT, they are very good for you and as far as easily transported fruit, they’re hard to beat. So a few years ago I put on my big girl fruit loving pants and starting eating bananas and I’ve come to appreciate them as a healthy and more importantly a filling snack. Bananas, not just for teething babies any more.

3. NOT eat peanuts. Ok this is really something that I love but don’t do (or don’t do as much b/c it’s not as good for me). Lately I’ve been studying Ayurveda, the sister science of yoga, so of course I start using my most available if not most willing guinea pig, myself. Without getting into the whole break down of Ayruveda let me just say this that according to this ancient science I am not supposed to eat peanuts. So I have turned to other nuts for my protein packed snacks and tried other nut butters for my occasional sandwich. Le sigh.

4. My taxes. You know, I’m just going to leave this one as is because who doesn’t hate doing their taxes but on some level understand the logistics of is all. Bummer, but we do it. 

5. Take antidepressants. Yep I take antidepressants. And you know what, I’m not ashamed at all. I thought I would be I thought I’d be seen as a sham as a yoga teacher who can’t yoga herself well. But in fact that was my disease talking, that was my unhealthy brain telling me not to fix myself because I wasn’t worth fixing! Do I like being on pharmaceuticals? No, not really, I like feeling like me again, I like not having thoughts that are wildly beyond my control but of course I’d rather be able to have my body produce the hormones that cause that all on its own. Plus, it’s like my amazing doctor told me, he basically said ‘look you’re a healthy, holistic young woman, you do yoga, you know how to fix yourself but what I’m seeing is that you can’t get yourself to use the tools you have laid before you, because you are sick.’ And I was sick and I am sick but just like he said, I know that I already have all the tools I need to make myself better. And one more day doing the things I may not like but are good for me, one more day on the mat and I’m one step closer to being med free. One step closer to finding that peaceful contentedness that yoga is all about.