Why pumpkin? Well, like I said, it’s autumn. Pumpkin is also quite nutritious. A half cup serving only has 40 calories and half a gram of fat, yet it is loaded Vitamin A, has 5 grams of fiber, no cholesterol and next to no sodium. One serving provides more than a days worth of Vitamin A, most of it in the form of the carotenoid, “beta-carotene”, an antioxidant. Vitamin A is good for your vision, helping to prevent night blindness, and necessary for cell growth and maintenance of skin tissue. It also promotes bone and tooth development.

Chipotle Pumpkin Soup
This recipe for a warm, spicy, low-fat soup is tasty, nutritious and quick to make.

4 cups low-sodium vegetable broth
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 medium onion, chopped
1 T chili powder (start with less and adjust to your taste at the end of cooking)
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1/8 to 1/4 tsp chipotle powder (use less to start and adjust to your taste at the end of cooking)
15 ounces pumpkin puree
1 1/2 cups black beans, cooked
1 cup frozen corn kernels
3/4 cup salsa

1. In a 2-quart pan, saute the garlic and onion for 3-5 minutes in about 1/4 cup of the vegetable broth. Stir often.

2. Add the seasonings and saute for another 2 minutes.

3. Slowly add and mix together, the broth and pumpkin puree.

4. Add the beans, corn and salsa. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and cook for 10 minutes.

5. Serve with bread or rice. Rice could be added directly to the bowl.

Cooking notes: If you don’t have vegetable broth, use 4 cups of water and 2 low-sodium vegetable bouillon cubes. Go light on the seasonings at first and add more at the end of cooking if you want it to be spicier. If you don’t have fresh pumpkin puree, use a 15 ounce can of pumpkin puree, but be sure that the only ingredient is pumpkin. Using the type with the pumpkin pie spices would give you some strange tasting soup! This was great with only 1/4 c chipotle salsa and the addition of 1/2 c diced tomatoes with green chiles.

More info:

• Beta-Carotene Info sheet
• Fat Soluble Vitamins
• Libby’s 100% Pure Pumpkin

Millet Cheese Spread

1 cup cooked millet
1/4 cup cashews
1/4 cup water
1 T lemon juice
2 T nutritional yeast flakes
1 clove of garlic, minced
1 teaspoon onion powder
1/2 to 1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon smoked paprika (optional)

Blend all ingredients until smooth and creamy. Let set in refridgerator to thicken.

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Notes: I use just over 1/2 tsp of salt and add in the smoked paprika or sometimes some chili powder. I made this with 1 tsp of salt the first time and it was a little bit too salty for my tastes, but then I’m not used to a lot of salt in things and rarely use it for cooking at all. 

If you’re not familiar with nutritional yeast, make sure you don’t get it mixed up with Brewer’s yeast. At some health food stores, I have been told they are the same thing and they are NOT!!  Ewwwww!  We use Red Star Nutritional Yeast which you can read about at http://www.bulkfoods.com/yeast.htm.

To be a smart choice, a food cannot exceed certain amounts of total fat, saturated fat, trans fats, sodium, cholesterol and added sugars. It also needs to be in a certain food group (fruits, vegetables, whole grains, low fat or fat free dairy) or have nutrients such as calcium, fiber or vitamins. The Smart Choice labels will display the number of calories and calories per serving.  I looked over the requirements for usage of the label and discovered that my personal requirements are already more stringent, especially when it comes to added sugars (1/4 of the calories could come from this!) and sodium.  Perhaps it will still be helpful for enough people to make the effort worthwhile.

Here are some of the limits a product must meet in order to display the Smart Choice label: 

More details can be found at http://smartchoicesprogram.com/nutrition.html

The Smart Choice program was set up by the Keystone Center, a nonprofit group. Food companies can choose whether they would like to participate, so not all “smart choices” will necessarily be labeled that way. Several large companies including Kraft, ConAgra Foods, General Mills, Kellog, Coca-Cola and Pepsico will likely participate.

The list of companies that will probably choose to participate seems to include those who manufacutre a lot of foods that aren’t so great for us. It doesn’t look like it includes those who fill the produce section with apples, carrots and other very smart choices although those foods would most certainly qualify. I wonder if a candy bar enriched with enough vitamins could manage to meet the standards? I’m curious to see how this turns out and if it impacts what manufacturers offer or what consumers choose to purchase.

More details:

• Smart Choices Program
• WebMD article
• ConAgra Foods News Release

This comprehensive book has 368 pages. It starts out with information about different types of rice cookers and helpful tips for purchasing one. Then it moves on to some of the basics you’ll find on most rice cookers, explaining the different cooking modes and basic things like how to measure and cook your first batch of rice. From there it moves on to a chapter of rice recipes and then to sections on how to cook all sorts of other things.

I use a 5.5 cup fuzzy logic rice cooker. One concern I had before buying the book was whether the instructions were tailored for the type of appliance I would be using. Fortunately, the authors have done a good amount of testing and provide useful notes to help you know if your rice cooker will work well with each recipe. They specify if the recipe is suited for a medium (6-cup) sized rice cooker or a larger (10-cup) one as well as telling you if you need a fuzzy logic machine or if a simple on/off type of cooker will suffice. In fact, there are quite a few recipes, especially the steamed vegetables based ones, that will only work with the on/off type of cooker.

Our rice cooker is almost always running. Sometimes it’s making the next batch of plain rice. Other times we’re trying out a pilaf recipe or cooking some other grain. In the morning it is often filled with the “Creamy Breakfast Oatmeal” made from steel-cut oats or sometimes the breakfast barley. I’ve gotten better results with the breakfast grains than I could get in a crockpot and with much less hassle, cleanup and babysitting than there would have been on the stovetop. At lunch time, you might find “Hearty Split Pea Soup” (without the turkey sausage since I don’t eat meat) or “Vegetarian Black Bean Chili” in there.

Basically, what I am saying is that if you need a book that’s better than the owner’s manual that came with your rice cooker, this is it. It will help you make full use of all the things your rice cooker can do and save you the time and frustration of experimenting to get just the right amounts of everything.

Order here:

We usually think of bulgur as a dinner time grain, but today I decided to try it in place of my usual oatmeal for breakfast.  I made it in the rice cooker, but I am sure you could just as easily make this in a pan on the stovetop if you adjust the amount of water.

========== Orange Bulgur ==========

1 c uncooked bulgur wheat
1 3/4 c water
3 Tbsp orange juice frozen concentrate
1/4 c sunflower seeds
1/3 c dried cranberries (such as Craisins)
3/4 - 1 c soy milk (optional)

Add the bulgur, orange juice concentrate and water to a rice cooker. Start the cooker on the regular rice setting. Near the end of cooking, stir in the cranberries and sunflower seeds.  Serve topped with soy milk or almond milk.

Nutritional Information per serving, before adding soy milk: 300 Calories, 7 grams fat, 9 grams protein, 55 grams carbohydrates, 11 grams fiber

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