Sweet Green Lemonade Juice

Fresh, sweet and green!  It's a bright glass of sunshine! Organic celery mixes well with any vegetable juice combination that you may create. This healthy fresh home made juice has celery as the star of the show for a change! Along with a whole lemon, cucumber, and two green apples, the taste of this green celery juice is light and sweet. Certainly a great substitute for your sweet drinks of the past. Celery juice is rich in B-complex vitamins, plus vitamin C, A, E, minerals, and helps maintains electrolyte balance. Using some of the zest of the peel adds cancer fighting limonene to your juice too. This is a sweet beauty that makes your taste buds sing! "Oh yes!"

'The King' bought me that retro royal nubby glass that you see in the photo for Valentine's. I'm thinking that perhaps The Queen may need a few more of those appropriate glasses!

Sweet Green Lemonade Juice

8 stalks of celery

2 granny smith apples 

1 lemon peeled

lemon zest

1 cucumber 

All ingredients are organic, but if you buy regular supermarket cucumbers be sure to peel them. We peeled the lemon, and had zested just one fifth of the rind beforehand for the nutrients and added flavor. Add each ingredient to your juicer, then drink up! 

This recipe makes enough juice for two servings. Enjoy!

Blue Berry, Red Berry, Black Berry, Green Pea Sprouts N' Dandelion Smoothie

Sounds a little like the old Dr. Suess title! A question for those cats sitting on the fence about beginning your transition to a plant based lifestyle... how does this very berry berry smoothie look? Does it look scary? Does it look hard to do? Now doesn't it look delish? Well it is! You cannot even see all the greens and super foods hiding in there! Oh they are in there, ready to help your body do it's work of healing you. Yes, you could be eating meals like this for breakfast everyday! Green smoothies disguised as dessert! It really is a dream come true! This is not green eggs and ham! This baby is filled with all manner of berries, live sprouts, and even dandelion leaves. They are some of the healthiest foods that you could can add to your life! So do it! Get out your blender and make this super healthy smoothie and smile! It's easy. Your body and your taste buds will thank you!

Berry, Berry, Pea Sprout, and Dandelion Smoothie

1 cup Coconut Water

1 tsp Chia seeds 

1 Tbs Sliced almonds

1 tbs Hemp seeds

1 tbs Golden Flax Powder
1/2 tsp Cinnamon
1/4 tsp Turmeric

handful Pea sprouts

Small handful Dandelion Leaves

1/2 avocado peeled

1 Banana

Blueberries

Red Raspberries

Blackberries

Add the coconut water to blender. Then put in the chia seeds, almonds, hemp seeds, spices, and fresh flax powder. Top that with pea sprouts and dandelion leaves (from the market).( You can substitute any leafy green such as Romain, spinach or Kale.) 

Blend, add banana (frozen or fresh), 1/2 avocado, and large handful of your berries, frozen or fresh. Blend again and pour! Drink up those minerals, vitamins A, C, K, phytochemicals, lutein, enzymes, proteins, healthy fats, and flavonoids! So easy and quick. Take it from a morning zombie, "You can do this everyday!" Put your smoothie into a travel cup and enjoy your breakfast on the run, knowing you are supplying your body with something really healthy. Oh the places you will go!

Forget those fattening zero nutrition fast foods, greasy foods, donuts, bagels, or that old 'no breakfast at all' routine. Eat a healthy smoothie instead! So says the Queen in the Hat!

Serve An Old Fashioned Meat And Potatoes Dinner For Meatless Monday's Using Portobello Mushrooms

This has to be one of the best 'transition meals' you could create, especially for a partner who is 'not that into' changing up their food patterns! Notice that it looks completely like the meals you and your grandparents grew up enjoying! For this amazing tasting dinner we are using the wonderful cancer fighting foods mushroom and onions. So goodness abounds in this fool the eye recreation of comfort food. Hubby was in heaven, and I liked traveling down food memory lane too!

This dinner quickly came together since I had a box of turkey gravy leftover from Thanksgiving. I had bought this gravy for guests, and now wanted to use it up from my pantry. You can purchase whatever organic flavor gravy you wish. And to keep this meal completely vegan, you can buy, or make your own organic vegan vegetable broth gravy. 

As this is a blog for those transitioning from many facets of the standard American Diet, this meal still fits perfectly into our 'take small steps and eventually make big changes' motto. Mushrooms sliced this large are a fantastic substitute for meat. Perfect for your meatless days! I can assure you that this meal will make the newbies to new healthier choices salivate just looking at the finished dinner plate! Give this easy meal a try!

Portobello Steak and Potato Dinner

1 Huge Portobello Mushroom

1-2 onions

10 organic French fingerling red pototaos

gravy of choice

Optional

sage

 1 Tb golden flax powder

cracked pepper

steamed asparagus

tomato slices

In order to make this dish look like sliced meat you have to buy the biggest portobello mushroom that you can find in your organic produce department. Take a look at this beauty! I put the fork in the shot so you can have a reference point for the size.

Slice up your onions, and place them into a stainless steel frying pan. Add some spring water to saute your onions till translucent, then remove the cooked onions, and set aside. Now for that meaty mushroom. After washing and trimming off the stem, cut across the mushroom evenly to create those thick meaty slices.

Place the sliced mushroom carefully into frying pan with spring water. Cover and saute slowly. Clean, and cut the organic French fingerling potatoes, boiling and bringing to a high simmer for 20 minutes. (All potatoes you ever consume absolutely must be organic! The fungicides used on regular potatoes leech into the flesh. There is no way of getting away from ingesting them. Potato farmers will not eat their own regular potatoes! Oh think of all the french fries we ate in the past.)

Keep checking the water in your mushrooms, turning slices as needed. When they get darker, add the onions back into pan along with your gravy of choice. Mix in flax powder and pepper. You can add some sage at this point if using the turkey gravy mix.

Remove and drain your potatoes from water, then slice them into large pieces. Add your fingerling chunks to the mushroom onion gravy mixture to soak up the gravy for about five to ten minutes before serving. Lightly steam fresh or frozen asparagus.

Plate with colorful sliced tomato. French fingerling potatoes have a nutty buttery flavor, and waxy texture that will complement this old school mushroom meat, and gravy meal. You'll love this dinner, especially if you are now transitioning to preparing less meats! 

Not just for 'Meatless Monday,' your family will enjoy this dish any day!

A Wild Seedy Nutty Salad Day

 

Hellooooo! So here we are, another day, another salad. Yes, it's another in my 'eat a salad' reminder series. Why? Well one of the secrets to getting healthier is.... to eat salads everyday. So Simple. I would love for you to make a habit of living 'la Vida Salad' every single day. Lunch, dinner, or both. If you add to that your morning smoothie, which is a liquid salad, then that's three a day. How awesome are you?!!!

Oh sure many people think eating salads everyday would be boring. It's not! It's exciting! There are so many items to choose from in the produce section! Eating food raw and uncooked provides your body with much more nutrients and enzymes than any cooked version. Whole foods rock, and so will you.

While you gather your ingredients together, we would like to suggest that you to throw down some seeds like pumpkin, sunflower, or hemp into that salad every couple of days. Plus toss in a few nuts like almonds, cashews, pecans, or walnuts on occasion too. Today's salad also has spinach, alfalfa sprouts, avocado, cucumber, purple cabbage, watercress, jicama, and tomato. So full of crunchy goodness! Now go get that nutty crazy rainbow inside of you!

Kale Kiwi Smoothie

Time for King Kale! The highest on the nutrient density scale, Kale is a great green to keep in your healthy greens rotation. So gather together your organic ingredients, and super foods to create a nutrient dense morning treat! C'mon Let's Rock The Kale!

Kale Kiwi Smoothie

2 - 3 kale leaves

2 kiwis

small bunch of pea sprouts

1 cup coconut water

1 tsp chia seeds

2 Tbs flax powder

1 Tb hemp seeds

1/2 tsp unhulled sesame seeds

1/2 cup blueberries

Add coconut water to blender, then chia, flax, hemp, and sesame seeds. Strip the kale from the stems and stalk. Then add kale and sprouts to your blender to mix together. Add unpeeled kiwis, and the half cup of blueberries (frozen is fine). Blend together on high. Pour and enjoy with some optional granola sprinkled on top. If you are afraid of tasting the Kale, don't worry! Smoothies always make the mean green taste like dessert!

KALE A Force To Be Reckoned With Tee

Speaking of "Rocking The Kale!" A couple of my t-shirt designs are now available for smoothie and juicing lovers! Here is your peek at 'The Queen's Table Shop' that I have been putting together with my own designs. You can view other designs in the QT Shop, and I will have a dedicated 'Custom Shop' tab above, in the top green stripe page menu for you as well. All my apparel designs are available on various shirt styles, for men, women, and children. You are welcome to make a request for a specific design. There are other useful products that I am currently starting to design for too.

Rock The Kale T-Shirt

The apparel comes in a multitude of color choices depending on the style, design, and the fabric you choose. We are not being compensated for the time it takes to design these items, as The Queen only makes about a dollar from each t-shirt sale. Still I really appreciate every sale in order to support my food/health blog work. The response to my healthy food mission has been heartwarming. I would like to be able to continue bringing you information, recipes, and news you can use, to get you and your loved ones healthier! I am looking into ways to monetize this blog work, and I hope you do not mind seeing some ads popping up in the sidebar soon as I research that possibility next.

Green Smoothies : A Force To Be Reckoned With Top

I offer my designs, so that you may express your love of living the green life, and get other people who see you, talking about making healthier choices too! Spread the good word through your example, and your clothing! Let's do our part to change the health paradigm together! Be sure to visit the entire "The Queen's Table Shop,"  where other products are available. The Queen thanks you! For those who have read down this far: I am still losing weight! Fitting into more of my old favorite clothes and coats! Woo hoo!

What's That? Persimmons!

During the winter months you may see these cute and colorful bright orange fruits in the produce area of your market. These are fuyu persimmons, and they are super sweet little buggers, or actually berries! If you never had one, believe me you will enjoy the taste of these pretty little things! I was originally advised to wait until they turned like jelly before eating, but that was not true for this variety of persimmon. That particular warning goes for the larger Hachiya astringent persimmon whose sourness when tasted while not fully ripe will apparently twist your face and tongue into 'spiralizer mode.' When shopping for persimmons be sure to pick the ones with no black spots, and check under the dried calyx on top too for any lurking bruises. Hubby and I decided to give them a try this week.

Be aware that this beautiful little flat Fuyu variety of persimmon will only last only a few days in the kitchen. The larger hard astringent persimmons can be kept in the refrigerator for months. Persimmons originally came from China, then Japan, and now they also grow in places like Italy, California, and other locations in the United States. Since there are many different varieties, I have included a video from John Kohler below about the different shaped persimmons, to help clear up the difference. Not only are persimmons mighty good tasting, they are filled with antioxidant compounds including vitamin C, Vitamin A, a high amount of fiber, are low in fat, enzymes and minerals. There was a scientific study that showed eating a persimmon a day may be better than an apple a day! It is said they can help vision, with aging, your heart, and some cancers. 

It is not recommended that you eat too many persimmons at once, or unripe persimmons, as the fiber and tannins called shibuol may cause a blockage in your stomach or intestines. We should eat a rainbow of fruits and veggies anyway, and not just one thing all the time. Adding this colorful red orange fruit occasionally would be a great healthy addition to the other fruits, like kiwi, apple, berries, pears, mangoes, papayas, bananas, etc that we eat in rotation.

I scooped the fruit meat out of the skin with a grapefruit spoon. My husband and I both enjoyed the amazing delicious sweetness. I put the leftover fruit skin in a baggie, placed it in the fridge, and I ate those later. Oh my! That was like eating candy!  Listen to John Kohler below talk about the inner layer of skin, as he explains all about persimmons in the video.




Besides eating the fruit just as it is, you can use persimmons in baking breads, pies, cookies, cakes, in cereals, dehydrated, in salads, salsa, stir-fries, as pudding, ice-cream, and sprinkled as a colorful topping. Very versatile! Here is a Spiced Persimmon Salsa  recipe I found at Cooking Light. Below is a nice kale, persimmon, and pomegranate salad with fresh citrus dressing.




Since we are trying to remind you to eat salads everyday, persimmons are such a nice way to liven up your everyday salads! Enjoy the persimmons while they are in season!