Share food prep strategies for optimizing health and well being and promote locavore food consumption

Coconut oil is supposed to inhibit dementia. Maybe stop it in its tracks.

Have been giving it to MIL for a month now and it seems to be helping. In case you might be interested.

there is a local band called Na Palapalai

If you watch Merrie Monarch you have heard their music.

They put on a concert this weekend, a benefit. It was on the other side of the island. This weekend was replete with fun stuff. There were so many venues to attend it was not a decision I could make so Mr Tiki made it for us.

We boarded the dogs on the other side of the island for a change of pace. They get out of course but stuck around. They do not like confinement unless we are nearby. Then it is all good.

The concert was amazing.

On our way to pick up the dogs, we stopped at Costco to stock up on provisions. Our meals out had not been as great and fabulous as you would hope for. So we talked food a bit much.

Tonight we had wild lobster and fat shrimp, with lemon zest, butter, sherry, ginger and some special sambal. Young romaine local grown with a mustard lilikoi dressing. Fat island shrimp. brown basmati but from elsewhere as no local rice.

A meal fit for a recovering ratty. Aloha Rat!!!!

We are running low on provisions, the store being rather distant and my plans of yesterday having been foiled. Nevertheless today’s breakfast was divine.

Pineapple from the garden, a delicious white. Perfectly ripe, it fell off the plant when I handled it. Sliced and delicately pan sautéed with the bagels that had been there before standing on their sides and staying warm.

Thin sliced – ultra thin sliced – manchego cheese on the plain bagels.

Local eggs fried with the yolks broken until they are crispy. (This cripsy part is important. If you have never fried an egg to crispiness you have missed out on the essence of egg.

Last of the champagne grapes in a turquoise bowl.

Sliced Aidels chicken apple sausage also pan sauteed to a delectable crispiness on one side.

Chew slowly. Savor. Is amazingly delicious.

As more of my friends are getting older right along with me, some encounter health issues that are aggravated by alcohol to the degree they must give it up.

I find that light consumption works best for me. Especially in a party atmosphere this can be something of a challenge. I always have a broad selection of non-alcoholic beverages at the ready.

For those who want to keep it light, variations on wine coolers and champagne drinks are fun and easy.

A wine cooler can be an ounce of wine, a bunch of ice cubes, and the rest side water. Slice in some citrus or even cucumber or drop in a couple of berries. Frozen berries are great in this.

Champagne mixed with orange juice is an old standby, and even better are juices like fresh grape. You can mix any fruit juice with champagne, half and half, and cut down on the alcohol by a whole lot. Here in Hawaii we have access to many unusual fresh fruits that make easily into juices.

Just thought I would share this. Even though it is now Lent.

Every once in awhile Mr Tiki gets an idea in his head for a change in diet. Usually I fight these because I stubbornly cling to my idea that above all else we eat healthfully.

But as it happens, dietary needs change as we change. For some reason I didn’t ever fully consider this. And this time Mr Tiki has hit upon some diet changes that are working really well for both of us.

First the enormous benefits: sleeping through the night. diminishing pain in the body. losing fat.

Now the food change: more meat. Way less starch. salad galore. The only bread we eat is Ezekial toast for breakfast and home made croutons on the Caesar salad. Salad is often on the plate breakfast lunch and dinner. Green drinks 4 or 5 days a week. Quinoa is about the only grain we eat other than oatmeal in grain form. Pasta has all but vanished from our menu, and it used to be my number one comfort food. But comfort food isn’t needed if you already feel good!

The photo is of one breakfast. Quinoa, baked egg, baby spinach sprayed gently with EVOO.

This is a low glycemic diet, with locally grown greens as the main feature. Sea greens also tossed into the salads. Sunflower seeds and pumpkin seeds, and walnuts, are even better than croutons.

When I am feeling not altogether right in my body, sea vegetables are my friend. They are seaweed, different varieties. You can buy them preserved in salt from the health food store, and other ways as well. The salt ones are the best I have found.

There are also kelp noodles.

I made a salad. Sea vegetables. Kelp noodles. Chopped cilantro. chopped fresh clams. Chopped octopus and/or squid. Portions are 2/3 kelp noodles, 1/3 sea vegetables. Light on the fish. a spoonful of miso, half spoon of wasabi paste. Toss and serve cold.

This may sound bizarre and peculiar. It is refreshing and healthy beyond belief. It will perk up your metabolism, enhance your mood, set to rights your digestive system (insofar as possible – no wild claims here) and leave you with energy to spare.

and it tastes remarkably delicious.

This is a Hawaiian food prep style. It is a way of spicing up and saucing foods. Usually it is raw fish, but can be tofu, or veggies.

My favorite poke style for fish is limu, a kind of seaweed that is fine and tendrilly, chopped and tossed with finely sliced ahi, ono, salmon, or mahi mahi. The sauce is soy sauce, may ploy ( a sweet chili sauce), wasabi paste, and a little sesame oil.

Soybeans, the green kind in the shell, are prepared poke style with Hawaiian salt and garlic, a little oil maybe, but not much. I can eat those like potato chips. Great with whatevah to drink.

Food done this way is so fresh it almost gets off your plate by itself. Very tasty.

Chopped mango, avocado, Thai chilies, cilantro
If you like add minced Maui onion

Chopped papaya, kiwi, Japanese cucumber and touch of lime.

Using whatever is at hand a salsa of fruits and perhaps gently sauteed shallots turns a simple piece of baked or sauteed fish into a fancy beautiful entree. These are also good on tacos or in wraps with chopped greens, with or without added fish.

Do you have a certain salsa?

Regarding tomatoes. They should not experience the inside of a refrigerator.

If you have never has sliced tomatoes with a soft cheese like feta or fresh mozzarella, coarsly chopped herbs like Italian parsley and basil, drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with good salt and freshly ground pepper then try it.

Capers are also a nice addition.

Fresh tomato chunks folded into steaming hot pasta along with steamed broccoli and just a bit of butter and oil can be perfect on a summer evening. Use only about a teaspoon of oil and butter for a double serving. It will add the taste and gloss without giving the food that oily patina.

Fresh spinach, basil, tomato, olives, and a bit of olive oil and balsamic vinegar can be chopped together until wilted and served with bread or on top of grilled meat.

What are your favorite ways to prepare fresh tomato?

I had a meeting down the mountain that overlapped dinner time. I cannot eat late, so combined some grocery shopping at the conventional market with buying some already prepared food and scarfing it at a table there.

Here is why that was a bad idea. The conventional market is a good source for certain things I otherwise would not buy. There were Bing cherries from California there, $8.99 a pound but for market club members 2.49 a pound. It is against my philosophy but my mouth said do it, so I came home with a bag full. But I can forgive that. The real mistake was the chop suey. It looked OK in the cabinet and I was super hungry. But as soon as I put the first bite in my mouth, it was obvious it was very oily. The seasonings included msg and other things that should not go into me.

I ate only part and tossed the rest. I killed off the badness with some wine when I got home. But it was a bad choice. I should have gotten the sushi instead. There would not have been extra oil, or msg, or other unmentionable flavorings and components.

So now I will not do that again.