Sprouts & Abundance

So, today was a particularly stressful day down at a certain public junior high school in Brooklyn which shall remain unnamed. :)

The dance I chaperoned was really upsetting. There was a HUGE table full of...crap. There were like four different types of chips, cupcakes, cake, and all kinds of cheap, bad food...soda, you name it. The cake was SO BAD, apparently, that one of the teachers (who happens to eat a fairly Standard American Diet), SPIT IT OUT, and had the worst look on her face for a good three minutes. She later told me the icing tasted like lipstick. :)

I feel like I contributed to the awful food situation, since the school guidance counselor "assigned" me to bring pretzels. I realize that pretzels aren't, by far, the worst thing I could've brought, but I also know that there was probably a much better option.

On the other hand, I have no idea what I could've brought that the kids would've actually liked. I considered a fruit & veggie tray, but that would've required me to bring plates, etc. as well. Storage would have also been difficult. Its just a bad situation. Would the kids have eaten it? Should I spend $15 on a vegetable tray just for it to sit there? Is it fair for me to decide what I want to bring even though the chick coordinating the dance needed pretzels? Is it fair for me to assume the kids wouldn't eat the fruit & veggies?

Lots of the chaperones were looking for water near the refreshment table throughout the night (hahah after all the salty crap they were eating), so I think I might bring a few gallons next time. I'll also check to see if the cafeteria staff can stash a vegetable tray in one of their refrigerators the day of the dance. If that doesn't work out I could at least bake some vegan cookies with zucchini mixed in. Haha. :)

I find that when I'm teaching my 6th graders and they're at their absolute worst, rolling around on the floor, screaming obscenities at each other, and and shoving people/objects across the room, I start getting intolerable cravings for the not-so-good-for-me Cuban food the bodega across the street starts dishing out around 12. Hm.

Now that its getting colder, I always pack an enormous kale salad, with lots of seeds (ususally sunflower & sesame) thrown in to fill me up. I also keep a lot of fruit in my bag to snack on in case I get hungry during my planning periods or after school.

Today's goodness, in order of consumption:
--1.5 quarts banana/mango/blueberry smoothie
--giant kale salad w/EVOO, sunflower seeds, sesame seeds, carrot, black sea salt, lemon juice, west African hot pepper and freshly ground black pepper
--two gala apples
--5 bananas
--giant kale salad with carrots, cucumber, plum tomatoes, sesame seeds, and ginger dressing (ginger, garlic, sesame oil, lemon, honey).

Here goes tonight's dinner:


...which happens to look a lot like last nights dinner. :) I just recycled my broccoli stir-fry ginger sauce recipe from the other night. It wasn't nearly as good without the broccoli, though. I can't wait to make more of the original stir fry recipe for dinner on Friday night. Fancy Schmancy!

Sprouting:
Today I made my first solo attempt at sprouting alfalfa seeds. They are probably my favorite type of sprout, but don't really buy them too often. First of all, I spend most of my time shopping at Trader Joe's, and they just don't have them. On the off chance I do walk over to Whole Foods, they're generally out of stock or the sprouts look ick. My favorite part of making my own sprouts is the cost. I spent $.80 for a little over an ounce of organic alfalfa seeds, and half of that is probably going to fill up the sprout bag. An entire meal's worth (if not more) of organic, FRESH, living, enzyme rich, incredible food for $.40. Sign me up!

These seeds have been sitting in my cabinet for a couple of months but I've been too lazy to do anything about it. The thought of sprouting is also somewhat intimidating. I've sprouted with jars before, but I've only gotten good results about 50% of the time. I don't mind sprouting lentils and garbanzos in a colander, but that is obviously out of the question for alfalfa seeds.



So, rather than try the jar method again, I used a nut-milk bag (When you use a bag, your seeds are less likely to get moldy). I threw in about 1/2 ounce of dried alfalfa seeds, and soaked them for about 60 seconds in purified water (I don't know if they even needed to soak for that long...). Then I hung them in my window, and I should have some decent sprouts in...a couple of days? I have no idea. I'm going to wait it out and see how they do. I hope the window pane isn't too cold, though, as they're pretty close to it and it was sleeting/snowing earlier today in my neighborhood.


Oh! After considerable peer pressure, I FINALLY joined Give It To Me Raw, the world's PREMIERE raw-food networking community! I'm really glad I did. What are you waiting for? Go! Join! Oh, and add me!