Vegetarian Cooking with the Sacred Chef

Spring Food Recipes

Spring Food

By The Sacred Chef.

Published in Eco Living Magazine

Celebrating spring is very much about the birds and the bees, sowing seeds and enjoying the fecundity of nature. So what foods stimulate the arousal of life inside us by their essential chemical make-up and perhaps by their shape and form? Eating well – beautiful organic food presented naturally and eaten after some blood pumping exercise is the first step. Food tastes so much better when you have a healthy appetite for it. Don’t eat out of habit. Don’t eat the same boring thing every day. Don’t eat if you are not hungry. Food like love making is better when it is special. Food is an essentially visual art medium, like painting it is an arrangement of form and colour on the plate. Glistening green spears of asparagus with a dollop of basil, macadamia nut and honey mayonnaise; freshly shucked oysters alive in their sea salty liquor; ripe red strawberries perfect in their natural state; a salad of warm artichoke hearts, goats cheese, fresh figs and baby spinach leaves; or a tangle of fettuccine slippery with extra virgin olive oil, cherry tomatoes, chillie and chunks of ocean trout. Each dish can be a moment of poetry involving all the senses – what other art form do we literally consume. Let the smears on your serviette be a testament to the abundance of your life.

Zinc is one of the most important minerals to be aware of in relation to our libido and fertility levels. It helps maintain sperm count and levels of testosterone in men and in women it is involved in a healthy menstrual cycle; it is vital for cell division during pregnancy. Zinc is also needed for the parts of our brains that activate our sense of appetite, taste and smell. Oysters are packed full of zinc as are fish, green leafy vegetables, lean meats, nuts and pulses. Organic veggies have higher levels of mineral content than those grown with chemical assistance. Why not grow your own organic veggies? Spend a weekend digging in a patch and readying the soil for sowing – you will be amazed when green things start sprouting and you will feel a quiet pride when you first serve the progeny of your garden. The taste, oh the taste will blow your mind. You get the complete package – exercise by honest toil to build appetite, pheromones from perspiration to attract the opposite sex, superior nutritional value from organic produce and the best flesh for taste and colour.

Avocadoes were known as testicle fruit by the ancient folk in Central and South America. They are rich in phytochemicals and are linked to lowering cholesterol. Their creamy texture, gorgeous colour and reputation as an aphrodisiacal food make them an ideal ingredient in dips, salads and wraps. Three quarters of the avocadoes’ which we consume in Australia are of the Hass variety – with distinctive purple black skin and oval shape. Other varieties are the Shepard – green skin with golden buttery flesh and the only avocado not to turn brown once cut open – it is available from Feb to April; Reed – green skin when ripe, round shape and peaks in November; Sharwil – smaller pear shaped avocado with a rich nutty flavor, winter/spring variety;  and the Wurtz – a smaller winter avocado grown in Queensland. Try spreading avocado, a good local honey and cracked black pepper on some lightly toasted sour dough rye bread for a delicious and nutritious start to the day.

Tropical fruits are pretty much sexy per se – things that like to grow and ripen under the sweaty equatorial sun. Biting into beautifully coloured fruits that explode in your mouth and send streams of juice running down your chin are experiences to surrender to. Fresh pineapple slices are particularly like eating sunshine and of course mango is the queen of the slippery fruit affair. These fruits are full of antioxidants, vitamin C and a diet rich in them can make you feel vital and youthful.

©Sacred Chef

Appeared in Eco Living Magazine

Excerpt from Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert

Penguin Books ISBN 9780143038412

Holy of Holies – Perfect Pizza in Italy

“Pizzeria da Michele is a small place with only two rooms and one non-stop oven. It’s about a fifteen minute walk from the train station in the rain, don’t even worry about it , just go. You need to get there fairly early in the day because sometimes they run out of dough, which will break your heart. By 1pm, the streets outside the pizzeria have become jammed with Neapolitans trying to get into the place, shoving for access like they’re trying to get space on a lifeboat. There’s not a menu. They have only two varieties of pizza here – regular and extra cheese. None of this new age southern Californian olives-and sun-dried tomato wannabe pizza twaddle. The dough, it takes me half my meal to figure out, tastes more like Indian nan than like any pizza dough I ever tried. It’s soft and chewy and yielding, but incredibly thin. I always thought we only had two choices in our lives when it came to pizza crusts- thin and crispy, or thick and doughy. How was I to have known there could be a crust in this world that was thin and doughy? Holy of holies! Thin, doughy, strong, gummy, yummy, chewy, salty pizza paradise. On top, there is a sweet tomato sauce that foams up all bubbly and creamy when it melts the fresh buffalo mozzarella, and the one sprig of basil in the middle of the whole deal somehow infuses the entire pizza with herbal radiance………”

Recipes

A different kind of sexy is the feeling you get sliding a warmed spicy olive into your mouth.

Warmed Kalamata Olives in Infused Oil

Into a fry pan over a low heat pour 2 tbspns of extra virgin olive, then chop up a lime & 6 cloves of garlic and a piece of ginger, a sprig of rosemary, a cinnamon quill and add this to the warming oil, before adding in 3 cups of Kalamata olives. Stir through for 5 minutes and add salt & pepper to taste. Serve on a platter.

Salted fresh pineapple is a great way to serve the tangy flavor sensation of fresh ripe pineapple. Choose a ripe pineapple by its aroma, if you can find one that has not been too dulled by refrigeration, and cut it up into bite sized pieces and lightly salt with a special sea salt freshly ground down in your mortar and pestle. Accompanied by a fresh lime soda or a cold beer — and heaven is right there on that tropical island inside your taste buds.

Fresh Asparagus Spears dipped in Basil, Macadamia Nut & Honey Mayonnaise

Whole free range egg or egg yolk mayonnaise with a teaspoon ofDijonmustard ;

3 Tsp honey

1 Tbsp white wine vinegar

1 Tbsp fresh lime juice

1 cup fresh basil leaves torn

½ cup roasted macadamia nuts

1 ½ cups extra virgin olive oil drizzzled in slowly.

Freshly ground black pepper & sea salt to taste.

Whizz it by hand or in the blender adding in your oil slowly as you go.

Lightly steam or blanch your asparagus spears and serve accompanied by your tangy mayonnaise.

Warm Salad of Artichoke Hearts, Chorizo, Goats Cheese and Spinach Leaf Salad

4 Globe Artichokes Steamed Peeled and halved

1 Chorizo sausage grilled and sliced

120g fresh goat’s cheese served at room temperature

1 cup chopped fresh parsley

1 bunch asparagus steamed

3 cups baby spinach leaves

3 Romano tomatoes sliced lengthwise into quarters

Dressing – ½ cup extra virgin olive oil

1 Tbsp balsamic vinegar

1 Tbsp lemon juice

sea salt & black pepper to taste.

Begin with the warm artichoke hearts and asparagus, cover them with dressing before gently arrange dobs of the goats cheese amid the slices of Chorizo, tomatoes, parsley and spinach leaves on a platter and lightly toss before serving.

©Sacred Chef

Cooking school on the sunshine coast with the Sacred Chef

August 29, 2011 | Categories: classic dishes, cooking classes, cooking schools, nutrition, Recipes, Reviews, Sacred Chef Catering, Uncategorized | Tags: aphrodisiacs in nature, articles by sacred chef, articles by sudha hamilton, fertility, libido, Maleny cooking classes, maleny cooking lessons, maleny cooking school, Recipes, spring food, sunshine coast cooking classes, sunshine coast cooking lessons, sunshine coast cooking school | Leave A Comment »