Using left over tomatoes from your garden

This will also be in Becky Holm's Douglas County News.

Judging by recent cool nights and morning fog, tomato season will be over in a week. If you have quite a bit of fruit on your vines, you will like the ideas below.


I really dislike commercial tomato soup, but homemade is wonderful and leftovers freeze well. Blend tomatoes – some can be over or under ripe – thoroughly in a blender. Add red bell peppers if you have them. Add chopped onions, dried basil and garlic. Transfer to a non-aluminum pot and cook down. Add salt, dry mustard, hot sauce or pepper to taste. Let cool. Reblend with approximately ¼ cup of oat, chickpea or wheat flour per four cups of liquid. Reheat and top each bowl with a dollop of sour cream if you like.

Salsa verde is traditionally made with tomatillos, but if you use green tomatoes, I won’t tell anyone. It also freezes well. Either drop the tomatoes quickly in boiling water, remove them and skin them before chopping or blend them so you don’t notice the skins. Place tomatoes in a non-aluminum pot, add onions, chopped bell or hot peppers, cilantro, a little lime zest and salt. Boil down. Cool and add chopped avocado right before serving.

natural treatment for alcoholism

I don't drink, but was married unhappily to someone who drank a LOT.  I wish I knew then what I know now about nutritional deficiencies and alcoholism.

Many alcoholics have blood sugar issues (tending to be hypoglycemic) and absorption issues (lack of B vitamins make it harder for enzymes to digest food so one can get the vitamins, which make it harder for the enzymes... a vicious circle).  I read three different doctors from a generation or two ago recommend B complex INJECTIONS.  The book I am reading now is Feed Yourself Right by Lendon Smith and I highly recommend it.  Smith recommends adding vitamin C to the injection, also.  The other books were Your Body is Your Best Doctor by Page and Abrams and another I can't remember because I am at my store instead of in front of my bookcase!  Curiously, I remember his face well from the photo in the back of the book.  The alcohol/B vitamin relation is also mentioned in Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon Morell and in Eat Right or Die Young by Cass Ingram. 

If three doctors practicing from the 40s through the 70s knew that alcoholism could be treated and eventually cured with simple nutritional support, why is this knowledge not commonplace now?  So many lives could have been improved or saved!  If you know someone with alcohol issues, please pass this knowledge on.

Shop like a Great Depression Survivor

This will be in Becky Holm's Douglas County News:

In 1976, when I was eleven and Mom was badly hurt in a car accident, Dad taught me how to shop for groceries. He told me we were going to fill up the cart and pay for it with $100.00 cash. It would be hard to fill a cart with $100 today without fake juice drinks and puffed up sugar cereal, but the principles he taught then still apply. Dad embarrassed me by snapping bottoms off asparagus and refusing to buy stone fruit because he did not want to pay for the pits. I love stone fruit so that is a rule I do not follow today. However, he also refused to buy food in boxes because he did not want to pay for boxes and air space, he wouldn’t buy canned food unless we shook the can to make sure it wasn’t full of water and he preferred simple, unprocessed food that was either bulk or packaged so he knew exactly what he was getting. When we were done, we had a cart full of meat, cheese, fresh and frozen vegetables for less than $100. Thereafter, he dropped me off at the store and I was to fill the cart for less than $100 by myself. All the way through the store I was counting and paying close attention.


Today I’d add the following advice: shop alone, do not talk on the cell phone while you are in the store, avoid big box stores that encourage you to buy more than you need, and shop twice a week rather than once so you always have fresh produce and do not throw any out. Subtract $5.00 per person from your normal grocery expense and take cash into the store. Have a secret stash to use ONLY if you find a quality ingredient at an exceptional discount. Otherwise if you spend $100.00 per week for two people, subtract $10.00 and take half of the new $90.00 total in to the grocery twice a week.

The first couple of times you shop this way, you may want to take pen and paper and mark one line per dollar with a hash when you reach five dollars.  Eventually it will become second nature.

Simple menu good for digestion and wallet

This will also be in Becky Holm's Douglas County News:

Eating simple home prepared meals can be both inexpensive and very good for your health. During fall and winter months, focus on onions, garlic, carrots, cole crops, apples and pears, all of which are locally in season.


For breakfast, eat eggs or oatmeal from rolled oats you cook yourself, not the packaged kind that is full of sugar, preservatives and flavorings. Top oatmeal with butter and raw honey, which will help you digest it. For snack, eat an apple or other fruit (eating fruit alone greatly helps digestion).

Lunch should be your biggest protein meal of the day, to give you long lasting energy and plenty of time to digest it before bedtime. Skip bread products and sugar items, both of which cause post-prandial sleepiness. Eat a lentil, seed, cheese or meat dish with vegetables. Again, fruit eaten alone makes an excellent between meals snack.

For dinner, eat a small amount of sliced meat (not deli meat, which is loaded with preservatives, sugar and also is often the culprit of food poisoning), nuts, seeds or avocado with a large salad. Lettuce, avocado and nuts promote a restful sleep. Dinner is also the best time to eat pasta or bread, but make sure to use whole grains for more nutrition and also to lessen blood sugar spikes and drops. Or eat a bowl of brown rice or quinoa.

A delicious entrée salad with an Asian flair: marinate chopped broccoli, green onions and bok choy or other cabbage in Bragg’s Liquid Aminos, ginger, sesame oil and lemon or lime juice for a couple hours, until wilted but still a little crunchy. Add sliced cooked beef, chicken, shrimp or almonds. Sprinkle with sesame seeds. Eating the vegetables raw preserves their enzymes. Enjoy!