In our kitchen, the egg comes before the chicken

Two organic eggs with tofu, quinoa and black beans made for a filling dinner.

A simple egg-white omelet with shredded Italian cheese and sun-dried tomato.

Which came first -- the chicken or the egg?

In our home-cooked meals, the egg comes first, along with fish, tofu, sweet potatoes, quinoa, squash and other ingredients that fill me up and help me follow a meat-free, bread-free diet.

And the chicken has to be organic or antibiotic-free or I won't buy it for family members who eat poultry.

Mashed sweet potatoes and squash with black beans and organic diced tomatoes.

I don't need all of the carbohydrates in one of those enormous New Jersey bagels for breakfast, and I can certainly do without artery clogging cream cheese.

The other night, I boiled sweet potatoes and Kabocha squash, drained and mashed them, and then added olive oil, butter substitute, a little salt and other seasoning.

The mash, with black beans and organic diced tomatoes, served as a filling breakfast side dish with a simple, egg-white omelet.

There's nothing wrong with comfort food first thing in the morning.

For breakfast, leftover haddock with mashed sweet potatoes and scrambled egg.

 


My wife brought home Costco Wholesale's fresh, wild-caught haddock from Iceland ($7.99 a pound); dipped the fillets in egg and then flour, and pan-fried them for dinner.

A single, leftover piece was perfect for breakfast the next day. 

Two organic eggs with shredded Parmigiano Reggiano and sun-dried tomatoes.

Pan-fried porgy under a blanket of onion, garlic and sweet peppers.

A Sunday dinner of pan-fried porgy with mashed Kabocha squash.

An egg-free breakfast of hot cereal with fresh pineapple and banana.

On Wednesday, I picked up a big dinner salad and a delicious root-vegetable soup from the Garden Cafe at Englewood Hospital and Medical Center, where I volunteer.

A dinner salad with tofu, beets, peas and beans from a hospital cafeteria.

This morning, half of an omelet with pesto and sun-dried tomatoes went beautifully with mashed sweet potatoes and sweet plantains. I also had a side of cabbage kimchi, below.

Put the turkey farm on your shopping list

Slow down for antibiotic-free turkey.

Editor's note: It's time to get ready for Thanksgiving.

How do you know the holidays are just around the corner?

Clementines show up in the supermarket after a long journey from Spain, and it's time to visit the Goffle Road Poultry Farm in Wyckoff.

The buildings may be covered with solar panels, but turkeys, chicken and other poultry are raised the old-fashioned way: without harmful antibiotics or animal by-products.

Thousands of Thanksgiving turkey shoppers walk through this door.

We serve turkey parts to guests on Thanksgiving, rather than a whole, big-breasted bird, so this morning I called in an order for 6 legs, 6 thighs, 6 wings and 6 pounds of turkey necks.

I'll probably be eating homemade shrimp and pasta, plenty of salad and wine.

When I stopped in to pick up the order around 3 this afternoon, I also bought an 18-ounce bottle of Uncle Dougie's Wicked Good No-Fry Wing Marinade for $5.95 or 50 cents more than last year.

My bill for the fresh-killed turkey and marinade was $49.15, but I passed on a guilty pleasure, big-yolk duck eggs, now $1 each.

The poultry farm also sells wild turkeys. 

It's the kind of friendly place where an employee gave lollipops to the children of two Japanese housewives who were waiting for their fresh-killed poultry.


Goffle Road Poultry Farm, 549 Goffle Road, Wyckoff; 201-444-3238. Web site: Gobble, gobble

At the Paramus ShopRite on Tuesday, the price of tangerines was a guessing game, but on Wednesday, a sign told shoppers they were five for $1.99.

Clementines from Spain were $4.99, a discount of $2.

   

The ShopRite in Paramus on Wednesday had a good buy on a 5-pound box of Spanish clementines for $4.99, and continued to offer Golden Pineapples for $1.99 each.

Jerry's Gourmet and More in Englewood.

 At Jerry's in Englewood, I picked up 2.2-pound boxes of La Santa Maria Fine Iodized Sea Salt for 99 cents each.
 

I added Jerry's assorted Italian olives and whole garlic cloves to a salad.

Another great item at Jerry's are assorted Italian olives and whole garlic cloves for a low $3.99 a pound (410 S. Dean St.; 201-871-7108).

I stopped there on the way home from Englewood Hospital and Medical Center, where I volunteer on Wednesdays and pick up a vegetarian soup and salad from the Garden Cafe.

At home, I added Jerry's olives, manchego cheese and smoked Alaskan wild salmon to turn the salad into dinner, and poured myself a glass of red wine.

A snack of smoked wild salmon, whole-grain mustard and reduced-fat cheese.

 

I eat Costco Wholesale's Kirkland Signature Wild Alaskan Smoked Sockeye Salmon year-round, not just at the holidays.

The price for a 1-pound package of the preservative-free salmon, in two sealed portions, has held steady at $15.39.

At Fairway Market in Paramus, smoked farmed salmon is nearly $30 a pound. 

I also add this wild salmon to my open-face egg-white omelets with manchego or reduced-fat sliced cheese, or eat it out of hand with sliced cheese and Trader Joe's Whole Grain Dijon Mustard.
 
 

After the lights went out, plenty of anxious eating

With the power out, we cooked by lantern light.

A super storm hit North Jersey on Monday with powerful winds that cut down trees and power lines, shutting restaurants and supermarkets.

Suddenly, food became one of the few comforts in homes without lights or heat.

Grilled cheddar cheese and bacon for my teenage son. a carnivore.

I've been eating anxiously, allowing myself bread and other food that haven't been part of my diet for a couple of years.

In an effort to use what fresh food we have rather than throw it out, I ate three bowls of bran flakes in a row with lactose-free milk, then had a cup of cocoa with more of the milk.

Finally, this morning, I threw out the rest of the carton.

I cooked the last two organic eggs before they spoiled.

In an elevator at Englewood Hospital and Medical Center today, a doctor who had lost power in the storm bought a comforting slice of dark-chocolate layer cake she conceded she probably wouldn't eat in normal circumstances.

I had more bread today, making a cheese omelet sandwich for my wife and eating half of it.

On Tuesday, the day after we lost power, I made a canned fish salad sandwich on a large doughy roll I ate routinely when I was 40 pounds heavier.

I felt much better, then was flooded by guilt.

Fruit flies invite themselves to dinner

Image via Wikipedia
My favorite cereal from Bob's Red Mill in Oregon is made with 10 grains.

Editor's note: Today, I discuss dinner at a Brazilian restaurant in Newark's Ironbound section; a documentary that questions our over-reliance on animal protein, and a hot cereal that is far better than oatmeal.

The first thing we noticed late Sunday afternoon at the Casa Nova Grill in Newark was how crowded it was on a day when the temperature hovered around freezing.


But we only had to wait inside the door for about 5 minutes before we were shown to a table in one of the first-floor dining rooms of this Brazilian restaurant in the Ironbound section.


The second thing we noticed were two or three of those tiny fruit flies over our table, the ones that seem impossible to kill -- and I tried. They stayed for dinner.


When we asked our waiter, Oswaldo, about the flies, he said the management was aware of them and that after closing the night before, the restaurant was fumigated. A second fumigation was scheduled for that night.


Our last visit to Casa Nova was on an overcast April day, when few of the cherry trees in Branch Brook Park had blossomed. We ordered too much and our bill for three soared over $100.


On Sunday, after a concert at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center, my wife and I ordered two entrees to share, which came with a visit to the salad bar.


Our main dishes were Giant Tiger Shrimp from Mozambique ($20.95) and Cod Fish, Portuguese style ($15.95). My wife drank fruit juice ($4) and I had a generous glass of California merlot ($5). 


Brazilians love meat, as we saw from waiters walking around the dining room with skewers of skirt steak, sausage and other items, and stopping at tables to serve customers who had ordered unlimited barbecue.


But they also love carbohydrates and starch: We found a platter of tasty potato sticks on the salad bar, and we got two small servings of delicious cheese bread, a couple of Portuguese rolls, sliced bread and freshly made potato chips with the shrimp, and boiled potato and a side dish of white rice with the cod stew.


The two head-on shrimp are the biggest I've seen served in a restaurant, and they came in the shell with a dipping sauce of garlicky oil.


Skin-on salted cod fillets were served in a milky broth with a boiled egg, boiled potato and whole garlic cloves, which melted in the mouth, and they were covered with shredded collard green.


The selection on the salad bar didn't seem as varied as on our first visit, but we did find beets, crunchy steamed broccoli, small tomatoes with cheese and those potato sticks.


The restaurant also serves salted cod or bacalhau, Brazilian style, with marinara sauce; and a Brazilian fish stew with coconut milk, as well as whole red snapper, each at around $16. 


Casa Nova Grill, 264 Ferry St., Newark; 973-817-7272.


'Forks Over Knives'


"Forks Over Knives," a new documentary I got from Netflix, argues animal proteins -- from meat, dairy and eggs -- are slowing killing us.


The doctors and scientists who appear in the film claim they can reverse and cure heart disease, cancer and other major health problems with a whole-food, plant-based diet.


Several people are shown throwing away their medications, and turning to such a diet, as well as to exercise. All lose weight and improve their health tremendously.


Bob's Red Mill Cereal


After my exercise session at Englewood Hospital and Medical Center this morning, I stopped at the ShopRite for more of Bob's Red Mill 10 Grain Hot Cereal.


A 25-ounce package of the whole-grain cereal cost $2.79. 


Preparation takes about 15 minutes on the stove top. I usually add dried blueberries, and cut-up dried apricots, plums and dates to it, as well as slivered almonds or pine nuts, and blue agave syrup as a sweetener.


The cereal comes from Bob's Red Mill Natural Foods Inc., an employee-owned company in Oregon. Here's a link to its Web site: 


Bob says, "To Your Good Health"


I also picked up 5 pounds of clementines from California for $4.99 with a store card, and a half-gallon of ShopRite 2% Lactose-Free Milk for $3.29, 20 cents less than usual.

More hassles at H Mart

Image by wallyg via Flickr

At Super H Mart in Ridgefield.

With my H Mart coupons expiring in two days, I wanted to get over to the Korean supermarket to pick up two 1-liter bottles of 100% pomegranate juice for $4 (normally $7.98).


That H Mart coupon offers an unusually good discount -- about 50%. For example, a second unused coupon offered 10% off "oriental sweet potatoes" that sell for 99 cents a pound, reducing the price to 90 cents a pound.


So, this morning, after a workout in the cardiac-rehab unit of Englewood Hospital and Medical Center, I stopped first at ShopRite in Englewood before driving a short distance to H Mart.


I picked up what I thought was a sweet potato and brought it over to a cashier with my coupon, and asked her if this was the right item. She said yes, so I bagged four or five small ones.


At checkout with a different cashier, the coupon was rejected -- I had the wrong potatoes -- only one of the problems I encountered today.


I found the pomegranate juice down one of the aisles, and put two bottles, the limit, in my cart. I found some fresh collard greens for 99 cents a pound and two small heads of red-leaf lettuce for 99 cents.


Another coupon offered 10% off green seedless grapes, but they were priced at $1.79 a pound, compared to 99 cents a pound at ShopRite, where I bought red grapes for the lower price. No sale.


Also on sale with a coupon was a table-top electric hot pot for $34.99, compared to the regular price of $49.99, but I'm not sure I would use it more than once or twice. 


I did want to use a coupon for live blue crabs that cut the price of $1.99 to 99 cents, but in the fish department, I found an empty bin. An employee brought out maybe 15 crabs, saying more were due to be delivered around noon.


I was trying to call my wife to find out if she wanted crabs for dinner, when a woman walked over and said she had called about blue crabs, and wanted to buy the ones the man had just put out.


I gave up, and handed her my coupon for the crabs.


The cashier rang up the pomegranate juice for $3.99 each, but scanned the coupon once for $1.99. I pointed out the coupon said 2 for $4.


She took off 20 cents for my reusable bag, the most of any supermarket in North Jersey. Then, I remembered I had a $1.06 credit for spoiled fruit I returned to the store a couple of weeks ago.


She said the checkout "machine" was new and couldn't process the credit. I again asked for the proper discount on the pomegranate juice, and told two people waiting on line behind me to be patient.


Her solution was to give me a second $1.99 discount for the juice, then discount an additional $1.99 for my store credit, while taking back the 20 cents for the reusable bag.


My balance was $4.99.


This is the same H Mart that resisted giving me credit for a 12-inch stainless-steel steamer that rusted after less than a year of use. A cashier lectured me about drying it completely before I put it away.


H Mart, 25 Lafayette Ave., Englewood; 
201-871-8822. Food court is closed.


Applegate Farms


Organic and naturally raised cold cuts are sold under the Applegate Farms label. In addition to being raised without antibiotics and growth hormones, the meats are uncured and free of preservatives.


The ShopRite in Englewood is one of the few to carry Applegate Farms, but rarely puts the sliced ham, beef, turkey and other meat on sale.


Today, I looked over the price labels and saw some were selling for the equivalent of about $18 a pound and others for about $13.70 a pound.


Trader Joe's has Applegate Farms cold cuts at much better prices, but is not as convenient. 


Related articles

• H Mart coupons prove to be no big deal (doyoureallyknowwhatyoureeating.blogspot.com)
• Lousy fruit is just waiting for you (doyoureallyknowwhatyoureeating.blogspot.com)
• A diet guaranteed to take off weight (doyoureallyknowwhatyoureeating.blogspot.com)

It's time to celebrate a healthy lifestyle

Image via Wikipedia

One of the joys of dinner is a simple salad with good olive oil and balsamic vinegar.

Today -- a month after I left Englewood Hospital and Medical Center -- I saw the cardiac surgeon who sawed open my breastbone and replaced one of my heart valves.


My next stop was Jerry's Gourmet and More, a couple of miles away, to pick up a prepared fish dinner and a bottle of red wine from Italy to toast my good health.


At Jerry's, I passed up the salami samples, but tried several pieces of cheese. 


In the back of the store, where I sipped two wine samples, I ran into a couple I had seen in the hospital's cardiac-surgery department, and recommended an inexpensive balsamic vinegar to them.


Before I saw Dr. Adam G. Arnofsky, who listened to my heart and commented favorably on the healing of my 9-inch scar, I got a brief physical from another staff member.


Frances Vela-Cantos, a nurse practitioner, reaffirmed my cardiac arteries were in good condition and required no bypasses during the Sept. 16 operation to repair my heart murmur.


I told her I stopped eating meat in February 2010 and ate a lot of seafood, salads, whole grains and vegetables -- such as a recent dinner of whole-wheat spaghetti and sardines in red sauce with an organic spring mix salad and wine.


She cautioned me about high-cholesterol shellfish, but said I could have meat or poultry once a month.


At Jerry's, I sampled a few cheeses, then went over to the refrigerated case for one of the store's Meals To Go -- 12 ounces of beautifully balanced, restaurant-quality food for only $6.99.


According to the label, my dinner has tilapia al pesto, shells al pomodoro, brussels sprouts, escarole salad and a stuffed mushroom. My mouth is watering. 


My other purchases were:


Two 16.9-ounce bottles of Ponti-brand Balsamic Vinegar of Modena, made without artificial color, for $1.99 each. This was the brand I was served everywhere I went in northern Italy last year.


Lavazza-brand Crema e Aroma coffee beans from Italy for my espresso machine were $19.99 for 2.2 pounds. And my bottle of Montepulciano D'Abruzzo wine cost under $6.


Since I left the hospital on Sept. 20, I've been chafing under the guidelines for my recovery, feeling one set of rules shouldn't be applied equally to an active senior like me and other, more sedentary surgery patients in their 70s and 80s.


For example, I was told not to drive for a month, but found that impractical and lasted less than two weeks in the back seat of my wife's car, with a folded pillow under my seat belt to protect my healing femur.


Today, Vela-Cantos said I shouldn't lift more than 5 pounds with one arm for another few weeks. That would rule out any food shopping, especially at Costco Wholesale. 


I've cut down but haven't completely eliminated food shopping, and always try to use two arms to lift items into and out of my basket.


In a few hours, I'll plate my tilapia dinner and heat it in the microwave, uncork the wine and prepare a simply green salad with extra-virgin olive oil and Primo balsamic vinegar.


Every bite, every sip will remind this survivor of how important good food and drink is to health and to life.

Jerry's Gourmet and More, 410 S. Dean St., Englewood; 201-871-7108.

Related articles

• A heart-to-heart talk about food (doyoureallyknowwhatyoureeating.blogspot.com)
• Recovery is harder than the operation (doyoureallyknowwhatyoureeating.blogspot.com)
• Going Italian without bread and pasta (doyoureallyknowwhatyoureeating.blogspot.com)

The 100% guaranteed weight-loss diet

Image by DJ Lein via Flickr

Pizza from Costco Wholesale.

You'll feel nauseous. When you try to eat, familiar foods will taste funny -- for days or weeks -- and you'll shed pounds without even trying.


I call this the Major Operation Diet. The doctors will put you to sleep and you'll wake up a new, slimmer you, with more weight loss ahead.


Nearly 14 days after I had open-heart surgery, my weight continues to fall. I weighed around 193 pounds today, compared with about 200 pounds on Sept. 20, the day I was released from the hospital.


My last food was at 10 p.m. the night before the operation, on Sept. 16, and I didn't have solid food again until more than 48 hours later in the recovery room -- a couple of cups of diet lemon ices.


Later, all the meals I was served at Englewood Hospital and Medical Center in Englewood were suitable for a diabetic, even though I'm not one. They were low-fat and bland, without salt or sugar.


My heart murmur wasn't related to my diet -- and my coronaries were clean and required no bypasses -- so why couldn't I resume my normal diet right away, and have something celebratory in the hospital -- like a gooey slice of pizza and a glass of red wine?


After all, I had survived an open-heart operation -- a major invasion of my body. But I never received any special recognition of that accomplishment -- not in food, not in any other way.


When I got home on Sept. 20, I returned to my normal diet right away -- with no adverse affects. 


That meant real, caffeinated coffee in the morning; salt to season my food, low- and full-fat cheeses; lots of wild-caught fish, salads and sauteeed greens; and a generous glass of Bordeaux with dinner once or twice in the past 10 days.


My blood pressure today was 121 over 67. 


I resumed eating Korean food almost immediately, including spicy cabbage kimchi. On Saturday night, we tried a new Mexican restaurant in Englewood.


After visiting my cardiologist on Wednesday, we drove over to H Mart in Englwood looking for a dinner of prepared items: a sliced rice-and-seaweed roll with fish cake called kimbap and seafood-and-chive pancakes or pajun.


I also picked up a pound and a half of collard greens. At home, I cut them up, and washed and blanched them in boiling water for several minutes before transferring them to another pan with olive oil, and seasoning them.


Kimbap, pajun and collard greens were a filling dinner, washed down with seltzer. The rest of the family had chicken in coconut milk and steamed white rice.


Tonight, I plan to blow the diet I've been following for more than a year with a slice of Costco Wholesale combination veggie pizza with anchovies (I have to add those at home). An 18-inch pie is $9.95.


I was told not to drive, so my wife is going for the pizza and while at the Hackensack warehouse store, she'll pick up a pound of organic spring mix, so I can make a big salad to have with my first pizza in a year.


Another glass of Bordeaux seems in order. L'chaim. 

Some of my meals come in pill form

Image via Wikipedia

Hot-and-sour soup.

A week and a day after open-heart surgery, my proportion of pills to food is higher than ever.


I take pills in the morning, just before bed and "as needed."


Meanwhile, I still don't have my old appetite back, and anesthesia residue continues to affect my taste buds.


I've eaten well since I returned home four days ago, enjoying grilled shrimp, cheese omelets; baked, wild-caught haddock breaded with panko, and big green salads.


Last night, we had Chinese takeout -- hot-and-sour soup, vegetable and shrimp dumplings; sesame shrimp for me with brown rice; and chicken with mixed vegetables for the rest of the family.


Tonight, I'm looking to get more spice out of life, so we're planning to go out for some scrumptious Mexican tacos, as I try to wipe out the memory of all those no-salt, no-caffeine, low-fat and low-taste meals I was forced to eat in the hospital before and after the operation.  


My nurse at Englewood Hospital and Medical Center gave me a list of nine pills -- including a vitamin, pain killer and pro-biotic -- and told me to take them daily. 


Before the operation, I took a baby aspirin, a 20-milligram cholesterol pill and a multivitamin.


When I eat and drink now, I still taste something funny in the back of my throat. My visiting nurse said the anesthesia affected my taste buds and hasn't left my system completely.

At the supermarket, organic lactose-free milk prices are defying gravity

Lactose-free milk at Walmart in Teterboro (2016).

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

At $4.99 or more for a half-gallon of organic, lactose-free milk, avoiding cramps and gas from eating dairy is getting expensive.

This summer, I started buying conventional, lactose-free, 2%-milk at the expanded grocery section of the Target in Hackensack, where a half-gallon of the store brand cost as little as $2.89 in August.

I was at the ShopRite in Englewood to fill prescriptions on Tuesday, and saw organic, lactose-free milk for as much as $5.19 a half-gallon. Instead, I bought the non-organic store brand for $3.39.

Lactaid, one of the first widely available brands of lactose-free milk, explains on its Web site: 

"Lactose intolerance is the inability to digest a sugar called lactose that’s found mainly in milk and dairy products.

"Normally, the small intestine produces an enzyme called lactase , which breaks down lactose into two simple sugars, glucose and galactose, that can be absorbed into the bloodstream.

"People whose bodies don’t make enough lactase can’t fully digest lactose, causing mild to uncomfortable side effects.

"Some people have a higher chance of being lactose intolerant. These groups include Hispanics, African-Americans, Asians and people of Jewish descent. It also affects adults more than children, since the body produces less lactase enzyme as people age."

Gas, cramping

Signs and symptoms are gas, cramping, bloating and diarrhea (sounds like my recent hospital stay, with constipation standing in for diarrhea).

Lactase, the enzyme that breaks down lactose, also is available in a pill, which you can eat before or with such problem foods as cheese. I buy mine at Costco Wholesale in Hackensack, but the warehouse store doesn't carry lactose-free milk.

Although Lactaid milk has been widely available for a decade or more, you never see lactose-free milk served at Starbucks, Dunkin' Donuts or in restaurants, forcing you to carry lactase pills or drink coffee black, as I do when I'm not at home.

Some yogurt and yogurt products are said to be naturally lactose free, including a sliced yogurt cheese available at Trader Joe's with and without jalapeno peppers.

Doctors talk food

In all the years I've been going to Dr. Glenn Brauntuch, my general practitioner in Englewood, he's never asked me what I eat, commenting only when I started gaining weight and urging me to eat less.

"I love food," my 228 pounds protested last year.

"Just love it less," he replied.

I was a food writer and news copy editor for a daily newspaper until 2008, so any food talk usually involved restaurant recommendations or complaints.

A decade or more ago, Brauntuch detected my heart murmur -- the swooshing sound of blood passing through my aortic valve, which was calcified and wouldn't close completely.

Heart murmurs aren't related to diet, he said, so I didn't have to stop eating milk, yogurt and other dairy food.

Open-heart surgery

Last Friday, my sluggish valve was replaced during open-heart surgery at Englewood Hospital and Medical Center. 

When I was discharged on Tuesday, I was given a sheet of paper from the hospital outlining what I should and should not eat -- the most comprehensive advice doctors have ever given me about food.

Foods to avoid include high-fat bakery goods, fried vegetables or those made with butter, cheese or cream sauce; fried fruit or fruit with butter or cream;  butter; whole milk and other dairy products; smoked meat or poultry; frankfurters, sausage, cold cuts and other cured meats; too many egg yolks and all canned beans.

Except for canned beans, I've avoided all of those foods for many years, preferring heart-healthy fresh fruit and vegetables; wild-caught, cold-water fish (salmon, sardines and so forth), and almonds.

In the past year, I've lost 30 pounds with a regimen of five weekly visits to the gym, weight training twice a week and virtually eliminating bread and pizza. And I was out of the hospital only four days after surgery.