Louise’s Low Oxalate Coconut Rice and Mango Salsa

A bowl of sunshine on a rainy day! This recipe is adapted from Naturally Sassy to reduce the oxalate content.  One of my favorite nourishing bowls of goodness and the cold salsa and hot coconut rice really work well together. This makes a delicious and satisfying  lunch or evening meal.

Serves 2    Oxalate per serving: less than 12 mg.

Ingredients:

Coconut Rice

½ mug basmati white rice

400ml can of coconut milk plus half a can water

Juice of 1/2 lemon

1 tsp grated ginger

Pinch salt

 

Mango Salsa

1 mango, stoned, peeled and diced

2 red sweet peppers, deseeded and diced

1 avocado, stoned, peeled and diced

Juice of 1 lime

Handful chopped coriander

 

Method

  1. Put rice in saucepan, add coconut milk, water, ginger and salt.
  2. Cover with lid, bring to boil, reduce to simmer and check after 10 mins or rice cooking instructions.
  3. When rice is cooked add lemon juice.
  4. It will look a little like creamy rice pudding.
  5. Mix all the salsa ingredients together.
  6. Pour rice into serving bowls, top with salsa and enjoy!

 

 

 

 

Dru Yoga: Energy Block Release 2

‘I must be willing to let go of the life I planned in order to live the one that is awaiting me’

For many of us with CFS at some point we  have to let go of the life we were living and planning,  grieve for it and try to look forward and enjoy the one we now have. Easier said than done!!!!!  Energy Block Release 2 (EBR2) is a sequence that is all about being in the ‘here and now’, focusing your attention on how the body is moving and responding with the breath, stretching and strengthening.

I recently used the above quote in the form of  an intention and affirmation as my class had been working up to completing the whole EBR2 sequence. Whilst I knew it may have an emotional effect on some of my CFS students I felt it would be helpful to the class as a whole. I didn’t expect it to have  such a powerful effect on me!!!   Following the class both of my CFS students both said how it really hit home, one still felt she was grieving for her old life, for myself I think I haven’t really grieved as such just moved on to my new life…..or so I thought!  The next day I found myself emailing a Search and Rescue Colleague to arrange return of my equipment and uniform.  I’d been hanging on to the hope of restarting volunteering with this fantastic group of volunteers doing a brilliant job unnoticed and often not  known about:  Oxfordshire Lowland Search and Rescue

Whilst sad to finally let go I feel privileged to have been part of the  team,  a very special group of dedicated people and whilst I close this chapter of my life to move on…… I’m just not ready yet  to throw my running shoes and kit away just yet!!! Maybe another couple of rounds of EBR2?

To safely practice and learn this lovely EBR2  sequence go to the  Dru Yoga On Line Studio. This video demonstrates beautifully that once learn EBR2  flows  with ease and strength ! Energy Block Release 2  

Louise’s Low Oxalate Watercress and Cauliflower Soup

This is a light gluten free soup delicious at any time of the year! Being low oxalate means trying to find flavor without the use of adding stock, for soup this can be a challenge! This soup can be made vegan or vegetarian, is quick and easy to make and despite its olive green appearance is rather nice! Enjoy!

Makes 2 generous servings: 5.6 mg oxalate per bowl

Ingredients:

2 small onions: chopped

2-3 cloves of garlic chopped

1 tbs coconut oil/olive oil/butter or ghee

200mg cauliflower chopped

500ml water

Watercress: approx. 80-90 gm bag/ large bunch.

2 tbs Nutritional yeast flakes

Salt to taste.

Method:

  1. Heat oil in a saucepan, then gently sweat onions and garlic with lid on for 5 minutes.
  2. Add cauliflower, water, watercress, nutritional yeast and pinch of salt.
  3. Bring to boil, cover with lid and reduce to a simmer for 15-20 minutes until cauliflower is soft.
  4. Blend until smooth, check for seasoning, adjust with salt or additional yeast flakes.

Optional:

Drizzle with olive or flaxseed oil, cream or sprinkle with chopped herbs such as chives or parsley.

Replace half the water with milk or coconut milk.

Add cream at the end of cooking for a richer soup whilst keeping the oxalate levels low.

Louise’s Low Oxalate Flaxseed Bread

 

Being gluten free and low oxalate has its challenges when it comes to bread which contains both!!! This recipe is adapted from one created by Hemsley and Hemsley follow link to original recipe:  Flaxseed Bread .  This bread makes delicious sandwiches and can be sliced and frozen for future use.

Flaxseeds are very low oxalate, low carbohydrate, high in protein and fiber. They are a natural source of Omega 3, calcium, magnesium, iron and zinc.

Total oxalate: 42.5 mg   Makes 8  generous sandwich squares: 5.7 mg per square

Total fiber: 118.5 g/14.8 g per square.

Ingredients

500g ground flaxseed

6 eggs

170 ml water

75g olive oil

3 tsp bicarbonate of soda

3 tbs lemon juice or apple cider vinegar

2 tsp garlic powder

2 tsp onion powder

1.5 tsp sea salt

Whole flaxseeds for sprinkling

Method

Heat oven to Gas Mark 5.

Line baking tray with baking parchment (I use a Swiss roll tray 37 x 25 cm)

Mix all ingredients together by hand or mixer.

Spread onto the tray and smooth surface with pallet knife.

Sprinkle with whole flaxseeds.

Bake for approximately 30 minutes until cooked, skewer comes out clean and bread is soft and spongy.

Cool on a rack, cut into eight squares, slice each in half length ways to make sandwich squares.

Fill with any low oxalate filling for a nutritious packed lunch or make into a lovely open sandwich, enjoy for breakfast with eggs or dip in soup.  Enjoy!

 

 

 

 

YOGA: Energy Block Release 1

Energy Block Release 1 (EBR1) is the Foundation Sequence unique to Dru Yoga. It is the first sequence that I teach in my classes and helps to provide a full body warm-up and will also help balance mind and emotions. This Foundation Sequence is a great way to get energy flowing more freely through the body and bring you to a place of deep inner stillness. It’s normal when you first start to practice the sequence and learn the movements to find that the breathing just doesn’t happen, this is okay! With practice you will find that you will begin to co-ordinate your breath with the movements and start to perform the sequence with ease and flow. Just relax, soft joints and smile!

Here is a lovely 10 minute home practice video with Nanna, a most inspirational teacher, just click here: EBR1

Louise’s Low Oxalate Apple and Cranberry ‘Cookies’

Louise’s Low Oxalate Kitchen
Let’s kick off with a treat! Following the LOD means not being able to just buy off the shelf on most occasions and these ‘cookies’ are a delicious treat for everyone! Working with coconut flour is interesting and any recipes that uses it with a description of ‘bread or cookies’ means ‘cake’! Perhaps I should be calling these ‘cake cookies’ to lower expectations. They are however still enjoyable! I’m still experimenting and will be posting other coconut flour recipes as they are perfected! To achieve a truly crisp cookie you will need the use of a dehydrator for a dunkable treat!

Apple and Cranberry Cookies: Makes approx. 9: gluten free, vegetarian, 1.2 mg oxalate per cookie

2/3 cup coconut flour
1/4 cup coconut oil melted (stand jar in a bowl of hot water)
2 eggs
1/4 cup runny honey
1/2 cup apple puree
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1/2 tsp apple cider vinegar or lemon juice
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup dried cranberries
Pinch salt

Method

• Preheat oven Gas Mark 4
• Line baking tray with non-stick baking parchment
• Sift flour and bicarbonate of soda into a mixing bowl
• Add all the other ingredients and mix with a wooden spoon into a ‘batter’, this will thicken slightly.
• Use a tablespoon to scoop mixture onto baking tray: 1 tbsp per cookie.
• Slightly flatten into rounds
• Bake in the centre of oven for approx. 20 minutes, until firm.
• Leave to cool on wire rack if you can!

These are ‘cookies’ with a moist sponge like texture, if you would like a firmer cookie follow one of the two stages below:

• After 20 mins cooking, place on wire rack, return to oven, turn off heat and leave for 1 hour
Or
• Turn oven to lowest setting and leave for another 20 minutes to an hour, checking regularly to avoid burning.

Dehydrator Method

• Following the 20 minute bake in the oven, carefully lift cookies onto dehydrator tray.
• Set at 70 °C for 4 hours.
• After 4 hours check for desired consistency, crisp outer and soft middle.
• Leave in dehydrator at 70°C for up to 8 hours to obtain crisp and crunchy cookies that hold up to a good dunk!

Will keep for a few days in an airtight container….but I doubt they will last that long! Enjoy!

Louise’s Low Oxalate Kitchen

Is your green smoothie bad for your health? For most people oxalates, a chemical naturally found in food particularly; fruits, vegetables, pulses and grains, cause no problems and can be consumed freely. Usually associated with the formation of calcium oxalate kidney stones, high oxalate levels have also been associated with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, autism, asthma/COPD, vulvodynia and under-active thyroid:

http://www.lowoxalate.info/research.html

For some of us, we are faced with adopting a low oxalate diet (LOD), reducing slowly to avoid a syndrome known as “dumping” which by all accounts is rather unpleasant. I have no formal nutrition qualification and would advise anyone who thinks they may have high oxalate levels to seek medical advice and diagnosis before making major changes.  These recipes will be for all to enjoy not just the LOD’s, my work colleagues have been sampling some of my recipes and my flaxseed crackers go down a treat!  I’ll be posting recipes which are low in oxalate levels which I have developed  and adapted from a range of sources due to the lack of availability of vegan and vegetarian low oxalate delicious meals.

For myself, already having had to cut out gluten (permanently), experiencing temporary lactose intolerance, already vegetarian and then temporarily vegan this change in diet was a huge challenge! My diet was  healthy, packed with nutrition, home cooked, organic when ever possible and then I was faced with a diagnosis of hyperoxaluria.  My green smoothie and a lot of my diet was actually doing me harm! What the spinach, kale and almond super food smoothie had to go? My sweet potatoes, carrots, beetroot, nuts, tempeh, tahini, rhubarb, chia seeds to name just a few all had to go! The horror! What was I going to eat??  The LOD aims for between 40-60 mg of oxalate a day, 100gm of spinach for example contains  1145 mg, a raw serving of 1/2 cup   contains 75mg of oxalate!   After a short period of rocking in a corner I took on the challenge and started researching low oxalate foods, what an eye opener! So little information and what was available was not always accurate, aimed at meat eaters and very little vegan/vegetarian options. However, I managed to get a link to an extensive spreadsheet of foods that had been tested in the USA (link now vanished!) and hence the idea arose for ‘Louise’s Low Oxalate Kitchen’. I am developing vegan and vegetarian (I am now able to tolerate dairy which is very low oxalate) recipes for my first cook book and will be posting nutritious recipes and the occasional ‘naughty but nice’ treats!

‘Louise’s Low Oxalate Kitchen’ is now open for business!