Cafe 118 - Winter Park, FL

    If you want a reason to travel to Winter Park, FL, just 30 minutes from Sea World in Orlando, I'll give you one: Cafe 118 in Winter Park on East Morse Boulevard.

    This is the third time I have eaten there and I have relished everything ordered.

    Today, I had raw lasagna. Layers of thinly sliced zucchini alternated with macadamia nut "ricotta" cheese, raw tomato sauce and a slice of a tomato. The portion was just enough to fill me up but not overwhelming. The flavors were so savory and rich and delicious.

    Howard had 4 veggie rolls filled with sliced cabbage, avocado and other veggies, each rolled in a collard leaf. Served with a bowl of sweet and sour sauce, you dip the rolls and munch and crunch. It was really enough for 2 people and the flavors were very satisfying.

    Since we were only going to eat 2 meals today, we had dessert: a slice of cheesecake with blueberry glaze on top and pumpkin spice pie with a cream sauce on the side and a nut crust.

    I know it sounds as if I were eating dairy, but all the ingredients were plant based and there was no dairy. There was also no refined sugar, only agave and other natural sugars. It was fake cheese and fake cream and yet the flavors were so rich, that I thought I was eating real cheese and sugar.

    I will be back because there is so much on the menu I haven't tried. Besides the appetizers, main courses and desserts, there is an extensive selection of smoothies made with not milks.

   With healthy food this tasty, I am less tempted to cheat. Sometimes I am tempted, but I resist. My goal is continued health and I don't think any meal or any food is worth risking my health for.













 

5 Ways to Live Longer

   The book The Longevity Project written by researchers Howard Friedman and Leslie Martin clearly points out that some myths of behavior have been debunked.

The five ways to live longer are:

1. You don't have to always think happy thoughts to reduce stress and lead a long life. Some worry is OK.
2. Gardening and walking are enough exercise to keep you healthy.
3. Being serious is not bad for you.
4. Working may keep you alive. "...those who were most engaged in pursuing their goals" lived the longest.
5. Having fulfilling social relationships, like marriage or healthy singleness, keeps women living longer. The married men in the study lived the longest.

So for the New Year, think a little, worry a little, smile a little, garden and walk a little, be serious when you want to be, work, and cultivate healthy relationships.

Cheers!

What is a Blended Salad?

   A blended salad is a healthy plant based meal that you mix in a high powered blender.

   Why should anyone want to eat it ?
  
   That's easy. It's a fast, delicious way to get lots of greens without feeling like you are in a pasture grazing.

   I just made a lovely blended salad for lunch. Here is what I mixed:

• one large organic collard leaf, cut up
• a stalk of celery, cut up
• about 9 organic grape tomatoes
• several leaves or organic dark green lettuce
• one organic carrot, chopped
• 1/2 cup of organic canned garbanzo beans
• about 5-6 tbsp. of Udo's oil (I dump instead of measuring)
• about 3 tbsp. of organic apple cider vinegar
• about 1 tbsp. pf Bragg's amino acids
• 6 pitted Kalamata olives

I blended the ingredients together in my Blend Tech machine using the setting: Whole foods, sauces, dips.

Then I toasted a piece of sesame Ezekiel bread.

Leisurely, I ate my lunch loving the miz of flavors and knowing how good for me this salad was.

Try it, at least once, before you tell me I'm nuts:)

Happy New Year!

A Prophet!

This morning my husband said to me, "You are like a prophet that no one listens to."
He was referring to the way that I eat. I have stuck to my plant based eating program for almost 2 years and flirted with it for 10 years and I am not sorry.

I am glad that I have no health issues. I just took my morning power walk to Whole Foods and back in the rain. That's hard core. I even impressed myself.

But so many have health issues that would go away if they changed what they ate. I know people with Crohn's disease, fibromyalgia, heart disease, kidney failure, arthritis, mysterious auto immune diseases,  cancer, joint replacements that don't remove joint inflammations, acne, diabetes and obesity. My heart aches for them knowing that if they would only consider changing their eating program, their conditions would improve, if not disappear outright.

What's a caring person to do? I can't yank their food out from under their noses. I don't bring the subject up at the dinner table. I don't shove books in their faces and I don't send them articles and jam their emails.

What do I do? I eat my food in front of them and enjoy it. I serve them food that is delicious and good for them when they are my guests at home. I pray for them a lot. And...I blog about it.

If you know anyone who has a health issue, please start to pray that they consider another way of eating and living. Pray hard. Pray a lot. Eat healthy food in restaurants and at home where they can see you. Exercise and enjoy your health. Enjoy it for all to see. You may be the only nutrition book they ever read.

If you dare, send them my way. And send them to: www.hacres.com

Life and health are only a click away.