Work beyond the suffering

I take comfort in this from Friedrich Nietzsche: “Haste is universal because everyone is in flight from himself.”

Image via indulgy.com
Image via indulgy.com

But, following the “I’m no Robinson Crusoe” relief that comes from absorbing Fred’s words, I immediately want to rise beyond it. I aspire beyond the suffering we’ve been delivered by virtue of merely being alive. Which, to my mind, is the point of suffering – to work beyond it.

The antidote to haste, I’ve come to learn, is coming home to yourself, sitting with yourself, making friends with the true self within. Still and gentle. It’s the only trick in the book to expose the

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Yes, I eat bones off strangers’ plates (and other food wastage tips)

As I explained in my Simplicious Food Waste Cheat Sheet for Trolls post last week, in my latest book, I Quit Sugar: SIMPLICIOUS, I plug doggie bags, double dunk my teabags and cook up my friends’ fish bones into stock, all of which apparently leaves some a little uncomfortable.

Last night's dinner with an egg stuck on top
Last night’s dinner with an egg stuck in the middle

But it’s necessary. And non negotiable. Food waste is the biggest pollution issue on the planet, surpassing industry and car emissions. And the biggest contributors to that wastage are consumers. 

Anyone gagging to make a difference to where our planet is at can start by not wasting food. It really is that simple. 

These are some of the things I do. Feel free to add to the list in the comments below and I’ll run a follow up post.

1. I don’t buy more until I’ve finished what I already have. I completely run out of yoghurt before I set out to buy another, that way I find myself using up the last of the sour cream or cheese in the interim.

2. I eat the WHOLE food. This means the apple with the core, and even the leaves from beetroot bunches (with oil, pepper and salt). Ditto the leaves from cauliflower and broccoli and daggy vegetables like swede, choko, and celeriac.

3. I don’t peel anything. When my veggies look lackluster, I make a big soup with lentils and bacon thrown in for flavour and protein. 

4. I ignore “best before” labels. The use-by date tells you when a food must be eaten for health and safety reasons, whereas the best-before date gives a rough indication of when it’s best to eat. Many countries have actually removed the “best before” date because they cause totally unnecessary food tossing. I ignore them. You should, too. 

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There’s a good scientific reason you’re neurotic

Have you caught the science news? Psychologists have advanced a new theory linking neurotic unhappiness and creativity in the brain, giving over-worrying an evolutionary purpose. Bingo!

Worrying and overthinking1 There’s a good scientific reason you’re neurotic
Image via lilaliensoul.tumblr.com

Normal worry, of course, has always had an evolutionary purpose. In the face of danger, freaking out helps us fight or flight. But neuroticism – freaking out when there is no perceived threat – has made no sense. And this no-sense-ness has left those of us in the over-worriers camp feeling even more freaked.

To be clear, I’ve previously been upfront about my neuroses. Feel free to gratuitously revel in them.

This new theory argues neurotic people are more prone to think about what might happen. This “mind wandering” can lead to high levels of creativity. We over worriers have highly active imaginations, and tend to be more creative problem-solvers. Fretting about stuff that hasn’t happened tends to

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Bonus Recipe! My Simplicious Beefin’ Good Jerky

This jerky recipe from I Quit Sugar: SIMPLICIOUS is seriously easy to make and will leave you feeling a little bit “frontier”. It’s great for lunchboxes. I fiddled around with this recipe to get a smoky-sweet vibe.

Beef jerky Bonus Recipe! My Simplicious Beefin' Good Jerky
Ugly photo, pretty cool idea: My Beefin’ Good Jerky

The image above is a photo I took while developing the recipe, my old sewing sheers that have become my kitchen scissors padding things out. Yes, it may not be the prettiest thing I’ve made, but that’s not what this recipe is all about. Trust me, it tastes better than the real thing and beats paying a ton for store-bought stuff! My beef jerky costs just $8 for 700g. For the same amount, store-bought, you’re looking at $60. Yep.

Some meaty bits to know…

* I use mince to make this – cheap, accessible, easy to blend flavour in.

* Beef mince is best, ensure it’s lean in just this instance!

* Don’t worry if your oven doesn’t go as low as 70 C. That’s dandy, but note the different cooking time.

And while you’re at it…

You can also make the Good For Your Guts Garlic recipe (also from Simplicious, which you can find here or at all bookstores) while you’ve got the oven

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A Simplicious style Leftovers Torta recipe

I love seeing meals regenerated from leftovers, cupboard essentials or any scraggy-looking veggies. My new book I Quit Sugar: Simplicious is  dedicated to the art of creating these kind of meals. I call it “perpetual cooking” (a meal should have no start and no end; it keeps going and going). My old mate Anthea Loucas and brilliantly talented editor of Gourmet Traveller magazine gets the gist. She made a torta out of her leftovers last night and shared it on Instagram.

Anthea's own 'Green Power' torts
Anthea’s own ‘Green Power’ torta.

She calls it The Green Power and it uses up hand-picked greens from the back of her fridge. I asked Anthea if she wouldn’t mind sharing her recipe with you folk. She kindly has.

Anthea’s Green Power Torta

  • 1 kg silverbeet, mustard greens and rocket
  • 3 potatoes
  • 3 eggs
  • 3 cloves garlic (crushed/chopped)
  • 1 onion
  • 1 teaspoon olive oil
  • 1 tablespoon dried chilli flakes
  • 1 lemon rind
  • sprigs of dill, parsley, and thyme to taste
  • few grates of nutmeg
  • handful crumbed fetta
  • handful breadcrumbs

Blanch silver beet, mustard greens and rocket (any mix of each is fine), cool and squeeze out any moisture and chop finely [or use leftover cooked greens from last night’s dinner, or parcooked’n’frozen greens from your freezer – Sarah]. Cook potatoes in salted boiling water. Peel and mash, then set aside [or use leftover mash; see my post on the gut-giving benefits of cooked and cooled and cooked again potato – Sarah]. Cook onion and garlic in olive oil until soft. Add chilli and greens mixture. Toss. In a mixing bowl, add greens mixture, plus potatoes, eggs, lemon rind, herbs, nutmeg

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A trick for writers and artists: create with low expectations

I did an interview with ABC radio host Mary-Lou Stephens the other day, chatting about food sustainability. Before I went on air she shared she’s just finished writing her latest book (she’s written several) and actually loved the process this time, churning it out in just three months. What was different this time, I asked (as most creatives do when they come across someone who’s found a smooth oeuvre in what is a painful process).

“I reminded myself daily that no one cares,” she said. “I swear, it gave me the freedom to just get the bugger done.”

Or as Seth Godin says, “real artists ship”. They. Just. Get. It. Out.

That same day I came across an Elizabeth Gilbert interview done in the wake of her latest book Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear.

“Every time I hear someone talk about discipline all I see is the scratch marks on the walls they left with their fingernails. All that anxiety. You’ve got to take it easy on yourself. You’re doing an inherently weird thing. You’re investing time and money into making something that nobody asked you to do. It’s inherently a wacky

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My Simplicious food waste cheat sheet for trolls

It would seem my latest book, I Quit Sugar: SIMPLICIOUS, is a little contentious. The fact I advocate doggie bags, double dunk my teabags, and cook up my friends’ fish bones into stock apparently leaves some a little uncomfortable.

In fact – and this astounded me when I heard – I got wind a few weeks back that two major news outlets were wanting to do a “tear down” of my sustainability message. Why? For sport? Clicks? Because food sustainability is such an obnoxiously wrong idea?

xxxx
Eating beetroot leaves: offensive? Or good sense?

I like to be on the front foot. And I like to calm the Zeitgeist, rather than inflame.

To this end, I figured it could be good to get in with a guide to the issue for anyone planning a shredding of my message. I’m not too fussed if folk go after me. I’m old, hardened and have techniques for dealing with such trolls and snippities. But I’d really rather the importance of the food wastage issue not get sullied by incorrect information.

Feel free to onpass to snippities, doubters and shredders in your orbit. Or copy and paste to forums where light might need to be shed.

Food Waste: A Cheat Sheet of responses

 

“Seriously. You think food waste is an issue?”

It sure is. Globally, 1.3 billion tonnes of edible food is wasted per year. The organization FutureFood2050 estimates up to 50 per cent of food produced for human consumption in the world is never eaten.

“Aren’t there bigger eco battles to fight? Like car pollution?”

Nope.

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Great art is born of great loneliness

Today, just this from Anais Nin on the connect between emotion and writing:

Image via Pinterest
Image via Pinterest

“You must not fear, hold back, count or be a miser with your thoughts and feelings. It is also true that creation comes from an overflow, so you have to learn to intake, to imbibe, to nourish yourself and not be afraid of fullness. The fullness is like a tidal wave which then carries you, sweeps you into experience and into writing. Permit yourself to flow and overflow, allow for the rise in temperature, all the expansions and intensifications.

“Something is always born of excess: great art was born of great terrors, great loneliness, great inhibitions, instabilities, and it always balances them.”

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Does quitting carbs cause thyroid issues?

Alright, this is a controversial one. Anything Paleo-orientated generally is. But let’s wade in. I have a number of reasons for distancing myself from the Paleo movement. I agree with many of the dietary principles inherent, just not the faddishness, the fanaticism and the insistence on basing it on a meta-theory of how we ate 10,000 years ago. I’m also cautious about the whole low/no-carb fervour in general. It’s not for everyone.

Image via with-grace-and-guts.tumblr.com
Image via with-grace-and-guts.tumblr.com

Like, for instance, anyone trying to get pregnant. But today I want to raise this one: cutting carbs might just trigger thyroid problems. Strap in. I recently came across American biochemistry and genetics expert, Dr. Cate, and have asked her to flesh things out…

People who run into trouble going low-carb seem to follow a pattern. First, they (make) a relatively abrupt switch to low carb (often less than 50 gm). Initially they lose weight as hoped but then, instead of feeling more energetic from their weight loss, they develop fatigue, sometimes accompanied by symptoms of low thyroid function including cold extremities, hair loss, and digestive problems.

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A Simplicious homemade bacon recipe

You might recall (it was a while ago; Simplicious has been an two-year project) I asked you what you’d like to see featured in the new book I was writing.

Whatever happened to THAT? Ha. Well, you’ll be pleased to know many of your requests made it into the end product. One request that came through I’d like to share today. Because it’s a nice story. Read to the end. It finishes with a sugar-free homemade bacon recipe.

nick
Meet Nick (and his mum). Nick asked for a homemade bacon recipe, which I’ve shared below.

Meet Nick, above. He and his Mum did the 8-Week Program some time ago and approached me at the “What Should I Eat Forum” in Sydney earlier this year. He told me it was he who’d requested a recipe for homemade bacon when I did the Simplicious call out.

Nick told me he works at Coles and always helps customers find healthy choices based on what he’d learned on the Program. What a legend. I got to tell Nick his request made it through and there’s a homemade bacon recipe in my new book. And Nick got to share a little of his story with me.

But it doesn’t stop there. After the photo above was shared on my Instagram, several people commented saying they’d been helped by Nick in Coles and that he was, indeed, a legend.

THEN… a few weeks later, I received a mail from Nick’s boss, Paul. It turns out that not only had Nick inspired customers at his workplace to make better choices, he’d also convinced his boss to quit

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