The Low Down

The human body is a metabolic marvel comprised of dozens of little systems connecting to create one complex system. Food is the fuel, the input, for the systems. Our metabolic machinery evolved over hundreds of thousands of years to function optimally on select fuels. These fuels were the original, Primal foods of the human organism. Over these hundreds of thousands of years our Big Game Hunting, small prey capturing, scavenging, foraging, gathering, opportunistic ancestors accumulated experience and wisdom about nourishing themselves. The learned to preserve and predigest foods to maximize the quality of their metabolic fuel. Eventually they learned to cook foods without destroying the important nourishing properties of the food, and then they learned to heal the human body with food. Only recently in the human evolutionary experience, have we abandoned all these hundreds of thousands of years of accumulated epicurean genius. Now we fuel our marvelous, complex metabolic machinery with crap invented to create profits for agribusiness. We have become dumb eaters. As we regain our eating intelligence it doesn't make sense to move back to the savannah and put out our fires or climb into our cave and pretend there is a glacier next door. It makes sense to fuel our bodies with all the primal human foodstuffs, prepared and preserved with accumulated ancestral wisdom and served up for the undeniable desires of the human taste buds. Primal, paleolithic food choices, handled according to ancient food ways resulting in outrageously good food.
PRIMAL. SMART. DELECTABLE.

Monday, November 1, 2010

North African Steamed eggs







This summer I had a chance to eat brunch with my sister at Amanouz Cafe, a Mediterranean- North African restaurant in North Hampton, MA. It was a great paleo brunch without any sense of loss and even with new things to try. The spicy lamb sausage links served with a little onion, tomato salad were unbelievably tasty. The eggs were spectacular. One plate of eggs had a buttery herb sauce over the eggs and the other plate of eggs had a spiced tomato sauce. The most noteworthy thing about the eggs was that although they appeared scrambled (my favorite) they were actually steamed. Most of us only think of poached eggs when we think of steaming eggs. Those of us who enjoy our eggs scrambled up and cooked in a skillet, are unfortunately ruining the eggs in the process. Scrambling the yolk and then subjecting it to the temperature of a hot skillet oxidizes the cholesterol in the eggs and damages the Omega-3 fats in the yolk as well. This is an issue many eaters of eggs are willing to accept, especially those of us who do not like egg whites separately no matter how they are cooked! However, scrambling the eggs and then gently steaming them prevents you from wrecking the delicate, beneficial fats in your egg yolks. You need to have an egg poacher or heat proof cups (ramekins) to put the eggs in and then the cups sit in a shallow water bath that is gently simmering. The pan containing the water bath is covered with a tight fitting lid so the eggs are cooked via indirect steam heat. First, scramble your eggs with some liquid. You can use water. A ratio of 1.5:1 will make silky smooth eggs. If you want them drier and firmer use less liquid. You can use broth too. They are moist and fluffy and delicious. And will essentially be "molded" (think jello mold) when they are done so they look extremely chic on the plate. Just in case you need to bust out that kind of impressive food skill. Caveman style...

1 comment:

  1. Thx Jen, gonna experiment with steaming my eggs. I've grown to love eggs! Bruce still doesn't know that I sneak raw eggs into his smoothies
    ~ Summer

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