Green Tea Lady

I have instituted a new rule: The Thirty Minute Rule.

I shall not entertain any job that requires me to commute more than 30 minutes. I’ll happily walk or bike up to half an hour, but no more. My current job is between 31 and 45 minutes and the last 5 minutes are the most challenging. The last 5 minutes involve riding up a ramp to cross over the highway (my knee is NOT a fan of this activity) and biking through the Gateway intersection. This is a 4-way intersection involving cars coming off a highway into an industrial/retail heavy area into which they just threw a major hospital. I have to cross through 7 lanes of traffic and there is a crosswalk in only one direction, not on the way home at night.

The other night, I was leaving work and stopped at the traffic light for a full 8 minutes. Stopped. Why? Because no cars were behind me (I left work late) to trigger the light to turn. I shifted my bike to stomp on the sensor thingie in the road to no avail.

I wish to pause in my story to observe my two reactions to this lack of success.

1. For cryin’ out loud! Why can’t a bicyclist trip to stupid light sensor! You’d think a woman of my zaftig proportions carrying provisions for two meals and a change of clothes for work would be heavy enough to be felt.

2. Thank all the trees in the forest I’m not so heavy that I trigger the sensor meant to register automobiles!

I now return to the narrative.

So, there I am, pondering if I want to walk the bike way out of the way to take advantage of the only crosswalk available to me, or if I want to risk life and limb (and break a law or two) and ride through the intersection. I may have been in favor of the latter if they hadn’t taken the one little island that used to exist away. No island of refuge, just 7 lanes of serious traffic. I decided I loved life too much and was just about to start walking when I noticed a white pickup heading my way from behind.

“Yay!” I thought.

My white knight was a woman who decided to stop her truck a full two car lengths behind the sensor area of the road. Mind you, I’m in the crosswalk area by this time and no where near the sensor. I tried to make eye contact.

Never in my life have I seen someone enjoy a cigarette more. I watched in utter fascination for at least a minute while she completely blissed out on the act of smoking. Meanwhile, time’s ticking and I really, really, want to get home and go to bed (remember, I’ve still got my whole bike commute in front of me). I finally made eye contact and began waving her forward. Her windows are closed so she can’t hear me. It took me another full minute to pantomime the importance of her creeping forward in some strange hybrid of Marcel Marceau meets an air traffic controller. I eventually prevailed in coaxing her up to the sensor to trigger the light.

I assure you, I raced through that intersection like the Four Horsemen of the Apolcalypse were on my tail light before the forces of evil could find some other way to detain me from hearth and home.

I’m thinking that intersection is probably a shadow duplicate of one appearing in some level of Dante’s Inferno. Every day, now, I expect to see Sisyphus working his way up the foothills to the north.

Hey, it’s a 32+ minute commute. I need to entertain my mind somehow. Feel free to judge me, if you will. I’m good with that. *grin*

Anyway, that’s my new rule. Anywhere worth working will be 30 minutes or less away from me. Period. A girl’s gotta have standards, right?

Breathe deeply,
Laugh with abandon,
Love wholly,
Eat well.

MiLady Carol
www.GreenTeaLady.com
http://miladycarol.com
Dazzling jewelry that reflects sparkling personalities!

Saturday afternoon, I volunteered to help in the kitchen at a fund-raiser event to benefit women who can’t afford mammograms and breast health care.  It was sponsored by a bevy of Red Hat Society ladies and held in a church with a kitchen.  I had heard about the High Tea at my Woman’s Resource Network meeting this month, so I volunteered to help.

I arrived a bit later than the rest of the kitchen volunteers due to a yoga class, so I just started right in without understanding where anything was in the kitchen.  My first task was to bake the savouries in the oven with one of the lovely ladies.  There were many boxes of Trader Joe’s little philo dough thingies and some little tarts to bake.  We preheated the oven to 400°F and started opening boxes.  The little philo dough thingies were presented in plastic trays that, the box said, were meant to go in the oven.  I cautioned that I thought it was a bad idea.  We were baking trays of these things at a time and plastic in ovens is a bad idea.  She assured me she’d done it before and we loaded two cookie sheets with these plastic trays and set the timer.  Fortunately, I was standing right there 10 minutes later when I saw open flame in the oven.  I opened the oven, pulled out the bottom cookie sheet, then set about looking for tongs to move the melting plastic off the element.  Suffice it to say, I managed, with help, to put out the fire and continue baking while the other ladies addressed the smoke alarm and the windows.  The event proceeded and I don’t even know if they knew there was ever a fire.

The point to my story is, it is ALWAYS a chancy thing to put plastic in high heat.  Plastics, generally speaking, are made from chemicals that often leach into whatever is in them when exposed to heat.  Then there is the potential fire hazard. In a perfect world, I’d have pulled out my Pampered Chef stuff and transferred everything out of the plastic before heating it. At home, you can bet that’s how I’d roll.

There are oodles of articles all over the Internet from highly reputable sources that warn about the dangers of BPAs and false estrogens that may leach into our food from plastics.  Just Google “plastic leaching into food” and take your pick.  Some are optimistic, others condemning, and not all of them state their sources and who pays their bills.  I’ve been following this issue for years and there’s no way to be sure, no matter what they say, that under every circumstance, they are NOT leaching into my food.  On that conclusion, I’ve taken action.

• I have very few plastics in my kitchen.  I’ve replaced almost everything that was plastic with bamboo, wood, glass, stainless steel, and stoneware.
• The plastics that remain never see anything hotter than room temperature.
• I’ve taken control of how my food is prepared by doing most of it myself.  I make most things from scratch in my own home – it’s very empowering.

I prefer to err on the side of caution.  Does this mean I refuse to eat at restaurants?  No.  I’m well aware that industrial cooking often takes shortcuts and heats plastics, yet I’ve made the conscious choice to reduce my daily exposure by changing the way I cook and eat 95% of the time.  There’s nothing I can do about years of my childhood and young adulthood.  All those microwaved plastic bowls for lunch, all that Teflon, and every plastic baby bottle of milk I consumed in ignorance can’t be changed.  I shudder to think, so I try not to dwell there.  Instead, I spent a couple of years replacing my kitchen tools – often one piece at a time – and making changes.  I focused on the forward.  While far from perfect, I’m on a happy path and I feel good about that.

Who’s with me?  If you’re in my local area and want to have a plastic kitchenware recycling party, let me know.  I’ll bake us some yummy treats and we can fill the recycle bin while we talk about the great new tools we’ve bought to make our cooking happier and healthier.
Breathe deeply,
Laugh with abandon,
Love wholly,
Eat well.

MiLady Carol
www.GreenTeaLady.com
http://miladycarol.com
Dazzling jewelry that reflects sparkling personalities!

I love rice porridge! It’s my favorite breakfast food… it’s warm, it’s tasty, and it’s a great way to start my day. On the weekends, I’ve been known to make fancier versions of my breakfast porridge that include marbled eggs. They are tasty and always pretty.  This, by the way, is not a traditional Chinese recipe, this is my own version.

Chinese Marbled Tea Eggs

6 – 8 eggs
½ c soy sauce or Braggs
zest from ½ an orange
1/8 c orange juice (freshly squeezed from the same orange, if possible)
2 star anise
1 tsp sugar
½ tsp ground peppercorns
½ tsp lapsang souchong tea leaves (for a smoky flavor)

Place the fresh eggs in the pan, add an inch of cold water, bring to a boil, and cook for 5 minutes. Cool the eggs under running water and rinse the pan.

When the eggs are cooled, gently tap the shells with the back of a metal teaspoon to make the webbing patterns. Keep the shell in tact so it holds its integrity in the next cooking cycle. Return the eggs to the pan and add the rest of the ingredients, and add enough water to cover the eggs completely. Bring it back to a boil, then simmer for 30 minutes, covered.

I leave my eggs to steep overnight. The longer they steep, the more flavor they have and the darker the marbled patterns will be. I’d say, steep at least 3-5 hours.

Options: Sometimes, I take out the anise and add cumin for a spicier taste. Many people add a cinnamon stick.

If you try it, let me know what you think!  And if you have a different recipe, I’d love to hear it.

Breathe deeply,
Laugh with abandon,
Love wholly,
Eat well.

MiLady Carol
www.GreenTeaLady.com
http://miladycarol.com
Dazzling jewelry that reflects sparkling personalities!

I was recently asked what teas are appropriate to drink while pregnant and nursing. There was a four-year period during which I was trying to become pregnant, so I had a lot of time to research this. Throughout that whole portion of my life, I lived as though I were pregnant – just in case. *smiles*

I’ll begin with the things one shouldn’t drink so we can end on a positive. *grin*

The big thing to avoid in beverages while pregnant is caffeine. That eliminates all black, oolong, and green teas – you know, real tea that comes from the Camellia sinensis bush. Also, steer clear of anything from the cocoa plant and any tea with maté (yerba maté). Both of these contain a lot of caffeine.

There are a few herbs not recommended during pregnancy that should be avoided in both teas and as rubs or flavorings in cooking.

• chamomile
• ephedra
• licorice root
• raspberry leaf
• anise
• sage
• rosemary
• hibiscus
• lemongrass
• sassafras
• nettle leaf
• fennel

Fret not. There are oodles of wonderful teas and herbs you can drink with impunity. I often made my own chai tea blends with peppermint, ginger, lemon zest, peppercorns, and finished with a shot of almond milk. The peppermint and ginger might even help with nausea in the first trimester. Just be sure to read the labels of any blended or bagged tea you may buy.

Another whole group of safe herbal drinks are the Rooibos teas, also known as African Red Bush tea or Honeybush tea. It is naturally decaffeinated, full of Vitamin C and anti-oxidants, and naturally sweet. If you buy a flavored variety of Rooibos, just make sure it doesn’t contain any of the herbs on the Not Recommended list. I was thrilled with the Orange Blossom Rooibos, myself.

As with everything in life, extremes are less than optimal. I understand that caffeine is not advised while pregnant, and I intentionally avoided it when I could yet, given the amount of water I drink, I felt that small amount of caffeine was negligible. Caffeine, and any other stimulants, raise the heart rate and could possibly stunt fetal development, so they are best avoided, yet I refused to panic over small amounts. Just remember to keep off the espresso and chocolate as best you are able. The same applies to the other herbs on the No-no list. If someone cooks an amazing dinner with a tablespoon of rosemary flavoring all the stew, I wouldn’t panic.

The best and most important beverage anyone can consider during pregnancy and breast feeding is an excellent quality water – and plenty of it. When someone is properly hydrated, it goes a long way toward washing the system of anything less than optimal. The best idea is to drink no more than 2-3 cups of tea or juice per day and let the rest be water.

Does anyone have any tips or tricks they’d like to contribute? I’d love to hear what you drank during your pregnancy!

Breathe deeply,
Laugh with abandon,
Love wholly,
Eat well.

MiLady Carol
www.GreenTeaLady.com
http://miladycarol.com
Dazzling jewelry that reflects sparkling personalities!

Today’s spotted wildlife while walking to buy a cucumber and snow peas… deer! Just nibbling on the foliage in a neighbor’s front yard.

Enjoy!

Breathe deeply,
Laugh with abandon,
Love wholly,
Eat well.

MiLady Carol
www.GreenTeaLady.com
http://miladycarol.com
Dazzling jewelry that reflects sparkling personalities!