Coconut Beeswax Hand Salve

Coconut Beeswax Hand Salve

Coconut Beeswax Hand Salve has got to be one of the best products. It is homemade, easy, fast, inexpensive, and all-natural. 

I took store bought coconut oil and beeswax in a 10:1 ratio and heated both to a liquid. I combined them, mixed, then poured it into a container where it solidified quickly with no cracking. The containers were perfect, just like store bought hand salve containers, that I got at The Container Store.

When I applied it, it was rich and moist like coconut and yet was sealed in by the beeswax. I washed my hands gently and the water beaded off on the applied area. It smelled nice and felt great.

Coconut is really the original moisturizer and beeswax is the original wax. I was just looking at how companies make candles. They wax is an industrial by-product, it produces suet, and burns faster. Beeswax is all-natural, cleans the air, and burns far longer. It can also be used to waterproof leather shoes, seal cutting boards, and makes great candles. 

This was a very easy project that I did with minimal supplies quickly and had the ability to scale down for a first try. 

Guinness Soup and Bleu Cheese Croutons

Guinness Onion Soup with Bleu Cheese Croutons and Chicken

I visited my local corner store to buy beer. This should be a common event for the local corner store, but apparently not this one. The woman running the store turned the lights on when I walked in. I guess this was the early motion detecting lights. I found a four pack of Guinness, which I like the taste of, but don't buy often enough to know the price. The woman didn't know either. She first attempted to place a phone call, to the owner/husband. She then started looking through a pocketbook with the price of everything in the store but couldn't find it. I eventually found the price for her in the book. She brown bagged it.

The beer was for cooking. I made Guinness French Onion Soup with Bleu Cheese Croutons. There is actually 100 ways to cook with Guinness. The Guinness adds a rich flavor to the onion soup and the bleu cheese croutons adds a crunchy, saltiness. It could be a entree. The bleu cheese croutons are actually wonderful when the soak up the soup and mix with the cheese.

I have it pictured here with chicken. No Guinness with those but beer can chicken is a possibility.

Conquer Belly Fat

Pork Belly and Vegetables

If all pork tasted like this, I would have it everyday. I bought a pastured pork belly from the Farmer's Market. These are the cuts that come with nipples. I scored the fat and roasted it for about thirty minutes on high then on a lower setting for an hour. The top fat becomes crispy and the inside is incredibly juicy. I bought a section and thought it would be dinner for two nights. I ate a section that was about an a fifth of it and now I'm very satisfied. I added carrots to roast with it and broccoli about fifteen minutes before it was done.

I have somewhat of a back log of meat I want to talk about. 

Clear The Clutter: What To Buy and What To Throw Away

What To Throw Away: Overpriced and Underdeveloped Sandwiches

I visited a local Safeway to buy two sandwiches. They have Signature sandwiches with themes that have olive spreads or onion rings and they were good then. 

Apparently this Safeway involves a half-day sandwich training program that allows you to test out of it. There was one girl who spent a good 20 minutes working on my wiches. She seemed a little loss and slow. The ingredients also were skimpy and driven in from the central plant. After fifteen minutes I didn't want them anymore but I guess I was emotionally invested in seeing the sandwiches finish like sitting through most of a bad movie. I surrendered the sandwiches back to Safeway and bought all the ingredients I needed to make my own. 

What To Buy: Sandwich Raw Materials

I used toasted Ciabatta with French Swiss and Salami and Roast Beef with a little red onion and mustard. the sandwiches were huge and tasted great. I made four hardy sandwiches that came out to the same price per sandwich.

What To Throw Out: Old (left) and Replace With New Jeans (right)

People apparently like worn-in jeans. Jeans they have had for years that are comfortable and smooth that are faded or have patches or a history. Not me. I like crisp, stiff, new smelling, dark blue jeans.

As part my own clear the clutter I am undertaking, I told myself that I would donate all my jeans in my closet and replace them with two or three nice new pairs. That is about five to six pairs of faded, loose, worn cuffed jeans replaced by two. If you like worn jeans you should check Goodwill in about a week. 

I think this was worth it because you wear these every day and something to improve your day as significantly as this is worth it.

I bought two new pairs at a local department store that had a very nice man working folding clothes. He tried to push another shirt on me (Green table cloth). When I ready to pay I was stuck behind a Russian couple trying to return items without a receipt. That's about as likely as getting municipal services in Russia without bribing the government official.

Frittata and Evidence for Coconut Oil

Sunday Night Frittata

With very little preparation or instruction I tried something new.

Cook bacon in a pan, drain some of the fat out and cook sausages and anything else you want in it. 

Beat 8 to 10 eggs and add it to the pan. 

Cook on the stove top then finish in the oven.

Fritta made Sunday night now will feed me every morning this week.

Now more about food.

I have been reading a few articles from peer reviewed nutrition journals that feed mice all sorts of things to prove a claim. So I went to the peer-reviewed literature for double blind clinic study on humans. Here's something interesting.

* A randomized, double-blind, clinic study measured women's waist circumference (an obesity study) on women taking soy bean oil and coconut oil. The women on coconut oil had higher HDL (good) level and a lower LDL:HDL ratio. Weight was down in both groups (no conclusion there) but only in the coconut group was their waist circumference down (i.e. coconut made noticeable weight loss or ie you look better in a bathing suit eating coconut oil).The soy group saw a rise in all the bad things.

Remind me to do a post about all the great things about coconuts.

Reference: M. L. Assuncao, H. S. Ferreira, A. F. Dos Santos, C. R. Cabral Jr., and T. M. M. T. Florencio, “Effects of dietary coconut oil on the biochemical and anthropometric profiles of women presenting abdominal obesity,” Lipids, vol. 44, no. 7, pp. 593–601, 2009.

Table Scraps: Portabello, Mustard Greens, and Coconut Water

 Portabello Mushrooms, Mustard Greens, and Coconut Water

Some time ago I did a version of Table Scraps, my version of Chopped. I used some pretty easy ingredients so I am coming back with it, this time while more difficult ingredients and less commentary.

I stopped by the store to pick up Portabello Mushrooms that are one of my favorite foods. I almost got arugula, a favorite but widely overused ingredient on the real Chopped as well as coconut water, a favorite of mine and very popular right now.

I had no idea what I was going to do but I figured a stuffed Portabello mushroom with a coconut water sauce. I scrapped out the inside of the Portabello that I mixed with Mustard Greens, onions, garlic,  broccoli, salt and pepper. I chopped those up finely and sauteed them in butter with the cap.

Portabello and Stuffing

I initially thought a salad would be good for the Mustard Greens but quickly thought a soup would be a better use because I had coconut water. I blended the coconut water with a little chicken stock ,onions, garlic, the second Portabello and Mustard Greens. I cooked this in a pan and served it with the stuffed top.

I am surprised at how fast the Portabello cooked. It really only needs a sere on both side and it is done. I also took a few slices of Portabello and broiled them in the oven with a little coconut oil. I wanted it crispy to be nice in the soup. The Blue Monkey Coconut Water was fine, it reminds me of FOCO, which probably means they both taste like aluminum cans. Only one is named after a type of guerrilla warfare. It probably didn't add much to the soup.

MSNBC "Should Try" Harder Themselves

"Should Try"

Nutritional Science has been made into nothing less than a cult. Under the guise of health and public safety, the cover of nutrition is being used to subvert the people. 

Big "N" nutrition now requires only elites (FDA, USDA) to dictate what is acceptable and and what is not, only elites are able to test and dechiper the research and so-called science, and the mandating to citizens, and especially public school children, what they can and cannot eat.

Now we see articles, that are either pro-elite or trying-to-please the elite (no difference), that openly mock those that would dare go against the elite-run nutritional mandates. Paula Deen recently disclosed she has diabetes. Many in the public that found (sick) comfort that somebody who goes against mandated nutrional guidelines. Articles like the NY Times openly mock the TV chef with "I told you so..." articles. 

(Could this be because of her public criticism of the current administration? I care very little about Mrs. Deen's personal or political views and am publicly neutral at this moment to most any administration policies.)

I am concerned that a private citizen who goes against the mandates of specious policies is being openly mocked by the elites-right now the media backed by higher powers. 

A recent MSNBC hit piece today is condescendingly telling Mrs. Deen that she must change her views-"5 diabetes-friendly swaps Paula Deen should try." Read the article. It is the same low-fat, whole grain nonsense that is worst than what Mrs. Deen is cooking. Whole diary and butter are not the problem. Processed, low-fat, wheat based regimes are the problem. 

For opposing the current policies and cooking traditional cuisine, this chef like anyone else out there, is being ridiculed, and now, talked down to in an attempt in marginalize her status.