Angelnina’s Cottage

CAKE, Mark Bittman, and Flexitarianism

I have been dying to make a Heavenly Angel Food Cake with the girls’ eggs.

I finally did just that.

I used my strawberry sorbet from the freezer that I had made a few months back.  I simply let it melt and poured it over like syrup.  This cake is simply divine.

Since it took 13 egg whites to make the angel food, I decided to make another cake that used the egg yolks.

Yellow Butter Cake w/

Dark Chocolate Frosting

We dug into this cake before I had the chance to take a prettier photo.  It was just too good to wait!

There is nothing better than a good old fashioned homemade cake.  It tastes different than the box cakes.  I like box cakes, but this cake doesn’t have that”candy” sweet taste that many box cakes have.

My intention was to freeze this cake,  but between Mark and I a few guests, there wasn’t a crumb leftover!

Speaking of FOOD, I went to see Mark Bittman speak at the University of Washington. He really gave me a lot of food for thought- pun intended.

Mark Bittman talks about many of the things that I’ve been thinking about in recent years–especially with the push toward high protein, low carb diets.   I have always believed I need to eat more vegetables and fruits, and less meat.   I’m also not into extreme diets that involve elimination (except for medical reasons), and I find Bittman’s views more balanced.   It sounds like common sense to me.

In his latest book, “Food Matters”,  Bittman is talking about eating less meat  (he is not a vegetarian), more vegetables and fruit, and cut out overly processed foods.  I’m in! (except where homemade cakes are concerned!)

He also writes:  We are finally starting to acknowledge the threat carbon emissions pose to our ozone layer, but few people have focused on the extent to which our consumption of meat contributes to global warming. Think about it this way: In terms of energy consumption, serving a typical family-of-four steak dinner is the rough equivalent of driving around in an SUV for three hours while leaving all the lights on at home.

Tonight I made up a recipe for a dinner of brown basmati rice, chopped organic brocolli, and homemade lemon tahini sauce.  I sprinkled toasted pine nuts over the top.  I served an organic garnet yam on the side with a little maple syrup and butter.    It was healthy, tasty, easy to make, and very filling.   We still had a slice of homemade cake for dessert.  I’m not interested in elimination–I’m simply learning balance.

In the past few days I’ve consumed more chard, beets, brown basmati rice, legumes, apples, oranges, pears, spinach, and nuts, than I’ve eaten in a week.  I think it is giving me more energy.  Who knew?

I am now considering using less meat in the meals I cook, and/or adding two-three vegetarian dinners to our weekly menu.    I think it will be more challenging for Mark.   Mark grew up with heavy meat and potato dinners.   I’m so happy he wants to make this change too.  I like the fact that we don’t have to feel like we’re giving something up.   As a flexitarian, if we want steak, we’ll eat steak!  We just won’t eat as much of it.

I can hear the vegans laughing at me now.