Terry’s Banana Coconut Chocolate Chip Cookies

Finally a cookie recipe that is wheat-free and uses up overripe bananas. Maple syrup adds sweetness instead of refined sugar from Terry Walters, author of Clean Food.

2 bananas, mashed
1⁄4 cup canola oil
1⁄4 cup maple syrup
1⁄2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup rolled oats
2⁄3 cup brown rice flour
1⁄4 teaspoon baking soda
1⁄2 cup shredded unsweetened dried coconut
Pinch of sea salt
1⁄4 cup semi-sweet dark chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350°F.
In medium bowl, combine bananas, oil, syrup and vanilla. In separate medium bowl, combine oats, flour, baking soda, coconut and salt. Add the banana mixture to the dry ingredients and blend until just combined (do not overstir). Fold in chocolate chips.

Line cookie sheet with parchment paper and drop batter by the heaping teaspoon onto sheet. There is no need to roll, flatten or shape the mounds. Place in oven and bake 14 minutes or until lightly browned. Remove from oven and place directly on wire rack to cool.
MAKES 11⁄2 dozen cookies

(Copyright 2009 Sterling Publishing, Co., Inc.)

Terry talks about Eating Clean on Bloom Talk Radio

Mango Walnut Chicken Salad

I get bored with the same old salad for lunch. Here’s one that will not only look colorful on your plate but will perk up any midday meal.

2 boneless breasts of organic chicken
1 mango
5 oz organic spring mix or baby romaine lettuces
3/4 cup walnut halves
crumbled goat cheese to taste
salt & pepper to taste
Lemon-Dijon dressing

Boil chicken breasts in water for approx. 20 minutes or until just cooked inside (or use leftover chicken cut in pieces). Let cool and chop in bite-sized pieces. Cut mango into one inch pieces or smaller by cutting the fruit in half along the center pit. Score the flesh of each half with criss cross cuts avoiding cutting into the skin. Turn the skin inside out and cut off the pieces. Trim any fruit remaining around the pit and cut into pieces as well.

Wash and spin dry the lettuce and place in a bowl. Sprinkle salt to the salad a few minutes before serving and toss. Add the mango, chicken, walnuts and goat cheese and toss with Lemon-Dijon dressing (recipe below) to coat. Add freshly ground pepper to taste.  Yum! Serves 4.

Recipe for Lemon-Dijon Dressing

Lemon Dijon Salad Dressing

I love this dressing and have been making it for years, as long as my brother Ken can remember who dubbed it “Barb’s famous Dijon dressing.”

Creamy from Dijon mustard without using heavy mayo’s. You can substitute apple cider vinegar but I’m partial to the the lemony taste. Drizzle this dressing on most any salad.

1/4 cup lemon juice
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
1/2 cup Extra-virgin olive oil

In a glass jar with a lid - I save old Dijon mustard jars - add the lemon juice and mustard. Put the lid on and shake vigorously to mix thoroughly. Add olive oil so that the dressing is 1 part juice and 2 parts oil. With lid on, shake vigorously again till mixed throughly and a creamy consistency. Refrigerate any unused dressing in the same jar and shake before each use.

Note: I don’t add salt or pepper to the dressing but “salt the salad” before I put on dressing. Complete with freshly ground pepper.

Supermodel Emme Awakens Our Inner Magnificence!

Body Image, self esteem, living a healthy lifestyle and more from full-figured Supermodel Emme!

Guest: Emme
LISTEN on Bloom Talk Radio
Aired: March 11, 2010
Photo: Robert Ashcroft

Emme, supermodel, television personality, author, lecturer, clothing designer, and nationally recognized body image and self esteem advocate has a clear mission: to awaken the inner magnificence inherent in each of us. It’s no wonder People magazine selected her twice as one of the “50 Most Beautiful People” and Ladies’ Home Journal chose her as one of the “Most Important Women in America” and one of the “Most Fascinating Women of the Year.” And the accolades don’t stop there: she was honored as a Glamour magazine “Woman of the Year” and as one of Biography magazine’s “25 Most Influential Women.”

Emme burst onto the scene as the world’s first full-figured supermodel hosting E! Entertainment Television’s “Fashion Emergency” and became the first full figured model ever to land a spokesperson’s contract with a cosmetics company when she signed with Revlon.

Emme is a vocal advocate for people of all ages to be fit and to live a healthy lifestyle and blogs on her website and in the Living Section at The Huffington Post.  She promotes and exemplifies a wellness lifestyle, positive body image and self-esteem and self-acceptance and has penned several books including her latest, What Are You Hungry For? (Harper Collins, 2007), a children’s book that addresses the reality that children have many hungers, including emotional ones.

Recipe: Emme’s Garlic Black Eye Pea Soup

Emme’s Website

Eating Clean

Can we nourish our bodies with delicious food that’s good for you and closer to the source?

Guest: Terry Walters author of Clean Food
LISTEN on Bloom Talk Radio
Aired: March 4, 2010

Join me and my guest, Terry Walters who is all about good health - body, mind, and soul.

For the past ten years, Terry has been teaching people to make delicious, healthy foods to nourish themselves and their families and compiled her recipes into Clean Food based on whole, minimally processed foods that can improve your health and your future in a sustainable way.

We’ll talk about eating clean and living well as Terry believes in nourishing yourself with nutrient-rich foods in a rainbow of colors and a full spectrum of tastes. “It’s about making healthy choices that nourish our bodies, our families, our communities and our environment. One choice at a time, with intention and compassion for our selves and our planet, we can eat clean and live well.”

Terry’s website

Who’s Blooming?

As a lively tap dancer with the Blossom Tappers (love that name!),  Louise lives life to the fullest and proves that age means nothing.

There are not enough hours in the day for Louise Cavallaro, age 81, to do everything she wants to do. But she makes sure she fits in dance practice, classes and performances with the  Blossom Tappers, a senior women’s tap dance troupe she joined over 20 years ago.

“I loved ball room and square dancing with my husband. But when he died I was looking for something to do.”  Ironically, while at probate court for her husband’s estate, Louise heard the tapping of feet across the hall. It was the Blossom Tappers, originally called the Orange Blossoms, and she immediately joined up.

The Blossom Tappers, currently ages 63 to 87, tap their way into everyone’s hearts, most recently performing at the Long Wharf Theatre in New Haven CT. Louise and the troupe were also invited to be the first senior group to take a workshop taught by a former Rockette and performed at Radio City Music Hall.

So I asked this peppy senior, what gives her such a zest for life? “I’ve always had a get up and go personality and also take kickboxing and aerobics. I don’t think about my age. Until last year, I never stated how old I was in years. But, my daughter recently said I should be proud to be in my 80’s and so active. So now I am proud and reveal my age.”

I also wanted to know which Seed for Success was important to Louise in  her journey through life. “Owning my Life was something I had to learn. I was always a daughter, student, wife, mother and widow. I was so busy being all of those people, I didn’t have enough time left over for me. Now I found me…the person inside of me who does her own thing.”

Louise’s advice on how to bloom at any age. “Just be yourself and never give up. Always take a new path. I follow what my father taught me. The most important thing you learn in life is what you learn after you think you know it all.”

Creamy “No-Cream” Butternut Squash Soup

Velvety smooth with just a punch of spice, makes this soup a winner sans the cream. And it’s easy because you don’t have to peel the squash!

While winter is still here, enjoy my version of butternut squash soup on a cold day.

1 butternut squash
2-3 carrots, peeled and cut into 1 inch pieces
1 medium onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoons olive oil
3 cups organic vegetable broth
1 teaspoon curry powder
1/2 teaspoon chili powder
salt & pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

My friend Lisa gave me the best tip to avoid the cumbersome job of peeling a butternut squash. Slice it lengthwise, scoop out the seeds then bake it in the oven in an inch of water (also called a bain-marie) with the flat sides down in a 9 x 13 oven proof glass baking dish. I added another easy step. Add the carrots to the water in the pan before baking so the carrots cook at the same time as the squash.  Cook for approx. 1 hour or when a knife can be easily inserted in the squash. Let cool first then scoop out the flesh and discard the skin. Place aside with the cooked carrots.

In a large stock pot, saute the onion and garlic in the olive oil over medium heat. Stir until softened. Add all other ingredients and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes. Remove from heat and puree in a blender (I have a high powered blender that purees this soup to it’s extra creamy consistency), food processor or with an immersion blender being extremely careful with the hot liquids. Or let cool first and then puree. Reheat when ready to serve.

Note: Because I use vegetable broth, this recipe is both vegetarian and vegan. I use an organic vegetable base which you can buy at a natural food market. Use 1 teaspoon vegetable base for every 1 cup of boiling water to make a very tasty broth.

Simple Lemon Garlic Salad Dressing

Tired of processed bottled dressings and the same ole oil and vinegar but don’t want to take out too many ingredients to make something tasty for your salad?

Try this simple lemon-ette with a garlic punch that simply uses garlic powder instead of mincing up a bunch of raw garlic.

Juice of 1 lemon (or organic lemon juice)
Extra-virgin olive oil - approx. 1/4 cup
Sea salt
Garlic powder (preferably organic - it tastes fresher)

In a glass jar with a lid - I save old dijon mustard jars - add the lemon juice and olive oil so that the dressing is 1 part juice and 2 parts oil. Use less oil if you like more of a lemony zing.  Set aside.

Place greens in your serving bowl and sprinkle with sea salt and a few shakes of garlic powder (not garlic salt) to taste. Toss. Let sit for 5 minutes - any longer and the greens will start to wilt. By the way, salting the salad before the dressing goes on is “the secret” from my sister-in-law Sherry who makes the best salads. I took it a step further and added garlic to the greens instead of having the garlic powder clump up in the dressing.

Shake the lemon-olive oil dressing in the jar and add enough to coat the greens evenly. Toss again. Reserve the remaining dressing for another day. So simple, yet so yummy and people ask me all the time, what dressing do I use because they love it!

Who’s Blooming?

“How can I leave my job?” became “How can I stay?” when Deb Gillap-Bassler realized she needed a career change. Here’s Deb’s story of how she followed her passion …

Wow! I often think my life has been incredible.  I have tried and enjoyed many occupations from fitness instructor to personal chef, marketing executive to interior designer, with an office overlooking the Statue of Liberty to a bullpen shared by 100+. The good, the bad, the ugly. It’s been really hard work because the pursuit to create the life I’ve always wanted has finally paid off.

I fell into marketing, suggested by a headhunter. With no other clear path and a good salary, why not try it?  But it took so much work for me to be okay at it.  Recognized for my loyalty and commitment, I still never really measured up with my peers.  I was forever the square peg in the round hole.

A decade into my marketing career, I was still struggling with my role there and a lack of inner comfort in performing the job well. My job paid for the American dream - a house, a nice car, savings, etc., how could I leave? But the question clearly became, “How can I stay?” Read more

Tags: career change, career transition, changing jobs, deb gillap-bassler, following a passion, passion

Look Who’s Blooming!

February 1, 2010 by Barb Scala  
Filed under Bloom Talk Radio: Archives

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Meet 3 inspiring women who are “blooming” while following their passions, overcoming challenges and making a difference.

Guests: Jennifer Covello creator of My Life baby journal, Laura Fitzpatrick-Nager cancer survivor & author of Swimming on My Wedding Day and Martha Hoffman founder of Call to Care Uganda
LISTEN on Bloom Talk Radio
Aired: Feb 25, 2010

Jennifer Covello

Jennifer always loved to journal and wanted more than just a baby book to chronicle her children’s lives. Hear how this single mom of two small kids, one with special needs, worked full time and managed to create and publish a keepsake baby journal entitled My Life…A Chronicle of the Journey which recently won the Living Now Bronze Award. Jennifer’s Story

Laura Fitzpatrick-Nager

When diagnosed with breast cancer for the third time, a wise friend said, “You didn’t create this, but
you can create your healing.” Listen to Laura’s story of hope in searching for role-models for living well with cancer and how she has become one herself as author of  Swimming on My Wedding Day: My Cancer Journey through the Seasons. Laura’s Story

Martha Hoffman

For many years, Martha had the same dream at night. A woman helping children. She soon realized that she was “the woman” and the children she needed to help were in Uganda. Find out how Martha embraced this country and it’s people as founder of Call to Care Uganda. Martha’s Story

Tags: bloomers, following a passion, jennifer covello, laura fitzpatrick-nager, making a difference, martha hoffman, overcoming a challenge, who's blooming

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