Health for life

This week, I planned to present you with an alternative to the Christmas cookie, as well as one of my favorite sweets: daifuku, Japanese rice balls stuffed with sweet red bean paste. Three tries ended with me covered in sticky, gelatinous goo.

Let’s just say my technique needs work.

Time was ticking when I decided to scrap the daifuku. My baker’s pantry is still pretty well stocked from Thanksgiving, so cookies seemed like the best choice for a quick and dirty replacement. I turned to the dependable and consistently marvelous How to Cook Everything Vegetarian by Mark Bittman.

Bittman’s How to Cook Everything books take the guesswork out of cooking and baking by showing you how to customize recipes for any situation. If you’re a novice or by-the-book cook, you’ll feel at liberty to make substitutions to suit your tastes or pantry, and you’ll eventually gain the confidence to switch things up on your own.

One recipe reminded me of my mom and I just had to try it: Oatmeal Apple Cookies.

My mom was always trying to get me and my siblings to eat healthy snacks when the rest of our friends and classmates were eating ding dongs and zingers. Oatmeal Apple Cookies are just the kind of cookies she would have made to put in my Muppet Movie lunch box next to the carrot sticks and carob-chip trail mix.

So, at least for today, think of me as your wacky, veggie aunt, offering you whole-grain and fruit cookies when everyone else has laid out chocolate-coated, butter-infused treats rolled in nuts and dripping with icing.

I made a ton of changes, based on MB’s variation ideas and some based on my own perences. He provides a vegan option for most of the recipes in the vegetarian cookbook, and I used his applesauce-for-egg and almond milk for cow’s milk suggestions. I also used nonhydrogenated vegan butter for dairy butter.

Here’s where I ventured out on my own: the original recipe calls for dried apples. I’m not a fan of dried fruit in general and don’t keep it around, so I took a chance and used the real thing. I also swapped granulated sugar for maple syrup. Excellent decisions all around.

The cookies are moist, sweet, and delicious. They may be a little on the soft side —no crispy edges, my favorite part of a cookie—but full of apple flavor and definitely a crowd pleaser; CB, my Roommate, and two of my officemates gave thumbs-up.

The recipe whipped up quickly too, from peeling and grating the apple to pulling the last pan out of the oven, the whole enterprise took less than 90 minutes. Oatmeal Apple Cookies would add a tasty and fast, if not entirely festive, option to the Christmas cookie rotation. And they’re much less sticky than daifuku.

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If this xx tips your canoe, swim on over to:

• Vegan Ginger Cookies
• Snickerdoodles
• Vegan Bran Muffins

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Oatmeal Apple Cookies
Makes about 4 dozen; 2 cookies per serving


1/2 cup nonhydrogenated vegan butter
1/2 cup maple syrup
3/4 cup brown sugar, packed
1/4 cup apple sauce
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups rolled oats (not quick oats)
1 cup apple, peeled and grated (about 1 medium apple)
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp clove
pinch of salt
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 cup soy, almond, or rice milk
1 tsp vanilla extract

1) Preheat oven to 375. Peel and grate apple and set aside.

2) In a large mixing bowl, cream together vegan butter, syrup, and sugar with mixer, then stir in applesauce.

3) In a medium bowl, combine flour, oats, apples, cinnamon, nutmeg, clove, baking powder, and salt.

4) Alternately, add milk and dry ingredients to butter and sugar mixture until dough is formed, mixing in a little more milk if dough is too dry.

5) Spoon out tablespoon-sized dollops of dough onto ungreased baking sheet and bake for 12-15 minutes. Allow to cool for a minute or two, remove from baking sheet, and continue on a wire rack.

6) Serve with a glass of almond milk or hot tea.

Approximate Calories, Fat, Fiber, Protein, and Price per Serving
137.3 calories, 3.8g fat, .9g fiber, 1.74g protein, $.23

Calculations
1/2 cup nonhydrogenated vegan butter: 800 calories, 88g fat, 0g fiber, 0g protein, $0.96
1/2 cup maple syrup: 420 calories, 0.5g fat, 0g fiber, 0g protein, $2.38
3/4 cup brown sugar: 628 calories, 0g fat, 0g fiber, 0g protein, $0.43
1/4 cup apple sauce: 51.75 calories, 0g fat, 1g fiber, 0g protein, $0.26
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour: 682.5 calories, 1.5g fat, 4.5g fiber, 19.5g protein, $0.32
2 cups rolled oats: 609 calories, 9g fat, 16g fiber, 22g protein, $0.24
1 cup apple: 77 calories, 0g fat, 2g fiber, 0g protein, $0.50
1/2 tsp cinnamon: 0 calories, 0g fat, 0g fiber, 0g protein, $0.02
1/4 tsp nutmeg: 0 calories, 0g fat, 0g fiber, 0g protein, $0.02
1/4 tsp clove: 0 calories, 0g fat, 0g fiber, 0g protein, $0.02
pinch of salt: 0 calories, 0g fat, 0g fiber, 0g protein, $0.02
2 tsp baking powder: 4 calories, 0g fat, 0g fiber, 0g protein, $0.04
1/4 cup almond milk: 10 calories, 0.75g fat, 0.25g fiber, 0.25g protein, $0.12
1 tsp vanilla extract: 12 calories, 0g fat, 0g fiber, 0g protein, $0.26
TOTALS: 3294.3 calories, 90.75g fat, 21.75g fiber, 41.75g protein, $5.59
PER SERVING (TOTALS/24): 137.3 calories, 3.8g fat, .9g fiber, 1.74g protein, $.23

Penned by the effervescent Leigh, Veggie Might is a weekly Thursday column about the wide world of Vegetarianism.

On Tuesday, I put out the call (as if you didn’t know it was me) for help with emergency lunch ideas. You came through aces, and I’ve been implementing a few of your tricks. (I already had hummus in the company fridge!) The full results will be posted in next week’s Q&A.

But here is what prompted the call for advice. Last Thursday morning, I overslept. The night before I had cooked corn-on-the-cob and some red beans for a quinoa salad recipe. My plan was to chop the remaining veggies and cook the quinoa in the morning before work. I needed a new plan.

With only 15 minutes until I had to leave for work, I started thinking about what I had ready and what I could prepare at the office. I’m new to this company, but I know 2 things about the place: lunch is sacred and there is a microwave in the lunchroom.

Dried quinoa, a slice of onion, and a teaspoon of salt went into a container. Into another, I combined corn from one of the cobs, a 1/2 cup of beans, and 2 canned chipotle peppers in adobo sauce. Taking one last peek into the fridge, I spied half a tomato and tossed it on top of the beans and corn. Maybe there was a knife at the office?

I was out the door right on time.

At lunchtime, Operation Microwave Quinoa deployed. I added 8 ounces of water (using my graduated water bottle as a measuring device) to the dry quinoa and onion. Using my best guess, I put the container in the microwave with the lid ajar, and set the timer for 5 minutes.

The quinoa was nearly done when the timer dinged. I removed the lid, reset it for 3 minutes, and what-do-you-know? It was perfect! Fully cooked, fluffy, and ready to eat.

I zapped my bean/corn/chipotle combo and sawed the tomato with a knife I discovered in one of the pantry drawers. In the future, I’ll try to cut all my veggies at home.

Once everything was hot, I mixed the contents into one container, topped concoction with the sliced tomatoes, and sat down to a delicious, office-cooked meal with Roger Federer. My last-minute lunch turned out to be a relaxing, satisfying break from a hectic day.



Thanks again for your fab comments on Tuesday. If you have any more last-minute lunch suggestions, feel free to share them in the comments.

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If this article tickled your fancy, sidle on over to
20 Cheap Healthy Dishes Made from Pantry Staples
The Brown Bag Brigade
Healthy Takeout on a Budget

Thanks to Managed Care Magazine, the Disease Management Care Blog can post this interesting 25 minute interview with Princeton healthcare economist Uwe Reindardt.  Suitable for desk-bound meal-break viewing by overachieving DMCB readers, the modest and insightful Dr. Reindardt gets it mostly right:

No, the slowdown in the U.S. rate of health care costs cannot be ascribed to passage of the Affordable Care Act.  It started wayyyy before Obamacare was passed and is more likely due to the economic slowdown and increased consumer cost-sharing.

Accountable Care Organizations remain an "iffy" experimental proposition because they "dont go all the way like Kaiser."

Republican proposals to let health insurers sell their products across state lines are hardly a health orm panacea, because prices (and theore premiums) are not a function of where the insurer is domiciled, but where the care is rendered.  Texas insurers would still have to pay New York prices.

Americans use fewer pills, occupy less bed-days and see fewer doctors, but we pay more because providers can charge more.  Despite being relatively small vs. the behemoths like Aetna and Cigna, regional hospitals have considerable market power that translates into take-it-or-leave it local single seller monopsonies.   Europeans, in contrast, have lower prices because their system is dominated by single purchaser monopolies.

Were headed toward a three-tier system comprised of 1) the indigent safety-net public programs, 2) the middle class "erence pricing" "networks" where consumers pay the difference if they want to buy up and 3) "boutique" health care for the 5%.

Theres reason to be optimistic about the next five years thanks to a sluggish labor market (making it easier to impose networks and even more cost sharing) and innovation (computational capacity is putting meaningful quality measurement within reach, while techy gizmos are making self-care simultaneously cheap and fun). 

Plus, theres reason to be of good cheer.  Compared to the U.S. education and the legal systems, health care is far more efficient and consumer-friendly.  Stop beating up on yourselves.

(The DMCB didnt quite agree with Dr. Reinhardts views on worksite wellness.  He finds the notion counterintuitive and intrusive, perring that insurers own wellness.  He neglects to mention that the employers who invest heavily in wellness are typically self-insured and that employers have an arguable stake in improving the quality of their human capital.)