Your Healthy Habits Today Matter Big-Time for Tomorrow

Healthy habits matter today big time for results tomorrow. And we can get a good dose of influence from the Blue Zones (discovered by Dan Buettner), where their habits feel like worlds apart from our modern, Western world.

But we can adopt their healthy ways. And I share a few of mine below along my journey including a healthy potato habit I have. 🥔

blue zones habits.

As for healthy habits, I’ve been eating whole-wheat bread and foods since I was young. I don’t think I ever had a slice of white sandwich bread. It was wheat, rye, or pumpernickel… but never white.

Whole wheat cherry glace pancakes with frozen Greek yogurt for Sunday brunch! 🥞

I’m so glad I didn’t let those past years of dissatisfied field trip bag lunches hold me back. Those and other healthy habits are happy keepers.

Below you’ll learn about some Sunday brunch inspo that came from healthy habits and endings too.

And what you create as eating healthy habits today becomes your tomorrow’s habits. And can be part of happy memories.

Some of them stick around from when you were younger, and still work. They need no replacement.

When I was younger, working smart was en vogue. Why?… je ne sais quoi.

…Maybe we were trying to learn how to cut corners? But working hard never went outta-style. Work was (and is) what made the world go round but talking about grunt work especially would be like going rogue.

And today, in a sharing society, we learned that there are no shortcuts. The good stuff is in the work and comes from the working hard process. So glad we kept the healthy habits. 🌱

And even the tough work proved useful for growth and experience.

Especially when we’re young, we need all the experience we can get…

In those years, I walked everywhere. I had no wheels. I walked to the bus, to the dentist, to school, on the paper route, and to my friends’ houses.

And when my high school friend got a new set of wheels, a brand spanking new red Cabriolet convertible for her 16th birthday, she offered to pick me up in the mornings to take me to school. It surprised me when I turned down that exciting offer.

My young mind told me that I shouldn’t count on that routine. Our young intellects were at work even when we weren’t fully conscious. 😉

And in a higher gear, I knew I made the right choice.

At that moment I solidified the habit of counting on myself… and not taking shortcuts that breed laziness.

No lazy (Kapha) mind is a better mantra…

And a good way to break out of that mold is to exercise even when we don’t feel like doing it. You always feel better after the burn.

An easier way is to step outside. Because there you don’t feel the sting. You don’t count calories burned. Your wristband does it automatically for you.

And you breathe in new air and let your senses do the rest.

And when you naturally go up and down steps, you’re doing exercise without having to convince your brain to work. It’s automatic to your mind and legs.

Simply, if you want to get to where you’re going, you need to take steps… or even better, the stairs. Fair, right?

Too often we automatically think of exercise as cardio and keeping up our heart rates. That’s just one type.

And the kind that makes a difference will be the exercises and moves you do.

Another habit area is consistently showing up.

Your presence becomes known. And you’re seen as someone who’s accountable and takes the time to be available. We all like to know people like this.

It’s a form of welcomed dependability.

And there are ways we all can be consistent whether it’s online or in-person. And where we can be part of our community.

For some years, I was part of organizing a regular brunch group. It fit what I was doing. I was helping others plan their hosted events, so why not host my own? It was volunteer mixed with fun healthy habits.

What made the group special was that we (I had a co-lead with me) opened the event to everyone. There were always newcomers to the group and the DC metro area. And the restaurant of choice had to set up several tables.

It was fun to try out new local restaurants including swanky Michelin Blue Duck Tavern places, historic National Press Room restaurants, and mod-deco fare ones on the Potomac River. Many celebrated Cherry Blossoms 🌸 like this one (speaking of en vogue):

And we met restaurateurs like this distinguished chef who put foodie restaurants on the maps in the 90s before Jose Andres.

Restaurant lunch time for brunch isn’t usually busy like dinner so that was a good fit for all. And being plugged in that way became part of healthy habits that season.

And during those years, as a theme, I was also inviting my own bunch to the restaurants where I ran the group events.

Similarly, if you take a look at your healthy habits, you’ll notice some repeats. Your regular habits that stick become what sticks out in your life tomorrow and years later.

Taking inventory of your healthy habits will help show you the gaps so you can have a fulfilling life.

You can consider:

Where are you spending most of your time?

What do you wish you were doing more of?

Are you plugged into your local community in some way?

How are you helping the world?

Just some food for thought as you go about your week.

For anti-inflammatory food shopping inspo, check out this 200 anti-inflammatory food grocery guide/list. 🛒

And these spuds could be part of your healthy habit start.

Healthy Loaded Baked Potato Skins

This used to be one of my favorite lunch meals when they had a loaded potato fixins' bar at my work. The skins are often tossed out and are loaded with fiber and vitamins that can be cooked, baked and enjoyed in our daily meal healthy habits!

Course Side Dish, vegetables

Cuisine American

Ingredients

Russet potatoes (or favorite potatoes)
Greek yogurt
Herbs (chives, thyme, and/or tarragon recommended)
Alliums (scallions or minced onions)
olive oil (optional)

Instructions

Cook your potatoes until soft on the stove.
Cut each potato in half and face down halves on baking sheet drizzled with a little EVOO if you like.
Bake on 350°F until browning occurs.
Let potato cool sligthtly and then add your healthy Greek yogurt topping and herbs to garnish and enjoy!

Healthy Chipotle Menu and Fast Food

Healthy Chipotle menu, healthy fast food, and healthy eating are all related. Chipotle makes healthy chips and chic beans in a pot. And they make it all so tasty good.

These are the same type of ingredients used and eaten that the longest living people on the planet today enjoy. These folks are also some of the poorest which debunks the myth that you have to be wealthy to be healthy.

And one of the plant-based healthiest meals that’s full of protein amino acids is the 3 Sisters dish traditionally with corn, tortilla, and beans. Learn how to make your own easy lime treated corn tortilla below to go with. 🌽

When you’re not at home and making eating out food choices, eating whole grains and more plant-based is part of healthy eats, and the Chipotle menu is one menu to consider for a fast lunch.

I wish they were around when I was younger. For elementary school field trips, we were asked to bring a bag lunch to school (…you may have done the same).

Most schoolmates had white bread sandwiches (the magical Wonder Bread enriched white bread) and were less likely to stand out and be judged. For lunch hour, your pride and identity were wrapped up in 2 slices of bread, lol.

Today, bread shaming doesn’t cut it …but I know the feeling as my sandwiches were made of whole wheat. Back then, I guess that was better than the occasional super healthy alfalfa-stuffed and sprouting kind where apparently the parents were on a healthy agenda (and didn’t get the memo).

And once in a while we had Taco Tuesday lunches where they offered hard tacos. Some preferred soft tacos. It was kinda like white vs. other breads.

These days we’re open to anti-inflammatory variety, and being more planet and health-conscious. And that’s reflected in our visible fast-food options.

Besides just breakfast, lunch, and dinner, sugary dessert yogurts have been replaced by fruit smoothie energy-vit-enriched powders, as nice in-between options.

Growing up in the DC suburbs, we didn’t have healthy build-it-meal places like Cava, SweetGreen, or Chipotle, or fast food places that offer plant-based meals.

No fast food place offered salads or greens, or at least fresh ones you wanted to try. And that’s coming from an area considered a cultural mecca (and foodie hub). Many field trips were to the DC national museums where we only had time to eat what we brought.

And health-conscious calories and nutritional meal information weren’t anywhere to be found (heck, we didn’t have internet). We’ve made leaps and bounds to become a more health-conscious society.

Living past 90 and 100 is a higher probability than it once was. And from all the living longer information available to us, we know life expectancy and maintaining ideal body weight is mostly determined by personal lifestyle choices.

So thankfully our society and the food community are rallying to help this cause. Aligned to this, the Chipotle menu offers a line called Lifestyle Bowls for healthier eating habits (that end up as regular eating behaviors).

Our bodies are resilient, and we know we know we have some control and can restore our imbalances through the mind-body (or body-mind connection). We also know our thoughts turn to feelings and our feelings to thoughts that can help us most if we’re aware.

These concepts I’ve grown intimate with because I’ve learned they are keys to helping unlock happiness… why live a day here dissatisfied if you don’t have to? And what you store inside impacts your health, in the one body you’re given.

And today and every day is a new day that can be a fresh start in a healthy new year or new season. It can be a good time to welcome changes. Food is a great place to start. And I think we can learn a tip or two from the Chipotle menu whether we eat out or cook in…

At Chipotle, like most fast-food chains, you get consistency and know what to expect. Here are some Chipotle menu healthy ingredient inspirations (from building a lunch meal bottom-up):

You could start with a tortilla or with a bowl of rice, where you get to choose white or brown (kinda like the white or whole wheat bread kinds we’ve known since we were kids)… And in adult wisdom and healthy gratitude, we know choosing brown rice goes much further in the healthy zone! 🦷

Chipotle also offers beans (that are often found in Mexican dishes). They offer two types (black or pinto) for simplicity, but did you know there are over 16,000 types of beans (and 40,000 varieties if you Google it)? In a Western diet, you and I have probably only encountered or eaten closer to 16 kinds. 😊

And just looking around, our American diet isn’t a bean-focused society like other countries. Chili is the glorified bean meal we tie to social occasions and sporting events. But, on the Chipotle menu, you also get the choice to add beans as a rice topping, plus another protein choice that’s considered the actual meat or star protein.

The added beans on the Chipotle menu are subtle but may be your only bean source for the week or month if you don’t get them anywhere else. Just sayin’.

And if keep going down the build-it meal line, you can add guacamole that has tasty value. You don’t necessarily think of the Hass avocado source that’s the add-on’s main health benefit. From there, you can build in green lettuce, a corn mix, and other daily made healthy toppings with herbs like cumin, oregano, and thyme. And all kinds of mild to hot peppers.

That’s as close as it gets to healthy fast-food eating out. I compare that way to my restaurant event planning days where I was around exotically delicious food all day (Spanish, Lebanese, Italian, and North African cuisine), but not all of it was healthy. It was a mixed bag mostly from the fried methods or rich sauces.

In the Chipotle recipes, they make a point to use health-conscious sauces. Soffrito is a Spanish sauce and Chipotle has sofritas as a plant-based protein option.

And now they have a second-plant based protein: chorizo (plant-based inspired sausage). Seeing a trend emerging?

In my area, you don’t have to go far to go to places like Cava, where you’re getting fast-food metro- suburban Middle Eastern chickpea falafel. You can also go from bean to chickpea legumes on fluffy basmati rice that you can learn to make at home in a double boiler method.

Or choose Sweet Greens, a salad, and green-grain bowl place that loves heirloom veggies (like in their Harvest Bowl). Ordering can feel like you’re picking from a California leafy green and veggie garden (and even close to the ground with their Shroomami or Curry Cauliflower bowls).

Then when you’re ready for something sweet, you can find smoothie places with tropical fruits and powder infusions. In city-metro areas, there are many to choose from, and you can add your chia, flax, and sunflower seeds. These are all mainstream now, but once upon a time they were exceptions.

Maybe reflecting on your food journeys and looking around your neighborhood food options, you’re a bit more inspired to eat a little more healthy Chipotle menu-inspired.

That could be a healthy step forward in your home tortilla meal and bowls.

You can get inspired by the healthy Chipotle menu when you're at home with your own bean, veggie, and plant-based ingredients. — You can eat more beans, tortilla, and plant-based goodness that good for you and the planet.

Easy Lime Treated Tortilla (Inspired by Longevity Zones)

Course: Breakfast, lunch

Cuisine: American, Mexican

Materials

fresh lime
package of soft yellow tortilla (healthier than white tortilla since yellow has beta carotene)

Instructions

Squeeze fresh lime generously all over tortilla. Let soak into tortilla and flip to the other side and do the same. Enjoy soft or bake hard.
For hard tortilla bowls, bake inside a heatable bowl. For taco shell shapes, use a upside down muffin tin, fold tortilla and lay "V" shape tortilla side by side in between muffin tin shapes to create the shape desired.
Bake flat or in taco shape at 250°F until toasted for about one hour.

How To Make Homemade Pizza For Lunch, Dinner (or Breakfast!)

Homemade pizza making is easy and fun, and can be a healthy meal (breakfast leftover, lunch, or dinner).

Making homemade pizza is easy and fun, and can be a healthy meal.

…For a yummy, tasty choice, what more can you ask for? You can make a healthy wheat, thin crust, thick crust, or airy crust like these…

homemade pizza with mushrooms. — Airy crust baked in an apartment oven reminiscent of restaurant wood-fired oven.

Plus, you can make your pizza from start to finish, faster than you can order a pizza and have it delivered.

And, who doesn’t love pizza?

It puts a smile on most faces.

And we all can use more happy LIVING in our practical lives 😊… so in that spirit, I’m gonna lean on my fun side today.

Fast, fresh, healthy, save money, fun to make… are you in?

If you are, then keep reading, and I’ll walk you through homemade pizza-making with healthy ingredients. 👇

First, you don’t need a kit. To make homemade pizza, you just need two simple ingredients you already have in your house (or can easily get) to make the dough. And 4 ingredients if you want a bigger crust rise and a little salt.

Homemade pizza needs no long prep time like pulling out ingredients in advance, like in other baking recipes. It also has an advantage over bread making: you don’t need to wait for hours for the dough to proof.

Making homemade pizza dough needs only a few minutes. You can simply prepare, bake, and enjoy in less than an hour.

If you’re not a planner this can be a winner. But then again, you’d probably buy store-bought or order delivery. …but then that would be no fun, and you wouldn’t get the healthy, homemade pizza. 🎉

So I’ll assume you’ll give it a try at least at some point.

Here’s how to make homemade pizza…

Before you do anything, there is one area to plan. You should consider what you’ll add on top of your pizza crust.

If you load with gobs of cheese, then you’ve added fat and dairy (…that isn’t always a bad thing as cheese has vitamins, calcium, other minerals, and satisfies cheesy craving…).

But this recipe is healthier so we’ll go with fresh or buffalo mozzarella cheese, like on a Margherita pizza. It’s one of the healthier (less greasy) cheeses.

Now you’re ready to start and pull out all your homemade pizza ingredients.

Instant yeast. I buy the small Red Star packets. The yeast balls look like microscope-tiny, perfectly round khaki brown color beads.

Water. 1 cup warm or room temperature tap water is fine. You may want to experiment as you know what they say about the famously delicious New York pizza crust (the rumor is that it comes from the water).

I’ve used seltzer and filtered water for pizza crust, and I find tap is still the best all-around.

Flour. You have options.

How to choose which flour to use:

If you use a mix of regular all-purpose flour with whole wheat flour, then your dough will be less sticky. And if you use semolina flour for your bench flour, then that will help your dough from sticking to the metal pizza pan you use. Another reason to choose whole wheat flour is the slightly higher, healthy fiber content. There are also gluten-free options.

In total, use about 2-1/2 flour total, but you will need more when you’re working with the dough. You get better with practice and experience. You may be able to later eyeball how much you need.

…Can you tell, I’m not into measuring (more fun) unless it will be a disaster otherwise. In the beginning, measuring is always advised.

Salt. 2 teaspoon table salt. You can use a little more salt if you use sea salt or if you plan to use fresh mozzarella (or buffalo mozzarella) that doesn’t have as much salt as some other cheeses.

Optional: 1 tablespoon EVOO (helps with adding taste and less sticky dough)

Here are the 5 easy steps (broken down in detail):

Step 1: Make the pizza dough.

homemade wood-fired pizza with mushrooms recipe.

Homemade Pizza Made Fun and Easy (But Looks Like a Pro!)

Course lunch, Main Course

Cuisine American, Italian

Ingredients

Flour of choice (bread flour, 00, and/or whole wheat, etc.)
instant yeast
salt
water
Optional: cheese, mushrooms, and toppings of choice.

Add the yeast to water and let it settle/dissolve for about 5-10 minutes. The mixture will have a milky color and consistency. Set aside.

Separately, add the flour or mixed flours of choice to your mixing bowl (I like half and half whole wheat and regular or all-purpose flour). Add 1 teaspoon salt or you can use 1-½ teaspoon sea salt (if you want to use non-iodized salt as I use). Then add EVOO if you’re using, and the water-yeast mixture.

Dough by hand method: You can make the dough by hand, and if you do it that way, I’d recommend creating a neat flour mountain on a shallow baking pan where the flour won’t stick to everything (like glitter) and cleanup is fast. Can you tell I was a Martha Stewart student? 😉

…Or if you prefer, just be yourself (always the best option!) and have fun with making a mess with flour all over your kitchen counter. You’ll get there all the same.

Then add a dip in the middle of the mountain where you would add the liquids, like you may have seen or done at home making pasta the old-fashioned way (except there are no eggs needed in pizza making).

Dough with machine (recommended): It’s easier to use a mixing machine with the dough hook, like the Kitchen Aid mixer (I have a pink Cadillac color one… Paris Hilton and I have something in common, lol).

With a machine, in a few quick minutes, the dough should be ready. You’ll know when it’s done when it’s not too dry, and not too wet, and has some good elasticity. Pizza dough is forgiving and is only part of the pizza pizzazz (say that 10 times).

Remember to scrape down the flour from the sides of the mixer. As you’re waiting for the dough to finish mixing, generously flour your pan. I recommend a mix of coarser semolina flour and regular all-purpose flour for the bench flour.

When it’s ready, pull the dough out of the bowl. You’ll be able to form a small ball with the dough, and you may need to add more regular flour on the outside if it’s too sticky. Form a dough ball and let it rest on the pan you’ve floured. Leave it sitting or resting at room temperature for 10 minutes.

Note, you don’t even need a plastic wrap or another container you’d have to clean like in bread making!

Step 2: Prep the toppings and the sauce.

While the dough is still resting, I get the topping ingredients ready.

I open the tomato sauce can (many restaurants use San Marzano tomatoes that I recommend), and I add finely chop anchovies with a serrated knife to the sauce as my secret ingredient (that’s not a secret anymore). It adds salt and another flavor dimension (or you can just add a teaspoon of salt to the sauce if you prefer a saltier-tasting pizza). Tomato sauce is usually too sweet, or at least I think so. I like my sweets, sweet, and my salt, salty. Not going to ask you to repeat that. 😊

If you are using fresh cheeses like buffalo mozzarella, slice the cheese into smaller bits. And if you use basil leaves, wet them a little like with a wet paper towel as they will settle a little better on the pizza. Alternatively, you can use spinach leaves like I use as healthy-alternative inspiration.

For any other wet ingredients like black olives, drain any excess liquid and dry them with a paper towel if you need to (as that would be a damper to your pizza… sorry, I couldn’t resist. Today is a fun day.).

By the time you finish this step, your pizza dough should be ready to work with.

A quick back story: I used to be a pizza maker (or pie maker as they referred to) as a teen, and for the busiest Domino’s Pizza not in the country, but in the world (yes the world! that is becoming smaller every day). So, I make the dough the way I learned from the modern pros! We used to crank out 300 or so pizzas in an hour as a team during the busy football nights, and during the 30-minute guarantee years (you probably don’t remember!). Our heads were down but it was fun energy in the shop! homemade pizza [OK back to the business of making your homemade pizza]…

Continue reading “How To Make Homemade Pizza For Lunch, Dinner (or Breakfast!)”

Summer Mediterranean Recipes + Faves from Foodie Restaurants

Off and on with my 20-year hospitality career, I worked behind-the-scenes in catering planning and event execution for Spanish, Italian, and Lebanese restaurants and fine hotels in the Washington, DC area — a top foodie hub. During that time, I picked up many great summer Mediterranean recipes and experimented with my own.

Some of my fondest memories were the large corporate and bridal events where I could get creative with the festive food and elaborate decorations.

From those experiences, I learned to create balanced menus for preferred and customized tastes around the specific seasons and events.

I’ve taste-tested delicious foods, recipes, and dishes from the chefs I worked with who came from around the world.

Some of my favorite summer Mediterranean recipes(great for warm seasons!) that I’ve added my take and twists to, are below:

Continue reading “Summer Mediterranean Recipes + Faves from Foodie Restaurants”

Ideas for Healthier Lunches, Picnics, and School

Ideas for healthier lunches is always on the agenda year-round.

Ideas for healthier school lunches make kids and adults happy with a balanced plate of veggies, fruit, protein, dairy, and carbs.

The time we take for lunch is often hurried and goes by in a blink of an eye. There are ideas for healthier lunches that you may have forgotten to try in your busyness.

We learn to speed through lunch when we’re old enough to learn. Lunches can be an afterthought when we’re hungry, running in between activities.

I would encourage the idea that lunch is the most important meal of the day (one I don’t recommend skipping or skimping on) when you need the extra energy to carry out your day!

If you like and can eat carbs or pasta, this is a meal where you can get the most efficiency out of your carbs.

You need and burn the energy in a working or working out afternoon. If you focus on carbs for your dinner meal, as you age, this can slow you down.

That’s why I like the idea of the plant-based dinner. But that doesn’t always fill you up during the day when you need the energy boost to keep you going like carbs can.

Growing up you have a memory about your overall childhood lunches.

My public-school lunches were both memorable… and not.

They were a special time that I could sit and spend time with my friends, and that probably helped me appreciate just sitting around with others socializing and chatting.

The cafeteria food I ate though was a different story… I wish we had ideas for healthier lunches. Continue reading “Ideas for Healthier Lunches, Picnics, and School”