“Massaged” red chard wrap
Ingredients:
6 red chard leaves (can sub with any other chard or kale)
1 cucumber
3 carrots
1 bell pepper (preferably red, yellow or orange)
1/4 red onion
1/2 cup cilantro
1 cup hummus
1 lemon
1 teaspoon salt (preferably ground “Himalayan salt” from WF (it has 84 minerals our body needs), if not, a back up choice would be ground “sea salt” (albeit it’s full of all sorts of crap from the ocean), but whatever you do, ditch the “table salt”)
TIP: You can mix this recipe up however you like even adding chix (if you must, try organic) and rice and beans or any other types of veggies you like. Also, when picking your veggies, whenever possible, consider buying organic so you avoid all those pesticides our body doesn’t know how to process. If you live close to heart of Chicago, check out “Stanley’s Fruit Market” on North Ave. (and Elston) right off the Kennedy (at least 1/3 of the store is organic fruits and veggies for 1/4 the price of Whole Foods!!!!) Oh yeah, big difference in the pocketbook and worth a little extra drive). Thereafter, a few blocks further down
North Ave.Stanley
North Ave.
Preparation:
Step 1 (inspiration): If you’re like me, you love music. So, why not turn on your favorite radio station, cd or ipod and crank up your favorite tunes WHILE preparing your meal. It puts you in a good mood and your good energy is transferred into the food you are about to eat!!! You’ll enjoy the food that much more when you’re done, believe me! And if you’re daring, “shake your groove thing” while prepping the food…. it’s extra movement, it’s fun AND it’s extra minutes you can report for the team!
Step 2 (“massaging” your chard or kale): Take the leaves you are going to use and cut off the stems. Then rinse them all (you can place in a salad spinner for a good rinse) and then shake them dry and lay out next to each other.
Now, sprinkle some Himalayan salt (it does not take a lot, so don’t over-salt) over all the leaves.
Take your fingers and gently massage the salt into the leaf. You’ll know if your applying too much pressure if you start tearing up the leaves.
Then flip the leaves over and sprinkle the back side and massage the back side as well. You can then flip back to the front and give it one more rub if you like (but don’t add any more salt).
Place back in spinner and rinse again. Then omit any water from the spinner, shake the leaves to remove excess water and then leave in spinner to dry out while preparing the rest of your ingredients.
Step 3 (prepping the filling): Take a cucumber, cut it in half and then slice long pieces (lengthwise) and set aside (tip, if you leave the skin on the cucumber, you will keep the majority of it’s vitamins).
Take your carrots and peel off the dirty skin with a potato peeler and toss away. Then, continue to peel the carrots till you have a bunch of nice super thin slices to place in your wrap (of course, you can’t peel the entire carrot this way, so go ahead and munch on the remainder of the carrots as a snack while you’re preparing the rest of your veggies).
Take your bell pepper, remove the stem and then slice it in long pieces.
Take your red onion, remove the skin and stems and then dice it up into small pieces.
Take a bunch of cilantro and finely chop up (you can leave the stems if you like, but know they are a little crunchy).
Step 4 (filing the leaves, wrapping and cutting them): Take your leaves out of the spinner now. I bet you will be surprised to see how much they have relaxed after their nice massage and water baths. They won’t be flimsy but they won’t be super tough either (nor bitter for that matter, YEAH!!!)
Take one leaf at a time and place it on a plate. It’s easier to wrap and cut this way since you won’t have to transport it to the plate if you prep elsewhere and then risk it all falling apart.
Place all the following ingredients lengthwise on your leaf: Take your hummus and spread generously (about a tbl. per leaf) over the top of your leaf. Now lay down your cucumber, carrots and bell pepper slices in the middle of the leaf. Then add your onions and cilantro and squeeze some fresh lemon juice on top (you may want to juice separately to remove the seeds). If you are choosing to add any of your own ingredients or substitute any of the ones I listed, you can add them to the wrap now. Just make sure you don’t over stuff so the leaf can wrap around all your goodies.
Now, simply cut it up into bite size pieces and enjoy! Don’t forget to smile and say “hmmmm” while eating!!!! BTW, you can wrap your plate up with plastic wrap and leave the leftovers for another day (will stay about 1-2 days if sealed well).
A few great alternatives and/or additives for this recipe also include (possibilities are endless):
1) Add avocado (yummy, great natural fat, good source of protein, and, guess what it's a "SUPER FOOD" just like Chard is, so you get a double pay out if you add this nice fruit to your wrap).
2) Substitute "miso" for your hummus (Whole Foods has miso made from soy.... if you're like me and try to not overload on soy (will talk about that topic in a separate post), then you can find miso made from "chix peas" (you'd probably have to find that online..... let me see if I can grab a link). Tada, gotta love google: http://www.southrivermiso.com/store/p/4-Chickpea-Miso.html
3) You can use "Nori" (that's the seaweed paper used to wrap "sushi" or "maki" in) instead of Chard (but a little disclaimer right now: be cautious WHERE any sea vegetables you buy are coming from since Fukushima dumped all that radioactivity into our Pacific Ocean, that body of water is contaminated and so is anything coming from Japan - rule of thumb, if you can't figure out where the sea vegetable came from, then don't purchase it).... but anyway, Nori is sooooo yummy (in fact, I will post a separate recipe for "Nori rolls w/nut pate". Speaking of.....
4) You can also sub out the hummus or the miso for a homemade "nut pate" (I will post a separate entry on how to make it at home (so easy and so yummy and soooooooooo good for you and full of protein and calcium, yeah!!!). You can also Google or go on YouTube for recipes on nut pates, they are plentiful!
NOTE: If you come up with some other great variations, please feel free to post them here for all of us to see and experiment with as well!
SCROLL DOWN FOR STEP-BY-STEP PICTURES!
My instructions were detailed, but it is a very simple thing to prepare. Just look at the pics and see!
Bon appetite!!!
PS Here's a link to my online demonstration of how to put the wraps together (use collard greens, chard, kale or nori for your actual wrap): http://www.youtube.com/user/ashtoncat70?blend=2&ob=5#p/a/u/1/kiBeipFKeMY
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