Miso Soup for the Soul

I've been sick for the past week, which has manifested in strange ways: my bad back, a splitting headache that lasted for days, runny nose (and other gross expulsions), light-headedness. You know, cold stuff. I've been spending a lot of time at home in bed, actively fighting my innate urge to push through my illness. Every winter, especially since moving to Pittsburgh, I've gotten sick. Each year, I push through my illness and ride my bike in the cold rain or snow, run the Schenley trails, and try to convince my body to stop being so wimpy. Now that I'm self-employed, I have the luxury of creating my own schedule (except for my multiple looming deadlines). I'm trying to use that to my advantage to give my body the time and space needed to relax. It's hard, but luckily since I work from home I can multitask and rest in bed with Cupcake Wars while still doing some light editing.

But, a girl's still gotta eat. I was thinking a lot today about bone broth, because I'm considering having guest bloggers contribute a post once a week, at least for a month, to offer a different perspective or set of knowledge than what's usually presented here. Paleo diets are fairly meat-centric, even though our human predecessors ate much less meat, and I was considering what sort of content I would want a potential paleo contributor to offer. That's yet to be disclosed, kind readers, but in the meantime it also got me thinking about chicken soup, since I'm sick, which was tied in with the bone broth for obvious reasons. But I don't eat chicken! What's a gal to do?

Luckily, I happen to be married to an industrial individual who does not have a head cold. In a matter of minutes, we had miso soup with dried seaweed, spiraled carrots, and sweet potato starch noodles, topped with Sriracha — aka rooster sauce, or "cock sauce" if you are 20 years old — to bring the heat that will hopefully help sweat out this evil being living in my sinuses. Here's some proof:

This soup hit the spot for a cool Pittsburgh evening when I needed something nourishing and satisfying. In case you are wondering about bone broth, however, I did find this nice recipe, which uses burdock root (the bone of vegetables) instead of animal bones. So if a paleo blogger does grace us with some insight and posts a bone broth meal plan or consideration, here's a helpful alternative. 

Roasted Squash Soup with garlic and green chile

It's been a while since I wrote about food or the quest for health, mainly because this whole month I've been inundated with posters as my boss has been working on a movie set, and I've also been writing a poem a day (which is, surprise, increasingly difficult). But last week I picked up a squash at the grocery store, a few days ago it made its way into the oven (with my help) along with a head of garlic and a bit of olive oil, and and finally tonight it turned into soup.

This soup, though, gosh. It's just so good. Something amazing happens when a butternut squash is roasted, it's like a savory candy, and.....well, here. I'll just post the "recipe" as I just whipped it up and didn't measure anything.

Ingredients:

1 large butternut squash
1 head garlic
~1/2 Tbsp. olive oil

1 C. vegetarian soup stock
1/2 C. Bueno brand Autumn Roast green chile, "hot" (or to taste)

~1 1/2 tsp. sea salt
~1 tsp. paprika
~1 tsp. cumin
~1/2 tsp. cinnamon

Preheat oven to 375F. Cut squash length-wise and remove seeds. Place both sides flesh down on baking sheet. Peel excess layer of paper from garlic head and place on baking sheet. Spray squash and garlic with enough oil to lightly cover. If you don't have a sprayer, you should get one but in the meantime, just drizzle the oil and massage it into the veggies. Roast for about 40 minutes, checking periodically. Skin on the squash should just start to ripple, and you should be able to pierce it easily with a fork. Remove from oven and allow to cool enough to handle (or, if you're me, leave on the counter for a couple days, put in the refrigerator, and eventually get cracking on this next step). Scoop flesh from squash and peel garlic cloves and put both in blender or food processor. Add stock and green chile and blend, adding more stock as necessary for desired thickness, and more chile for more heat.

Transfer blend to large pot and put on low heat. Add spices to taste and bring to simmer, stirring frequently, for about 15-20 minutes.

This recipe is low fat, fairly low calorie, low sodium, gluten free, and vegan. It's also rich in vitamins and minerals, including Vitamins A and C, and complex B vitamins. This time of year, our immune systems are being pushed to their limits as we try to enjoy the last long rays of sunlight and warm, dry days, but there's a lot of impurities and germs being spread around, and it's easy to get sick. It's also a time when a lot of folks, myself included, are busy and don't put nutrition first, and that's a quick way to break down and allow for sickness to set in. Good food builds a solid foundation going into the cold winter months. This recipe should keep well, either frozen in small batches to take to work, or for a good 4-5 days in the refrigerator. (This is a guess. Please use good judgment and don't get sick. I'm not a food scientist and my ability to eat "iffy" foods is unparalleled).