Betty’s Escarole and Beans

It's been a year since my sweet mother-in-law Betty passed, and as I was thinking about her the other day, I was overcome by a craving for escarole and beans. Having grown up in a very English family where meat, potatoes, and tasteless overcooked vegetables were the norm, I had never even heard of escarole when I married Gary back in 1977.

Radha with Sal and Betty Bello

Even though I had been vegetarian for many years before marrying into the Bello family, my Italian recipes were limited to the following:

1) pasta with tomato sauce.
2) pizza with tomato sauce.

That's not much of a repertoire.

I was pleasantly surprised to be served so many tasty dishes whenever we visited my in-laws. Betty had learned to cook from Gary's grandmother Nanny, and since she and Sal met when she was just thirteen years old, she had plenty of years to absorb Nanny’s Italian menus.

Nanny was an expert in knowing how to feed a family on very little, and loved to share her secrets with Betty. (And Gary too for that matter!) When I joined the family I too learned the ins and outs of cooking these great peasant meals that are simple, tasty and healthy.

Last summer after spending the day gardening in the front yard of our home in Vancouver, I had that same desire for escarole and beans. I hopped on my bike to purchase them at our local organic market. Surprisingly, I couldn't find it anywhere. For the next few days I shopped around disappointed that no one had my escarole! How strange is that?

Anyway, it's the end of April now and we're returning home to Vancouver next week. I'm so glad that I got my fix before traveling across the continent. Once home I'll keep searching for the elusive escarole, and I'm sure that with time and a bit of detective work I'll find it somewhere. Six months is way too long to go without a meal that brings back such pleasant memories of dear Betty.

Escarole and Beans

2 tbls olive oil
2 garlic cloves chopped
1 lb escarole chopped
4 cups veggie broth
1 fifteen (15) ounce can Cannellini Beans
Add to taste: pinch of salt, crushed red pepper flakes, parmesan cheese and a dash of parsley. (These are all great options!)

Directions:

Heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a heavy large pot over medium heat. Add the garlic and saute until fragrant, about 15 seconds. Add the escarole and saute until wilted, about 2 minutes. Add a pinch of salt. Add the veggie broth, beans. Cover and simmer until the beans are heated through, about 5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper, parmesan and parsley to taste.

Ladle the soup into 6 bowls. Drizzle 1 teaspoon extra-virgin olive oil over each. Serve with crusty bread.

Enjoy!

Everything Waits To Be Noticed

Stepping into the unknown...

Since 1971 we have been blessed with earning our right livelihood by sharing our life style with students, clients and seminar participants. Our combination of eastern philosophy, western psychology, and body-centered psychotherapy have been instrumental in allowing us to remain healthy and fulfilled over the past four decades

During that time we have been running an experiment that focuses on remaining available to all the invitations that arrive in the course of a day. A healthy diet, a daily practice of hatha yoga and pranayama (breathing techniques), combined with our meditation program has kept our mind clear and our nervous system strong thus allowing us respond appropriately to the many challenging situations in our life. This approach was in sharp contrast to our previous method, where we would surge forward attempting to control and manipulate events, only to be let back down again when these attempts inevitably failed. That method of reacting to life left us depleted, agitated, and most assuredly not as healthy.

We have discovered that it is essential to not only know the invitations that are useful and need to be accepted, but even more important to know which ones we should just let pass on by. An example of his occurred in 2003, when we began receiving numerous invitations to move to Vancouver, British Colombia. Thankfully we chose to move into the unknown rather than being paralyzed by fear or uncertainty. We both shutter to think what would have happened if we had not listened to this guidance and sold our house in South Florida in the early months of 2006.

We believe that being open to change is an important part of growth and that remaining open to the unknown possibilities before us is an essential part of a divine plan. However, it is our responsibility to keep our radar tuned in to these signals. Over and over again, our experiment has guided us perfectly. In the first chapter of our book we present to the reader this philosophy by sharing how, by allowing the perfect Sunday brunch to find us, we found ourselves treated to an extraordinary experience – “the best Sunday brunch in town.”

At the end of chapter one, as is the case with each of the thirty-one chapters of The Swami And The Married Woman, we give the reader the enlightening moment that was revealed to us during the chapter. In this particular case, it was as simple as knowing that the best way to find something was to allow it to find you. These enlightening moments are a daily occurrence for us, not because we are special, but because we pay attention to everything around us, which allows us to remain open to possibilities from beyond.

We are not, however, always that aware. Missed opportunities are a part of life, but we’ve come to recognize them not as mistakes, but rather as warning signals that let us know we’ve veered too far astray from the course we’re supposed to be on. These days, we can tell when we are trying to force our will on a situation rather than trusting the process. This awareness at least enables us to shift gears and return to our more comfortable receptive mode.

Whenever we’re out of balance (i.e. being influenced by a selfish desire), we miss opportunities and usually wind up in a less satisfying situation. An agitated mind is not only spinning us in circles, but also forces us to make the same mistakes over and over again. Like Bill Murray in the movie Ground Hog Day, we become caught in an endless stream of situations that leave us with no hope of moving forward into a more fulfilling and rewarding life. We are locked in the past, not knowing how to get free.


It does take practice and a heightened awareness to stay alert to the myriad of invitations that life offers us, but the rewards far outweigh the expenditure of energy. Science is finally catching up to this simple idea, demonstrating how stimulating the frontal lobe of the brain (the part concerned with processing new experiences) creates feelings of peace and satisfaction.

So, one may ask, how do I stimulate the frontal lobe of my brain?

Good question.

In order to experience a sense of peace and fulfillment, all we have to do is be open to the unknown. That’s why we continue to believe that:

Enlightening Moment #1

"The best way to find something is to allow it to find you."

Hurry Up Alfredo

I love the challenge of making dinner from whatever I find in the kitchen, and one thing that always helps is staying stocked up on some key ingredients that I know I'll need sometime in the future. And that future was the other night.

I looked in the fridge and found some whole wheat linguine, broccoli, and beet greens on the middle shelf. There were onions and garlic in the veggie bin, and so all I needed was a sauce for those noodles. I immediately thought of Lauren Ulm's Vegan Yum Yum:


A half hour later Gary and Kalyani got back from teaching at Country Club of Florida, and the fragrant smells from the kitchen jolted their senses into high alert. They called out in unison as soon as they walked through the door, "Wow, that smells great! What's cooking?"


Hurry Up Alfredo

1 cup soy or almond milk
1/3 cup rounded raw unsalted cashews
1/4 cup nutritional yeast
3 tbl tamari, low-sodium
2 tbl earth balance margarine
1 tbl tahini
1 tbl fresh lemon juice
2 tsp dijon mustard
1/2 tsp paprika
1 pinch nutmeg
1 pinch salt
black pepper to taste
2-4 garlic cloves (optional)

First grind the nuts in the blender and then add the other ingredients. Pour over the veggies and noodles and warm together before serving.

It tasted fabulous and has been put on our short list of recipe repeats.

Enjoy!

Gary and Kalyani, about to enjoy some Hurry Up Alfredo