Go Green Cake Bake

Hi Folks,

I posted my intention to bake a cake on Facebook last night and Mary Valk asked for the recipe if it turned out well. I won't taste it until tonight, but it smells great so I'm sharing the making if the cake, now. This is not the healthiest cake in the world, but I'm going for a natural cake without chemicals. I did make and exception with the cherries. 

Bottom Layer for Cake

Heat oven to 350 Degrees. Put about 1/2 stick of organic butter in a 9 X 13 inch pan and melt it in oven. Take pan out cover the bottom with as much raw turbinado sugar as you want (or use organic brown sugar). Slice fresh pineapple and place in pan. Put Maraschino cherries in pineapple holes. Fill in other spaces with chopped pecans.

Set aside and get out three bowls

All ingredients should be at room temperature.

Bowl one - Fill with 3 ¼ cups whole wheat pastry flour ( I used King Arthur white whole wheat)

1 ½ tsp. baking powder (Use non aluminum version - regular baking powder has aluminum which is linked to Alzheimers)

½ tsp. baking soda

Mix all these ingredients and set aside

Bowl two - fill with one cup of plain yogurt  (try Horizon with the fat - be sure to stir the cream in from the top before using - this is the best yogurt I've ever tasted - I only eat milk products on special occasions - most people do not do that well with dairy products) and two teaspoons of real vanilla (notice the imitation is made of chemicals). Set aside.

Bowl three - Two sticks of salted organic butter, 1/2 teaspoon sea salt (I like pink Himalayan sea salt - Celtic sea salt is good too).

1 ½ cups organic sugar (fair trade evaporated cane sugar) http://www.greenamericatoday.org/proGrams/fairtrade/products/sugar.cfm

 

Whip these together until fluffy - or do the best you can. Fluffy might be an overstatement of what's possible here.

 

Add four room temperature organic locally produced free range eggs (help end factory farming for chickens - the chickens suffer unmercifully in these big farms, not to mention how unhealthy the eggs are - chemicals, etc injected in hens).



Add 1/3 flour mixture to sugar mixture, then 1/3 yogurt mixture and continue until all ingredients are mixed. Put mixture on top of the pineapple concoction.




Time to tasty - wow gooood!

 





Put it in the preheated 350 degree oven on top shelf. Smell the wonderful kitchen aroma. Wait about 30 minutes and check the middle to see if it's done. My oven cooks pretty fast but put it back if it's not done. Pardon me on this, I'm sure you have this much sense.



Baking away.







It's a done deal.

 Will turn it over later tonight before I go to my friend's home.



And don't forget to compost the waste.



http://www.howtocompost.org/

Now this is a healthier cake. Healthier for my friends and myself and healthier for the planet. Go green.

WARNING - do not cook in a glass pan. The outside gets done too fast. Use metal pan. I dumped the cake out and found the center to be raw. I didn't find this out until it was cool. It passed the toothpick test so I didn't know there was a problem. I did not want to turn it over again - one time over was a feat. So I then cooked it 40 minutes longer with the pineapple side up. I just kept putting butter (it seems if I add butter or rum to anything it tastes great) on it so it wouldn't dry out and it tasted yummy. I think I used three sticks of butter in this cake so you know it was rich.

Posted by Anne Sermons Gillis

No Post Ends in Environmental Rant

Do not toast my post for no post is near.
But I’m having a good time; I’m in good cheer

And soon I’ll get back to quips and words

But for now I’m content just looking at birds

By the river, by the pond and by the lake

so check back again and make no mistake

I’ll be back to add my voice or just forget this blog it’s all your choice.

Okay maybe a I’ll write a little something.

I really have been looking at the birds. Yesterday we turned the sprinkler on our parched garden and backyard. Within just a short time the birds came in mass. I’ve never seen so many cardinals in one place. They just sit in the trees and water showers them. We have a little bird bath and I saw a big – ish bird bathing there – a thrill for me. Today I see honey bees at the bird bath.

Since last week my husband and I have been in Wimberley, TX in a cabin, on River Road, tent camping on the Guadalupe, gotten in a short visit to Palmetto State Park and a day at Huntsville State Park. Since Jim retired we have had plenty of time to drink in the magic weather and to spend time in nature. Our little dog, Lucy, got a piece of the action and today she road in a canoe for the first time. She did great and we think we have a good boat dog. Well, we haven’t tried her in a motor boat.

Tonight I’m going to another meeting about stopping the toxic injection wells in Conroe, Texas. As the crow flies, that’s pretty close to me and it’s in a urban setting. http://www.stopthetoxicwells.com/ We have been working for years to stop this egregious crime against our water, the air and the people who live in this area. Our governor, Rick Perry, appoints the commissioners to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. They rubber stamp every application for new business unless there is enough outcry to defeat them. Certainly that wasn’t enough for the Baytown citizens who just lost on the new coal mine issue. Yes, we need more mercury in the air, more acid rain. We have the support of all the politicians in this area, thousands of citizens and reports that prove this is a bad move. People and agencies against the wells have spent well over a half million dollars in protest. And people want get democracy in other parts of the world. I’m waiting for it in our country.

What's the Difference Between Being Nice and Just Keeping My Mouth Shut?

False "being nice" means unconscious behavior that keeps us stuck in avoidance of how we feel, how it is for now and what is really going on.

True "being nice" flows - it's a natural behavior that doesn't require much thought. When we feel safe and no longer need other people to feed our need, we are genuinely nice.
Keeping our mouths shut can be the conscious decision to see things another way - to define the situation so we decide to forgive the other for their unconscious behavior or perhaps we put our inner reality on the shelf at the time and then take time when we are alone to see what bothers us about the situation and how the situation might serve us.

Keeping our mouths shut can also be avoidance. If we keep out mouths shut and work through our issues about the circumstance, we are freed, but if we keep our mouths shut and never deal with the issue, we add to the numbness of our souls.

If keeping our mouths shut helps us not to blame others or take their inventory, it's a good thing.

If keeping our mouths shut means not to yell and scream at someone, it’s a good thing.

It is our responsibility in our healing process to find a compassionate way to express our feelings. Giving unsolicited feedback to others is usually not a good idea. Most people complain so they can work through their feelings. The solutions they seek are on a feeling basis not an action basis. All these ideas are slippery because each action and behavior has a light and shadow side. It takes consciousness, compassion and awareness to determine which action to take.

I think the topic could be a book something like: "What I Thought and Didn't say Keeps me in Perpetual Trouble."

Life is Not Serious

I have a slogan, "I'm sincere, but not serious." It's easy for me to write little sing-song poetry. It's trite, yet I like the whimsical nature of the rhythm and rhyme.

So here's one of my little ditties.


I am okay but I forget


That I am whole and hold regret

For things I’ve said and all I’ve done.

Why can’t I let the past alone?

I am not bad or wrong or crass

I am a wonder not my past!



I’m not an outcast, I want to see

that all the world belongs to me

and yes in turn I want to know

that I belong to it also.

I’m sane and smart and I am one

with everything under the radiant sun.



I am one with sky so blue

With friends, strangers and family too.

I’m not alone, I hold your hand

And together we’re more, we take a stand

To love, protect and cherish life

To end our struggle, toil and strife.



I take my freedom, it’s my choice

Not to listen to that imprisoned voice

I can not do my life alone

I have to live in a welcome home

of care, good-will where life abounds

where no one’s lost where all are found.

Empowering Messages

http://empoweringmessages.com/visitors/AnneGillis.shtml

This comment on ease was made a few years ago;  letting go of suffering has no time limit.

Anne Sermons Gillis
annegillis.com

I'm in Mood for Food

Seoul Food

My friend called today from Florida. She's at a health institute. Much of the focus there is on food. The plan suggested for her is virtually impossible for her to manage at home unless she was wealthy or had hands that worked. She has rheumatoid arthritis. Her hands - not so good. She calls them claws. There are not going to be able to grow sprouts and to juice. But maybe those hands will fool her. She wants off the toxic meds. She believes her healing path is through food. I know food is seminal in healing, but when you can't get the recommended food for healing - what does that do for your heart, your hope, your dreams?

My husband and I fast on Tuesdays. My friend the chiropractor says it’s not a fast. The new definition of fasting is “to reframe from certain foods.” But he is old-fashioned so according to the old version of fasting, I guess we’ve doing a cleanse. I'm hungry. I'm not grumpy or agitated but I'm dreaming of eating a whole wheat homemade cracker that I made yesterday. This tasty little cracker has seeds in it along with olive oil and salt.. Tomorrow I'll be back on my regular food plan and in the morning I will barely think about food. I'll down a ground flax seed, apple juice, cranberry juice and spirulina concoction and be off on a one hour bike ride. I'll return home and eat or maybe I'll wait until after I walk the dog. Food is not such a big deal the day after “cleansing” because it is no longer the forbidden fruit.
I grew up in a food obsessive family. When someone in my family talks about a party, a vacation or a wedding you’re going to hear about the food. I did a picture book of my trip to Korea and Thailand and it is full of food – street food, eating on the floor food, seafood, food before it’s cooked, food in paradise, bakery food – it’s nuts this food thing I have.

Our favorite restaurant closed recently and my husband and I are bereft. We heard the rumors of closure but we had to see for ourselves. We rode our bikes down to Teasars and peered into the darkened rooms. Until recently this was a chandelier-filled den of pleasure. Now nothing is left except the ghosts of delicacies. We have to find a new place to spend our anniversary. It’s like we lost a family member.
I believe in food magic. The right food can cure anything, it can ease pain – we’re talking chocolate here, food can make you hyper, lift your spirits or soothe you. Food can win friends, make life more social.

I have a position on food. It’s not good, it’s not bad. Life is my oyster and I’ll have a little butter on them, if you don’t mind. And pass the hummus please.
Anne Sermons Gillis annegillis.com

You Can Smell the Peace

 This morning I went to the Unitarian church to hear my friend, Tony George, play drums. He did an outstanding job. Our friend Paul Klein led the pact and a handful of musical masters shared soul and rhythm with the congregation.

I returned and found my tail-wagging wildly enthusiastic dog, Lucy, waiting. As I often do, I went for the floor and we rolled around together. We had a grand time and in between our antics she managed a sniff or two. I watched her smelling me. It was so intimate. She’s sniffs me all the time, but until today, I really didn’t take part. Today, I offered no resistance and became a co-conspirator in this animal act of recognition. “Oh I know you, this is your smell.” In the past, I’ve smelled her too, but not to recognize her, just to manage her health. Does she smell, does she need a bath, do the inside of her ears smell funny? She’s the only living animal I smell.

With a few exceptions – I smell people’s breath, their B.O. and their gas, and that’s not pleasant. I don’t intentionally smell others, no sniffing and drinking it in. No smell and tell. Their odors just happen to be in line with my olfactory receptors. These human odors don’t have much character. I can’t ever remember thinking, “You have such lovely breath.”These are not terms of endearment. I can’t imagine living 300 years ago. Smelling was not an elective. Every day was a smellathon. If you were near anyone, you knew it. Now we’re sanitized, scrubbed clean and antibacterialized.

I read somewhere that if you lick your arm, and wait 3 seconds and then smell it; you can smell your breath. It does work. I think that’s why I brush my teeth three times a day. And in full disclosure, I admit I do smell under my arms frequently because I don’t use deodorant. This is my maintenance smelling.

This reminds me of a smell joke. Can you believe I actually know a smell joke? Actually I know two. A janitor is in the elevator. He is alone and lets out a big one. It was one of those stinky ones so he sprays some Pine-sol. When the next person get in the elevator he exclaims, “What the heck? It smells like someone shit a Christmas tree.”

I can’t resist. My mom told me this next smell joke. It was so uncharacteristic of her; she was a little on the prim and proper side until she got Alzheimer’s. Then all that propriety sort of leaked out. “The blind man passed a fish market. ‘Good evening ladies.’” I think that was the family dirty joke.

Now, back on track. I wish people were not so standoffish – you know that 18 inch rule - too close and we’re in someone’s space. I wish people could get close enough to recognize each other’s fragrance, that one identifying odor unique to him or her. I remember that deep time of intimacy with a new lover when I wanted to drink him in. I would smell his clothes – his chest - I just wanted to be closer. I wanted my breath to bring him into me.

I wonder if we knew each other intimately - I knew your smell and you knew mine, could we call ourselves enemies? Could we forget that primal musky call to life? Could we go to war and kill each other? If I was intoxicated by your essence, what would I do? What would you do? What would we do? If were that close, would we go to war?