Recipes Mania News March 2006

Welcome all new readers that are receiving their first issue of Recipes Mania News. We don’t claim to be the smartest ezine on the net, our specialty is cooking rather than magazine editing, but it does serve as a focal point to keep us together as a group. If you have any requests for inclusion in future ezines you can email me at recipesmania(at)hotmail.com (Replace (at) with @ - this is done to avoid this ezine being classed as internet spam.)

Here in the Southern Hemisphere we’re coming to the end of a long hot summer (The hottest ever in Sydney since records first started back in the 1800s) that is a sure fire warning that global warming is a reality. Our peak temperature on New Years Day was about 117F (46C) and the damage that it did to my garden was phenomenal. Plants that have withstood our harsh climate for more than 40 years burned and shriveled and we all had to spend time cutting burnt leaves from plants to give the remainder of the plant a chance at recovering. This set my mind to work about the effects of global warming on future food supply chains when you take the following into account:

1. We often have temperatures up to 110F (42C) and it has little effect on the plants in our gardens, even if the high temperatures persist for a week or more. The day I’m talking about was only 7F (4C) hotter and in the period of a few hours it destroyed so many plants, including vast patches of grass, around 70% of our lawns.

2. Now imagine what will happen to a field of crops if it is exposed to long periods of this level of heat.

3. How many of our meat producing animals rely upon good grass growth to feed and fatten. Take away the grass and farmers are faced with feeding problems.

4. As crops die off fields are liable to soil degradation that affects the next crop.

5. To counteract this problem more chemicals will have to be added to rejuvenate the soil, more genetically modified crops will have to be grown to counteract the affects of heat.

6. Extra chemicals will pollute water sources.

You can already see a never-ending cycle of problems forming a queue while we, as a race, argue about our rights to burn fossil fuels and continue to contaminate our environment. It is now starting to become obvious, even to a non-greenie like me, that a major catastrophe could be the result.

Just as a footnote to that article I was reading some facts about world population and discovered that there are now more than twice the number of human beings on this planet than on the day I was born. As populations grow more agricultural land is being used to build homes, leaving us with less growing land to feed more people. If, in a few years time, global warming creates a 20% reduction in output from the reduced farming areas and population growth is out of control, how are we going to cope? - Now ask yourself whether we can overcome a major setback in our food production and supply chain?

It isn’t very pleasant reading but there is no point in ignoring the frequent indications from nature that our planet is having a major problem in sustaining growth at the rate that is being demanded.

The March recipe of the month is another in our quick recipes portfolio. To qualify as a Recipes Mania quick recipe it must be healthy, nutritious and able to be prepared and cooked in less than 30-minutes. These recipes are proving very popular with our readers and are an indication of the very fast pace of life in this era.

We publish these quick recipes as a viable alternative to fast food. The difference being that these recipes are healthy and non-fattening in the right serving sizes, fast food usually does not meet this criteria.

Recipe of the Month

Almond Mussels:

This almond mussels recipe takes around 10 minutes to prepare and a further 10 minutes to cook.

Ingredients:

4oz (100 grams) unsalted butter.

6lb (2.7 kilo’s) Mussels cleaned and de-bearded. (Not: If any of the mussels are open at this stage discard all opened mussels.)

2 large garlic cloves (3 smaller will do – it depends on your taste.)

3 fluid ounces (75ml) dry white wine. - Don’t make the common mistake of using cheap wine; the rule is never cook in a wine that you’re not prepared to drink at the table.

½ lemon, juiced.

2oz (50 grams) lightly toasted almonds, chopped finely. (You toast almonds in a non-oiled pan over low heat, tossing a few times until the first sign of browning.)

4 Tablespoons of Italian (flat leaf) Parsley.

Method:

Melt the butter in a very large saucepan. Add garlic and cook gently for about 4 minutes.

Tip the mussels into the saucepan, adding wine, lemon juice and almonds. Cover and cook over high heat, giving the pan a shake every minute or so, until all the mussels have opened. - It is the steaming that will open the mussels so be sure the lid is on to retain steam. (About 4 minutes)

Add half the parsley and stir well.

Scoop the mussels into 4 pre-warmed dishes. Throw away any mussels that do not open during cooking.

Be very careful here: Divide the juice between the four dishes but DO NOT use the bottom few tablespoons of juice because it will probably be gritty.

Sprinkle the remaining parsley on top of the mussels and serve with warm crusty bread and butter.

This almond mussels dish serves 4 people and can be prepared and cooked in under 20 minutes.

The popularity of my weight loss diary series of articles has taken me by surprise. So many other sites around the world have picked up on them and re-published the articles. This made me think that maybe I should give a link to the first article for my regular readers. The system is good for controlling weight as well as losing it. CLICK HERE to read the first of the articles.

The Power of Positive Thought.

A farmer prepares a large field for planting by adding all the right fertilizers and ploughing the field thoroughly. He then plants one half of the field with wheat and the other with poison ivy.

Each half of the field receives the same rainfall and the same amount of sunshine through the growing period. When it is harvested each side of the field has big crops. The difference is that the wheat will sustain you and help you to grow, the ivy will poison you.

Now imagine that your mind is a large field and that positive thoughts are like wheat and negative thoughts are like poison ivy. The positive thoughts will sustain you and help you to grow as a person until you are where you wish to be in life. Negative thoughts will hold you back and poison your thinking, hence it will poison your personal growth also.

The great thing about our thoughts is that we have the choice to accept them or discard them. If we discard negative thoughts we will grow and achieve. If we decide to discard positive thoughts we will not grow; in fact we will recede.

Moral: The most important question you ask before accepting a thought is: "Is this thought positive?" - We all hold the position in life that our thought process allows us to hold. If we wish to move forward from that position we must first change the way we think.