Many of us are becoming increasingly aware of the role nutrition can play in helping us to live mentally and physically healthy lives. I carried out some research on nutrients that have been linked to mental health and recently adapted the information I found to create a shopping list of good mood food ingredients, to help people bring healthy ingredients into their every day lives.
I was delighted when a friend of mine on twitter offered to provide regular good mood food recipes based on the shopping list, with a few of her own favourite ingredients added to the mix. This blog post provides the first in a series of good mood food recipes provided Julie Gibbons from www.organikal.com. You can find out more about Julie at the bottom of this post…
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Good Mood Food Project – Morning Mood Enhancers – Three Recipes To Help Start Your Day On The Right Foot
We owe much to the fruitful meditation of our sages, but a sane view of life is, after all, elaborated mainly in the kitchen. JOSEPH CONRAD
Getting off to a good start each day is really easy in this season of bounty. Especially if you’re lucky enough to be able to visit a Pick Your Own Fruit Farm.
That’s just what we did last weekend, and so this first of the Good Mood Food Recipes isn’t much more than a suggestion that you visit your local Pick Your Own farm and collect some essential ingredients to kick start your day in a good mood.
What’s in season?
Right now (if your quick!), strawberries and raspberries are aplenty – and bursting with vitamin C and manganese : good for alleviating depression and memory loss.
The great news is that studies show that there is no significant loss of nutrition in these fruits when they are cut and prepared*, so even though they are best eaten fresh on the day you’ve picked them, you can make them last a little longer and you’ll still be receiving the benefits.
Not sure what else you can do with them? Here’s a couple of ideas inspired by some homely recipes provided by Jamie, Hugh and Nigella off the telly:
Good Mood Food Recipe 1: Easy Peasy Strawberry Jam
Can’t be bothered messing around with jam thermometers and such? This is the jam for you!
Ingredients: 1kg organic strawberries & 150g organic unrefined caster sugar
I know what you’re thinking … where’s the rest of the sugar and what about pectin?… That’s the really great thing about this jam – it’s low in sugar and the fruit provides all the pectin you need.
To make this happy jam: Simply mush the strawberries up (with your hands for extra feel good factor) with the sugar in a large pan and leave to marinade for 30 minutes. Bring to the boil for about 25 minutes and decant into a sterilised jar (sterilise the jar in the dishwasher beforehand).
The jam will be runnier than average and won’t keep as long, but you’ll be scooping it onto your toast and adding it to your yoghurt so often, it’ll be gone in no time.
Good Mood Food Recipe 2: Moist Muffins With Lemon And Raspberries
I love to start my day with a cup of herbal tea and a muffin. There’s something more substantial about it than a bowl of muesli, don’t you think?
Ingredients:
- 60g unsalted organic butter, cooled
- 200g plain organic wholewheat flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp bicarb of soda
- 150g unrefined organic caster sugar
- 1/4 tsp salt
- Juice & zest of 1 organic, unwaxed lemon
- 50 – 100 ml of milk (depending on how juicy your lemon is)
- 1 organic free range egg, beaten
- 125g fresh raspberries
Method:
Preheat your oven to 200 degrees C – and prepare your muffin tin with cases.
Mix all of the dry ingredients together and add the lemon zest. In a measuring jug, add the lemon juice to the melted butter and then add enough milk to make it up to 200ml.
Add wet ingredients to dry then fold in the raspberries. Spoon the mix into the cases and bake for 25 minutes.
Perfect with a morning cuppa – and certain to enhance your mood!
(I adapted this recipe from Nigella Lawson’s Muffin recipe in How to Be a Domestic Goddess)
Good Mood Food Recipe 3: Raspberry Melon & Cherry Fruit Smoothie
Smoothies are such a fun way to start the day – and provide a really quick way for you to ingest some vital nutrients for your good health. This recipe uses up the inevitable leftover raspberries that you didn’t manage to eat on the day you picked them. Of course, you can always freeze your leftover pick your own fruit. The frozen fruit is ideal to add straight into the blender and will save the need to add ice at the end.
Adding cantaloupe melon to this recipe is a nutritional bonus : cantaloupes being extremely dense in nutrients, and providing a comparatively high level of valuable nutrients per calorie, including carotenes and potassium**.
Ingredients:
- 250g fresh organic raspberries
- half an orange fleshed melon such as cantaloupe (ripe & juicy)
- handful organic cherries, stoned
- 300ml fresh pressed organic apple juice
- some crushed ice.
Method: Combine all the ingredients into your blender and pulse until smooth. Serve immediately!
*source: http://www.whfoods.com/genpage.php?tname=foodspice&dbid=32
** source: The Complete Book of Juicing by Michael T. Murray
Julie Gibbons escaped the software marketing rat race five years ago to discover an organic lifestyle, build a location independent income, home school her son and spend her holidays house swapping.
She uses her experiences along the way to help other ordinary families achieve the lifestyle they want : to eat organically, live sustainably and be healthy. Her easy access range of practical programmes and tools bridges the gap between the eco warrior and the everyday working mum.
Julie writes at www.organikal.com
Hi Julie / Tina – great idea for a project! Thanks very much for the suggestions.
Thanks Joanna… stay tuned for more yummy recipes.. :-)
[...] decided to put together a new feature for The Mind Sanctuary called The Good Mood Food Project and I was delighted to participate. The aim? To work with a list of ingredients Tina has researched [...]