It’s day 3 of Get Healthy Co-op Style!  Today UA member and health coach Kim Wilson provides you with some healthy recipe ideas and a sample 1-day meal plan.  We want to make it really easy for you to start making practical changes.

Please follow along, join us, blog, tweet and Facebook about it and be sure to use hashtag  #GetHealthyCoopStyle.

* * *

Optimal Health Begins in Your Kitchen

by Kim Wilson, Health Coach

I have a confession. I think about food all the time! I just love to eat. So what’s a healthy girl to do? I head to the kitchen and cook, of course!

The greatest gift you can give to yourself and to your family in 2013 is to start cooking at home more often. One of the top reasons the United States is the fattest nation in the world is because we eat out constantly. It seems as though no one has time to cook anymore. Well I am here to tell you that cooking at home can not only add years to your life, it can also give you energy, increase your mental sharpness, prevent colds/flu/heart disease/illness and make you feel amazing!

My philosophy is to “cook once and eat twice.” I don’t want you slaving away in the kitchen everyday! Make double the recipe and then enjoy the fruits of your labor the next day as well.  Designating Sundays as a cooking day works really well too. For example, I like to make a big batch of brown rice and then just heat it up with some veggie broth when I need it during the week.

Here is a typical day of meals for me (recipes to follow):

WAKEUP/BREAKFAST:

• Upon waking up I always drink a cup of warm water with lemon. Warm water will clean out your lymphatic system and the lemon will help stimulate the liver to detoxify.

• I love to juice! It’s like liquid love for your cells. I like to to start the day with a green juice. In the winter I add jalapeno to kick it up a notch! (Note: If you are time pressed in the morning, juice the night before and store the juice in tightly sealed mason jars, so you can just grab and go).

• About an hour after my green juice, my go-to breakfast is a big bowl of oatmeal with apples, walnuts, flax, cinnamon & coconut milk. Warm, comforting and filling.

LUNCH:

• Lunch is usually a green smoothie, packed with beneficial fiber from fruits and veggies from my UA co-op style produce share.

• Snacking is a must for me! Warm homemade veggie broth is fun to sip on during a cold winter day. I also like to cut up an apple and sprinkle it with cinnamon.

DINNER:

• Who doesn’t love pizza for dinner? But instead of ordering out, make it yourself! My favorite is an easy green pizza recipe from one of my favorite books, The Engine 2 Diet. It’s packed with nutrients and is super delicious.

You will probably notice that almost every meal I eat contains a green vegetable of some sort. Increasing your green vegetable consumption in the single most important thing you can do for your health. Warning: You might have to upgrade your UA half share to a full share!

Kim’s Recipes

Liquid Love Green Juice

Ingredients:

• 2 medium cucumbers
• 6 celery stalks
• 1 apple
• 3 kale
 stalks
• ½ inch of ginger
• Half of a jalapeno
• 1 lemon

Directions
:

1. Rinse all ingredients
2. Add ingredients through juicer
3. Serve and enjoy!

Kim’s Hearty Oatmeal

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup organic oats
• 1 tablespoon ground flaxseed
• 2 tablespoons raisins
• ½ cup apple, chopped
• ¼  cup coconut milk
• 1/2 handful of walnuts
• ½ tsp cinnamon

Instructions:

1. Cook oatmeal in water according to directions with flaxseed, raisins, and apple
2. Drizzle with coconut milk and top with walnuts and sprinkle with cinnamon

Kim’s Cleansing Green Smoothie

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 cups water
• 1 head organic romaine lettuce, chopped
• 3-4 stalks organic celery
• 1/2 head of a large bunch or 3/4 of a small bunch of spinach
• 1 organic apple, cored and chopped
• 1 organic pear, cored and chopped
• 1 organic banana
• Juice of 1/2 fresh organic lemon
• Optional: 1/3 bunch organic cilantro (stems OK) and 1/3 bunch organic parsley (stems OK)

Directions:

1. Add water and chopped head of romaine to blender. Blend at a low speed until smooth.
2. Add celery, apple, and pear and blend at high speed.
3. Add cilantro and parsley (which help chelate heavy metals out of your body).
4. Finish with banana and lemon.

Also check out Kim’s Glowing Green Smoothie recipe.

Kim’s Veggie Broth

Ingredients
:

For every three quarts of water add:

• 1 large onion, chopped
• 2 carrots, sliced
• 1 cup of daikon or white radish root and tops (ideal, but optional)
• 1 cup of winter squash cut into large cubes
• 1 cup of root vegetables: turnips, parsnips, and rutabagas for sweetness
• 2 cups of chopped greens: kale, parsley, beet greens, collard greens, chard, dandelion, 
cilantro or other greens
• 2 celery stalks
• ½ cup of seaweed: nori, dulse, wakame, kelp, or kombu
• ½ cup of cabbage
• 4 ½-inch slices of fresh ginger
• 2 cloves of whole garlic (not chopped or crushed)
• Sea salt, to taste
• 1 cup fresh or dried shitake or maitake mushrooms

Instructions:

1. Add all the ingredients at once and place on a low boil for approximately 60 minutes. It may take a little longer. Simply continue to boil to taste.
2. Cool, strain (throw out the cooked vegetables), and store in a large, tightly-sealed glass container in the fridge.

Green Pizza ~ courtesy of The Engine 2 Diet

* * *

Kim Wilson Pollock is a Certified Holistic Health & Wellness Consultant dedicated to helping busy individuals live a healthier lifestyle. She received her certification through the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. Kim’s life changed in 2006 when her mother was diagnosed with stage four ovarian cancer. Her mom decided to fight her cancer through nutrition by changing her diet and eating real foods, juicing green vegetables and creating delicious green smoothies and Kim was quick to join her mom in this new lifestyle!  Visit her at [www.kimwilsonhealthcoach.com]. Follow Kim on Facebook and Twitter.