Mango Chia Pudding

‘Fibre is a midlife woman best friend,’ is one of my mantras whenever I am talking about womens health and menopause.

Hormone molecules such as estrogen are built with a cholesterol tail and fibre from our diet hooks onto that tail, to drag excess hormone out of our body. This leads to a reduction in our hormonal symptoms during peri-menopause and menopause

New research links increased fibre in the diet to a decrease in depression in peri-menopausal women as fibre also supports the health of our microbiome. Just as in ecosystems and communities, the diversity and health of our microbiome is directly linked to our mood and mental health.

Understand, we are not just alone as ‘us’ ladies, we have an ecosystem inside our gut and the health of this ecosystem directly impacts how happy we feel daily. Feeding our internal garden, improves our mental health as we pass through hormonal change.

Fibre in our diet can also help us to manage our blood sugar levels and keeps us off the sugar roller coaster by delaying the speed at which glucose from our food is dumped into our blood stream. If you are a woman who experiences:

1. Mood swings
2. Weight gain around the middle
3. Energy crashes or exhaustion
4. Waking in the night
5. Increased urination
6. Pre-menstrual symptoms

You may be experiencing blood sugar dysregulation and it is not your hormones at all!

The problem we have is when we arrive at peri-menopause, up to 50% of us will be deficient of fibre in our diet.

No wonder we are being ravaged by hormonal symptoms and feeling deeply uncomfortable on a daily basis! Our body is trying to tell us that it needs help and our support to pass easily through this challenging time.

So, we can go to the store and buy psyllium husks and senna, or we can make it delicious, fun and easy by making simple high fibre recipes, that help to build health in our bodies at midlife.

I was cruising my local grocery store when I saw these two stunning Atauflo mangos, with their price reduced, because they were at peak perfection of ripeness.

Isn’t that crazy! Food is reduced in price because it is perfect for eating?

In the soup we are living in, our food systems are primed for food transportation and mass production, not for food flavour or our health.

I could not pass up these beauties and I knew I had all the ingredients at home to immediately transform them into a delicious breakfast/snack/dessert dish.

Chia seeds are packed with soluble and insoluble fibre, magnesium, our relaxation mineral and anti-inflammatory omega 3 fatty acids. If you do not like the texture of chia seeds, you can blend the ingredients of this recipe to make a ‘pudding’ textured chia pudding.

Coconut milk provides medium chan fatty acids to support our brain health, prevents the sugar in the mangos from flooding quickly into the blood stream and helps to keep us satiated for longer.

A question I always ask myself when I am cooking is… ‘How can I add MORE!’

I added anti-inflammatory and blood sugar balancing spices to add delicious flavour and boost the health building properties of this dish.

This recipe is super easy. It just takes chopping, measuring and stirring to make a delicious, fibre rich, blood sugar balancing treat in your refrigerator.

My tip: When you see a perfectly ripe mango, buy the mango. Even if you sit and eat it in the bath with the juice dripping down your boobies, you are still a winner!

Ingredients

2 perfectly ripe small mangos or 1 perfectly ripe large mango
1/4 cup Chia seeds
1 cup coconut milk
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp turmeric
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1 tbsp raw pumpkin seeds
1 tbsp shredded coconut.

Instructions

1. Turn on a podcast you love and start by chopping your mango

2. Put the chopped mango in a large bowl with all of the other ingredients except the pumpkin seeds and shredded coconut.

3. Stir all the ingredients together until they are fully combined

4. Put the pudding mix into a single glass container or portion into smaller containers depending on how you want to eat it.

5. decorate the top of the pudding with the pumpkin seeds and shredded coconut to add more flavour and fibre

6. Store in the refrigerator overnight and the Mango Chia Pudding is ready to eat the next morning.

Roasted Cauliflower, Pistachio and Pomegranate Salad.

It is hard to emphasize the importance of cruciferous vegetables to women going through hormonal change.

Let’s take a step back and reacquaint ourselves with what is happening inside our bodies…

As we move through peri-menopause, our chill and juicy hormones of progesterone and estrogen begin to deplete. This is not a smooth curve down to our ovaries retirement, but is full of spikes and crashes of hormone. We are living animals and the organs of our body do their utmost to function to the best of their ability. As they splutter to a halt our ovaries can gather the building blocks for manufacturing estrogen only to spurt an excessive amount into the bloodstream. We can go from zero to 60 from one week to the next and our health needs to be good enough to handle these changes so we experience the least amount of symptoms and can roll with them with grace.

The organ helping us out here is the liver. Our liver grabs excess hormone from the bloodstream and deconjugates, or breaks it down into compounds that can be easily removed from the body via our poop. The magical daily detox!

If you have constipation, you are going to have issues with feeling excessive symptoms of hormonal change.

If you do not like vegetables or fibre in your diet…think standard American diet where 95% of people are deficient in fibre, then you are going to experience excessive symptoms of hormonal change.

The food we eat changes our experience of menopause.

Cruciferous vegetables support us by offering the body fibre and a healthy serving of a compound called 3,3-Diindolylmethane. This is the compound that gives cruciferous vegetables their cabbagey smell. It also helps the liver in its process of breaking down hormone. You have the fibre for the poop and the fuel for grabbing and smashing up the hormones that are driving you crazy with symptoms.

Eating cruciferous veg regularly in your diet, throughout menopause means you have constant liver support, reduced constipation and a reduction in your hot flashes, mood swings, breast pain and bloat.

Cruciferous vegetables are all those in the cabbage family.

Think red and green cabbages, kale, cauliflower, collard greens, broccoli and Brussels sprouts.

We wouldn’t want to just eat boiled cabbage…that would be punishing! But this Cauliflower Salad with its burst of Middle Eastern flavour is something you are going to want to ladle onto our plate.

For this dish I roasted a stunningly beautiful, lime green, romanesco cauliflower but a regular white cauliflower or broccoli would be great too.

The roasted veg is paired with nuts, pomegranate seeds and the warming spice blend Baharat from Turkey. Think black pepper, cardamon, cloves, paprika and nutmeg.

The beauty of using nutrition as your first line of defence against menopausal symptoms is that as you nourish your body with these gorgeous crucifers, you are also protecting your heart health, preventing colon cancer and introducing an easily absorbed plant based source of calcium into your diet…as well as delighting your taste buds.

Ingredients

1 medium cauliflower or 1lb of broccoli
5 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
5 tbsp raw pistachios or hazelnuts
1/3rd cup pomegranate seeds fresh or frozen ( approx 1/2 a pomegranate)
2 sticks celery sliced on the diagonal
1/3rd cup roughly chopped parsley
1 tbsp Balsamic Vinegar
1 tsp Baharat spice mix.
1/2 tsp sea salt

Instructions

Toss the cauliflower or broccoli in 2 tbsp of olive oil
Roast in the over a 400F /200C for 20 minutes.
Add the pistachios or hazelnuts for the last 5 minutes of roasting the cauliflower to toast them and bring out the flavour.
Meanwhile chop the celery and parsley and prepare the pomegranate seeds
In the bottom of a bowl whisk the remaining 2 tbsp of olive oil, 1 tbsp of Balsamic vinegar, the Baharat spice mix and the salt.
Add all of the ingredients to the bowl and toss in the dressing.
Serve with roasted chicken or salmon.

Turkey Herb Breakfast Patties

When our hormones start to fluctuate at midlife, there are long term health implications for us as women, outside of our midlife experience of menopause and it’s sometimes uncomfortable symptoms.

Hormonal change is not a cause, but a risk factor for poor cardiovascular health, dementia and Alzheimers disease.

Estrogen holds a protective effect over both our metabolic health and the neurons of our brain. As estrogen depletes we are pushed, incrementally, towards insulin resistance; which has implications for our brain and cardiovascular health and experience a pruning of our neurons; which has implications for our brain health and would explain our brain futzes and short temper at midlife.

This can feel horrifying to learn and can cause us to feel overwhelmed and helpless. Many women DREAD menopause and our perception of the process of hormonal change impacts our symptoms with negativity resulting in stronger and more uncomfortable symptoms.

It’s good to take a deep breathe, step out of fear and get some perspective as, in reality, the gold standard for protecting both our brain health and our cardiovascular health as we age is still nutrition, reducing stress and exercise.

Regardless of being women and experiencing hormonal change at midlife, we have all the tools we need to protect ourselves from future health complications.

One of the most impactful ways we can support our health for the future is to take great care with our diet to balance our blood sugar levels on a daily basis. No more sugar roller-coaster with its energy buzzes and crashes, mood swings and exhaustion. Just calm, consistent energy throughout the day.

Believe it or not, this can be challenging.

1. We live in a terrain that is OVERLOADED with sugar in every product we buy. It takes effort and stepping outside of the Standard American Diet to break-up with sugar.

2. If we are addicted to cortisol, our stress hormone, we REALLY enjoy the sugar roller-coaster and it is hard to let it go. Scan your life for clues and notice where you are drawing stress in…overeating for a sugar-high, an argument for no reason or a coffee to get amped up.

3. Our microbiome can become unhealthily overgrown with yeasts due to years of excess sugar in our diet (hello those with a sweet tooth!) and when we suddenly cut back on sugar, we experience nasty flu-like symptoms and off-the-chain sugar cravings as Candida yeasts demand sugar from our brain.

One of the ways we can release the grip of sugar from our bodies is by eating a healthy, sugar-free breakfast, packed with protein, healthy fats and fibre on a daily basis. These make-ahead Turkey and Herb Patties will help you to follow through on your health goals at breakfast.

The protein found in turkey is rich in the amino acid, tryptophan. Tryptophan is a building block for both serotonin and melatonin in the body. When we eat turkey we are helping ourselves to keep our mood balanced and our sleep consistent.

By adding herbs and garlic to this recipe, not only do we pack in deliciousness and flavour, but we are supporting a healthy microbiome and a reduction in our sugar cravings. Garlic and sage are toxic to Candida, the unhealthy yeast that can take hold of our microbiome. As Candida dies off, you may feel headachy and low in energy but, balance is being created in your microbiome for healthy microbes, that help you to metabolize excess estrogen from the body and will bring a reduction in menopausal symptoms.

By eating these patties with eggs and vegetables in the morning, you are increasing the amount of protein you ingest at the beginning of the day. Breakfast is the most important meal for balancing blood sugar levels and climbing off that roller-coaster.

When you ditch the unhealthy, but well advertised, box cereal breakfast, the muffins and the doughnuts, you give your brain and your body the steady energy it needs to get through your morning

Additional protein with your meals at midlife is also supportive of tissue health and with exercise, such as lifting weights, prevents muscle wasting as we age. When we maintain muscle in our glutes, thighs and hips, we are protecting our mobility and also our continence!

Make and cook these patties ahead and store them in a sealed container in the refrigerator for a week to make protein at breakfast a breeze!

Ingredients

1lb ground organic turkey thigh
2 tbsp chopped fresh sage or 1 tbsp dried sage (use fresh sage if you can, it’s delicious!)
3 green onions finely chopped
1 bunch parsley finely chopped
1 clove garlic minced
1/2 tsp sea salt
1/2 tsp ground pepper

Instructions

Put all of the ingredients in a large bowl and combine using your hands
Go lightly and try not to overwork
Preheat the oven to 350F 175C
Line a large baking tray with parchment
Take a table spoon of the mix at a time and form a patty in your hands
Place the patties on the baking tray and bake for 30 minutes until cooked through
Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator to reheat at breakfast
Patties will keep for a week in the refrigerator and can be frozen for up to 3 months