Summer Squash Soup

Hands up!

Anyone else find themselves with a glut of zucchini and summer squash as the plants are just loving the heat this summer?

I cannot resist the beauty of a shiny summer squash or zucchini whenever i see them in the store or t the City Farm and found myself with over 2lbs in my refrigerator.

I needed a recipe fast.

I adapted this recipe from online vegan recipe creator, Debra Klein, to create a protein rich, nutrient dense soup, creamy but dairy-free and packed with flavour. The soup is no longer vegan but conatins all that gut-healing bone broth collagen and mineral dense goodness that we need to support our bodies through hormonal change.

Did you know that there is no word for hot flashes in Japan?

So few women experience this symptom of peri-menopause as they pass through hormonal change so there is not a descriptor in the language. This is changing as wheat heavy foods become more popular in Japan and the Standard American diet and subsequent fast foods are enjoyed by the culture, but, a traditional Japanese diet heavy in fish, fermented foods and soy support a woman through a symptom free peri-menopause.

Let’s talk about the phyto-chemicals in soy beans that mimic estrogen in he body and help to reduce symptoms of peri-menopause.

They have had a bad rap and there has been scaremongering that these foods can create a risk of breast cancer.

When we drip feed our bodies gentle plant based chemicals that mimic estrogen in the body we are supporting our vaginal health, brain health and libido. These gentle estrogens attach to beta estrogen receptors in the breast that slow down the turnover of cells, making them breast protective.

Make sure that you buy organic soy products as this crop is heavily sprayed with glyphosate, it was genetically designed that way and glyphosate is extremely damaging to our gut lining…it was designed that way, it is how it kills pests.

The big benefit of using soy in this soup is that it creates a creamy texture without needing to add inflammatory dairy products such as milk and cream. Don’t get me wrong, I love the occasional creamy dessert or scone with cream and jam and I LOVE butter but in my everyday cooking I shy away from dairy heavy recipes.

So, we have a high protein, plant heavy soup with a creamy texture, that helps to prevent menopausal symptoms and is rich in all the mineral dense nutrition and gut healing properties for bone broth.

How does the soup taste Louise? Am I going to love it?

Creamy and herby in flavour, this soup has a deep umami taste due to the 2 tbsp of miso paste added at the end. Miso paste is found in the refrigerator in your food store or an Asian grocery and is made from fermented soy beans. Because it is fermented the nutrition from protein, iron, magnesium our relaxation mineral and the B group of vitamins that support our nervous system and boost our energy are easily absorbed.

Above all else Miso Paste benefits for your microbiome, you inner constellation of healthy bacteria that impact so many areas of our health from mood to yes you guessed it, menopausal symptoms in a positive way. The Miso Paste is added at the very end of the recipe once the soup has been taken off the heat and in this way the healthy bacteria in the Miso can stay ‘live’.

What a gorgeous way to include this stunning summer vegetable into your weekly rotation of nutrient dense meals.

Ingredients

2lb summer squash and or Zucchini diced
1 large onion diced
4 cloves garlic finely chopped
2tbsp extra virgin olive oil
4 cups chicken broth
8oz silken tofu
1 cup peas frozen or fresh
1 bunch fresh basil
2 heaped tbsp miso paste
Salt and Pepper to taste.

Instructions

Put the olive oil in a large soup pan and add the onion, garlic and squash.
Sauté very gently with a lid on the pan for 15 minutes or until the squash are softened.
Add the chicken broth, tofu, peas and whole bunch of basil.
Using a hand held blender or in batches in a food processor or standing blender, whizz the soup until it is smooth and return to the pan.
Bring the soup back to simmer and turn off the heat.
Add the miso paste once the soup has cooled a little so that you keep the fermented ‘live’ properties of the miso.
Add salt and pepper to taste and serve.

Serves 4-6

Hibiscus Tea For Summer Hydration

One of the challenges of summer can be staying hydrated in a healthy way.

When we are fully hydrated our joints ache less, we are less likely to feel lethargic, get a headache or feel hungry. Our digestion is improved , our skin is more supple and our brain functions more efficiently with better cognitive function.

Numerous studies tell us that North Americans are chronically dehydrated with an estimated 75% of us needing to drink more liquid on a daily basis.
Survey of 3003 Americans, Nutrition Information Center, New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center (April 14, 1998).

Just like with foods and nutrition, there is a good better and best when it comes to hydration and as we passed through a ‘heat dome’ earlier this month, I turned to Iced Hibiscus Tea for hydration as one of the best options out there.

Many of us turn to fountain sodas and canned pops when the going gets hot and the challenge is to avoid drinking insulin spiking regular and diet soda. (Yep! Your read that right. Diet sodas also ‘trick’ the body into spiking our inflammatory hormone insulin when the taste of false sweetness hits the tongue.) When insulin is spiking regularly in the body, you are going to feel out of control symptoms of peri-menopause and will be pushing yourself towards insulin resistance; the first step on the path towards diabetes.
Mathur K, Agrawal RK, Nagpure S, Deshpande D. Effect of artificial sweeteners on insulin resistance among type-2 diabetes mellitus patients. J Family Med Prim Care. 2020;9(1):69-71. Published 2020 Jan 28. doi:10.4103/jfmpc.jfmpc_329_19

Red hibiscus flowers are packed with anti-oxidants in the form of anthocyanins which give the flower its colour. These anti-oxidants help to mute the effects of free radicals in the body and it is free radicles that promote aging and fan the flames of inflammation.
Ajiboye TO, Salawu NA, Yakubu MT, Oladiji AT, Akanji MA, Okogun JI. Antioxidant and drug detoxification potentials of Hibiscus sabdariffa anthocyanin extract. Drug Chem Toxicol. 2011 Apr;34(2):109-15. doi: 10.3109/01480545.2010.536767. PMID: 21314460.

The hibiscus flower is a power house for lowering blood pressure due to its mild diuretic properties and studies show both diastolic and systolic pressure is reduced with the introduction of tea made from hibiscus into the daily diet. 75% of us may be dehydrated but 1/3rd of all folks in the USA are believed to have high blood pressure and hibiscus tea offers a safe and natural way to hydrate and tackle this cardiovascular health issue.
Serban C, Sahebkar A, Ursoniu S, Andrica F, Banach M. Effect of sour tea (Hibiscus sabdariffa L.) on arterial hypertension: a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials. J Hypertens. 2015 Jun;33(6):1119-27. doi: 10.1097/HJH.0000000000000585. PMID: 25875025.

Of even more interest to the midlife woman is that fact that hibiscus flowers are rich in phytoestrogens. These are plant chemicals that gently mimic estrogen inside the body. As our ovaries are slowing down production of estrogen in order to get some well earned rest, gentle support from plants can help to reduce our symptoms of peri-menopause as we move into estrogen deficiency.

The food and nutrition that you eat daily can either support you or tear your health down and in peri-menopause we can make choices that support a reduction in uncomfortable symptoms in the body.
Saeed IA, Ali L, Jabeen A, Khasawneh M, Rizvi TA, Ashraf SS. Estrogenic activities of ten medicinal herbs from the Middle East. J Chromatogr Sci. 2013 Jan;51(1):33-9. doi: 10.1093/chromsci/bms101. Epub 2012 Jun 14. PMID: 22700791.

When I talk about the naturally occurring plant estrogens found in soy, hibiscus and raspberries, I invariably get asked about breast cancer. There has been some inaccurate press that states foods that contain phytoestrogens are dangerous as they increase our risk of breast cancer. Nothing could be further from the truth. Naturally occurring plant estrogens are recognized by the body and accepted into beta estrogen receptors in the breast which trigger the slowing of cell turnover. Hibiscus estrogens have been found to go further and cause the death of cancer cells found in the breast making hibiscus breast protective.
Nguyen C, Baskaran K, Pupulin A, et al. Hibiscus flower extract selectively induces apoptosis in breast cancer cells and positively interacts with common chemotherapeutics. BMC Complement Altern Med. 2019;19(1):98. Published 2019 May 6. doi:10.1186/s12906-019-2505-9

When we include micro doses of plant based estrogen into our diet, we calm uncomfortable hormonal symptoms at midlife and protect our breast and vaginal health and the health of our libido.

Fruity and delicious to taste, perhaps the best reason for sourcing hibiscus flowers or tea bags and keeping a jug of iced Hibiscus Tea in your refrigerator is the fact that you get to ditch sugar laden and chemical riddled diet sodas from your day and instead embrace one of natures pops of flavour. A simple switch that builds better health.

Ingredients

1/4 cup, 2 tbsp Red Hibiscus flowers or 1-2 Hibiscus tea bags
8 cups boiling water
Ice to taste
1 Lime juiced (optional)

Instructions

Pile the hibiscus flowers or tea bags into a tea pot and boil the water.
Steep the flowers for 5 minutes and either allow to cool or add ice until cool.
Serve refrigerated and add a squeeze of lime for more juicy sourness and a shot of electrolytes and vitamin C.

Why My Mantra is Baby Steps to Better Health

You’ll hear me say it a lot.

The best way to improve your midlife health is to take BABY STEPS to better midlife health.

But what do I really mean?

I clearly remember hitting rock bottom with my health. I was 46 years old and felt about 92 with my aching shoulders and hips.

I remember laying on the sofa late one afternoon knowing that I needed to make dinner for my family but simply not having the energy to get up and walk to the kitchen. Standing left me feeling lightheaded (a classic symptom of adrenal burnout) and I suffered so greatly with sharp spikes of pain in my legs from varicose veins that I would cook with one leg up on the counter, taking turns to rest each leg to relieve the pain and stay standing.

I could not get out of bed in the morning, pulled all of my energy for life from a coffee cup and found it hard to get a full night sleep as my anxiety kept me tired but wired in the late evening and watching the clock at 4am. I had lost my joy.

I craved sugar 100% of the time and beat myself up with unkind thoughts when I ate carbs or chocolate. My energy crashed every day and I did not link my breakfast of a skinny venti latte and baby carrots to my cravings, exhaustion and subsequent carb binge every afternoon. I ate to avoid all fat, bought skimmed organic milk and vegetables and thought I was doing an OK job with my diet.

I had never heard of peri-menopause and had no clue what that meant for my body.

I made an appointment with my doctor only to hear the worst advice for midlife women… “You need to eat less and exercise more!”

Two weeks later, I was sat behind my desk on the back row of the Canadian School of Natural Nutrition, on a quest to find out how I could eat to feel like myself again.

The information I learned in school was so enlightening and valuable BUT I instantly felt my anxiety surge as I swung from rock bottom to overwhelm.

How was I going to change everything about my diet and everything I ate so that I could feel healthy again?

This is when I made an amazing discovery about real whole foods! When you get to the root cause of your health issue and use food to fuel your body for health, you can relax and only need to take one baby step at a time.

Let me explain with a bowl of raspberries.

1. These berries provide nutrition in the form of real food and all of their nutrients are recognized and easily absorbed by the body.

2. These raspberries provide fibre that help us to poop, our daily detox, and this in turn helps us to remove excess estrogen from the body supporting a reduction in peri-menopausal symptoms such as hot flashes, night sweats and midlife acne. Our daily poop also supports our liver health, keeps our skin clear and helps to prevent cancer of the colon.

3. Raspberries contain vitamin C to support your skin and other tissues of the body. Vitamin C is important for immune system health and acts as an anti-oxidant which helps to prevent cancer.

4. The dark red colour of these berries shows us that they also contain other anti-oxidants called anthocyanins which have powerful anti-cancerous, anti-microbial, anti-diabetic, anti-inflammatory and anti-obesity effects on the body.
   https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5613902/

5. The fibre in these berries also helps to support our microbiome, providing food for our healthy bacteria which in turn supports our mood, immune health and hormonal balance.

6. Raspberries contain phyto-estrogens, plant hormones that mimic the effects of estrogen in a healthy way when they are in our midlife bodies. This supports our mood, vaginal health and libido as we move through peri-menopause and into the estrogen deficiency of menopause. Phyto-estrogens help to prevent breast cancer as these gentle plant based hormones bind with beta estrogen receptors in the body to slow cell growth.

Real whole foods are truly powerful in the body!

Just the one simple step of including a portion of raspberries into your day either from frozen in a smoothie, or fresh on a serving of Energy All Day Granola impacts multiple areas of your health.

Just one baby step, carried out consistently will be transformative for your health.

What my clients hire me for is the support and accountability to stay on that path to health and keep taking those baby steps, one after another, after another.