Judy a la carte!
I’m back I’m Nebraska for a bit and stopped by Judy’s show!
Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead Interview
Hello friends!
TONIGHT! Joe Cross from the inspiring documentary Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead joins me on my radio show- The [All Natural] with Tanner O’Dell
Listen live online from anywhere in the world by visiting kzum.org. If you’re in the Lincoln Nebraska area, KZUM 89.3 is the place to be. 
6:30-7:00 pm CST! Talk to you soon.
Interview with Grayson Schmitz from Top Chef Texas
Join me tonight at 6:30 pm CST for an interview with Grayson Schmitz from Top Chef Texas! She’ll be calling into my radio show to give you the Top Chef scoop, and talk about what’s been going on since the show. If you’re a foodie, then don’t forget to tune in!
photo from graysonschmitz.com
Listen live from anywhere in the world on kzum.org or tune your radio to 89.3 KZUM if you’re in the Lincoln Nebraska area.
The podcast will be available a few days after the show!
If you have questions for Grayson, leave them in the comments!
Asparagus Obsession Leads to….
I’m slightly obsessed!
With this veggie really shoving spring into our faces, I can’t help but eat it almost every day of the week! It’s easy to cook, easy to eat, and easy to love. The only thing about it is you can only take so much of the same thing. Most of us find a way we like to eat certain foods and we cook that same recipe until we kill it…until everyone is screaming for you to stop because they know what’s coming for dinner.
So how do you keep asparagus interesting? Well here’s a couple simple ideas
#1 
Turn your asparagus into a refreshing salad!
Ingredients
- 1 bundle fresh Asparagus spears, snapped or trimmed to remove the tough ends
- 1/3 cup quinoa cooked in 1/2 cup of water with 1/2 tsp salt.
- 1 red bell pepper, Julienned
- 1/2 cup sliced almonds, toasted
- 1/3 cup feta cheese
- enough Lemon Vinaigrette to dress the salad
How To
- Bring a big pot of water to a boil and start getting your asparagus ready! Snap each spear or trim the woody end off, then using a sharp knife simply slice each spear in half length wise. (You don’t necessarily have to slice them in half, but I like it better that way!) Then when your asparagus is prepped just put it into the boiling water and blanch for about 1 minute. Blanching is just a fancy word for quickly boiling. After the minute is up you want to “shock” the asparagus in an ice bath, which is just a bunch of ice water in a bowl. This will stop the cooking and cool down the asparagus getting it ready for the salad. Pat the spears dry, and then add them to a bowl to assemble the salad!
- Cook your quinoa until tender and all of the water has been absorbed, then allow it to cool. You can rinse it in ice water to quickly cool it off. Then add it into the bowl with the asparagus.
- You have a couple of options with the red pepper after you thinly slice it. You can quickly sauté it with a bit of olive oil for some added flavor, roast it with a bit of olive oil at 425 degrees for about 7 minutes, or leave it raw in the salad. I personally like it roasted, but feel free to do whatever you would like. Once it’s prepared how you want, (let it cool if it’s been cooked) put it into the salad bowl!
- Now you can toast the almonds, which it extremely simple! Using a small sauté pan, just allow the almonds to toast until they turn a golden color and you can easily smell them. I do this on medium high heat, with no oil in the pan. Careful because they can go from perfectly toasted to burnt in no time!
- To toss the salad just add the almonds in along with the feta cheese and then lightly dress with the lemon vinaigrette. This salad is best served the same day it’s made, but if you do make it ahead of time, just keep the feta, almonds, and vinaigrette separate until serving time.
The sky is the limit when turning your asparagus into a salad. You can add any ingredients you would like and create your own unique salad. Make sure to share your pictures with me if you make something!
Make sure to share your pictures with me if you make something!If you have questions about this recipe tweet me or leave a comment below!
#2
Asparagus Frozen Yogurt!!
Yea…I went there. And honestly I was pretty sure I wasn’t going to like it, but man was I wrong! The asparagus flavor just excites your taste buds and boggles your mind. I can’t wait for you to try this out! Plus it’s crazy easy to make…and you can always make it dairy free! One of my tricks for jazzing up ice cream is buying a plain fat-free and no sugar added frozen yogurt…then adding great flavors to it. Strawberry rhubarb, sweet potato or beet ice creams are just a few ingredients away when you steal my tip.
Ingredients
- 2 cups fat-free, no sugar added frozen yogurt. (to make this dairy free, just substitute almond or coconut milk ice cream)
- 1 bundle fresh Asparagus spears
- 1/4 cup plain yogurt (You can use almond or coconut yogurt)
How To
- Start by putting the 2 cups of frozen yogurt into a mixing bowl. Allow it to soften while you prep your asparagus!
- In this recipe I only use the top 3-4 inches of the asparagus to make sure they are extremely tender. So slice your asparagus spears and blanch them just like in the recipe above! That means drop them in boiling water for about 1 minute, and then move them to an ice bath to stop the cooking process. Next just pat them dry once you take them out of the ice bath and add them to your blender or food processor.
- Add the yogurt to the asparagus in the blender or food processor and puree until it’s nice and smooth. To make the puree extremely smooth you can press it through a sieve after your done mixing!
- Now just add the asparagus mixture to the frozen softened yogurt and mix well! You can easily just swirl the asparagus mixture into it as well to create a white on green look with your ice cream. Taste the asparagus frozen yogurt mixture before you put it into the freezer. If it’s too strong of a flavor for you, just add a bit more frozen yogurt to mellow it out. Then let it freeze back up for a couple of hours and serve!
If I were you I would feed this ice cream to our friend and have them guess what the flavor is.
Tweet me or comment below with questions!
What are your favorite asparagus recipes?
One of my favorite things to do is just simply roast the spears. I love the two recipes above, but there is almost nothing better than asparagus lightly coated in olive oil, sprinkled with salt, pepper, and lemon zest, then roasted at 425 for 7-10 minutes. Yep there’s a little bonus recipe for you. Finish them off with a bit of fresh lemon juice and YES! delicious.
Talk to you all soon! Enjoy your asparagus! (we could get into the whole smelly pee thing…but thats another blog. and it’s gross)
The “Wannabe” Generation
Ever since I was probably 4 years old I’ve had something or someone I wanted to be.
My dream job at 8 years old was to be a singing veterinarian. Slowly that evolved into me wanting to tackle the restaurant industry. (Weird transition…I know) But at 18 years old I’m still dreaming bigger than ever, waking up every morning embracing the fact that I’m a wanna be.
Usually the term “wannabe” is looked down upon in our world. If you know me well though…I like to take things and flip them into a positive light! Truly though, the restaurant industry is changing because of the new generation working in and consuming it. No longer are teenagers just working for a paycheck, oh no, they are looking for “what am I going to gain from this?”
In the following short podcast I’ll be introducing some hiring and incentive ideas to really bring quality Gen Y employees into your team. Every idea is from my own brain…an 18 year old expert on bridging the gap between generations!
Enjoy! if you have any questions make sure to tweet me.
How to Hire, Inspire, and learn to Admire Generation Y in the Restaurant Industry – Podcast #1
Healthy No Bake Cookies!
My girlfriend @Marahartt inspired me to make these cookies!
because my experience with no bake cookies looks like this:
They just weren’t very pleasant…..Too sweet, Crazy texture, and nothing like a cookie. Plus they were no where close to healthy since they were packed with powdered sugar, sweetened coconut, and milk chocolate.
Well welcome to my world folks, where I make recipes as healthy as possible. Those cookies above (if you can even call them cookies) were a thing of the past. (occasionally i’m in the mood for unhealthy…but that’s another blog.) The no bake cookies I’ve created for you today are Gluten Free, Dairy Free, Soy Free, Vegan, and just plain wonderful. If that doesn’t sell you though, I have some powerful ingredients just waiting to make you happy and healthy.
Introducing! The new and improved: Healthy No Bake Cookie
Ingredients
- 1 cup rolled oats
- 1 cup toasted shredded unsweetened coconut
- 1/2 cup ground flax seed
- 1/2 cup dairy free semi-sweet chocolate chips
- 1/2 cup raw unsalted almond butter
- 1/3 cup Agave Nectar
- 2 tbsp. Chia Seeds
- 2 tbsp. minced crystalized ginger
- 1/4 cup dried goji berries
- 2 tbsp. Black currant juice
- 1 tsp. vanilla
Why ground Flax Seed?
Many nutrition experts prefer ground flax seed over whole flax seed because the ground is easier for our bodies to digest. In this recipe I needed something to bind the cookies together, and the health benefits of Flax Seed made it my number one choice. Flax seed is full of fiber, omega-3 fatty acids and phytochemicals called lignans.
Why Chia Seeds?
I’m a lover of chia seeds because they really give you a boost of energy…that lasts! But that’s not the only benefit of putting these in my recipe. Chia seeds also have more omega-3′s than Atlantic Salmon, more antioxidants than fresh blueberries, and more calcium then 2% milk. I try to sneak chia seeds into everything that I can. More recipes will come with these as the star.
Why Goji Berries?
More and more people are using these berries…and honestly…I just wanted to try them in a recipe! I have never used them before, so I thought this was the perfect time! The cool thing though is goji berries are packed with nutritional benefits: tons of Antioxidants, essential minerals, amino acids and 4 unique polysaccharides (complex carbohydrates). I bought my goji berries dehydrated..and then I rehydrated them in black currant juice. Feel free to rehydrate them in whatever liquid you would like! If you can’t find these tasty little berries…dried cranberries are and excellent alternative!
How To
- Start by re-hydrating the goji berries in the black currant juice. You can really use any kind of juice, or even water to re-hydrate the berries…black currant juice is just what I had available. Place the berries into a small bowl and then cover with the liquid for about 30 minutes.
- In a nice sized bowl, mix the oats, toasted coconut, ground flax seed, chocolate chips, chia seeds, and ginger. (to toast the coconut, spread it out on a small baking sheet and toast at 425 degrees for about 5 minutes, or until nicely browned…but not burned!) …also, make sure to chop the crystalized ginger into very small pieces. This is a sticky ingredient, so I like to use scissors and snip small pieces right into the bowl.
- Once the goji berries are nice and plump, drain them from the juice remaining in the bowl and then add them to the mix. give it a quick toss and then get ready to add the next ingredients!
- In goes the almond butter, Agave, and vanilla. Using a silicon spatula, just gently mix all of the ingredients together!
- Once everything is nicely incorporated…use a 1 tbsp. measure and make your cookies. This recipe makes about 30. Roll each tbsp. full of the cookie mix into a ball and then flatten it into a round cookie shape.
- I place my finished cookies on a lightly greased cookie sheet, and then refrigerate them for at least 2 hours.
Once these healthy no bake cookies are finished…share them with a friend, eat them with your breakfast, eat them as a snack, eat them as dessert, eat them on a bus, eat them on a plane, eat them on a jog, eat them at a party….
Obviously there are no limits here.
Feel free to experiment with other dried fruits or berries…chopped apricots, mango, or blueberries would be fantastic in these cookies!
Make sure to tweet me with your questions.
If you like this recipe and what I do here on my blog, leave a comment below!
Vegan Avocado Lime Ice Cream
It has been extremely warm and sunny here in the great state of Nebraska this week! The only bad thing about the weather here is the fact that it could totally be snowing next week….or even tomorrow! I have an uncle that’s a weather man, and predicting the weather has to be harder than predicting what Lady Gaga is going to wear next. This state smack dab in the middle of the country is full of crazy weather…and some crazy people. Me included of course.
Some people may really think I’m crazy with this recipe…but believe it or not, avocado ice cream is nothing new! My vegan take on this frozen favorite (favorite for some anyway) will blow you away with its flavor and simplicity! So while this great weather is here and spring fever is driving me towards ice cream…I thought I’d share this fantastic recipe with you.
Ingredients
- 4 ripe avocados
- 1/2 cup fresh lime juice
- 1 cup coconut milk (I use Silk Pure Coconut Milk)
- 2 1/2 tsp. Truvia
How To
- Start by mashing the avocados in a bowl. (remove the ripe green avocado from the skin, and save the skin for presenting the ice cream if you would like!)
- Place the mashed avocado into the bowl of a food processor and add the lime juice. Turn the food processor on and mix for about 1 minute. The mixture will be extremely smooth.
- Now add the coconut milk and truvia. Turn the food processor back on and mix for another minute. If you don’t have truvia…I recommend you buy some! But you can also use liquid Stevia or Agave. You’ll have to taste your mixture when sweetening with something other than what I used in this recipe to make sure you have it sweet enough.
- I recommend that you now transfer the ice cream base to an ice cream maker and churn for about 20 minutes. You can then put the ice cream into a freezer safe container, and freeze if until ice cream texture is achieved. (about 2 hours)
- Don’t worry if you don’t have an ice cream maker though! you can place this ice cream right into the freezer without churning. It will turn out just as great, but will take a bit longer to freeze and won’t have quite the same texture.
I love to serve this ice cream in the avocado shell…but feel free to just put it into a bowl with a couple spoons. This dessert is definitely flavorful, exciting, and green! I love it and I hope you will as well.
Tweet me with questions!
Tonight on my radio show
Hitting the airwaves with me tonight is two amazing ladies. Michelle Kosmicki, an autism advocate, and Dannie Elwood from Behaven Kids. Michelle has a dream of creating planned autism communities. She’ll be talking about how most of us spend our lives planning all kinds of things…wedding, parties, meals, etc. But everything drastically changes when you have a child with autism. We’ll be learning a ton of information about what autism really is, and how you can potentially help people with this developmental disorder. Dannie on the other hand helps children with behavioral problems. Behaven Kids offers a range of behavioral health services that give all children and families hope and help, including the Specialized Day Program, counseling, child behavior coaching, training/workshops, parenting books and more.
Listen in tonight for this great show by tuning your radio to 89.3 KZUM, if you’re in the Lincoln Nebraska area, or you can always visit kzum.org to listen live from anywhere in the world. We go live at 6:30pm CST, and if you have questions for these ladies you can leave them in the comments, tweet me, or post on my Facebook wall.
Here’s a video of Michelle Kosmicki giving a talk at TedxLincoln
Here’s a video from Behaven Kids
We Need Your Gift
Last night I had Shane Farritor on my radio show! He’s a professor of Mechanical Engineering at UNL. We talked all about gifts on the air, because Shane wants YOU to share you gift and your passion with the world. Watch his Tedx Talk below and if you’re in the Lincoln area make sure to come to Ignite Lincoln on January 26th to hear both Shane and I speak.
Click here to listen to my interview with Shane!
100 Dreams
Happy monday everyone!
Here’s my challenge to you this week: Create a list of your 100 dreams
Below are my 100 dreams to help spark your imagination. Just think of anything you’ve ever wanted to do! I’ll be crossing these off throughout my whole life, and every year I update and revise my dreams.
Share your dreams with me if you’d like!
My 100 Dreams
- Inspire other people to follow their dreams by passionately pursuing each of mine.
- Have a TV show on Food Network because that’s what first inspired me to cook.
- Open a restaurant that focuses on serving healthy food and helps families become healthy.
- Successfully host and promote my radio show and podcast so It’s very well known and respected.
- Become a more focused entrepreneur
- Create my website so that it’s extremely unique and engaging with many new and returning guests.
- Own a food truck that serves healthy food that tastes AMAZING.
- Workout 6 days a week, or every chance I get. Even if I don’t feel like it.
- Have 10,000 twitter followers…and then any number beyond will be like a dream.
- Eat dinner with Alton Brown
- Get a meaningful and cool tattoo.
- Go skydiving in the Swiss Alps
- Move to California for college and always have a place to live there.
- Create an online cooking show with a big sponsor. (Kitchen Aid, BHG, Vitamix)
- Always be as unique and creative as possible.
- Get my pilots license.
- Spend a month in Vietnam.
- Build a house on LOTS of land.
- Live where I can see tons of starts at night.
- Win a James Beard Award!
- Be a guest on Good Morning America.
- Be a guest on the Today Show.
- Be a guest on the Rachel Ray Show.
- Be a guest on the Ellen Show.
- Eat dinner and have awesome conversation with Jose Andres.
- Meet and talk with Jamie Oliver and then partner in some kind of project.
- Get a huge sponsor to support our Fatplate radio show.
- Open restaurant incubators in Lincoln and beyond.
- Purchase farmland and grow all kinds of healthy and delicious foods.
- Open a restaurant that uses only food from the farm.
- Syndicate one of my radio shows.
- WRITE A BOOK! Write more than one book actually, and get them done fast! Then be a New York Times Best Selling Author.
- Go to New York City and visit Food Network and Chelsea’s Market.
- Make a time capsule.
- Go back to the Grand Wailea on Maui every 5 years.
- Live in Spain for 1 year.
- Go on a cruise to Panama, Costa Rica, and Belize again.
- Buy a small house/shack in the Caribbean.
- Visit Atlantis in Nassau again.
- Snorkel in the Great Barrier Reef.
- Go vegan for a week.
- Workout on the beach.
- Dye my hair a crazy color.
- Cook with and eat bugs.
- Eat a piece of fish or other sea life on the boat that caught it.
- Compete on Iron Chef America.
- Go to Culinary School.
- Get a degree in nutrition and dietetics.
- Throw a BIG party for all the close people in my life that helped me become who I am.
- Be the keynote speaker at the UCLA extension restaurant industry conference.
- Create a speaking tour and go all over the United States.
- Get 1,000 “Likes” on facebook.
- Have a destination wedding.
- Create a color-coding system for food that is served in schools. With the mission being to educate students about nutrition without them really knowing their learning.
- Go on a speaking tour with a political figure.
- Eat dinner with Anthony Bourdain.
- Have 4 children.
- Be a mentor to many people.
- Visit South Africa.
- Always remember to give back to the community!
- Always start by telling people why I’m doing what I’m doing, not just the details about what I’m doing.
- Buy a boat and Jet Ski!
- Have a cabin on a lake in Nebraska.
- Meet the President and First Lady.
- Eat my way through Europe.
- Cook with an old Greek lady in her kitchen.
- Never become part of a pyramid scheme business.
- Always remember to BE MYSELF.
- Remember who my true friends are and let them always know how thankful I am for them being in my life.
- Go up to Grand Island and cook with my grandma, and talk to my grandpa who I haven’t seen since I don’t know when.
- Watch the sunset on the airplane beach in St. Martin.
- Own sugar gliders again.
- Go in one of those shark cages where I can see a great white up close and personal in its own environment.
- Be involved with the UCLA extension restaurant industry conference every year.
- Visit a black sand beach.
- Have lunch with….drum roll please…Oprah!
- Have my podcast do AMAZING on iTunes.
- Buy the person behind me in a drive through at a coffee shop their drink(s).
- Re-design the idea of what a kitchen should look like.
- Build a mobile kitchen for speaking engagements that’s unique and cool!
- Own a range rover
- Own a FJ cruiser.
- Help my mom open up a business.
- Create a HUGE healthy eating campaign and partner with big name entertainers.
- Buy a pair of TOM’s sunglasses.
- Allow a needy family to always eat free in my restaurant.
- Be mentioned in a lady gaga tweet. LOL.
- Eat dinner with Andrew Zimmern.
- Be a New York Times and LA Times contributor for food and nutrition.
- Randomly be cast in a movie.
- Always hand write and mail thank you letters.
- Go on a cruise through the Mediterranean.
- Learn how to play the guitar.
- Go on an African Safari and see a giraffe.
- Own a “pocket pig” as a pet.
- Design a line of cooking tools.
- Be the spokes person for a BIG non-profit organization.
- Have a unique and fun office space. A one of a kind office atmosphere.
- Look at the stars from a boat out in the middle of the ocean.
- Always remember Success is a journey, not a destination.
