Heart of the Matter Monday: The Right Kind of Concern

Food Fact Fridays: Quiona Granola

One of my favorite blogs is InspriedRD.  She has wonderful recipes and a great perspective on life and faith.  She also has monthly contributors speak on fitness and  ethics in the field of dietetics.  It is worth multiple visits to her blog each month, but I couldn't help also bringing over one of her recipes over here.   It is Quionoa (KEEn-WA) granola .  It certainly is different than your regular oatmeal granola and may not be for all people, but I found myself really liking (ok,so I  thought it was delicious and had a hard time with portion control!). For people who are gluten-free and/or who wish to avoid any kind of oatmeal (even the gluten-free kind) this is worthy of trying.  Keep up your healthy, holiday eating goals with this unique recipe!

Cathryn's Variations:
Soak Quiona and walnuts for 2 hours or overnight.  Drain both before using.  Note that this adds ~ 20 minutes to the cook time.  Why soak the grains and walnuts?  Well, it helps to activate the enzymes that take care of a pesky little anti-nutrient in both nuts,seeds and grains called phytic acid.  Phytic acid binds to the vitamins and minerals in your food, inhibiting your own absorption of them.

Crunchy Quinoa Granola

Recipe type: Breakfast, Snack

Prep time:  5 mins

Cook time:  20 mins

Total time:  25 mins

A fun twist on granola. Gluten-free and oat free. Super easy and delicious!

Ingredients

• ¾ cup pre-rinsed quinoa
• 1 cup walnut halves
• ½ cup unsweetened coconut flakes
• ½ tsp. Celtic sea salt
• 2 Tbsp. coconut oil
• ¼ cup maple syrup
• ½ cup unsweetened dried cherries (I used dried blueberries...yum!)

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Combine quinoa, walnut halves, coconut, salt, coconut oil and maple syrup. Spread quinoa mixture into a thin layer on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Bake for 20 minutes, stirring halfway through. Toss with dried cherries and cool. Store in an airtight container.

Gainfully Employed

Today I kind of feel like a little girl who goes to kindergarten for the first time—the little girl who suddenly feels like a like a “big girl.”  You know the feeling right (Or if you are a homeschool-all-the-way girl like me then you only pretend you know the feeling because you never really had a true first-day-of kindgarten-smile)  The girl-child has all the big girl stuff: the shoes, the lunch box, the piggy tails or French braid. Everything that says “big girl.”   Everything, that is, except for the little feeling of “small girl” that is still inside. I guess this feeling can be just called “the new experience feeling.”

Today I feel a sense of the big girl-little girl feeling because today I start my first job as a Registered Dietitian (RD). 

Scary.  Exciting. Crazy.  The rate at which the whole job-finding and hiring process went truly astonished me.  It once again makes me truly thankful for God’s many kindnesses to me. 

A week after my surgery I started putting out applications for clinical RD jobs.  I wasn’t trying to be overly ambitious (although I was feeling pretty good) I just figured that the job search process was going to take a while so why not start sooner than later?  Three weeks later, I submitted my third job application to a long term care agency.  I never really thought of starting my career in that sort of environment since most of the RDs there are “on their own” and I am a new RD who wouldn’t mind some mentoring relationship with my “superiors.”  Somehow, when I saw the job posting I just thought I would go ahead and give it a shot.  My stomach gave a complete lurch when they called me back the same afternoon I had applied, wanting to know if they could schedule an interview for the next week.  One week and three interviews later, I accepted the full time position. 

Scary.  Exciting. Crazy.

So today I begin a new journey.  I will be working for a company that owns five long term care facilities ranging from 20 to 53 miles from my home.    The Senior RD and I will visit a different facility each day, conducting initial and follow-up nutrition assessments for 700 patients in addition to supervising some of the food service operations in each of the kitchens.  (Note: NOT all 700 patients need assessments each week. There are monthly and quarterly assessments as well as special circumstances that call for them). 

Past experience has taught me that nothing in life is easy.  So my expectations for this job run along those same lines.  I am excited and scared and expect some hard days/seasons (whether it be the > 1 hour commute each day, or co-workers, patients etc) but I also bank on Gods Faithfulness.   

In a time when many I know are having some difficulty with finding suitable jobs, I am thankful that God has provided for me.  Health-wise I am feeling great and in many ways feel as though a page…perhaps a new volume, has been started.  Thank you Lord.