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Honestly, I wasn’t sure if this mix “Discoveries” drink would be any good. It’s from Starbucks, and you already know I love Starbucks coffee. But the stuff at home…it just seemed a little, “boxed wine” for my taste.

But I wanted a change-up from the usual coffee with a hint of half-and-half or soy milk. So I purchased this Starbucks, “Discoveries” Caramel Macchiato for 5 bucks. It was usually $5.99 but it was on sale. And since I thought I might get more drinks out of it than going to Starbucks and talking to a barrista I decided to give it a shot.

Here’s what I ended up making:

1 part ice –

4 parts Starbucks Caramel Macchiato Mix

2 or 3 parts Half and Half

STIR and ENJOY!!

It is a fun drink and the half and half makes it easily silky!!! Yum!

-Tyler

PS: Here’s a video that I made showing how its done.

Heirloom Tomatoes – DE LISH OUS

Have you ever heard the term, “Brain Foods?” This term is used for good study foods that get the mind and body in a state where one can absorb information.

The brain needs nutrients in order to make new neural connections and new folds in its lobes.

One of the most important nutrients the brain needs is fat. Without natural healthy fats, the brain doesn’t function very well. But that’s not all. The brain needs blood. Also salt is required for neural connection firing. Potassium is important as well. Also selenium is important for lots of body functions. Psychology Today says that selenium is a cellular antioxidant.

An easy way to get many of these nutrients at once is to eat more food. This may seem strange in our society today. We are often told to eat less and to watch our calories. But in fact most of us aren’t getting the right kinds of foods as often as we should. This is especially true if one is doing heavy studying in the hard sciences, art and/or mathematics.

When I say food, I’m talking primarily about vegetables, legumes, nuts and quality fruits. Many of us are disgusted by vegetables because they look strange, they aren’t sweet and they aren’t fun. But if you watch the video below, you’ll see that vegetables are actually very fun.

I’m not vegetarian at all. I just ate two hamburgers yesterday with bacon on them. That’s about as non-vegetarian as it gets.

But I definitely make sure to eat lots of vegetables, mushrooms, nuts, legumes and other good foods as well as what I call, “Fun foods.” If you’re studying strenuously, you really have little choice. Pill-Form-Vitamins are preached all the time by internet gurus. But these pills are no way near as good as eating what is called, “A wide spectrum diet” look it up. See what other people are saying about eating lots of natural foods in ADDITION to your already established diet.

So let’s talk about Heirloom tomatoes. In the video and the picture above, they look like candy. They’re shiny, colorful and beautiful on the inside. But on the outside they look irregular, kind of scary and downright amorphous at times. Many people see a heirloom tomato for the first time and they think it is some other kind of fruit or vegetable like a pepper or something. They just don’t look like what we’re used to seeing.

Heirloom tomatoes have a natural source of iron, the best kind of natural water and many other nutrients. Why is water important? Well how much do you pay for bottled water? It isn’t cheap right! Imagine if you could buy a little bottle of water that was purified over several months and it had tremendous amounts of trace rare nutrients in it. That’s exactly what heirloom tomatoes do. They are a system that is created by the tomato vine which has the function of making little baby tomato vines. That’s what tomatoes are actually, they are basically the “fruit” of the tomato vine. So the vine puts tremendous amounts of work and energy into each heirloom tomato to make it a perfect vessel for its creation process. It’s a contained system, the seeds in the tomato get all the water they need from the fruit of the tomato in order to grow for its initial stages. So the water inside an heirloom tomato is very good for a human being. This is because human beings and other animals are part of the ecosystem which perpetuates the life-cycle of the tomato. So don’t feel bad about eating vegetables. They want us to eat them.

Also, you’ll see there are mushrooms in this video. These are cremini mushrooms that you can get at any supermarket. They taste great if they are boiled with the tomatoes. Mushrooms are naturally high in selenium and if you cook them thoroughly they simply taste great!

I hope you enjoy the video below!

-Tyler

Yellow Curry: Mushrooms and Carrots and Also White Potatoes

This Yellow Curry recipe is super easy. All I did was first cut up my vegetables. I actually cut them up while the wok water was heating up. This saves time.

After cutting the white potatoes, carrots and mushrooms I tossed them in the wok. Also, some black pepper and salt was added to the mix.

Around the same time, I started to heat up another pot of water for the rice. The rice is very easy to do. First, boil the rice till you start to see that bubble stuff appear. The biggest mistake is using too much water, overcooking the rice and then discarding water. Never discard water. You loose nutrients that way.

The trick is to use only a little bit of water for the rice. And after the rice begins to make those filmy bubbles…turn off the rice heat and then cover the rice while it is still on the stove. The residual heat will create a toroidal temporary convection which will recycle the heat in the pot. Since it’s covered, all the water will be absorbed into the rice. This makes the rice taste great and you don’t have to multi-task it at all.

Once the vegetables in the wok are boiling and the water seems to be bubbling away, add the curry powder, more pepper and a little salt. Once the vegetable curry becomes slightly saucy instead of watery…you’re done!

I actually added a little, “Beef Bullion” to the curry to add some meat flavor. But that is completely optional. If you want a vegetarian and/or vegan meal skip that step. But since I’m an omnivore I added it for a little pizazz!!

Here’s a video which shows you the end product and a little about the process:

-Tyler

Scrambled Artichoke Heart Frittata in cooking process

This is a recipe for hungry people. If you eat this too many days in a row, then you probably won’t live to read the next recipe that this site has to offer. It is a Scrambled Artichoke Heart Frittata and it is delicious. I eat food like this if I am extremely hungry and have recently done a great deal of exercise. It is high in fat, cholesterol, protein, and oil. It also has artichoke hearts, tomatoes, some avocado and pepper in it to make it more balanced. The main ingredients are as follows:

Preparation Bowl #1

4 eggs – yolks and all, beaten and put in its own bowl.

Preparation Bowl #2

1 medium sized tomato – cut out all the hard parts. Then cut it up into pieces. It will be mostly melted and turned into the juices for the meal so making it super small is unnecessary and not recommended.

1 half of an avocado – it is preferable that this is a ripe avocado. This will make the whole dish taste good.

4 artichoke heart sections – these artichoke hearts could be purchased in a little jar. They usually come in oil. They are delicious quite literally by themselves, and will make an excellent addition to this simple dish. If you don’t have any that are in a jar. Then you can always use fresh artichoke hearts. If you are using fresh artichoke hearts that you boiled and steamed yourself. Then just use one full artichoke heart that you cut into four pieces.

Once everything is in Preparation Bowl #2 then add some salt, olive oil, and pepper to the bowl. Stir it up with a spoon and let it hang out until you are ready.

Preparation Bowl #3

White Cheese (choose your favorite white cheese) – add as much as your little inner cheese minion wants (if you do not feed your cheese minion then it will no longer be your familiar) it is best if the cheese is cut into manageable chunks or slices. They are going to be melted as the dish progresses.

Let’s get started!

First things first. This is an easy dish to make. It is much faster than the other recipes on here and it is fun. You will impress people and probably yourself with how good it is. Too bad you will probably eat it all yourself and not share. (I don’t)

Take a skillet or pan and put some olive oil in it. Make sure you have all your preparation bowls ready to go. Then turn the heat on high over a small stove and heat up the pan. Once the olive oil is all spread around by using a spreading brush add some butter to it. Once the butter is all heated up and bubbling, drop the beaten eggs from Preparation Bowl #1 into the pan. Don’t disturb it for about 40 seconds or more. Right before it gets cooked enough that it looks like it could be turned into an omelet, then take a spatula and scramble the eggs. Once the eggs are slightly cooked for about 15 seconds, move onto the next step.

Quickly stir in the contents of Preparation Bowl #2 into the eggs. Add more oil and butter as you go. Start stirring immediately and let the tomatoes get all juicy into the mix. You can reduce the heat to medium at this point. I would add some extra pinches of salt and more pepper during this time. Too much salt makes it gross, but pepper can be quite generous if you like pepper.

Continue to stir the whole thing for another 40 seconds and then add the cut pieces of white cheese from Preparation Bowl #3 into the pan. Now your meal should look like the first picture at the top of this recipe. Keep stirring and stirring, try not to let too much stick to the bottom of the pan. Although some sticking is inevitable unless you have some kind of super non-stick ban that I don’t know about.

As your stir the Scrambled Frittata, you will notice the meal is changing color. I’ve found that depending on the type of olive oil you use, the color will vary. But you can always taste test the eggs to see if it is done.

Scrambled Artichoke Frittata ready to eat

Once you taste-tested your meal, and find that it is done. You can put in on a nice plate, put it in a bowl…it will taste good no matter what if you did it right. I prefer putting it in a bowl because then it stays warm longer. And since there is so much food, it takes a little time to eat it all. I usually just put it in a bowl and then clean up the dishes before I even eat the meal. In the Zen Book I’m reading, the zen master says that once the area is clean after eating the food, then and only then is the meal complete. Well, I like to eat guilt free by doing the tougher dishes first…everything except for my fork and bowl. That way I don’t have to worry about it and I can go for a walk around town to digest the meal.

This is a lot of food, so two young people could probably share this and both feel happy. But the picture makes it look so small. I just want to pinch it with my fingers and eat it all over again.

One thing you’ll notice with food preparation, is that the size and shape of the serving dish will greatly affect the perception of the portions. If you look at the picture up and to the right, it will look very small. But in fact there is 4 eggs in there and a whole tomato, among other things. If this was on a plate you probably wouldn’t even be able to finish it all without it getting cold. But in a large bowl, it looks like a little fairy snack…for giants to eat.

-Tyler