Healthy Food Buys

This week Costco has wild caught sockeye Copper River salmon fillets for $9.99 per pound.  Having grown up eating fresh caught salmon in Western Washington, I  recognize Copper River as some of the best wild caught salmon available for a short time every year.  The salmon is a deep red color naturally, high in omega 3 fats, exceptionally tender and grills easily on the BBQ.  These fillets run between 1 to 2 pounds.  I prefer the larger fillets running around 1.5 pounds.  I find placing the seasoned fillet on the grill skin side down for 8 to 9 minutes on medium high with the lid closed yields perfectly grilled salmon every time.   While the salmon run on the Copper River in Alaska, Costco puts out a limited number of fresh salmon fillets every morning.  Once you have tasted Copper River, you will remember year after year what a true treat it is to eat Copper River salmon at home.

Costco also has frozen organic raspberries and frozen organic blackberries in the frozen food section.  Conventional grown berries are in the top dozen of most contaminated with pesticide fruits and are not recommended if you want to avoid illnesses related to pesticide ingestion like autoimmune and cancers.  So finding a supply of organic frozen berries in large packages for smoothies and baked goods is an anti cancer find.  This week I bought the frozen organic berries and baked a Northwest berry crisp using gluten free oats, walnuts, butter, brown sugar and gluten free flour to make a dessert to go with the grilled salmon.  Pesticide free berries and wild caught salmon are delicious healthy food choice for the whole family.

Alaskan wild caught salmon has many advantages over farmed salmon starting with it’s natural high levels of omega three fats.  Farmed fish is often raised with antibiotics, hormones, artificial dyes and GMO grains to speed up growth and make the salmon flesh appear similar to wild caught salmon.  What the salmon ingests as food is ultimately passed onto the consumer which is why eating fresh wild caught salmon is the healthy pick.

 

Northwest Berry Crisp

1 cup gluten free oats

1 cup walnuts

2 tablespoons of gluten free flour

1 tablespoon almond flour

1/3 cup organic butter

½ cup organic brown sugar

1/3 cup organic white sugar

1 tsp vanilla

½ tsp of salt

2 heaping tablespoons cornstarch

5 cups of frozen berries (blackberries and raspberries)

Blend butter and brown sugar.  Add oats, walnuts, vanilla, salt. Set aside.

Add 1/3 cup white cane  sugar to frozen berries.  Take 3 tablespoons of water and mix with cornstarch to form a slurry.  Mix slurry into frozen berries and sugar mixture.  Spray baking dish with Pam and place berry mixture in dish.  Add oat walnut mixture as topping.  Place in preheated  350 degree oven for 45 to 55 minutes.  Remove from oven once topping browns and berries are bubbling.  Serve with vanilla ice cream or frozen yogurt.

A note about gluten free flours.  There are many different based gluten free flours.  The flours that are bean based- fava or garbanzo tend to have a metallic aftertaste.  Although rice based and potato based gluten free flours have a higher glycemic index you may find them more palatable. In this recipe I use  gluten free rolled oats (Red Mill)  to replace most of the flour used in traditional cobbler or crisp with minimal gluten free flour.  From a health stand point, oats are the better choice over flour as oats are a whole grain with a high fiber content and lower glycemic index.

To avoid GMOs in sugar, buy organic sugars or cane sugars.  Most beet based sugars are genetically modified and until we have mandated labels for GMOs you have to discern for yourself what plant based foods are likely to be GMO or not.