Gallo Pinto is a whole grain and legume mixture. Gallo Pinto has its roots in Costa Rica where it is a white rice and black bean mixture with a spicy sauce called Salsa Lizano. Our recipe makes it with brown rice and other grains. The recipe is below. You can buy the sauce in the United States or you can make a similar sauce from the recipe provided below. Ingredients:…
Congee is a grain-based, medicinal porridge served for centuries in traditional East Indian and Chinese homes. It is an easy and affordable dish to incorporate into any diet. It is used preventively to promote good health and strong digestion. Congee for breakfast is simple and easy to make. You use a small amount of grain with 5-6 times more water, sea vegetables, dried fruit and spices. For a lunch or…
By Kathryn Hayward, MD, and David L. Thomas, Jr. Exciting things are happening with the 4 COS4S initiative. People love the inclusiveness, creativity and joy of collaborating to encourage restaurants, schools and hospitals to offer whole food, plant-based options. In this blog, we are introducing The Home Project as a fourth 4 COS4S project to complement the other three. You don’t need to wait for a 4 COS4S restaurant near you—you can…
By Kathryn Hayward, M.D. and Elle Stetson-Dibble One of the most emotionally charged subjects concerning our food choices involves animal welfare. As we embarked on understanding and writing about this often-polarizing topic, we made a commitment to discover a way to discuss it with balance, openness and curiosity, and to find areas of common ground among all concerned. We both felt eager to learn about this theme from a variety…
By Kathryn Hayward, M.D. On Thursday night last week, we enjoyed a wonderful dinner at the first restaurant on Mallorca to embrace the 4 COS4S project. From prior posts, you will recall that 4 COS4S invites restaurants to add to their menus four whole food, plant-based items. The restaurant is Can Amer, one of Mallorca’s finest dining establishments located in the small city of Inca. A few weeks ago, Caty…
By Kathryn Hayward, M.D. and Elle Stetson-Dibble There are few activities that affect our individual health and well-being more than what we put in our bodies for nutrition. When we make daily decisions about what to eat, we usually think about how that food is going to taste, going to make us feel, and how it is going to affect our health and our weight. However, we often do not think…
International Integrators Facilitator Caty Genestra Villalonga has started a movement in Spain around the common expression “4 COS4S” or “four things” to increase awareness about the benefits of eating whole, plant-based foods. As discussed in the January 25th blog, the 4 COS4S Project started by inviting restaurants on the Mediterranean island of Mallorca to add “4 things” (“4 cosas”) to their menus whose ingredients are whole food, plant-based and do…
Our Mallorcan friend Caty is the inspiring leader of the International Integrators project 4 COS4S. When Caty became involved with International Integrators, she read El Estudio de China (The China Study), which immediately affected her awareness of her own eating patterns and those of her two school-aged nephews and their schoolmates. “It’s nothing like the Mediterranean diet that I grew up with,” she says. The more Caty learns about whole…
A few years ago, I was facilitating a group of medical students in a self-reflection exercise. After sharing, listening, weeping and hugging, we stood in a circle and pressed the palms of our hands together and brought them to our hearts. I looked deeply into the eyes of each student in the circle and said, “Namaste. The light in me sees the light in you. The sacred in me sees…
I live on the island of Mallorca, a Spanish island in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea. People here regard themselves as the Chosen Ones when it comes to diet. After all, numerous scientific studies or at least their press accounts have told the whole world that the Mediterranean diet is the winner. For those living around this body of water, this is a source of pride (“we are the…