A Homemade Thai Meal for a Hectic Life

People sometimes have this misconception that I cook intricate, time-consuming, healthy meals every single night. Unfortunately, I do not; like many of you, my lifestyle is not conducive to that. I have a 9-5 job in addition to my holistic health counseling practice, my daily exercise regimen, and important relationships that I nouirsh. There are only so many hours in the day!

I'm very conscientious about not consuming a lot of packaged foods, but there are some options that are free of crazy additives. For this recipe, I use Trader Joe's light coconut milk and Thai Kitchen's red curry paste. Isn't that great that even the simplest meals can be healthy?! I like whipping up this Thai dish. So simple.

Shannon's Simplest Thai
(Serves two)

• Get your rice cooker going with 1 cup brown rice and 2 cups of water!
  
• Chop 2 heads of broccoli into small florets.
• Steam the broccoli for 8 minutes
• Meanwhile, rinse 18 pre-peeled and deveined shrimp
• Chop 3 cloves of garlic into tiny pieces
• Sautee garlic in 1 Tablespoon of sesame oil for 1 minute.
  
• Add shrimp and cook until it turns pink.
• Toss in broccoli.
• Mix 1 Tablespoon of Thai red curry paste with 1/2 cup of lite coconut milk and pour over shrimp and broccoli.
• Serve on top of rice. Voila!

WHY NOT TO CONSUME SOY

Many of you already know that I am not a huge fan of soy. In fact, it really irks me when companies promote and tout soy as an ever-so-amazing health food. It's not; not the way we have come to use it here. Most soy products on the market today are genetically engineered--government subsidies have enticed farmers to convert many of their crops from “real food” to soy. What does this mean for food manufacturers? Because soy is a subsidized crop, it is CHEAP, so all packaged food companies jump on it and USE it! It is hard to find a packaged food product that does not contain soy.

Soy has harmed me personally. I was a vegetarian for 12 years. As I launched my career in holistic health back in 2002, I was simultaneously suffering from severe abdominal cramps that would at times paralyze me. After eliminating foods, I found that when I didn't eat soy, I didn't get those abdominal cramps! I had a soy intolerance! It was then that I became skeptical of soy. I learned that it wasn't healthy after all; that it raises estrogen levels and that because it's genetically engineered (when it's not organic), it can create a whole host of problems.

Interestingly, when I consumed soy, I had a horrible problem with ovarian cysts...and guess what? High levels of estrogen cause cysts! These days, I have eliminated all foods that have high estrogen levels (no more morning cups of Joe).

Today, seven years after my departure with soy, research continues to reveal the dangers in excess soy consumption. The latest: consuming large amounts could have harmful effects on female fertility and reproductive development.

I advise you to keep your soy consumption in check. If you are going to have it, choose the fermented types such as miso or tempeh and make sure it's organic! If you want to read more about the latest soy research, check out this article from Environmental Health News.