Bok Choy Smoothie $2.00

Ok, so unless it’s in a Thai Curry, I find bok choy a bit difficult to handle.  I’ll do it steamed with my special sauce, but during the summer, who really wants to turn up the heat?  That’s why I created this recipe for raw bok choy.  I’d hate to waste any of my local, organic CSA share from Central Brooklyn CSA.

Note: This recipe can be remixed based on what you have in the house.  Below are two delicious variations.

Recipe 1

• 2-4 giant leaves of bok choy
• 2 uber ribe frozen bananas
• 1 cup vanilla coconut milk (refrigerated kind from Trader Joe’s)
• 1 cup clean water
• 1/2 cup frozen mango chunks
• juice of 1/2 lime

Serves 1-2 people as a whole meal.

Price estimate breakdown:  bok choy $0.25 (1/4 of head from CSA share which includes about 8 items for $7.36 EBT); organic bananas $0.58 (.29 each TJ’s); coconut milk .37 (1/8 of $2.99); mango chunks .50 (1/4 of $2 pack); 1/2 lime .13
TOTAL PRICE:  $1.83

Recipe 2

• 2-4 leaves bok choy
• 1 banana
• 1/2 haas avocado
• 4 dates (this will determine the sweetness)
• 1/2 cup frozen mango chunks
• juice of 1/2 lime
• Coconut milk to blend

FREE YOGA at Hip Dhamma June 13- July 17

Coming Soon to a Studio Near You—Free Yoga!

With yoga now all the rage, when are you finally going to get on board? OK, maybe you tried it, but it didn’t hit the mark. Or perhaps you’re a committed practitioner, but still itching for the studio that feels just right? We’ve got you covered.

LUNA Bar and Yoga Local are teaming up to bring you a wide array of free yoga classes, all around New York City and the vicinity, and all accessible via your mobile phone.

Download the free Yoga Local iPhone App or find a participating yoga studio via Yoga Local’s website (bodylocal.com); all you have to do is sign up and show up. The rest is on us. From June 13 to July 17, we are giving away 500 yoga passes from 25 different studios with the LUNA Free Yoga Series.

We’re also raising money for the amazing nonprofit Edible Schoolyard NYC . Started by Alice Waters in 1995, The Edible Schoolyard Project teaches elementary school kids about the life cycle of the food they eat by having them raise and prepare their own meals. The food curriculum is seamlessly integrated into their learning. In the last two years, the LUNA Free Yoga Series has raised funds for other charities such as Food Fight, Kula for Karma, and Bent on Learning; with your help, we’re going to do even more good work this year!

How does it work? Sign up with your email address via the Yoga Local iPhone app or LUNA Free Yoga Series websiteand receive a free class pass at the participating LUNA studio of your choice!

If you want more accept our challenge to support Edible Schoolyards with a $10 donation, and you will be entered to win one free month of yoga at the participating LUNA studio of your choice.

Imagine—a month of side cranes, wheel poses, and forearm balances—all for free!

Help yourself and your community: visit the LFYS website to sign up!

Sancocho Recipe and Lesson Plan

Sancocho (Soup) y Ensalada (Salad)

Let’s say good-bye to winter with this warm comforting soup, and welcome in fresh greens with an enlivening salad.  Sancocho recipe inspired by the Go Green East Harlem Cookbook.  Read about how it became vegan here.

Vocabulary

• yucca – a root vegetable
• starch – an important element of our nutrition. Delivers carbs, gives a sense of comfort.
• Plantain – a commonly used ingredient in Caribbean cuisine

STEM

• Science – We identify starches in our diets and their roles.
• Technology – We use a few helpful tools to mash our green bananas.
• Engineering – The texture of our soup will depend on the cooking of the bananas.
• Math – if this recipe serves, 6, how many times do we need to increase the quantity to feed our class and friends?

Equipment Needed

• Knives
• Stew pot
• Blender or food processor
• bowls

Ingredients
Sancocho

• 2 yautia root (sub yams if necessary)
• 1 large yucca
• 6 potatoes
• 2 ears of corn
• 1 green plantain
• 1 bunch cilantro
• 1 large yellow onion
• 1 bell pepper (green)
• small pack of tofu or meat imitation (optional)
• 4 green bananas
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• S&P

Salad

• 1 large green cabbage
• 2 avocados
• 2 red bell peppers
• handful of sun-dried tomatoes sliced

 Procedures

Sancocho

• Peel yautia (or yams), yucca, and potatoes and cut into large chunks, Break or cut the ears of corn into pieces. Cut the plantain into this slices. Chop the cilantro, culantro, onions, and peppers.
• In a large stew pot, add 2 cups of clean water.
• Puree the green bananas, drop pureed bananas into pot of boiling water.
• Add all remaining ingredients and return to boil, adding water if necessary. Simmer until all ingredients are soft. Add salt and pepper to taste.
• Optional, sprinkle in some imitation meat protein for varied texture.  We used Tofurkey ground beef.

Salad

• Chop cabbage finely
• Use two avocados to make a creamy dressing by blending with water and salt
• Slice various veggies to adorn the salad

Sancocho!

For the last day of winter, the kids and I created a warm and delicious sancocho, a stew that I first learned about while living in Santo Domingo.  The stew is rich and creamy and contains a medley of soothing starches like yucca, yautia (we used yams), plantain, and potato.  There’s something truly marvelous about the soothing quality of starches.  While they lamented the absence of meat, di youth nonetheless indulged in the sancocho, going for bowl after bowl as they praised the recipe and the cooking class!  Even my director noted that there was something addictive about it.  Just for the record, I broke down and bought them some tofurkey ground beef, which gave a nice texture to the vegan dish, though I generally avoid soy products.

The best part of creating this recipe was coming to understand how the creaminess is achieved.  I doubted that it could ever be made vegan when I first tried it.  But to my surprise the creamy consistency comes from pureeing and boiling green bananas.  I predict that I will be serving this dish A LOT in the near future despite the warm weather on the horizon.  The recipe and lesson plan is here.

Birthing and Blooming: The Divine Feminine Spring

*Art & Yoga Workshop dedicated to Spring and the Divine Feminine*

Come explore the concept of Birthing & Blooming through yogic movement and paper crafting

This is a pay what you wish experience.

Suggested Donation – $15 RSVP here

Participants will take part in one hour of open level yoga activity followed by a journaling exercise, delicious healthy snacks and paper crafting!!

Bring your journal, favorite scissors and paper.

We are setting goals and creating intentions for the oncoming vibrant Spring season!!

Fun playlist will consist of Nina Simone, Bjork, Alice Smith, Sade, Lauryn Hill, Imani Uzuri, Erykah Badu, Betty Davis, Teena Marie, Janet Jackson and so on and so on 🙂

This is will be a very feminine centered class but ALL genders are invited to take part!!  Facebook event link.

All Kale Everything Recipes/Lesson Plan

All Kale Everything – Massaged Kale Salad, Cheezy Kale Chips
Lesson plan created by rachel bolden-kramer for culinary classes at Keys to Abundant Life
Read about how the youth responded to the recipe and more here.

 Vocabulary

• Antioxidants – found in veggies, these help neutralize harmful free radicals that cause cell damage
• Brassica – the cabbage family of vegetables
• Alzheimer’s – a disease that causes damage to the brain.  Vitamin K in kale is found to be a treatment

STEM

• Science – Kale has vitamin K, which is important for bone health, like calcium, and is more beneficial to our bones than milk!
• Technology – We will mimic the process of dehydration by baking kale chips in the oven on a low temperature.  Dehydration helps us retain the most nutrients in our food.
• Engineering – We will create a perfect consistency for our pate in our food processor.  We will create a chiffonade of kale leaves for the salad
• Math – We will need to measure 1 cup of nuts for each batch of pate, broke up over two batches.

Equipment Needed

Cutting boards
Knives
Small food processor
Citrus press
Measuring cup
Cookie sheets
Parchment paper

 Nut/Seed Pate

• 1 cup brazil nuts, cashews, or seeds
• 1 red bell pepper
• 1 capful turmeric
• 2 cloves garlic
• juice of 1 lemon
• ½ tsp sea salt

Combine all ingredients in food processor and blend until thoroughly combined and almost creamy

Massaged Kale Salad

• 4 bunches of kale
• 6 avocados
• 6 tomatoes
• 6 cucumbers
• 2 white onions
• 4 sheets of nori
• 2 lemons
• drizzle of olive oil
• nut/seed pate

Wash and de-stem kale.  Stack leaves and roll into a bunch.  Cut strips by slicing the roll to create a chiffonade.  Place strips in bowl and massage with lemon juice and olive oil.  Cover and let kale marinate.  Add chopped tomatoes, cucumbers, avocado, onion, shredded nori, and dulse powder.  Toss with nut/seed pate.  Serve!

Cheezy Kale Chips

• 2-4 bunches of kale
• nut/see pate

Preheat oven to 300.  Wash and de-stem kale.  Tear into chip size.  Toss in pate.  Lay chips on baking sheet.  Bake for 10 minutes or until dry and crispy.

All Kale Everything

All Kale Everything
by rachel bolden-kramer

Kids love anti-oxidant rich greens, a better source of calcium than milk, and with more vitamin C than orange juice.  Don’t believe me, just watch.

I have a food budget to spend on the last minute lesson plan I created just after receiving the call to substitute for the usual chef on duty at three after school cooking classes in Brooklyn.  All Kale Everything demands only the finest ingredients, so let me give yo a$$ a checklist: 6 tomatoes, red bell peppers, cucumbers, and lemons; 12 avocados, 32 ounces of brazil nuts; and 30 nori wraps, it’s nothing!  That is in addition to the 8 bunches of the green super leaf that these young chefs are about to get real intimate with.  I’ve planned to teach them the ancient method of kale massage with olive oil and lemon juice.  And since time is limited, I’m blowing my entire budget at Green Planet on Fulton despite Tenzin’s prices.  Since sticking to my EBT enhancement strategies typically means nailing bargains at larger chain stores, I’ma balance it out and support my local organic market for All Kale Everything.  Trinidad James would approve of this organic ostentatiousness.

When asked what we will be making in class today I answer that first we will start with the cheese.  After identifying where cheese usually comes from, cows’ udders, I introduce our first task – to make cheese out of vegetables.  As most students get down to washing, de-stemming, and chiffonade-ing our kale leaves, I put the hyperactive chefs in charge of the food processor.  I’d rather see them make nut paté in a safety locking Cuisinart than hand them knives.  They’ll also be in charge of the kale chips – operating an oven and watching to make sure the chips don’t burn is very demanding of attention!  Bell peppers, added to the nut mix introduces a creamy texture, and a capful of turmeric turns our paté bright yellow.

The kale chips are an instant hit.  The salad is a tougher sell.  Tremaine went a little overboard with the dulse powder, which he is referring to as purple magic.  So along with our nori wraps, which make salad a fun activity to eat, this remix is a bit more seaweedish.  A couple picky eaters turn down their share of the green goodness.  I remind them that instead of thinking of it as bad, they might want to consider it something different from their usual food routine.  Sierra jumps right in with the 2 Chainz treatment:  “That’s different, yeah that’s different / Pull up to the scene with the sushi wrapper, pull up to the scene with the sushi wrapper.”  See video.

My second leg of the trip home is the A train at rush hour.  I am that woman who will nestle into that empty seat between the other two people on the three-seater.  A toddler in Romanian woman’s arms reaches out to caress the bumpy lacinato leaves peaking out of my tote.  I assure his mom in the universal language of smiles and baby talk that it’s all good.  She mimes the universal nom nom nom as he lifts a sample to his lips.  I pass him his very own small leaf, which he tears to pieces and distributes to the woman and girl in the seat adjacent to us.  We all delight in this moment, and I’ve never felt richer, as kale currency circulates from Avenue P to Utica.

Lesson plan and recipe here.

Black Presence Month BedStuy

February is not just our 6-monthiversary, it’s also the month of love and Black Presence.  To honor the present moment we are launching our second location at the BedStuy Supper Club 613 Jefferson Ave btw Lewis and Stuyvesant (A/C trains at Utica).  New regular Sunday classes at 10am and 12pm (kids) start Feb 10.  Every 3rd Sunday we gather to celebrate after the 10am class at 613 Jefferson, for our workshop at 375 Stuyvesant. See class descriptions with locations.

Schedule of Events

Sunday, February 10:
10-11:15am Yoga for All  // 12-1pm  Yoga Meets Dance (ages 5-12)
BedStuy Supper Club 613 Jefferson Ave btw Lewis and Stuyvesant

Sunday, February 17:
10-11:15am Yoga for All (at 613 Jefferson)// 12-1pm Yoga + Meditation for Adults (at 375 Stuyvesant) // 12-1pm  Yoga Meets Dance (ages 5-12) at 375 Stuyvesant  //  1-2pm  Celebration, food from our neighborhood restaurants! (at 375 Stuyvesant)
Freebrook Mansion 375 Stuyvesant Ave at Decatur  ***Please note that the regular Sunday kids class 12-1pm moves to 375 Stuyvesant Ave on 3rd Sundays Celebration.  The regular Sunday 10-11:15am class stays at 613 Jefferson Ave.

Reserve your space and pay online.  Events/Classes are $5-20.  We accept cash/credit/debit/PayPal online and at the door. Hip Dhamma welcomes all regardless of ability to pay.  Please contact info@hipdhamma.com or 347.670.4325 for scholarships and work-exchange (trade your time and skills for classes).  Click the “Classes” tab below to enroll in a class or event.

2 for 1 Yoga Classes All November

This month, as our gift to you, we welcome you to bring a friend to yoga for free. Along with one paid admission ($20 drop-in or just $15 if you RSVP, your friend, neighbor, or family member can join you for a full mind-body workout at the Hip Dhamma Yoga center located at 375 Stuyvesant Ave, Brooklyn. After all that we’ve been through in the last week, let’s embrace our neighborhood and spend some time in peace together. “Free friend” admission valid for new students only. Returning students may bring a new student for “free friend” admission. Questions? Reply to this email or drop us a line at info@hipdhamma.com. Work-trade opportunities and scholarships available.

Namaste!
-Hip Dhamma Team

Upcoming Classes:

Saturdays w/ Gullah Girl Tea
8:30 – 9:45am with Rachel
10:00 – 11:00am with Rachel

Tuesdays
6:30 – 7:30am with Rachel
7:00 – 8:00pm with Tanya

Wednesdays
6:30 – 7:30am with Rachel
7:00 – 8:00pm with Trina

Thursdays
6:30 – 7:30am with Rachel
7:00 – 8:00pm with Tanya