Apr

Healthy Recipes for Your Body and Spirit

by Meredith Mullins on April 30, 2018

A tribute to healthy eating: Spinach and polenta gratin

A Cultural Encounter with Healthy Eating

Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you who you are—Brillat-Savarin

Our eating habits and cooking strategies often reveal something about us.

Since I find this revelation to be true for myself, I’m sharing a story about inspiration . . . and how eating and cooking patterns can be influenced after experiencing life-changing OIC moments.

Green wild herb soup with flowers, a soup for healthy eating showing a cultural encounter with healthy recipes. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

Wild herb soup—made with nettle, dandelion, and wild garlic
© Meredith Mullins

A Fasting Tale

Full disclosure. I am not a cook. I am also not a particularly healthy eater, which I conveniently blame on genetics. However, twice a year I go to the Buchinger-Wilhelmi clinic in Germany for a cleansing fast. (See OIC story.)

I come away with much more than a new lightness of being (physical, mental, and spiritual), a rested digestive tract, and the joy of fasting euphoria (although those treasures alone would be worth the trip). I see my visit as a cultural encounter with good health—in the moment and for the future.

A range of vegetarian healthy recipes, showing the cultural encounter with healthy eating. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

A variety of choices for healthy eating
© Meredith Mullins

I am inspired to continue the program of healthy eating and to actually take the giant step of preparing some of the recipes that I have been shown. I also look forward to practicing some of the tips introduced in the demonstrations and lectures.

Salad with sprouts and apples, a healthy recipe from Chef Hubert Hohler at Buchinger-Wilhelmi clinic in Germany, showing a cultural encounter with healthy eating. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

Sprout and apple salad—so fresh, so easy
© Meredith Mullins

First-Time Memories

I pause here to mention that the first time I came to the clinic, I was not especially embracing the idea of fasting. I updated my will before I made the journey and said goodbye to friends and family as if it were the last time I would see them. I was not convinced I would survive.

I had never fasted before, and had visions of hunger, heartburn, and hallucinations. As it turned out, I was pleasantly surprised.

Vegetable soup from chef Hubert Hohler at the Buchinger-Wilhelmi fasting clinic in Germany, a healthy recipe for fasting, showing a cultural encounter with healthy eating. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

Garden vegetable soup for a fasting dinner (you come to love it!)
© Meredith Mullins

It seems I was a natural. No hunger. No heartburn. And only a few hallucinations on the famous Day 5 of the fast (where they say one often begins to feel the fasting high).

At the clinic, it’s not just about what you are eating (or not eating). It’s about a total reset of your body so that healthy eating becomes a natural rhythm once you return to the outside world.

Chef Hubert Hoholer of Buchinger-Wilhelmi Clinic in Germany, a chef sharing healthy recipes for a cultural encounter with healthy eating. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

Chef Hubert Hohler explains the reason for minimizing oil in cooking.
© Meredith Mullins

A Spirit Guide with Heart

A large part of that healthy food experience comes from the heart of Chef Hubert Hohler. He has been with the clinic for 25 years and brings passion, exacting standards, and joy to his job.

He also is an expert in plant-based cooking with pure organic materials, and shares his knowledge with clinic guests via twice weekly cooking demonstrations.

Pan with zucchini and rosemary, a healthy recipe from chef Hubert Hohler of the Buchinger-Wilhelmi clinic in Germany, showing a cultural encounter with healthy eating. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

Chef Hohler’s advice: Sauté with no oil. Just herbs and the natural liquid of the vegetable.
© Meredith Mullins

Chef Hohler is a good role model for clinic guests. He understands the fasting process, as he has fasted every year for the past 30 years. And, most of all, he loves to cook.

He is dedicated to creating delicious healthy organic food—the tasty broths for fasting and the vegetarian meals to lead in and out of the fast or for people who prefer just a low calorie healthy program.

chef Hubert Hohler at the Buchinger-Wilhelmi clinic in Germany, showing a cultural encounter with healthy eating. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

Making fennel sauce or soup—you can decide after the basic preparation.
© Meredith Mullins

He visits other cultures and brings the best of those worlds to his recipes. He experiments constantly, all with a goal of increasing the health value of the food. And he knows that certain recipes, the ones that long-time guests look forward to, should remain as is. It is not necessary to make them “new.”

Soufflé with vegetables, one of the healthy recipes from Chef Hubert Hohler at the Buchinger-Wilhelmi clinic in Germany, showing a cultural encounter with healthy eating. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

A favorite: the easy-to-make quinoa or cottage cheese soufflé
© Meredith Mullins

Five Basic Tips for Healthy Eating

Here are five tips I’ve learned at Buchinger-Wilhelmi from Chef Hohler (with a reminder that I’m not a cook, so I have much to learn.) I am happy to report that these have now become a part of my everyday healthy-eating processes.

Control oil (quantity and quality). Sauté vegetables without oil, as the natural liquid in the vegetables is sufficient. Add a touch of oil to your dish at the end to give taste. Make use of a variety of quality oils. For example, use almond oil to sweeten a bitter taste or walnut oil to add astringency to something sweet.
Use natural sweeteners rather than sugar. Ripe fruit serves as a sweetener (bananas, apples, apple juice).
Create salad dressings using blended vegetables (avocado, carrots, tomatoes) to minimize fat and calories. (Try the avocado vinaigrette in the free recipes below.)

Salad with avocado vinaigrette dressing, a healthy recipe from Chef Hubert Hohler, showing a cultural encounter with healthy eating. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

The avocado vinaigrette dressing with a touch of tomato to change the taste and color
© Meredith Mullins

4. For soup or sauce, start with the basics: onion, potato, and a vegetable. The only difference between soup and sauce is the amount of liquid in relation to the vegetables and the fact that a soup must stand on its own, while a sauce accompanies something to complement it.

5. Use fresh herbs for seasoning rather than salt. As you think about seasoning, taste to see what you’re missing on your tongue’s taste buds (sweet, salt, bitter, sour). In other words, don’t just add salt. Be more creative. Think about what herb or spice can add the missing taste.

OIC invites you to download the special free recipes below for practical ways to use these tips.

A bouquet of wild herbs and flowers to be used in healthy recipes for a cultural encounter in healthy eating. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

Everything in this bouquet can be used in cooking.
© Meredith Mullins

Beyond Tips and Recipes

In addition to the tips from Chef Hohler, his spirit of cooking organically is everpresent. He is careful about all the products he uses. He knows the producers and what processes they use. And he relies on seasonal products to ensure the freshest of ingredients.

From his time as a teenager helping to harvest his family’s asparagus crop, he has learned to appreciate the work behind products.

White asparagus in a pot, one of the healthy recipes of Chef Hubert Hohler of the Buchinger-Wilhelmi clinic in Germany, showing a cultural encounter with healthy eating. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

Even though Chef Hohler had to wake up at 5 am to harvest his family’s white asparagus,
he still loves to cook with it.
© Meredith Mullins

He looks for producers who really care about what they’re doing. If something is grown with love, he feels that the love will be noticed. And, then, when the kitchen also prepares the food with love, he believes that combination is a real treasure for those who are eating.

Chef Hubert Hohler at the Buchinger-Wilhelmi clinic in Germany demonstrating healthy recipes for a cultural encounter with healthy eating. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

A cooking demonstration that tempts all the senses.
© Meredith Mullins

A Change in Everyday Rhythms

Yes, it may be difficult to watch a cooking demonstration when fasting. After all, those wonderfully fresh vegetables and fruits seem very different from the broth for dinner. And the smells from the demo seem to touch all the senses in a cruelly heightened way.

Piece of lavender cake from the healthy recipes of chef Hubert Hohler at the Buchinger-Wilhelmi clinic in Germany, showing a cultural encounter with healthy eating. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

Yes, desserts are allowed after the fast, so try this lavender cake with a pear topping
© Meredith Mullins

But what this theatre of food preparation is actually doing is providing a look into the future. This is what I’ll be doing when I leave Buchinger-Wilhelmi (albeit not in quite as nice a kitchen).

The sights and sounds and smells have found a way to some deeper place. This cultural encounter with healthy eating will now be a part of my everyday rhythm.

Ready for some easy-to-make, delicious, healthy food? OIC offers this free download of favorite recipes for healthy eating from Chef Hubert Hohler.

Thank you to the Buchinger-Wilhelmi Clinic for this inspiration for healthy eating.

Comment on this post below, or inspire insight with your own OIC Moment here.

Meredith Mullins 6 Comments

Cultural Encounters/Germany

Apr

Meet the Challenge: Escape Rooms of the World

by Meredith Mullins on April 9, 2018

Detective with magnifying glass, part of the new trend of escape rooms around the world which enable cultural encounters and teach life lessons. (Image © demaerre/iStock.)

Everyone loves a challenge.
© demaerre/iStock

Cultural Encounters, Adrenaline, and Life Lessons—All in a Day’s Fun

I couldn’t help but get excited. Maybe a little nervous. I’d heard about it. I’d read about it. People had described the experience in a way that was seductive and sense-heightening. It was time to go for it. To see for myself.

Of course, I’m talking about escape rooms—the newest game phenomenon taking root around the world and offering cultural encounters of the mind-challenging kind.

Escape rooms are more than just a game, though. They’re theatre, mystery, teamwork, logic, puzzle solving, deciphering, intellectual sport, and, most of all, real-life fun.

Sherlock Holmes violin in the Exodus Escape Room in Monterey, California, one of the escape rooms around the world that offers cultural encounters and life lessons. (Image © Richard Green/Exodus Escape Room.)

Sherlock’s violin sets the stage.
© Richard Green/Exodus Escape Room

You’re Sherlock Holmes, Harry Houdini, Indiana Jones, Nancy Drew, Inspectors Poirot and Clouseau, Columbo, Harry Potter, and Jessica Fletcher all rolled into one.

And, if your main purpose is fun, you are also a child again.

Ladder to an escape opening, not typical of escape rooms around the world where cultural encounters and life lessons abound. (Image © Peshkov/iStock.)

Escape is not this easy in the escape rooms of the world.
© Peshkov/iStock

For those of us who spend too much time in front of a screen of one kind or another, when we step into a world of make believe that actually has tangible elements and human teamwork, it’s a welcome treat. Add to that the challenge of the hunt, and we’re in game heaven.

I was ready. I had trained watching quiz shows like Jeopardy and reality shows like Survivor. I had scored 800 on my math SATs (albeit many years ago). I was a daily sudoku player who was also immersed in a second language (brain activity . . . check!). And I reveled in detective mysteries.

Bring it on.

Sherlock Holmes study at the Exodus Escape Room in Monterey, California, one of the escape rooms around the world, where cultural encounters and life lessons abound. (Image © Richard Green.)

Sherlock’s Study—the setting for a race against time to escape
© Richard Green/Exodus Escape Room

What is an Escape Room?

An escape room is a kind of physical adventure game where a team of people are locked in a room and have to figure out how to escape within a certain amount of time.

The players must work individually and as a team to discover clues, find hidden objects, solve problems and puzzles, answer riddles, unlock locked safes and boxes, and think creatively and strategically as a team.

Sherlock Holmes items on a desk in the Exodus escape room in Monterey, California, one of the escape rooms around the world that offers cultural encounters and life lessons. (Image © Richard Green/Exodus Escape Room.)

Which of these items has a hidden clue? Perhaps all of them?
© Richard Green/Exodus Escape Room

Since there are more than 3000 escape rooms in the world, they can take many forms. You can escape from a room set in specific time period (Sherlock Holmes, Roaring 20s), or you can escape from a prison or a dungeon or a space station.

You can rob a bank, find a missing person, solve a murder, be an adventurer, defuse a bomb, or capture (or be) a spy. The themes are creative and endless, and, more often than not, fit within the culture of the country.

Casino setting at The Game in Paris, France, one of the escape rooms around the world that offers cultural encounters and life lessons. (Image © The Game/Paris.)

It’s time to rob the Royal Casino. Can you make the heist in the one-hour time limit?
Photo courtesy of The Game/Paris

Cultural Encounters While Escaping

Escape rooms around the world all have different themes—settings and characters that have meaning to the particular country and culture—for example, a metro car, a casino heist, a haunted house, an espionage center, or the catacombs.

Metro car in Paris, one of the escape rooms around the world, where cultural encounters and life lessons abound. (Image © The Game, Paris.)

In Paris, one of the escape rooms is a metro car.
Photo courtesy of The Game/Paris.

In Berlin, you escape to the other side of the wall, and send a message to tear the wall down. In Ontario, Canada, you participate in the Ontario Gold Rush of 1866. In a replica of 18^thcentury Zagreb, you find a passage so you can save an innocent woman accused of witchcraft from burning at the stake. There’s even an escape igloo at a ski resort in Slovenia.

Other cultural adjustments also exist. In the U.S., you can be teamed with strangers. In some other cultures, working with strangers would never be forced.

In all cases, the gamemaster explains the problem to be solved, and what may and may not be touched, lifted, or moved during the experience. (Everything not mentioned is fair game.) The door is locked (well, not in all cases, due to legal liabilities, but you get the idea). And the adrenaline rush begins. The clock is ticking. It’s a race against time.

Catacombs, one of The Game escape rooms in Paris, France, one of the escape rooms around the world that offers cultural encounters and life lessons. (Image © The Game, Paris.)

The Catacombs Escape Room: Dark, dangerous, gloomy and captivating. Enter at your own risk.
Photo courtesy of The Game/Paris

Five Escape Room Life Lessons

What happened to my team in my virgin escape room experience? We had to find a murderer in the era of Sherlock Holmes.

We were a bit timid at first (since we didn’t all know each other and we hadn’t yet figured out how to work as a team), but we fell into the rhythm, used our individual talents wisely, and escaped the room with 15 minutes to spare.

The exhilaration of solving the final clue and finding the key to escape was a proud victory, especially since only 50% of the teams working our room had actually escaped within the time limit. We weren’t on the leader board, but we were in the top 50%.

Can we reveal any secrets? No. Escape room ethics dictate, “What happens in the escape room, stays in the escape room.”

Bookshelf in the Exodus Escape Room in Monterey, California, one of the escape rooms around the world that offers cultural encounters and life lessons. (Image © Richard Green/Exodus Escape Room.)

Look closely. There are at least five clues in plain sight.
© Richard Green/Exodus Escape Room

Aside from having a fun adventure, my real “Oh, I see” moment came when I realized that the five things I learned from the escape room experience were also good life lessons.

Appreciate that everyone has unique skills. A great team works well together but also thinks differently, finds unique paths, reaches conclusions in different ways, and thinks outside the box.
Divide and conquer, but keep clear lines of communication. Use everyone’s specific skills to benefit of the team and to make effective use of time, but, while working independently, let the team know what clues have been found and what puzzles have been solved.
Don’t be afraid to ask for help. (In the escape-room world, the gamemaster is watching and can provide hints if needed to keep the team from getting stuck or frustrated.)

Narrow room with violin case in the Exodus Escape Room, one of the escape rooms around the world that offers cultural encounters and life lessons. (Image © Richard Green/Exodus Escape Room.)

Is there a room behind this room? Only time will tell.
© Richard Green/Exodus Escape Room

Don’t stop searching. (Look everywhere for clues. Crawl under things, turn things over, look behind things, empty drawers and pockets. Check and double check.)
Enjoy the experience. You don’t have to “win.” (But it would be nice not to be locked in the room forever.)

Am I now an escape room addict (diplomatically called “enthusiast”)? Possibly.

I can imagine a road trip with cultural encounters in Estonia, Hungary, Romania, Cyprus, Japan, Australia, and the Netherlands . . . and all the other countries with growing escape room opportunties.

And, even if I stay home, the escape room life lessons are worth living.

Group including Meredith Mullins, Jerry Fielder, Alexandra Roden, Patricia Roden and others in the Exodus Escape Room in Monterey, California, one of the escape rooms around the world that offers cultural encounters and life lessons. (Image © Exodus Escape Room.)

Our victorious team: Unique skills and teamwork were the key to our success.
Photo courtesy of The Exodus Escape Room

Thank you to the Exodus Escape Room in Monterey, California and The Game in Paris, France.

Additional information VIA Professor Scott Nicholson.

To find escape rooms near you, here’s a map of worldwide escape rooms.

Comment on this post below, or inspire insight with your own OIC Moment here.

Meredith Mullins Comments

Cultural Encounters/Life Lessons/Worldwide Sites

Feb

There’s Something About Santa Fe

by Joyce McGreevy on February 19, 2018

A trompe l'oeil mural at Big Adventure Comics shows why Santa Fe, New Mexico inspires wanderlust. (Image © Joyce McGreevy)

Santa Fe strips away its own layers to reveal greater surprises. (Big Adventure Comics, Montezuma Ave.)
© Joyce McGreevy

When Wanderlust Leads Southwest

There’s something about New Mexico. Its magnetism can activate wanderlust from thousands of miles away. Like the time a friend and I stood speechless in London’s Tate Modern, gaping at a painting by Georgia O’Keeffe.

“Black Cross with Stars and Blue” is one of O’Keeffe’s earliest depictions of the land that became her obsession.

Feeling Transported

The image transported me to a place where stars are more defined, shadows blacker, and blues more astonishing than anywhere else on earth.

Oh, I see: I had to return to New Mexico.

Turquoise gates at the School for American Research show why Santa Fe, New Mexico inspires wanderlust. (Image © Joyce McGreevy)

There’s something about wanderlust for the Southwest. New Mexico’s history is one of convergence: diverse cultures summoned across centuries from as far as the Bering Land Bridge, the kingdoms of Spain, and Mexico’s Sinaloan coast.

From the American East came wagon trails and railroads, Highway 66 and the Interstate. Today, airline contrails trace the sky with arrivals from every corner of the Earth.

An antique caboose shows why Santa Fe, New Mexico inspires wanderlust. (Image © Joyce McGreevy)

Feeling the Itch

“If you ever go to New Mexico, it will itch you for the rest of your life,” O’Keeffe said. You don’t get New Mexico out of your system. It becomes part of your system, the way a seed becomes a network of hidden roots. There’s a reason it’s called The Land of Enchantment.

The open door of an adobe shows why Santa Fe, New Mexico inspires wanderlust. (Image © Joyce McGreevy)

There’s something about returning to a place you thought you knew.

Years earlier, I’d traveled around New Mexico, riveted by the landscape: Ribbons of green obsidian, red rhyolite, and silvery tuff flowing across rock. Washboard roads so rutted a spider’s legs traveled faster than truck wheels.

Colorful rocks in soil show why Santa Fe, New Mexico inspires wanderlust. (Image © Joyce McGreevy)

Cliff dwellings protected by glittering curtains of sudden rain. Blood-red mountains sheltering forests of chrome-yellow cottonwoods. Unlit byways where one’s eyes slowly distinguished black mesas from indigo sky.

I thought I had New Mexico figured out. But like land sculpted by the elements, New Mexico is always changing, and whenever you return, New Mexico changes you.

The window of an art gallery shows why Santa Fe, New Mexico inspires wanderlust. (Image © Joyce McGreevy)

Feeling Curious

I arrived during the slow season—too early for the open-air Santa Fe Opera, too late for group tours that had gone on winter hiatus. Would there be more to Santa Fe than upscale boutiques clustered around the Plaza? Would Santa Fe be just a pleasant interlude, “New Mexico Lite”?

Santa Fe's Plaza at shows why New Mexico inspires wanderlust. (Image © Joyce McGreevy)

Feeling the Unfamiliar

There’s something about life at 7,000 feet above sea level. As I trekked to the hilltop adobe that would be my home, my heart drummed. The feeling was unsettling, as my lungs whispered Guess who’s mortal?

Soon, however, hiking at high altitude became natural. The more I walked, the more I hankered to walk.

I picked up Elaine Pinkerton’s Santa Fe on Foot: Exploring the City Different. On every walk, I met people who encouraged conversation. New Mexico is neighborly, and Santa Fe is downright friendly.

Travel and history books at Collected Works show why Santa Fe, New Mexico inspires wanderlust. (Image © Joyce McGreevy)

Independent bookstores like Collected Works (shown), Travel Bug,
and Op. Cit. thrive here. Their events draw crowds.
© Joyce McGreevy

Feeling Welcome

I never did make it to the Visitors Center. I just visited with Santa Feans, who scribbled lists of favorites: pueblos and palaces, bird walks and dharma talks, trail hikes and town halls, farmers’ markets and folk art, research centers and shopping centers, coffee shops and workshops.

Green chile cheese crossiants at the Farmers' Market show why Santa Fe, New Mexico inspires wanderlust. (Image © Joyce McGreevy)

Feeling Inspired

Thanks to locals, I saw the annual Nuestra Musica at the Lensic. Where four-generation families sang canciones and conjured armonía from saws and cigar-box guitars.

Where a former lieutenant governor turned musician led the house in a rousing recitation of popular sayings known as dichos. (My favorite: Buscando trabajo y rogando a Dios no hallar. “Looking for work and praying to God not to find any.”)

Where 94-year-old Antonia Apodaca proved that every age is the right age to sing of love, blow kisses, and dance for joy.

Renowned musician Antonia Apodaca performing at Nuesta Musica inspires audiences in Santa Fe, New Mexico. (Image © Joyce McGreevy)

My days became threads that wise hands wove into the pattern of Santa Fe culture. At every museum, a docent took me under his or her wing, sharing knowledge they’d spent a lifetime acquiring.

The more I discovered, the more I wanted to learn. Books accumulated on my bedside table. I stayed up late perusing Santa Fe histories, novels, maps, and photos. I went to readings and lectures. The mysteries multiplied.

The exterior of SITE Santa Fe Colorful shows why Santa Fe, New Mexico inspires wanderlust. (Image © Joyce McGreevy)

Feeling Enchanted

There’s something about Santa Fe that surprises. Things I’d considered clichés commanded new respect: Once, I was woken by the howl of a coyote, a sound so sharp it cut a gash in the thick, dark stillness of the night. I could feel the reverberation long after that singular sound had ended.

A sunny, high-desert landscape shows why Santa Fe, New Mexico inspires wanderlust. (Image © Joyce McGreevy)

A snowy, high-desert landscape shows why Santa Fe, New Mexico inspires wanderlust. (Image © Joyce McGreevy)

Because there’s something about Santa Fe. “When you take a flower in your hand and really look at it,” said O’Keeffe, “it’s your world for the moment.”

When wanderlust led me to Santa Fe, I expected a pleasant interlude. But it flowered into a fascinating world.

Comment on this post below, or inspire insight with your own OIC Moment here.

Joyce McGreevy 4 Comments

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