IDEAS | Leafy and Tenders: Earthbound Farms Power Greens

[Teri Rose, OblSB, Program Director]

I continue to be excited by the ever-growing variety of pre-bagged, pre-washed leafy and tender veggie options available at all types of grocery stores. In fact, our Twin Cities grocer, Cub Foods, in my opinion, has the freshest and largest selection of fresh prepped veggies (even compared to Whole Foods). This is a reflection of consumer willingness to buy these veggies and their request for help in getting them prepped and on the table.

Food safety note: Despite unfortunate recent food safety concerns, the benefit of consuming high amounts of leafy and tender veggies strongly out weight any potential risk. When it comes to pre-bagged, PRE-WASHED, produce, the CDC advises not rinsing them again at home.

Earthbound Farms Power Greens

A favorite product of mine is Earthbound Farms Power Greens. I like Power Greens because it is a mix of baby spinach, baby chard, and baby kale. This provides important nutrient variety – without even trying (or with having something else to clean!).

 

Nutrition Highlights

• Baby Swiss Chard: rich in minerals including magnesium, iron, copper, and potassium; the red pigmented stems of Swiss Chard contain betalains which are the same detoxification-enhancing compounds found in raw beets
• Baby Spinach: rich in B-vitamins, carotenoids (like lutein, zeaxanthin, and vitamin A important for skin health and cell turnover), flavonoids (which are anti-inflammatory) chlorophyl (which might help regulate the signaling of hormones used to control appetite), and minerals iron and magnesium
• Baby Kale – rich in lutein (important anti-oxidant for eye health), anti-oxidant vitamins A and C, and cancer-protective glucosinolates (which also support your body’s natural detoxification pathways)

(Above links provided to WHFoods.com which provides my favorite user-friendly summaries of the current research in whole foods.)

My Top Uses

NOTE: Be sure to always serve Power Greens with your garnish of fat; many of the remarkable nutrients in greens are ‘fat-soluble‘ which means they need fat in the digestive system to be absorbed.

Lightly Wilted with a Sprinkle of Salt and a Touch of Ghee (or butter) (cook over medium heat for only 3-4 minutes until start to wilt; opt to add 1 teaspoon of ghee or butter for every 6 cups of raw greens wilted)

1. Serve alongside any protein (I really enjoy them with eggs)
2. Use them to bulk up pasta and grain dishes
3. Favorite snack idea: Melt parmesan on a small corn tortilla and top with wilted greens

 

Raw

1. Makes my favorite base to home-made chopped salad (pictured below)
2. Add during final minutes of making veggie soup and blend with immersion blender (or allow to cool and use regular blender) – greens will add a richness and ‘creaminess’ to the broth
3. Throw a handful or two into CARE Breakfast Blends (CARE Step 1 Recipes) and other smoothies

 

 

Things to Consider When Selecting

• Watch the use by dates (pictured below): as excited as I am to see more pre-bagged options at the market, I’m also disheartened to see bags past their prime till on the shelves. Scan the bag for any wilted leaves, wet/crushed leaves, and any browning. Also, check the dates on the bag and ensure it is at least a week away.
• Buying on sale: buying these greens on sale can be extremely budget friendly but be aware that stores often put these on sale as they are getting close to expiring. This doesn’t mean to pass on the sale, just be sure they have an immediate spot on your meal plan.
• Buying from Costco: As of now, Power Greens have been a staple at Costco – it is great getting a 1.5lb bag for only $6.29 but again watch the dates and freshness. This becomes even more important when you buy in bulk. What I often do is try to get through 1/2 of my Costco size bag raw and then plan on cooking the other 1/2.

 

[Anonymous]

Last night was my first night of successful intermittent fasting, eating all my food in a 4 hour window for the first time in years!  But it wasn’t easy and I went to sleep thinking, “God, I got away with one there.  Please help me find some easy, ‘low hanging fruit’, improvement ideas tomorrow.  I’m a bit worried about today’s big win being too much too soon and setting me up for failure.”

Then this morning I go to the Blogs to search for today’s inspired reading, pretty much choosing a piece at random, and end up here.  And how fortuitous it was!  Yesterday’s OMAD (“One Meal a Day”) checked all the boxes.  It was made at home, clean, delicious, and enjoyed at a comfortable pace with the Wife.  But after reading this blog, I realized how EASY it would’ve been to smuggle a half-pound of mixed greens into my feast, bumping up my phyto-nutrition and anti-inflammatories considerably.

And I’ve walked by this product so many times at Costco and various markets.  How shameful!  As Mrs. Rose wisely points out, mixed salad blends like Power Greens are super convenient, affordable, and so easy to incorporate into a meal plan.  For example, last night’s bean salad could’ve been served atop a small pile of Power Greens.  I could’ve wilted a big handful into the leftover Holiday Chili I reanimated from the freezer and not even noticed it.  And my Orange Giulio Smoothie would’ve looked stunning in emerald green.  What a potential game changer for an aging, fat, broken man sorely in need of whole food plant nutrition ideas.  Low hanging fruit, indeed!  These past 36 hours have been a whirlwind of change!  Please slow it down, God!  Haha!

OK. Power Greens (and mixed salad blends like them)… So what?!

1. I’m definitely going to take advantage of these bulk mixed greens products and smuggle loads of greens into my meals.  It’s just inspired Stewardship, right? Adding a 1/2 pound daily shouldn’t be a challenge.  And it helps that I’ve been eating strong bitter greens, like escarole, rapini, cicoria, cabbage, etc., since infancy.  It’s just that I stopped making the time to shop, prep, and cook them.  With Mrs. Rose’s Power Greens idea, I have no excuses.
2. I’m going to start RIGHT NOW and challenge myself to make the trip to Costco, instead of paying someone to shop for me, as I’ve grown accustomed of doing.  This may sound like a silly goal, but I haven’t been able to walk more than 11 minutes straight in 6 months. And that’s with a cane and at a snail’s pace!  (Back-to-back bouts of COVID have riddled my legs with severe DVT, gout, and arthritis.)  I’ll make it FUN and assume the role of knight-errant, pressed to brave the hordes at Costco in search of a plastic clamshell chest of verdant treasure.  Haha!  And I’ll be sure to bring the Divine on my quest.  :)

[Anonymous]

Mixed results, but definitely a learning and growing experience!  The trip took me beyond my walking quota and there was quite a bit of pain.  But I was able to take breaks and Bio-Spiritual Focusing Pause a few times, which helped.  Still though, I have a lot of inflammation to deal with, plus my blood is essentially toxic sledge yet.  Quest achieved and feast well deserved!

[Carol Prudencio]

Way to go Jim!

[Anonymous]

Not to beat a dead horse, but look at how GREEN my Earl Green has become now that I’ve discovered the virtue of using mixed greens in my concoctions!  (BTW, I strained it here for aesthetic purposes, but usually I drink the pulp without a problem.)  I won’t bore you with more pics of all the applications I’ve experimented with in the past few days, but note I am now on my third bag of Earthbound Farm mixed greens and I’m really starting to take to it.  Nutritional level up achieved!

[Anonymous]

Yet another way to sneak Power Greens into your diet!  It’s so easy to just wilt a large handful to any soup or stew.  This is a bean dish called all’uccelletto and is inspired by ancient recipes for braising little birds.  We make it with all kinds of beans, no sparrows needed, and make it so often we just call it “Oooch”.

Oh!  And I like to use 100% whole food plant based garnishes now.  This here dish is garnished with hulled sesame.  (Super anti-inflammatory!)

[Author]

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