MÄNI'S BLOG CAFÉ
Your café on the web for current information about delicious, healthier versions of traditional foods for the health conscious connisseur.
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04.17.06
Get Fresh, Go Green with Mäni’s Bakery Café has been proven to be of use to our customers. The awareness of eating and drinking green, and its benefits for our bodies has shown in the popularity of our new items. And not only that, people are modifying existing dishes for the added benefit of eating green. It’s wonderful to see such enthusiasm. Small changes like these in our diets, are what provide the most benefits. And, the awareness as well brings us to another level of participation. The Green campaign has gone so well, we will be keeping all of our new items, and expanding our Green menu to give you new Green items in the future. If you have suggestions, or comments, we would love to hear them. And, tell me what you think of Get Fresh, Go Green! How do you like the new items, our Total-Green and Berry-Green smoothies, or the Matcha Latte? And we definitely want feedback on the Kale and Collard greens. Let us know what your thoughts are below, we are very interested. Go ahead, add a comment!
04.04.06
Over the past few weeks we have mentioned some health benefits of various greens. We have mostly talked about anti-oxidants, and cancer fighting benefits. Well, every week, we throw something else at you! It is the green season. Things are turning green outside, flowers are blooming, and at Mäni’s things are greener than ever. Collard Greens! I bet you didn’t see that coming. No, seriously, collard greens. I’ve known they were good for me. But when I found out how good they really are for me, and you, I almost freaked out. Lets talk about our immune system for a second. In addition to all the standard (now that we are infatuated with the benefits of eating green) cancer fighting anti-oxidant benefits, we now have some powerful immune boosting elements. Mainly then fact that 1 cup of collard greens contains 118% of your RDA for Vitamin A, 57.6% of Vitamin C, and 53.5% of the rare element Manganese (which helps your body utilize Vitamin A, which protects our mitochondria, which is the power plant in almost every cell in our body). Not to mention everything else listed in this helpful breakdown of all the nutrients in one cup, cooked. And, if you are into exercising and keeping your body in tune, which I believe is the third element of Balanced Living, Collard Greens are also a magnificent source of calcium. One cup providing 22% of your RDA, 1 cup of milk provides 30% of your RDA. Are you Vegetarian? Don’t drink milk? Go green yo! So, if you haven’t tried collard greens before, come by Mäni’s Bakery Café, our restaurant and bakery on fairfax, and starting Wednesday we will be serving collard greens. We’ve been serving Kale, Collard’s cousin, since “Get Fresh. Go Green” started.
03.31.06
We first featured the Match Latte last summer in our Newsletter. The article was titled Mucho Mas...Matcha, and detailed at length the amazing benefits of this green tea drink. Ahh the wonders of matcha. Little caffeine, and lots of benefits. The nutrients available in matcha cause brain wave activities, which help with relaxation, focus and concentration! Antioxidants & polyphenols also prevent cancer. Drink hot or cold with skim, whole, soy or vanilla soy milk. It’s wonderfully refreshing!
03.28.06
I know a lot of people grew up despising beets. Why, I can’t really understand. Maybe it was the way our parents and grandparents prepared them: straight from the can. Well, Chefs grow up in order to avoid this type of situation, canned vegetables that is. Admittedly, I have been to some nice restaurants, and their beets are nothing to talk twice about. Maybe their chefs still use canned beets? Not to beet a dead horse, but Mäni’s doesn’t use canned beets, or really any other vegetable, except for tomatoes when we make roasted salsa. Canning vegetables involves high heat and long cooking times. These two elements can destroy the nutritional value in foods. So, needless to say, we are making a fresh beet salad. The beets are lightly cooked, then shredded and marinated in a balsamic goat cheese marinade. We then take this awesome beet mixture, and put it on a round 9-grain crouton, layered with goat cheese. The goat cheese, crouton and beet are placed on a bed of arugula with a Mexican papaya, mango, and pineapple salsa and drizzled with red beet vinaigrette. Beets are reported to have cancer protecting elements. How does it do it? The purple pigment in beets, betacyanin, is a powerful cancer fighting agent. Other elements also increase anti-oxidant enzymes in the liver, which is where most free radicals (see our glossary on greenage) are generated. These enzymes are what protects us from the effects of free radicals. And, as if the beets aren’t enough already, the arugula is an excellent source of greens that aids in digestion, prevention of certain cancers, and is high in vitamin c and calcium. It’s already become one of our most popular salads. Get Fresh! Beet It! Go Green With Mäni’s.
03.21.06
Have you gone a little green at Mäni’s yet? We put out our new menu on Friday, and so far its going great. If you haven’t noticed, green is our theme! And it isn’t green like the color of a crayon, it’s green like the color of Wheat grass, and Matcha, and Spinach, and every other edible green you can think of. The point of all of this is, greens are an opportunity to be healthy in a way many don’t realize. If you haven’t had the chance yet, check out our Glossary on Greenage to find out more of the benefits on eating green. So, take a little time to sample what we have. Try the Steamed Greens (mostly Kale, although this will change every few weeks to another great leafy green). And definitely give one of our green smoothies, like the Total Green, a try. It’s packed with 25 different sources of greens, including Wheat grass, Barley grass, and Spirulina. We have the ingredients if you want to see them all! From where I am standing, my intention is that everyone gets to know the benefits of eating green. If there is anything we can do better to assist your green-ness, please let me know!
03.17.06
Hungry Girl has a St. Patrick’s Day special edition today with diet-friendly green food. Pay particular attention to these two points:  Of course we also love the following super-healthy green foods: artichokes, sugar snap peas, granny smith apples, romaine lettuce, spinach & broccoli. Eat at least SOME of those today. Leafy green vegetables are loaded with antioxidants, minerals, folate, and flavonoids. These all work to prevent free radicals from damaging cells. Eat your greens!
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