Natural Freedom: Sweet Potato and Black Bean Enchiladas

Tuesday, November 11, 2008

Sweet Potato and Black Bean Enchiladas

It's been a really long time since I posted! I've really been neglecting my blog, so I'm making a mental note to post a new recipe at least once a week! Today's recipe I got from another blog, but I cut a few corners, making it quicker and easier while still keeping it healthy.

Ingredients
1 Jar 505 organic green chili 

 
Enchilada Filling

2 (15-ounce) can organic black beans, rinsed, drained 
4 cloves garlic, minced 
Fresh lime juice from 2 big juicy lime 
 2 large diced sweet potatoes 
1/2 cup chopped roasted mild green chiles 
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin 
1/2 teaspoon chili powder mild or spicy 
Sea salt and black pepper to taste 
 2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro(I used freeze dried) 

Assembly

2 to 4 tablespoons olive oil, as needed 
 16 organic white or yellow corn tortillas  

Method
Preheat your oven to 350°F. 
In the meantime, for the Enchilada Filling, using a mixing bowl, combine the drained black beans with minced garlic and lime juice. Toss to coat the beans and set aside. Fry sweet potatoes until golden, then add veggie stock and turn on low until sweet potatoes are soft, add the chopped green chiles; add the spices. Season with sea salt and pepper. 
Pour about 1/4 cup of the 505 Green Chile Sauce into the bottom of a 9x9 glass baking dish. 
To assemble the enchiladas, grab a skillet and heat a dash of oil. Lightly cook the corn tortillas to soften them, one at a time, then layer 8 of them in the bottom of your pan. Pour sweet potato mixer on top of tortillas, then pour on the beans. Next lightly cook the other 8 tortillas and layer them on top.
Top with the rest of the sauce.  
Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, until the enchiladas are piping hot and the sauce is bubbling around the edges. 

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About this blog

Where to start? January 8, 2008 I decided I was tired of being overweight. I have gained 60lbs in the last few years for reasons I couldnt explain until recently, but I will come back to that later. In my quest to get healthy and lose weight I joined sparkpeople.com, I followed their diet(which other people have had great success with) for 2 mos and I did lose some water weight, but that was it. I was convinced that it was "healthy" and stuck to it to a T, was even working out 6 days a week but I wasn't losing any weight, or inches, even though I was working out and meticulously counting calories, and logging food after every meal. I kept eating "healthy" but quit tracking calories and kept exercising because the one thing that I did gain from sparkpeople was a HUGE burst of energy that I hadnt felt in at least 6-7 yrs, that is the only reason I stuck with it.

My daughter has asthma and it has been really bad this year. I have a friend on delphi forums that I met through my Fibromyalgia(FMS) support group that also has asthma, she had a link in her sig to an asthma support group, so I clicked on it hoping that I could get some advice about my daughter, her link didnt work so I did a search on delphi using the keyword asthma. This forum came up in my search and it was called Healthy Haven, naturally since I was trying lose weight and it mentioned asthma, I clicked on it. Finding that forum has changed my life, and the host of it has in a very short period of time taught me what healthy really is. Granted I still have a ton to learn, but thanks to her(Kabbalist) being so patient with my questions and what I call "health ignorance" I am on the right track. I have become totally obsessed with researching truly healthy living and finding recipes that are 100% healthy, or altering non-healthy ones to be healthy.

The first day I found Kabba's haven I couldn't wait to share my "healthy" recipes that I had found on sparkpeople so I told Kabba that I had a healthy chocolate chip cookie recipe, she asked me to share it and so I did. I was stunned when she told me that my recipe was *NOT* healthy...what, how is that??? it has splenda instead of sugar, applesauce instead of oil, and egg beaters(which are low in fat and cholesterol) instead of whole eggs how can it not be healthy? It's low fat, low calorie, and sugar free! She explained to me that first off splenda is just the opposite of healthy and provided me with articles why it isn't(I'll share those in a post under the label splenda) she then asked me why I use applesauce? I told her it was to replace the oil to bring the calorie and fat count down, she honestly didnt understand that, and told me that we need good fats like coconut and olive oil, and that anything that says low fat or low calorie is again *NOT* healthy. She also said that eggs were meant to be eaten straight out of the coop, not stripped of their good for us fats, their cholesterol and sold in a cardboard carton, so egg beaters are, yep you guessed it, *NOT* good for you!

The things she was telling me made sense. After sitting on what she had told me for a while she posted a before and after picture of herself and her weightloss, when I asked her how she did it, she said its simple, I quit eating dairy(I've since learned dairy is evil! and will post articles on that too), quit eating refined sugars and processed foods and lost 101 lbs all without counting a single calorie or fat gram. I was again amazed!

So with that I decided this was what it was going to take for me to lose weight and started to transition into a truly healthy lifestyle. With Kabba's help I found a good natural sweetener for my family. She uses agave nectar which is a perfect sweetener but on the spendy side and with 5 people that love sweets, it just wasnt cost effective, but at the same time I needed to find an unrefined sweetener that wouldnt enter my blood stream too fast because I have hypoglaucemia. Last thing I need is a sugar that enters to fast, spikes my blood sugar, then bottoms out to quickly! I finally settled on turbinado sugar because it is unrefined, affordable and doesnt enter the blood steam as fast. I banished all of my boxed, processed foods to a cupboard that had TONS of space and forgot about them(can't bare to throw them away when there are starving people in this world) I started using soymilk and I quit buying those hugs bags of cereal for my kids breakfast that were full of sugar and empty calories, instead I make them homemade baked oatmeal for their breakfast everyday(this makes me feel like the beave's mom lol). To save on food costs even more, we eat vegan 4-5 days out of the week, have beef once a week and chicken the other days. I would go totally vegan but the kids miss their meat and I can not give up steak.

This is why I started this blog. So I can track what I learn or find, and help others along the way.

Now coming back to the reasons I gained so much weight. Even with going to a totally natural healthy diet, and exercising I was still not losing weight. I got to thinking that 40 of the 60lbs that I gained came on in about 3 mos , then it dawned on my that that happened at around the same time I started Cymbalta for my FMS pain and depression. I quit taking it for a while and didnt gain anymore, but then I started it again and gained another 10lbs(the other 10 are from moving to a town that has fastfood and pigging out on it). I decided the reason I was losing now is because of the medications I was on. Cymbalta claims that it doesnt cause weight gain, but most people I talk to that are on it either gained tons of weight in a small amount of time, or cannot lose weight. I was on another medication for my insomnia that is known to cause weight gain, called elavil. The logical step is to get off of the medications, this is a hard decission for me because the cymbalta gave me my life back and my pain levels are 1-2 most days instead of 7-8. I ultimately decided to get off of it though because, yes it has taken away the pain so I can have a normal life, but it doesnt really matter if I'm too fat to take advantage of it! I have stopped taking the elavil, and I have started weaning off of the cymbalta. I'm hoping that by eating naturally and exercising regularly it will keep my pain in check so I can still enjoy life without the meds.

I hope you enjoy this blog, and become a regular reader. I also hope that this blog helps someone, even if it helps just one person then its worth it!