G-U-A-C-A-M-O-LE!

[via Dining Chicago]

I love my simple guacamole recipe. Check it out over at Forkd. The song’s recipe calls for chilli and onions but I like to eat my guacamole with spicy tacos or beefy fajitas, so I keep it nice and cooling.

Do you like your guacamole spicy with tortilla chips or some other way?

Artisan du Chocolat is by far my favourite and, best of all, they run a stall at Borough Market every weekend which sells the misshapen chocolates that don’t make it to the stall. They’re cheap and still taste gorgeous! :)

Today I ran across a fabulous guide to tasting dark chocolate from Chow. Chocolate is incredibly complex, but the tasting process itself should be focused around into 4 distinct areas: Visual, Aroma, Texture and Flavour.

Texture: Break a chunk off. A clean snap indicates that the chocolate’s been well tempered. Put it in your mouth. Close your eyes and think about what you’re experiencing. Chew a few times to break it up, and let it melt in your mouth.

See the full article; How to Taste Dark Chocolate over at CHOW.

One Serving of Almonds

Fruit and Vegetables

Common wisdom says you should eat at least five servings of fruit and vegetables every day. Problem is, what actually counts as a serving size?

According to the World Health Organisation, adults should eat a minimum of 400g (14 ounces) of fruit and vegetables every day to help stave off chronic diseases such as heart disease, cancer, diabetes and obesity.

In other words, one serving or portion of fruit and vegetables is 80 grams. That’s 2.8 ounces. Eat five portions every day and you’ll hit your daily target.

Great. But what’s that in real terms?

Ah, now you’ve hit the crux of our site. Have a look around. You’ll find photos of one measured serving of all kinds of fruit and vegetables, along with their calorie counts, glycaemic load and a load of other useful information. Here are some to get you started:

• One Serving of Tangerines
• One Serving of Pepper (Capsicum)

Nuts and Seeds

Nuts and seeds are a huge segment of food. You’ll find all sorts of nutrients in different seeds, so it’s not appropriate to use a general weight measurement for serving size. Instead, we’ve settled on 160 to 180 calories as a reasonable amount of energy to eat in one sitting.

Have a look at these pages to see how different 170-odd calories can look from seed to seed:

• One Serving of Shelled Pistachios
• One Serving of Brazil Nuts

Proteins

According to dietician and nutritionist, Dr Mabel Blades, one serving of meat is approximately 100 to 150 grams of uncooked meat, or 3.5 to 5 ounces. This will shrink depending on how the meat is cooked.

We’ll update this post to include the other foods groups in the next couple of weeks.

Download version 0.3 ‘Weefz’s Show Post Subcategories‘ from the WordPress Plugins Directory (or see below for version 0.4).

Here’s how it works:

1. Unzip the download into your WordPress plugins directory
2. Activate it in the plugins management screen
3. Go to your template editor
4. Within The Loop, add the following tag
<?php wfzShowPostSubcategories('prefix','suffix','separator','parent category id number') ?>
5. Replace prefix, suffix and separators with the text of your choice, keeping it within the single quotation marks
6. Replace cat_ID with the ID number of the parent category

For example, say that you want to show the post’s subcategories of category 5 in an unordered list. Use the following tag:

<?php wfzShowPostSubcategories('<ul><li>','</ul>','</li><li>','5') ?>

I have used this with all versions of WordPress from 2.2.1 to 2.7.0. It doesn’t do anything fancy, so should work with earlier versions.

Disclaimer: This is my first WordPress plugin, so please test it out before installing on a live site. I use it myself right here at One Serving – it drives the links to the “High in” nutrient fields for every food serving size post.

Drop me a comment below with any questions or advice. If you like the plugin, feel free to buy me a beer or healthy juice drink with the PayPal button ;)

Update 8th June 2009: Plugin is now on version 0.4. By popular request, it now allows you to display subcategories without any separator. Just use the following:

<?php wfzShowPostSubcategories('','','','your parent category id') ?>

It’s temporarily available here until I find the time to upload it properly to the WordPress Plugins directory.

Nothing.

So, I started this site. You’ll be able to find all your favourite foods, right here. You can look up all sorts of food – one serving, one portion, one helping of food. We’ll even slice it up so you know what it will look like. You can find out which food group everything belongs to and what you will get from it.

You’ve probably seen at least one version of the Food Pyramid. You know that every day you should eat about six servings of starchy food, five servings of fruit or veg and only one of those notoriously-unhealthy-but-oh-so-tasty treats.

But what the heck counts as just one serving?

• You buy a packet of peanuts… it’s so easy to just eat the lot in front of the TV. How many servings is that?
• You take home a punnet of strawberries… throw some cream and sugar over them and dish it out to your family. How many servings is that?
• You order a plate of chips in a restaurant… they gave you far too many, so you only eat half of them. How many servings is that?

You deserve to know exactly what you’re eating. You’ll be able to find out right here.

- Debbie Timmins, founder of OneServing.com

“Honesty is the cornerstone of all success, without which confidence and ability to perform shall cease to exist.”
- Mary Kay Ash – founder of Mary Kay cosmetics.

P.S. If you like the sound of our site, drop me a note in the comments. I love hearing from new people. We’re launching in October! Check back regularly or subscribe for updates.