State of the Kitchen 5: No Energy to Cook

So, yesterday, I had a MRCP to look at why the CT said that I had an atrophied pancreas. Based on the results of the test, it’s not my pancreas, but my kidneys, that are atrophied. It’s highly unlikely that it is diabetes because I have been under good control A1C-wise since I was first diagnosed.

So an MRCP is an MRI where they put this plastic blanket on your chest (feels like the weight of an xray vest) and plug it into something on the table. That blanket tells the MRI to take an image every time you breathe out. It does this so it takes an image in the exact same situation every time, so apparently taking an image while breathing in may be different than when breathing out. Then, they have you hold your breath a bunch of times while they do 10-15 second images.

This MRI sucked. It really sucked big time. Here’s why, I’m a large person and MRI machines are rather small. But I am always able to breathe normally and get full, big breaths that leave me feeling like I got enough. This was not the case for this MRI. With the plastic blanket, I was not able to get a full breath. Not only that, but the MRI was apparently about an hour long (according to my parents, I was trying to just focus on one barely breathing breath at a time). An hour long with no breaks while laying down unable to get a very good breath while stuck in a small tube.

I was a hair’s breath away from squeezing that, “Get me the hell out of here” button they give you for MRIs. However, I knew that this could give my doctors some information, enough to rule some things out, and possible figure out some new things. But apparently, it was all just ruling things out. It doesn’t look like I have autoimmune or regular pancreatitis or hepatitis, so that’s probably good.

I am the proud owner of a fatty liver and atrophied kidneys.

On the energy front this week

This week has not been good for energy. I’ve been walking around having a hard time processing things and understanding what I’m looking at or reading with my eyeballs. Sometimes, I can’t even understand what I’m listening to.

Days where I have something else to do, like a doctors appointment or a procedure, generally exhaust me for the rest of the day. In the past four years, I have only come home from an appointment and cooked once and that was a week or so ago.

I’ve tried to think up some recipes to make, but my brain just isn’t there, so I’m thinking that I might have to switch my posting each week until I can get back to creating some recipes. So, I am going to share recipes that others have created and I have made at some point on one or both recipe days. I’m going to share a link to their site and maybe discuss if I can how I found the recipe, how it was, and ways that I plan on expanding on it.

What I cooked this week.

This week, I made fish balls and that’s it. That’s all I was able to make because it has been a really hard week for energy. Chronically ill living sucks sometimes. Here are the pictures I took of the fishballs.

Slow Cooker Creamy Taco Corn

This is the fifth, and final, recipe of my 5 recipes for a 2-course Mexican Dinner. If you haven’t read the other recipes, here they are.

Story Time with The Chronically ill Chef

I am not always sure whether I will be able to cook or not. It depends on my energy and standing over a hot stove when I am already fatigued and brain fogged is not going to do my body any favors. So, whenever I can, I like to use the slow cooker, though I usually call it a crock pot because I’m Minnesotan and that’s what I grew up calling it.

So a few weeks ago, I knew that I was going to be making the Fundido Enchisagna later that night, so I decided that I wasn’t going to try and make a side using the stove or oven. I was going to use the slow cooker. I found several recipes to see how slow cooker cream corn is usually made and went from that. I combined techniques from several recipes and the end result was described as an “11” by my dad (I don’t understand his system, to be honest).

Some crock pot recipes have you going back after an hour and doing something to it, others have you coming back more often. This one just has you dump all the stuff in and walk away. No mixing, no fuss. That should be my slogan.

Some of the cream corn things I saw had you cut the cream cheese and butter into cubes, I didn’t do that because I had another thing to make several hours later. It came out perfectly fine without doing that.

Oh, and here’s a note on what I think is happening scientifically with the immersion blender (I keep miscalling it emulsion). So, after you do blend it and put it on high for 15 minutes, it thickens the cream corn and I think that is because blending it releases some of the starch from the corn. And when you put cornstarch into a soup or sauce, it thickens it up, and I think the same thing is happening here. Though I don’t know for sure.

So, I have had to throw away meats sometimes if I don’t have the energy to cook it. I always feel terrible doing that. But, this side dish recipe doesn’t have any meat. It uses frozen corn, but you can use whatever kind of corn you want.

Ingredients

  • 2 1/2 pounds frozen corn kernels
  • 2 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese
  • 1 cup butter
  • 1 cup milk
  • 1/2 cup taco seasoning
  • 2 tablespoons white sugar
  • salt and pepper to taste

Directions

  1. In a slow cooker, combine all of the ingredients. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Don’t mix it unless you absolutely want to.
  2. Cook on low for 4 to 6 hours or on high for 2 to 4. I recommend low, but if you are in a timecrunch, go ahead and try high.
  3. When you are about ready to eat, mix the ingredients together.
  4. Use an immersion blender or spoon about a cup or two into a blender and blend it (be careful when doing that, it will be hot) and break up a fair amount of it.
  5. Stir again and put the cover back on, putting the slow cooker on high for 15 minutes.
  6. Stir one last time and serve.

MiniTip XI: Get the Measuring Cups and Ingredients Before you Cook

TL;DR

Before you cook, go and get the measuring cups and ingredients. Assess whether you need a break after doing this and continue once you are ready. Your job this week is to try this.

This week, try this strategy out with a simple recipe. Take a picture of your ingredients and measuring spoons taken out and share it with me on Facebook or twitter at @ill_chef

Tip Expanded

You can apply Newton’s first law to chronic illness: If a chronically ill person is not in motion/doing something, they will not be able to start without a push.

I’m going to try and keep this short because I’m not feeling very well today. Sometimes, cooking when you have a chronic illness is difficult. In Friday’s MiniTips, I discussed breaking cooking up and taking breaks. Here is one way to start. I discussed it briefly in that one, so I’m going to discuss it in more depth here using an example.

When I am cooking, I find that I have a hard time initiating if I approach it as I’m going to do it in one go. So, I rev up the engine, or at least start it up, by making sure I have the ingredients. Then, if I need to, I take a break and read the instructions for the recipe. Once I’m recovered and ready, I take out the ingredients. I assess my levels, take a break if needed, and then get

This helps ease me into the cooking, doing one task helps give me the inertia to keep going. You can apply Newton’s first law to chronic illness: If a chronically ill person is not in motion/doing something, they will not be able to start without a push. For me, starting with gathering ingredients is that push.

Call to Action

This week, find a recipe that you think you can do. Take out the ingredients and measuring spoons before you cook. Take a picture and share it with me on Facebook or twitter at @ill_chef

My Baking (Mis)Adventures: A Successful Double Batch of Chocolate Chip Molasses Cookies

Here’s another live-tweeting baking session on twitter.

MiniTip X: Break Cooking Up

TL;DR

When you are cooking, listen to your body and take breaks as needed. Separate cooking into its individual parts: get ingredients, get measuring cups & spoons, 1st step, 2nd step, etc. After each, you may be able to take a break. Take it if you need it.

Take a picture of yourself or whatever you are doing while you break up cooking while cooking and share it with me on Facebook or twitter at @ill_chef

Tip Expanded

The worst thing anyone can do is ignore their body. With every sense we have, our body is trying to tell us something. Pain, pleasure, all of those things are our body trying to communicate something to us. Our job is to try and figure out what it is saying and give it what it needs.

So if you know that pain is coming on after you gather all of the ingredients, take a break. Sure, some of the ingredients may come from the fridge, but a few minute break will be better in the long run than pushing through it and then needing a week or more to recover.

Break the act of cooking into smaller parts:

  1. Gather the ingredients
  2. Gather the measuring spoons
  3. Start with step 1
  4. Step 2

Assess how your body is doing after each of these parts and take breaks as needed. Sometimes it won’t work because everything is time sensitive. Stove recipes are usually really time sensitive since you don’t want it to burn. But one thing you could do is turn down the heat if you need a break. It may mess up some stuff, but again, it’s better to take a break than not be able to finish because the pain gets worse and worse.

Another really important, if not the most important, is to learn your body’s signals. What is your body trying to communicate to you.

What it looks like in action

When cooking, I often start having severe pain in my back. There are two kinds of pain, one is just an achy pain, the other feels like stabbing needles. I know roughly what each one means and how to relieve it. I know that the stabbing needles is that I am getting overheated and need to cool down somehow. I get overheated very easily because I have anhidrosis, meaning I don’t sweat. The back achy pain is just that I’m in a position that my body does not appreciate.

So, the stabbing needles, cool down in front of a fan or away from the heat source if I am standing over a stove. For the achy, I use a slow yoga moveset to stretch out my back. I got the moveset from when I first started getting sick when I signed up for DDP Yoga (The first 10 seconds of the video below). I don’t do the screaming because I don’t like screaming when cooking since that would probably give my parents a heart attack since screaming coming from the kitchen does not bode well.

I just spend a few seconds in each position trying to breathe and move on to the next position slowly, listening to my body. I can do this in the kitchen and it helps with my back pain.

So, find things that work for you. They may be weird, they may be normal, find things that work for your body.

Call to Action

This week, make something and break it into small parts. Listen to your body throughout the cooking process and take breaks as needed. Break the cooking process down so you can take breaks, so that’s why I call it break cooking. Okay, maybe that doesn’t really make sense, but still.

Take a picture of yourself or whatever you are doing while you break up cooking while cooking and share it with me on Facebook or twitter at @ill_chef

Enchisagna (Enchilada Lasagna)

This is the fourth recipe of my 5 recipes for a 2-course Mexican Dinner. If you haven’t read the other recipes, here they are.

As I mentioned in last Tuesday’s recipe, I love Fundido Sauce. This recipe is a simple way of doing enchiladas that doesn’t involve filling them up, then spend precious energy trying to fold or roll them just to have them explode because they are too full. This happens almost every time if you have dried out gluten-free wraps (and even if they aren’t dried out).

Story Time with The Chronically ill Chef

I decided several weeks ago that I was going to make a meal (both a main dish and a side dish). This was what I made for the main dish. I had my mom show me how she did it. She was explaining how it was like a enchilada lasagna way of doing it and I couldn’t figure out how it was done since wraps are square and a square cake pan, which we made it in, wasn’t.

Enchisagna

So, she showed me and it is very simple. So, we were talking while she was making it and we decided that this recipe will henceforth forever be known as enchisagna. So, a big shoutout to my mom who showed me how to do this.

A note, you could, if you want to go cray-cray, fill this up with cheesy enchilada.

Ingredients

  • A bunch of tortillas (You can use any size)
  • Meat or filling for the enchiladas (you can fill it with just cheese, refried beans and cheese, meat and cheese, or cheesy enchilada).
  • Cheddar Cheese

Directions

  1. Grease the bottom of a 9×13″ cake pan with pam or butter.
  2. Cut the tortillas into half, cut the remaining pieces in half again (It should be in four pieces).
  3. Putting the square edges on the square sides of the pan, lay down the first layer of tortillas in the pan. The bottom of the pan should be covered with tortillas.
  4. Put on half of the filling you are using. Put on half of the cheese on top of that.
  5. Place another layer of tortillas on top of the filling and cheese.
  6. Repeat steps 4 and 5.
  7. Top with more cheddar cheese or sauce of your choice.
  8. Bake at 350 degrees for around 15-20 minutes.

How I Survived my First 4 years of Chronic Illness: State of the Kitchen

This week has been physically hard for me. I had severe fatigue where I couldn’t even hold a remote control or Xbox controller. I try to not get down on my body when this happens because I think I know the fatigue or brain fog will pass.

But I’m terrified that it will last for a long time. I don’t remember much of 2018 because the brain fog and fatigue was so bad. The only way I can tell you something I did is by going into my “year in books” on goodreads.com and see the books I read. I remember those, but I don’t remember much else. That said, I can’t remember them off the top, bottom, or side of my head.

When I got sick, I separated myself from my body. What I mean by that is that, as a defense mechanism, I viewed my body as a wholly separate being and entity from me. I wasn’t dizzy, my body was; I wasn’t fatigued, my body was; I wasn’t brain fogged, my body was. Maybe that wasn’t a healthy way of doing it, but it is the way I had to do it in order to survive.

I hated it. I hated my body because it was letting me down every minute of every day. I wanted to present, I wanted to work, I wanted to do something meaningful. Instead, all my body could give me was one heartbeat at a time. So, I wasn’t able to cook.

I used to cook on Sundays when I lived down in Ames, just before I got sick. I would decide on recipes to make on Saturday night, order a delivery of the groceries, and just cook all day on Sunday. My record was 7 dishes: Herb-Crust Parmesan Salmon, Cauliflower Pizza Dough, Pizza Sauce, a pizza using the cauliflower pizza dough, Sugar Free BBQ Sauce, Crockpot BBQ shredded Chicken, a sugar-free mock Wendy’s shake, and stuffed mozarella chicken parmesan.

One of my ex-therapists (I have seen at least 8 therapists since getting sick, 2 of whom kicked me out. Yeah, I’m that nuts) told me to cook. I tried to explain that I had such severe brain fog that I can’t even remember what I did yesterday, so it was not safe for anyone in my house for me to cook. She said, “Then make a sandwich.”

I don’t feel like making a sandwich is cooking, if you make the meat that goes on the sandwich or the sauce that goes on it, sure. However, she was saying, “Make a peanut butter sandwich,” as if that was going to help me feel better.

I can’t plate the dish to make it look pretty because I’m pretty shot after I cook the meal. But I cooked it and that’s what matters to me.

I was severely depressed because being chronically ill sucks. And I am usually good at recognizing pattern, but I couldn’t figure anything out for my chronic illness. Some days were good, some bad, with no patterns to what caused it. When you can only do three things (reading audiobooks, watching tv & movies, and playing video games), and sometimes you can’t even do them, you get sick of them.

So, I wasn’t able to cook for 3 years. When I went to the eye doctor, she told me that I had inflamed corneas and dry eyes and prescribed Restasis for it, and I wasn’t expecting anything from it. I was thinking that it would just help clear the inflammation from my eyes and that’s all. Three weeks later, I could wear my clear glasses (I had to wear dark glasses for 3 years because I would get severe migraines if I wasn’t wearing them) full-time.

Then, on a whim, I decided to try and make a box of brownies, knowing that I would probably need my mom to finish them if I couldn’t. Got all the ingredients, mixed it up, put it into the oven, and then took them out.

I needed a few days to recover, but I tried something else, another small recipe that didn’t include many steps. This was a recipe from scratch of cooking over the stove, and I couldn’t finish it because the anhidrosis started stabbing my back since I can’t sweat. I got the ingredients and everything done, but I couldn’t withstand the heat. I needed a week to recover from that one, but I came back and cooked another thing and cooked it all the way through. And then another several days later.

Since I have been able to cook, even though I am not able to do it every day, I enjoy the things that I can do. I enjoy getting to sit down and read an audiobook, or watch a YouTube video, or play a video game. And I cook when I feel the need, desire, and ability.

So, I’m still chronically ill. I know that cooking will set me back and that I will sway around like a drunk after I cook. I can’t plate the dish to make it look pretty because I’m pretty shot after I cook the meal. But I cooked it and that’s what matters to me.

What I cooked This Week

My brain sucks at remembering to take pictures. But I made a few things this week that I didn’t take pictures.

  • Homemade Nacho Cheese
  • Crockpot Leg of Lamb garlic onion roast
  • Garlic mashed potatoes

Cheesy Enchilada

This is the third recipe of my 5 recipes for a 2-course Mexican Dinner. If you haven’t read the other recipes, here they are.

Story Time with The Chronically ill Chef

I have major texture issues with food. I love the taste of onions, but I cannot stand the texture. And it goes beyond hating it because when I bite into an onion, my body decides that it is going to dry heave. Even if I focus all of my energy on not dry heaving and just enjoying the onion, dry heaves.

I get that way with whole tomatoes as well. I love the flavor of tomatoes, but the texture is an absolute no-no. So, now that I am an adult and have recognized and accepted that those issues are a reality that I can’t get past, I have figured out hacks to still have the food by either using a distracting texture or change the texture of the thing.

For example, I can have whole diced tomatoes as long as I have a big enough cracker that keeps its crispiness. But if it starts getting soggy and the tomatoes are not mushed up enough by my teeth, dry heaving. I also use a mortar and pestle on onions because then I have the flavor from the oil in the onions with only a little bit of onion chunks, not enough to cause a problem.

So, that’s all well and good, but who cares. What does that have to do with cheesy enchilada. So, when I was in 11th grade, I hadn’t figured out the ways of hacking the dry heave. So, for an entire year, I ate nothing but hamburger helper cheesy enchilada for every meal. I knew that I liked it, I knew that I could handle the consistency, and I knew that it was delicious. So, I had it for every meal.

I did Post-Secondary Enrollment Options (PSEO) in my last two years of high school, which meant that I went to college classes at the local community college and the state paid for it. So, I wasn’t eating school lunches, it was only cheesy enchilada for lunch and dinner (I didn’t do breakfasts, still don’t really, now I’m supposed to graze because of gastroparesis).

After a year, I started branching out and having some other things. But I always loved cheesy enchilada and still love it to this day. When I was diagnosed with celiac disease, I was heartbroken because the cheesy enchilada had wheat in it. I wanted cheesy enchilada, but it wasn’t available anymore.

Well, that was around the time that we found the taco seasoning recipe. I asked my mom what she thought putting rice and cheese into the taco mix would work, thereby making our own cheesy enchilada. She didn’t know if it would work, so we tried it. It was incredibly bland. But I realized that we had put in more ingredients without increasing the taco seasoning.

So, I recommended that we doubled the taco seasoning that we put into it. And, lo and behold, it worked. We have tried this recipe with store-bought taco mix and, in my opinion, it isn’t as good. It’s a little more bland than this one.

So, without further ado, here it is.

Ingredients

  • 1 pound ground beef
  • 2 taco seasoning mixes
    • 1/2 cup + 4 teaspoons if using the big batch taco seasoning
  • 2 cups uncooked rice
  • 3 cups water
  • 3/4 cup shredded cheddar cheese

Directions

  1. Brown hamburger in a pot.
  2. Put in all ingredients except cheese.
  3. Let cook for 15 – 20 minutes.
  4. Pour in cheese and cook until cheese is melted.

MiniTip IX: Checklists on Paper

TL;DR

Use a plastic sheet protector and whiteboard marker to check off ingredients and steps that you have completed.

This week, try this strategy out with a simple recipe. Take a picture of your finished checklist and share it with me on Facebook or twitter at @ill_chef

Tip Expanded

Several weeks ago, I posted that Checklists are your Friend, but not everyone can or want to use a phone when cooking. Some people may not be able to use a phone because it causes migraines or they find it easier to read on paper than on a phone. Others don’t want to use a phone because they just prefer paper.

Well, here’s how to still use checklists to help you complete each step of the recipe. All you need are plastic sheet protectors and a whiteboard marker. You’re going to want to get as thin of a whiteboard marker or else you will probably end up crossing out multiple steps or ingredients. Otherwise, you will want to make your text larger when you print out the recipe.

First, you print out your recipe on paper; then, you put it into a plastic sheet protector. Now, as you finish the different steps of the recipe, cross it off with your whiteboard marker. Do the same for the ingredients.

Call to Action

This week, find a recipe that you think you can do. Put it into a plastic sheet protector and as you put in the ingredients and finish the steps, cross them off. Take a picture of your finished checklist and share it with me on Facebook or twitter at @ill_chef

My Baking (Mis)Adventures: I didn’t Mess Up Gluten-Free Focaccia Bread

I hope you don’t mind, but sometimes I just don’t have the energy to write full blog posts. So, I decided that I am sometimes going to live-tweet my cooking thing. So, here’s the live-tweeting of my successful attempt at baking Focaccia Bread.

I think I am going to do this more because it makes it easier to keep up with this blog. Right now, I’m able to post almost every day because I have spurts of energy on days I don’t cook, so I write a for an hour if I’m lucky or 10 minutes if I’m not. So, live tweeting may be the best I can do sometimes.

I just wanted to give a shoutout to King Arthur Flour for replying to my live-tweeting and coming up with the recipe of the gluten-free focaccia bread I made.

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