Three Super-Easy Steps to Healthy Oven-Roasted Sweet-Potato Wedges

Sweet potatoes, you gotta love 'em for being a rich source of antioxidants, vitamins, minerals, and dietary fiber. Unless you're completely a newbie to the wonders of sweet potatoes, now that's another matter. You have a lot of enlightening to go through just yet. 

In the Philippines, we call sweet potatoes, "kamote." It's a super food for me because it's cheap, filling, and amazingly nutritious. Assuredly, practical parents won't fret on the price of this super food.

Usually, in cooking sweet potato, I just boil it in water without adding anything. I got tired of the taste, so I wanted to try a new recipe. 

I got the Oven-Roasted Sweet-Potato Wedges from Health's website, but I did not follow everything because I don't have all of the ingredients. 

Below is the one I tried and to make it more interesting, I asked my 5-year-old daughter to help me. She's not much of an eating person. I always have to force her to eat, almost always (quite her mother's opposite!). I decided to have her help me with the preparations to increase her interest in food. Maybe if she helped me cook it, she will be more interested in eating it!

I woke my daughter up earlier than usual, and she woke pretty fast when she learned she'd be cooking. That's one of her fastest waking-up rates, second to the times when her military father is around.

Let's get to work. It's baking time!

Oven-Roasted Sweet-Potato Wedges Recipe

Ingredients

• 2 small sweet potatoes (Note: I would have wanted it unpeeled and brushed well to clean the skin, but the skin was not so nice, so I had to peel it.)
• 1 tablespoon garlic-flavored olive oil (Note: I don't have garlic-flavored olive oil so I just added some minced garlic on the olive oil.)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt 

Preparations

1. Preheat oven to 450°. (I don't have an oven yet, so I used my roaster).
2. Peel sweet potatoes; cut each potato lengthwise into 8 wedges. In a large bowl, combine sweet potatoes and remaining ingredients; toss well to coat.
3. Arrange potatoes in a single layer on a baking sheet or the grill. Bake potatoes at 450° for 30 minutes or until soft and lightly browned, turning wedges after the first 15 minutes. Serve immediately.

My daughter patiently waits for her breakfast.

Testing, Testing

Okay, so the sweet potatoes cooked in only 13 minutes, maybe because the preheating took too long, Or so I thought. I put the temperature incorrectly, actually. Toinks! 

Anyway, probably becaus of the hurried cooking, it's a bit dry and not enough saltiness for me. I would add a little more than a dash. Zoe loved it though. I mean, chef Zoe loved it. We dipped it in tomato ketchup. 

Yummy mother-child bonding. Hurrah to healthy living!

Ready to eat! Healthy sweet potatoes! (Sorry for the poor lighting. I'm still getting used to taking photos of food in our seemingly-underground kitchen hehe)

How did this recipe go for you? What sweet potato recipes have you tried already? 

The Surprisingly High Price of Natural Living in The Philippines and the Gaping Business Opportunity Behind It

What is "organic" or "natural" is expensive.

It's amazing and puzzling really, but it's true. 

As a citizen of a developing country, my transition to natural living is not as simple and affordable as I thought it would be.

Since my journey into DIY-natural living has started, I've come across some price and resource access difficulties. And I thought it was as easy as going to the supermarket and buying them like other groceries!

Also, since I've been a DIY convert, I've also opened my eyes to wonderful business ideas that can result to social changes.

Shocking Prices and Dismal Availability of Materials 

The first problem in my natural living journey is access to materials/ingredients. I cannot get many of the supplies I needed initially. Where can I buy bentonite clay and raw cocoa butter, for instance? SM does not sell them, as well as the local wet and dry market.

I'm in the Philippines and I thought I can order some of the organic products from Amazon.com, but sadly, these companies with the materials I need do not deliver to the Philippines.

I was depressed for a few seconds. Depression is unheard of in the Philippines, even if many of us do get depressed. We Filipinos are generally happy people who like enjoying the present, so depression is not, well, enjoyable, so it lapses too swiftly.

To learn more about where I can buy these natural products, I asked my friends through Facebook about these products and they said that I should go to Healthy Options at SM Mall of Asia. Some suggested Rustan's and Glorietta. Who knew that looking for bentonite clay (et al.) can be so hard?

As for the price of natural living, oh the agonizing price! Each of them range from P300 upwards, some are more than a thousand a bottle and they're in such tiny amounts, especially the essential oils and other oils. 

I was almost discouraged to continue my DIY-natural-living lifestyle. I wanted to be more practical in life, not practically penniless!

Whatever the price challenges, I still invested money (swipe you go credit cards, tsk tsk) on my new natural living lifestyle. I know that these small amounts would go a long way anyway.

I realized now why not so many people are willing to go natural and DIY. The time, money, and energy involved can be unnerving at first, but in time, it gets easier. 

With your stock of materials that you can use for many and different products, you'll soon realize that the investment is worth it, especially considering that you're doing this to promote good health and practical living for yourself and your family. 

For example, Vitamin E oil is expensive, but it can be used to make many products. You can also compare DIY projects to commercial products, and the latter are more expensive than the former. 

My long-term computations assert that natural living is still more practical than my former lifestyle. Yes, long-term is the way to go for us practical parents and individuals. 

On Purchasing Natural Products: Physical Places and Places to Click

I just went to Healthy Options at SM Moa, and thankfully I got some of the products I needed. They're, as expected, much pricier than those available online, considering import duties and their other expenses. I'm looking into Sulit.com for better prices and found other options, but I haven't bought from them yet because of budgetary concerns.

While looking for affordable local organic products, I'm so happy to stumble into Kikay Corner's website because she brought me to Liquid Castile Soaps by Casa de Lorenzo. They sell numerous kinds of oils and castile soaps. I can't wait to try local organic products! Hopefully, we can see more of these firms/people offering local products like raw 100% cocoa butter, beeswax pastilles, baking soda in larger packages and the like in the future.

I looked up Castile Soap, Witch Hazel, Bentonite Clay and Vitamin E oil at Galleon's website and theirs are quite more expensive than Healthy Options. If you're near a Healthy Options shop, they have cheaper products, but they don't have all the stuff. Galleon has numerous products that cannot be bought in the Philippines, so you can try their website too.  I'm planning to buy 100% raw cocoa butter from them.

Healthy Option's Castile Soap is also cheaper than Casa de Lorenzo's. I was quite surprised. I thought local products would be cheaper. Still, you can try their castile soaps because I heard they're great too, and they offer Calamansi Castile Soap, how cool is that! I also bought several essential oils from Case de Lorenzo, and they're a reliable supplier. 

As for baking soda, I'm so thankful I found Queen's Baking Soda. It's a lot cheaper than Arm & Hammer's but not so accessible. Even in SM Supermarkets, baking soda is hard to find and they only have Arm & Hammer's brand, at least during the times I went there.

Divisoria offers the cheapest baking soda at Php 25-30 though. Tabora street is the place to go for inexpensive baking soda.

Apple cider vinegar is expensive. I use Bragg's and I like it better than other brands. Too bad there's no better or equally good local version. 

Products Purchased from Healthy Options @ SM MOA for making Homemade Products like Homemade Natural Bug Repellent Spray

The High Price of Imported Natural Products: Opportunities for Local Natural Products

As for the other imported products, I'll find a way to replace them with local counterparts. That would take a good deal of experimentation, but I'm willing to do it. I've nothing against imported brands but they are very expensive and hard to find, and I want to support local products too.

Furthermore, I believe there's a large business opportunity for a natural-living market in the Philippines. Do you know that virgin coconut oil is available by gallons to Americans, but not here in local Philippine supermarkets? Do you also know where some of these virgin coconut oils are sourced? From the Philippines! But we Filipinos cannot buy in bulk because our local supermarkets don't sell them! 

At the same time, coconut oil can be made into many products, from shampoo to deodorant to lotions (the list is almost endless), but they're not being widely made and popularly used/marketed in the Philippines. 

Why oh why?

I see plentiful coconut trees here, even in the cities, and more so, in numerous provinces, but we do not have a thriving coconut-oil industry that can make different coconut products, including hygiene, beauty, and medical products! The government and business community are seriously under-investing on something so local to us, and yet has potentially striking local and international business potential!

Gaping business opportunity! My mouth is agape too!

Oh don't get me started. I can get so frustrated when I talk about this. Many coconut farmers and workers are dirt poor, when they can turn their coconuts into diverse products that can truly improve their lives. That they remain poor when they are middle-class-in-the-making breaks my heart. My mind screams: This is nuts! 

I wish I can do more for our coconut industry, as well as our agricultural industry, but this is all I can think of for now. Starting a blog that uses their products and pushing the demand for coconut oil and other local products through promoting healthy living. 

Hopefully, I can also motivate entrepreneurs who have the money and networks needed to invest in the R&D and marketing that can turn the coconut industry into one giant, middle-class-making industry.

Small Beginnings, Large Dreams

Natural living is mind-boggling pricey. 

Natural should be practical, not 

However, the high price of natural living in the Philippines can be reduced- through investment, R&D, and marketing that can increase the demand for these products and reduce their prices.

It wouldn't harm us to also dream that, one day, other changes will also happen in the Philippines- a wonderful transformation in the development of the local coconut industry and other agricultural industries, followed by more wonderful social transformations in the life of many of the poor.
  
How's your trip to organic beauty and living and DIY flying? Any similar challenges? How about DIY triumphs? Please do share them with me and let's exchange ideas and learn from one another!

Lovely Beasts and Distracted Beauties

You don't shampoo and condition everyday? How beastly!

You don't know the latest fashionable commercial products? How beastly!

You don't look like her and her and her? How beastly!

Beauty versus the beast. No longer a romance, but a saga of endless battles. 

Beauty versus the beast. Trending worldwide, even in developing countries.

Beauty versus the beast. Making nearly two hundred billions of dollars for the cosmetic industry in 2010.

STOP!

Why is there a beauty on the one hand and a beast on the other hand? Aren't they both beauties?

Beauties are Hot and Beastlies are Not

Aren't we all beauties?

No, there are golden standards and guidelines. Beauties are these and these, and the rest are beastlies. Conform or be destroyed.

But who defines whatever you said? Who defines beauty? 

Society. Society defines beauty.

What society? Society of commercial-beauty-corporations-sponsored medical industry and media? 

Uhm. Well. Not really no or yes.

A group of celebrities who may not even be using these products as regularly as they claim in commercials? 

Coughs. You're referring to?

Who defines beauty? 

You?

Yes, you. YOU.

Maybe we can have our own definitions of beauty.

Maybe we can start by answering our own questions regarding beauty.

Maybe you can tell me what beauty is, what natural beauty is, and maybe we can agree on something, disagree on others, and keep on redefining social terms according to our realities and aspirations.

And let's not stop this time. Let's ask these questions and answer them together anytime and anywhere we feel like it.

Beautiful Moms Who Hardly Sleep

Moms sometimes wonder, how can we stay beautiful when bills, marital matters, childrearing duties, and family issues keep us awake at night?

It's not even about looking fresh and flawless (do we really need to be flawless all the time?), but feeling deeply beautiful inside. Knowing beauty not from the mirror or the expectation of others, but from our own expectations of ourselves.

Your beauty is there alright. In your core. You don't even need a mirror to see it. You surely don't need others to confirm it. You just need your assured affirmation.

In a world where commercialized beauty and hygiene products rule, it's hard to find the meaning of "natural beauty." Natural beauty is like one of 'em crazies locked up in a looney bin, the keys thrown away by society's " beauty standard" gatekeepers.

Is she gone for good? She is if you say so. 

You can free her. You can awaken her. You can be your natural beauty. 

You only have to open your mind. You only have to close your ears and eyes to commercialized media and other social distractions that insist on a one-way road.

And you have to be willing to do tons of research and experimentation. 

You have to be willing to do some soul-searching too. 

Beauty is hard work. It is a "thinking," "doing," and "feeling" kind of hard work. 

But I can join you. I can and will help you because I want to be beautiful too. 

Beautiful moms, we can do this. We have to, if we want to change something that feels wrong. 

We have to, if we want to be able to look at ourselves inside and outside and feel better. Better because we're doing something. Better because we're doing it ourselves.

One Beast-of-Burden Journey

Natural beauty in the way of the old and some additions of the new is a whole new world out there, if you've been distracted as long as I have. We have to get down to business and be ready to work for it. 

More importantly, you cannot be naturally beautiful outside if you haven't accepted it inside you. You can't change behavior without changing your mindset. 

If you don't think you're beautiful and nature has simple products to keep you healthy and beautiful, then why are you still reading this? 

You must admit first that you're beautiful and confirm it from your soul. Now, beauty seems to fit with a simple life, don't you think? If you want a simple, practical life, then continue reading.

One of the best ways to change your mind about beauty, and indeed having a beautifully happy life, is to do research and to criticize research. Read, read, read. Think, think, and think even more about what you have read and its applications to you.

You also have to find others who are on the same journey and connect with them. Share ideas. Chime in your experiences. Try DIY yourself.

Now, back to the research element of beauty.

Want to know more about No 'Poo? Tap, tap, tap on your keyboards and research what it is and try them out until you know what's best for your hair and scalp.

Natural make-up? Tap-tap some more and find different natural selections to suit your skin and style.

Homemade remedies for children? Tap again and you'll find different selections of homemade medicine for the entire family.

Homemade aphrodisiacs? Tap those sexual blues away, for the Net is a net of DIY sexual-appetite inflators. You'd be blown away by the fruits and veggies that can blow you away really good.

Homemade self-esteem? That's one of the best homemade products ever. The product of giving yourself the empowerment you need to control your life, and to set the standards that shape how you see yourself and how you want to live.

No More Fighting, Yet We Are Winning

Call us beasts, but we are lovely beasts. And you who resist us and want to change us, you're distracted beauties. 

You're distracted if you doubt your own beauty because society's measures say you don't fit in.

You're distracted if you follow everyone else except what you really want.

Beauties, think about it. Come with me, let's walk together. 

Walk with me. Run with me. Fly with me. 

Let's live life in our own terms. 

Let's live life through learning and relearning.

Let's beast it out beauties, and roar that we are women in control, roar that we are evolving forevermore, and roar that we are beautiful because we simply are.

The Ghost of Deathly Follows

Goosebumps don't lie. You can feel it when someone is staring at you. 

When I saw her, a cold draft spilled into my spine.

She's been looking at me for a while, that pale-looking woman with dry, tangled hair, sunken bloodshot eyes, and blotchy-red skin. 

The horror! The horror!- Kurtz in Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness

I'm beginning to get scared. I don't like strangers who stare like you're someone being judged for the gallows.  Like you're someone she'd bring with you to her gallows. 

I look at her closely. She looks so familiar and yet so unfamiliar. There's something sad and desperate in her eyes, like she's crying for help. Like she's crying for someone to save her.

I look closer.

I have to look closer. 

She looks back. She stares long and hard at me. 

Siphoning all the courage I have, even tapping my daughter's courage reservoir because she's braver than me on many accounts, I stand up. I walk slowly towards her. I am no longer afraid. 

I reach for her face. 

I see myself touching my face. That woman is me.

That's me and what I've become relying too much on commercial products. 

That's me, the Ghost of Deathly Follows, the woman who follows what's "in" because prime-time commercials say so, because celebrities say so, and because everyone else who don't really give a rat's ass about my true welfare says so.

I don't want to be possessed anymore by the Ghost of Deathly Follows.

Donned in a Ghostbuster's suit, I sat in front of my computer, flexed my fingers, and typed, "homemade shampoo" until I reached Simple Mom's "How to wash your hair without shampoo." I read her blog and numerous other articles on no 'poo.

The dam of knowledge exploded. I was washed away. I followed Tsh's advice on going 'poo less.  Baking soda shampoo followed by apple cider vinegar solution for conditioner. 

I was washed away the second time, literally, and it was the best washing ever. 

Since then, I wanted to be washed over and over again. 

From inside to outside. 

This is the reason why I started wearepracticalmoms.blogspot.com. 

Because following the most popular manufactured products in mainstream media is not always the best and the most practical option.

Because we all need a good washing every now and then.

Because we all have our ghosts to vanquish.

From now on, I vow to overcome the Ghost of Deathly Follows through DIY, natural living, and a simple, more meaningful lifestyle. 

From now on, I shall no longer be stared at during the wee hours of the morning by some sallow ghost!

Come! Help me! 

Let's vanquish these ghosts of what we were, so that we can be the goddesses we are meant to be!

Let's wash away our insecurities and floods ourselves with new and practical knowledge and skills that will redefine who we are in our own terms!

Let's break the gallows that haunt us because this time, we are the executioners- the executioners of our fate!

Next Chapter: Baking Soda Wars