TK77 Soup Instructions and Using Your Senses to Pick Produce

Dear TK77,

You sent me a private message about the vegetable broth recipe that I posted and asked whether or not it was ok to leave the broth in the pot. I tried to respond to you privately but it seems your account is not accepting private messages.

When I used to make this every week, we left the broth in the pot for a 2-3 days without any problem. It seems that the combination of boiling the vegetables and the alkaline mineral content in the broth kept it from spoiling.

Also I noticed you mentioning that you shop at local farmer's markets and you are saving up for a refractometer. I have noticed that using your senses can help you pick better produce until you can afford a refractometer.

The first sense is smell. High BRIX produce smells good and the smell is easily detected. I find this very valuable in choosing any fruit (ie lemons) or things like tomatoes, carrots, onions, celery and many green leafy vegetables. When you go to your regular grocery store you will be shocked at how a poorly grown lemon, picked unripe, and shipped from halfway around the world doesn't smell like anything.

The other sense is taste. I taste everything before I buy it. If the fruits or vegetables don't taste sweet then I don't buy them. In the case of vegetables I am particularly looking for an unpleasant bitterness that signals a high NPN content. These I avoid like the plague. NPN is a big deal and most vegans/vegetarians don't understand it so, despite the severe diet restrictions they place on themselves, they still are not healthy. Be bold about asking to sample the produce. You are a paying customer and you deserve a quality product and most often smelling and tasting are the only way to determine the quality of product that your farmer is selling you. I find that farmer's at the markets are marking their product up quit handsomely so if you are paying a premium price you should expect high quality product and service.

The third sense is your 6th sense or intuition. Many times I get a feeling about certain produce and I gravitate toward it at my local farmer's produce market. Funny thing is that it is almost never the fancy organic stuff. I am a big believer in organic farming but most organic farmers are not familiar with the concept of BRIX and the methods behind growing high BRIX produce. Additionally, I think the whole concept of organic certification has really limited organic farmer's ability to produce high BRIX produce. It also adds to the cost as they have to jump through a bunch of expensive hoops to get certified. The stuff I naturally gravitate to tends to me local and often is labeled "pesticide free." Learning to listen to your intuition has many more benefits as it is the way that your spirit which communes with our Heavenly Father communicates messages to your conscious mind. And you know there is no truth apart from Yahweh's truth.

Ok this was a message about originally about soup...Yes you can leave the soup out for a couple days and reheat it on the stove whenever you want to have some.

Agape,

Evan