Bonnie in Pioneer Press

A toast to health: Pioneer Press' Irv Leavitt and Northbrook nutritionist Bonnie Minsky at Prairie Grass Cafe. Prairie Grass uses the Tallgrass Beef that Bill Kurtis raises, which he claims is high in vitamins, with a better balance of Omega-3 and Omega-6 fatty acids, Formula 409's and Indy 500's.
(Allen Kaleta/for Sun-Times Media)

MegaBites heeds call to eat small

December 10, 2009

By IRV LEAVITT
ileavitt@pioneerlocal.com
Pioneer Press

If not, Now hear this: Do not eat a 3-pound cheeseburger! Do not eat 42 scoops of ice cream, even if you get it free! All the restaurants involved in my weekly excursions sell other choices that are better for you. Eat those instead. Or share the big things. Or take some of it home. It's probably OK to eat something too big once in a while. But make it a special occasion. Call us. Maybe we'll put it in the paper.

Every few weeks, we hear from a well-meaning person who criticizes the big food feature. A sort of read-and-get-fat phenomenon. So just to make sure you know we're not trying to kill our readers, Pioneer sent me, the perpetrator of the fat-promoting features, on a five-day week -- Thanksgiving week -- of healthy eating. It's documented in the food diary below.

Before I began, I sought advice from Northbrook nutritionist Bonnie Minsky and an Evanston counterpart, Monique Ryan, which I have mangled, truncated and discounted in the following story. You can learn actual facts about their work at nutritionalconcepts.com and moniqueryan.com.

In the meantime, eat a salad. They're good with lots of bacon.

Monday, 9:15 a.m., Kappy's Pancake House, 7200 Dempster St., Niles:
A month before, I agreed to an interview here by a college student, fondly anticipating one of the world's great breakfasts: Kappy's Lox Benedict. That's Eggs Benedict with lox standing in for Canadian bacon. It can make a whole week better. But not this week. I got oatmeal. For $5.99, it came festooned with bananas and various berries. And walnuts. Walnuts? Eating oatmeal shouldn't make noise. But it was palatable, more so after I sprinkled a little brown sugar in it. The kid ate biscuits and gravy with bacon and eggs. I hope he flunks.

Monday, 1:30 p.m., Glenbrook Hospital, 2100 Pfingsten Road, Glenview:
Time's short, so it's a late lunch in the cafeteria, a two-minute drive away. But the pizza, chicken cacciatore, pork loin and Buffalo chicken wrap didn't look like health food. From what remained, it took me all of two seconds to choose the salad bar over the Boca Burgers. Not very hungry, I just got two-thirds of a pound of various vegetables and tofu, with oil and vinegar. It took almost as long to dig the $4.32 out of my pocket to pay for the salad as it did to eat it. And it was a long walk through the parking lot and the building to the cafeteria to eat a tiny lunch, so I'm guessing I burned all the calories I consumed by the time I got back to the car.

Monday, 5 p.m.: Prairie Grass Cafe, 601 Skokie Blvd., Northbrook: I liked Minsky's choice for a healthy dinner to repay her for her advice. They have real meat here. Prairie Grass uses the Tallgrass Beef that Bill Kurtis raises, which he claims is high in vitamins, with a better balance of Omega-3 and Omega-6 fatty acids, Formula 409's and Indy 500's. The $39 tenderloin tasted so good I chewed with my eyes closed to discourage people from talking to me while I ate. Kurtis' product seems spectacular now, but it really just tastes like beef did 40 years ago, before the USDA started upgrading meat so that Gaines-Burgers could pass for people food. Co-Chef Sarah Stegner came by and related that Kurtis' outfit uses ultrasound on living cows to discern if the meat is marbled enough before actually opening the container. This would have been impressive in my old neighborhood, where half the population thought ultrasound to check pregnancies was a frill. Minsky and I had ordered a couple of salads as starters, one of which she kept telling me "may be the best salad I have ever had." It was good, but I can't get that excited about a salad that doesn't have lobsters or uranium in it.

Tuesday, 10 a.m., Taco Burrito King, Harlem Irving Plaza, Norridge: Another old appointment: Three of us tried foot-long burritos for Mega Bites. We all got the chicken flavor, easy on the cheese and sour cream. One of our tasting partners said her burrito seemed lean and healthy, especially since she'd expected something greasy. I ate half a burrito, and I was good for hours.

Tuesday, 8:15 p.m., Lulu's Dim Sum and Then Sum, 804 Davis St., Evanston: Nutritionist Ryan said even the crispy stuff here is OK, being only "lightly fried." So over the roar of gabbing Northwestern students, I ordered three fried vegetable spring rolls for $5.99 and a $4.99 bowl of vegetarian hot and sour soup. The soup was heavily laden with about 20 different kinds of vegetables, including many I could not name on a bet. But it tasted like hot and sour soup is supposed to, which was a relief. The little fried things, each the size of a roll of dimes, were crunchy and tasted nice in their hot mustard/sweet chili sauce puddle. But minutes later, I got that "When do we eat?" sensation. Steve Goodman's old line from "Chicken Cordon Bleus" came rushing back: "Can you see that old dog out in the street/He's got a big smile on his face/Cause they let him eat meat." So I bought an order of Chicken Shao Mai ($5.99), wontons filled with minced chicken and soy ginger. They looked like four badminton shuttlecocks, but they did the trick.

Wednesday, 4:38 a.m., home: I jerked awake so hungry that the lining of my stomach was trying to eat itself. I tiptoed into the kitchen and nuked a half-cup of oatmeal, and added garlic salt, which is the way I like it. I also like cheese, but that's some sort of crime, according to Minsky. Then I remembered: When I told her about Monday's oatmeal, she said I could have also had an egg-white omelet with one yolk. Good, but I was afraid of using fire while half-asleep. Ever stir a raw egg into a bowl of oatmeal? You could do worse.

Wednesday, 1 p.m., Blind Faith Cafe, 525 Dempster St., Evanston: I invited former wrestler Ed "Haystacks" Ross of Wilmette, a devotee of barbecue and giant hamburgers whose gustatory prowess helped us launch the first Mega Bites last June. When he got his Bibim Bop -- a Korean vegetable and rice bowl that typically has meat and a fried egg on top -- the 6 foot 8 man-mountain pointed delicately at some gray rectangles, scattered over the brown rice, that were neither meat nor egg. "What the hell is that?" he asked. Tofu, the waitress said. He looked ticked. Would you like to switch? I asked. Yeah. "But I still don't think I've made out on the deal," he added, eyeing the Mongolian Stir Fry and its grilled seitan. "This is trying so hard to be meat," he said, chewing on the wheat gluten. "It's never gonna be meat." He approved of one of the appetizers -- a fried risotto cake -- but when asked what he liked best, he silently placed a finger on a glass of lemonade. I liked the Bop, and finished it off. Ross didn't eat much, so he bought a vegan cupcake. "Something missing," he said. "That would be butter," the waitress giggled. "Or eggs."

Wednesday, 2:30 p.m., Whole Foods, 1111 Chicago Ave., Evanston: "See her about a turkey," a grocer told me, nodding at a woman sitting at a desk placed awkwardly in the middle of the store. "What's your name? What kind of turkey did you want?" she asked, with the wary, measured voice of someone who's spent the day solving the Thanksgiving turkey troubles of a multitude. Before I could respond, she perceived that I had no reservation, and was one of those people who thought he could just waltz in and get a fresh Thanksgiving turkey, like he was the mayor or Adam Lambert or somebody. She sent me back to the original gent, who in 10 minutes somehow found me an 11-pound turkey -- free-range and hormone- and antibiotic-free -- but at $1.99 a pound, not otherwise free. Among my other purchases were an 11-dollar pound of "wild-caught" cod and a couple of organic Yukon Gold potatoes for Wednesday dinner. Also, since my daughter Megan, 9, won't eat fish, I bought a $6.99 package of grass-fed beef hot dogs and a $3.99 pack of organic multigrain buns to go with them. Wednesday, 7 p.m., home: Dinner was baked cod with lemon and garlic, roasted potatoes and microwaved spaghetti squash. I had to get that big yellow gourd out of the refrigerator to make room for the turkey. The fish was a little overcooked, the potatoes a bit underdone, and the spaghetti squash had to be reheated. Otherwise excellent. "This hot dog is not very good," Megan said.

Thanksgiving Day, home, 11 a.m.: Minsky had told me people eat too much wheat bread, and the only name-brand she would recommend was Ezekiel 4:9 Bread, which is sprouted and flourless. By definition, it sounds like it's something other than bread. But I had bought a $3.69 loaf at Whole Foods, anyway, and made sandwiches for lunch. They were filling. My wife was done after half of a ham sandwich. I made a sandwich out of the leftover fish, and was good 'til turkeytime. I made a bologna sandwich for Megan, and she gave me a big thumb's up as I took a picture of her eating it. She then ate the baloney and left the bread behind. She wouldn't let me take a picture of that, however. "Why not? Isn't that the truth?" I asked. "The truth stinks," she said.

Thanksgiving Day, home, 5 p.m.: We started off with squash soup from a recipe of Minsky's, which combined baked squash, carrots, onions, chicken stock and pinches of allspice and garlic. Reviews ranged from "This is a little too spicy" to "This is good. It's a little spicy." The turkey was the juiciest we remembered, and a looker. The organic sweet potatoes turned out good, but the organic pumpkin pie was a bit bland. I ate more than I had all week, but compared to previous Thanksgivings, it was like a fast. Megan won't eat turkey, so Helen baked a one-pound canned ham for her. She didn't eat the ham, either.

Friday, 7:45 a.m., home: Oatmeal. Garlic salt.

Friday, 2:30 p.m., Pioneer Press, 3701 West Lake Ave., Glenview: I'm sick of restaurants. I'm kind of sick of food in general. So last night, I just made tabbouleh , which I haven't done since Mega Bites started. Boiling water went into salted bulgur wheat. Cooled it off, added garlic and chilled it overnight. Added lime and cilantro (definitely better than lemon and parsley) in the morning, plus chopped Kirby pickles, green onions and tomatoes. Time to eat: cubed feta cheese on top. Minsky might argue, but my 1977 Moosewood Cookbook recommends it. So there. I felt great after the tabbouleh, and I had enough left over for two more meals over the weekend. But Monday, I was back at Kappy's. And I had already had enough oatmeal to last a while.