Following take 1, where I answered my friend’s mom question, “Hi Josh, My son says you make an awesome vegetable stew with seasonal produce. Is there a formula for it?”, she wrote back:

I did it!! I got an instant pot and I made a simple stew with: Lentils, acorn squash, kale, spinach, garlic and some Braggs seasoning. I added some nutritional yeast later and topped it off with chopped sweet onions and cracked pepper. It turned out AWESOME!

I always do some batch cooking every week and freeze what I make in portions. This is going to revolutionize my system😁😁😁.

I’m going to make a fruit stew tomorrow because I have a sweet tooth and this is a healthy option that needs no added sugar.

Thank you Joshua!

Valerie

Ps: I listened to a few of your podcasts. You have great ideas. You’re changing the world.  🤗

I responded:

The first day of the rest of your life 🙂

Now that you have the technique, you can change the proportions, put in new ingredients by season, and a few other tricks. For example, I find garlic loses its flavor if I put it in the whole time. Instead, I add it when I open the stew and it’s still boiling. Same with ginger. Jalapenos and some other seasonings I put on when I serve it.

You can also see how little packaging you can get. Can you get so little that you take a month to fill a load? Then six months? Then a year? Have you seen this video: https://joshuaspodek.com/year-emptied-garbage. I bet you’ll find the food tastes better, you’ll meet more local farmers, get more in touch with the seasons, see how much our culture wastes, and will lose taste for packaging.

Oh, you didn’t add nuts or avocado. I recommend adding something to give it richness. You might experiment with more nutritional yeast. I add more than most people would expect because it adds a lot of flavor. You can spoon it on your bowl to find out.

When I eat my fruit stews, I have to remind myself I didn’t add sugar. If someone gave me one without my knowing no sugar was added, I would never believe it was just fruit. All I do is chop a couple oranges, apples, and bananas and pressure cook them for a couple minutes. So easy! After cooking I can add cloves, ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, or other spice, or chia seeds, flax, oats, or other seed or grain, and so on. Also nuts, coconut, cacao nibs, etc.

I’d love to hear how your next steps go.

Josh

P.S. If you like the podcast, please spread the word. Reviews on iTunes or wherever you listen help, as does telling people about it.

I can’t wait to hear what comes next.

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