78. Take The Quiz!!

Take the Fast Five Quiz:  Alcohol and Cancer

 https://reference.medscape.com/viewarticle/968444?uac=159011HR&faf=1&sso=true&impID=4143181&src=

Back on the weekend with another story from Irm's archives. 😊     SanTeh!

77. Chemo What the Heck is Einkorn?

That's what I thought when I first came across it recently.  What the heck is this stuff? I had never heard of it and we are in the grain-growing business! 

Einkorn is the oldest, never been hybridized, wheat known to mankind.  It may have an anti-inflammatory effect.  It has gluten in it, but in a different form than what is in our cereals today.  It should however be avoided if you have celiac disease or wheat allergies.  It tastes slightly bitter and is considered to be of neutral acidity.  Google it if you are interested.  Or check out:  www.don'twastethecrumbs.com  Article: Einkorn: a wheat for the gluten free?  It has tons of info on it.

76. Easy Chocolate Fudge Cake

 

Easy Chocolate Fudge Cake

Good for a quick 1 or 2 small portions!  😋 I like simple recipes!!😄

Ingredients:

• ·       3 Tbsp milk with 2 TBsp sugar added
• ·       3 TBsp einkorn flour, 2 Tbsp unsweetened cacao powder, nothing added
• ·       1/8 tsp baking powder
• ·       1 to 2 Tbsp Greek yochurt, regular kind, not non fat

Equipment:

• ·       Microwave
• ·       2 microwaveable bowls

Put milk and sugar in a bowl.  Microwave till hot so the sugar can easily dissolve.  Mix well.  Set aside to cool.   Mix einkorn flour, cacao powder and baking powder in another bowl.  Flatten any lumps.  Mix well.  Add dry bowl mix to wet or reverse.  It does not seem to make much difference.  Mix till it is like batter.  Then add the Greek yochurt.  Mix some more.  Microwave cake mixture for about 1 minute.  Take out of microwave and let cool.  If you find this too dry, top with table or other cream.    I usually put the cake mixture in 5 ½” bowls but I have used smaller bowls, pried out the cake, cut it lengthwise in half and added cherries and whipped cream to be like miniature Black Forest Cakes!   (Recipe adapted from a women's magazine.)

The einkorn flour and the unsweetened cacao powder was bought at the health food store.  Now what the heck is einkorn?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrZ314PbSzU   Carole King: Bitter with the Sweet

75. Chemo A Bitter-Sweet Weekend

Happy Belated Mother's Day to all the mothers and gramas this weekend! For us the weekend was bitter-sweet.  The sweet part:  I finished my last chemo treatment on Thursday (yeah), our son was home for a very nice visit and we managed to get some long overdue visiting in with some of the relatives.  Very nice!

The bitter part:  on Saturday there was a graveside funeral service for my husband's younger sister who passed away from cancer November after a brief stay in palliative care.  By the time the cancer was found, it had metastasized all throughout her body even though she had been treated by the same family physician for  number of years.  I can not comprehend this. There are so many diagnostic tools available.  How could this possibly have been missed? It is just tragic beyond words.

Back tomorrow with a recipe and then other, much needed, more pleasant topics for a while!

74. Chemo Undergoing Procedures before Surgery (follows post #56)

 First I received a blood transfusion.  Although I was a bit apprehensive about this, I had no side effects, thank goodness!  My 95 year old mother did however, after she had a blood transfusion in her much younger years.  She claims that a monk had been the donor.  After the procedure she took a liking to drinking trappist beer, wore a lot of sandals (if she did not go barefeet) and started wearing baggy clothing! 😄

Next came the iron infusion.  This did not go without a hitch.  The nurses had to interrupt the treatment for a while and then start it up again at a much slower pace because I had a reaction to it.

Lastly I had a CT (cat) scan.  The results from that indicated that I did not have Stage 2 but indeed Stage 3 colon cancer, that it had spread into some lymph nodes, that the cancer was "on the move".   It had been decided by then to do the operation first to remove the diseased part of my colon and the operation was to be followed by chemotherapy to kill all residual cancer cells afterward.

73. Chemo Best Egg Salad Sandwich Ever!

 I was teaching in a school quite a distance away from my home.  Monday mornings, my husband would prepare my lunch for the day so I would not be late.  This particular Monday I knew he had made me an egg salad sandwich, an absolute favorite of mine.  I was really looking forward to it!

Arriving at the school, I tossed my non-descript lunch bag into the staff room fridge in the pile with all the other lunches.  When it was lunch time I quickly grabbed my lunch and proceeded to eat it.  Much to my delight the egg salad was exactly the way I like it: very creamy with just the right amount of finely chopped onion added!  My husband had really outdone himself!  Every bite was sheer bliss!

I was just about to sink my teeth into the second half of the sandwich when a frantic woman's voice filled the room.  Or rather, she had her head stuck in the fridge and kept muttering: "I can't find my lunch.  I just can not find my lunch."  Then it slowly dawned on me that the delicious sandwich I was eating might not be mine? I went to the fridge.  Sure enough, my bag had been tossed into the back in between last month's left-overs.  Whoops!  Sheepishly I confessed my error to the poor substitute teacher, apologized, tried a lopsided smile and suggested a "lunch swap"?  She found no humor in this, stomped out of the staff room and headed straight for the nearest Tim Horton's.  With most of the sandwich nearly eaten, all I could do at that point was just shrug and finish the Best Egg Salad Sandwich Ever!

72. Breast Cancer and Chemo

I thought I should include these links.  You might want to read this info if you have had breast cancer or are currently taking treatment.  

https://www.forbes.com/sites/victoriaforster/2022/04/08/breast-cancer-survivors-at-increased-risk-of-heart-disease/

https://www.forbes.com/sites/elaineschattner/2018/02/07/reasons-not-to-freak-out-about-risk-of-heart-disease-after-breast-cancer/ 

https://www.forbes.com/sites/elaineschattner/2014/08/13/breast-cancer-chemotherapy-varies-widely-study-raises-questions-about-early-treatmentchoice/   https://www.forbes.com/sites/elaineschattner/2014/08/13/breast-cancer-chemotherapy-varies-widely-study-raises-questions-about-early-treatment-choice/

I am having difficulty with these links.  Sorry.  You can look for it if it interests you.