Spinach and Collard Greens Pesto
Pesto has become one of my closest friends since tomato sauce became a holiday food. Generally here in the US, pesto is primarily made with sweet basil. Well, basil is really high in potassium and I’m really not that fond of it. In Sicily, where pesto originated, it is made using just about any vegetable that can be ground into a paste (pesto literally means paste). I’m using collard greens and spinach for this version - spinach is expensive on the K+, but it has other nutritional value - so I used it on the video, but please experiment! Try turnip or mustard greens! Celery leaves work amazingly well and are so cool and refreshing in a cold pasta or rice dish. I’ve used cooked asparagus, Spring mix or 50/50 salad mix, and artichoke hearts (expensive on the points, but sooo worth it). Sun dried tomatoes…yummm.
Here’s the count using just collard greens:
K+: 81mg PHO: 69mg Pro: 6g
Here’s the count using the recipe on the video - collard greens and spinach:
K+: 111mg PHO: 71mg Pro 5g
DASH count: per serving: 1V, 1P, 2FA
*Remember, if you are using other veggies for your sauce, please adjust the counts!
RECIPE
Makes 6 servings
4 cups (tightly packed) uncooked collard greens - washed and stemmed. I use the kind in the bag mainly because I eat a lot of collards every week. Go ahead, treat yourself to some convenience!
3-5 cloves of garlic - this is to your taste
¼ cup macadamia nuts
¼ cup parmesan cheese
¼ cup (and maybe a couple of tablespoons more) olive oil
1tbsp fresh lemon juice
¼ tsp chili flakes (optional)
Salt and pepper to taste
Put the garlic, nuts, and cheese in the food processor and pulse it until you get small crumbs that are pretty uniform in size. Then add 2 cups of your greens and half of the olive oil. Whir this into a coarse paste. Do not liquify it or it will be texturally gross. Put this mixture into a decent sized bowl. Then put the other 2 cups of the greens, the lemon juice, and the spices in the processor with the other half of the oil. Whir these together until they are the same texture as the first batch…you might need to add a little extra oil - don’t be shy about it. Combine the two batches and mix together well. You can use it right now, but if you let it flavor meld for about a half an hour, it will be much tastier…and even better tomorrow. This will sit in the fridge for about 4 days, and freezes like a dream! So easy, so tasty. It’s simple food that loves you!
Food Journaling 101
14 April 2024
So, I realized that in the prior blog post that I stressed the importance of journaling your daily food and water intake, but didn’t give any resources or guidance for anyone new to an eating plan. I am so very sorry!
Keeping a log of your daily food intake really is tedious until you get used to doing it. It becomes a habit after a while, but until that time you have to be purposefully diligent in writing down everything you consume. Let’s go over the “why” first, and then we will talk about the “how.”
Why do we need to keep a food journal?
Whether you are eating for diabetes, cardio/hypertension, CKD, or just to shed some unwanted pounds you have daily limits that you must adhere to and keeping honest records of your daily eating shows you your progress over time and sets the benchmarks for your success. It lets you know where you are in your day’s allotments so you can prepare yourself for unexpected cake, spur-of-the-moment dinner with your sister, or plan for an evening of Mexican food and movies. Keeping a journal leaves a history of meals and food combinations that you enjoyed and that worked well for you, and bonus, Yo, lists their nutritional count so you don’t have to calculate them again! It’s also a record of those days where you weren’t at your best. Your food log is you talking to your future self - so while you are writing down the embarrassment of that Frap beverage you got yourself at the green coffee chain on every corner, forgive yourself by moving forward and jot down some words of inspiration and cheerleading. Remember that treats, cheats, and holidays happen. Your success depends upon your ability to make those moments few and far between, and to get right back on track. Journaling is you being accountable for your eating behavior and responsible for keeping yourself in line. And it works.
What’s the easiest and best way to keep a food journal?
There is no singular best way. It’s a very personal and individual thing, so you have to find what works best for you. There are some who can keep everything on their phone or who create a spreadsheet for themselves. Others need a preformatted journal, which you can purchase online or even at Wal-Mart - they are not very expensive and come in many styles (i.e. what information they record). I, myself, am a knight of pen and paper and use graph paper and a three ring binder. I tend to write big and sheet paper allows me to jot down recipes and reminders - and serves as a place to keep my food lists safe and handy. I also know that ticking off my daily servings as I eat them works extremely well for me. This is years of being an old school Weight Watcher.
Here’s one of my entry dates for you to check out:
Graph paper RULES!
Notice that at the top of the page, the food groups are listed with circles indicating how many of each I can each day - that is Weight Watcher training - DASH also uses this format. I list my daily limits of potassium (K+) (note that my labs indicate that I can up to 2400mg of K+, but my allergy to it says “No, Sir!”), phosphorus (PHO) and Protien (PRO) at the top of the page, and then I have them broken down into columns. This is so I can list my noms and their values, add them up and check off their little circles as they are consumed. It leaves me a running total of nutritional count and a visual of what options I have left as I eat through my day. I keep myself in line by using my love of lists and crossing off my accomplishments. For me, this works. Mayhaps it will work for you, or serve you well as a guide as you learn what method suits you best!
As always, thank you so very much for the read and please let me know how I can help you with your daily food tracking! My goal is to help make things fun and easy as we walk down our food journey together!
Keep bein’ groovy!
-Sparks
Meal Planning is SO PAINFUL!!
12 April 2026
Meal planning. We all have to do it to some extent. Some of us are good at it, some of us…not so much. In truth, it really does help to budget your daily food intake, and it helps your pocket book quite a bit as well. I am one of those people who is really good at making a meal plan and really bad at sticking to it. So many times I have promised myself that “this time, I’m just going to put the screws in and stick with it,” but my screws are usually a glue stick that was purchased from the dollar store, so my stick-to-it-tiveness very much lacks integrity. I know this about myself and acknowledgement is the first step to recovery, right?
Not keeping to plan is one of the biggest reasons we fall off of the food plan wagon - and there are many reasons we give up on our eating plans: we get bored with the menu options, we get tired of weighing and measuring our food, it’s a pain to keep a food journal, and coordinating a menu to what’s available and on sale at the groceries is a skillset unto itself. Also, sometimes the sample guides we are given read very well, but each meal requires its own shopping list. People with time and money budgets don’t need that hassle.
I have come up with what I call base elements for my weekly eating to streamline the planning process so I can plan by the day instead of by the week, keep shopping consistent, and that keeps my pantry prepared to make a variety of recipes that are filling and that can be mixed and matched without exceeding my daily limits. I still keep an honest food journal, though. We all have to journal in the way that works best for us. Whatever you stick down your gullet…WRITE IT DOWN and account for it! When you are eating for CKD and for Hypertension/Cardio, there are no “free food” options. Everything you put in your mouth has a cost - and for my CKD buddies, this includes water. It’s hard to do at first, but make a conscious effort every day. After a while, it becomes a ritual, and you will memorize the counts on your most eaten foods…in other words, it get’s easier and becomes a habit.
Back to the base elements thing. Here’s the hacks and cheats I use to keep myself on track and I truly hope this inspires and helps you.
Eat a Salad with Breakfast. What. You’ll eat pancakes for dinner and think nothing of it. A loose cup of salad greens tossed with a dram of olive oil and a molecule of light vinegar is refreshing, adds visual “bulk” to your breakfast, and is an easy way to pack in 2 vegetable servings and maybe one or two fruit servings. I usually toss in a serving of blueberries and sometimes mixed raspberries and blackberries, sometimes strawberries, sometimes I chop up a tangerine - but I always add red and/or green onions. You might not dig that, but the fruit helps the onions find their sweetness, and I love onions. Sometimes a little peeled cucumber finds its way in there, but usually I’m just in a hurry. I’m not a morning person, so having a tub of 50/50 or Spring Mix makes things easy.
Always have prepared rice in the fridge. Every country around the world uses rice - there are thousands of recipes based upon it and having it ready saves you time. Yes, refridgerating rice changes the texture, but we rarely just eat a bowl of reheated rice. This is to build recipes - like for fried rice or to add into soups. Besides, rice is very cheap and holds in your cabinet for a long time - white rice does. Brown rice will eventually go wonky, so don’t buy a 25lb bag of it. Cooked rice only keeps for a couple of days, so this is something to make a couple of times a week.
Learn to love the veggies that already love you. There are some veggies that prove Mother Nature isn’t totally against us. These veggies love us because they are low in potassium (K+) and phosphorus (PHO) and keep that low count when they are cooked, and they are used world-wide. They are cabbage (purple and green), cucumbers, onions of all varieties, collard greens, peas, and most varieties of lettuce. Keep some of these already sliced or chopped in the fridge and ready to grab. Yes, I actually cook lettuce and cucumbers sometimes. Cucumbers add a lot of body and a fresh, “green” flavor to stir fries and they are surprisingly delish sauteed with plant-based butter and (pick your variety of) onion. And lettuce? I use my wilting salad greens to make pesto, in soups, and toss them with rice or noodles for both hot bowls and cold spoon salads. Don’t yuck it. It's a good use of food that prevents the costs of waste - and sneaks in good servings of our much needed fiber.
Silk Cashew Milk: I stumbled across this in my mad search for a dairy alternative that was low in K+ and PHO, and that did not contain sea salt - which I am allergic to. It comes unsweetened and is very low in calories, and is lower in K+ and PHO than even almond milk (you do have to look up the full nutritional info on The Internet Oracle). More importantly, it does not have an odd aftertaste or weird mouth-feel - so it cooks and bakes like a dream. Rice Dream is my second runner up, but it has a sort of sweet flavor, and it contains sea salt.
Just use olive oil. And no, you should never think you have to buy an olive oil to sautee and a different one to use in salads. Find one you like and make it your staple. Olive oil does not deep fry well at all, so for that once or twice a year fry-fest, just use vegetable oil.
Eat rice, pasta, and hot cereal every day. On the DASH diet, we get SO MANY servings of grains…mainly because we get so little actual meat and because a high fiber diet eases so many ailments. Rice, pasta, and hot cereals are inexpensive, shelf stable, and can be used for purposes other than intended. For example, I use cream of rice cereal as a thickening agent, and Malto-Meal as a binding agent. I bake with oatmeal all the time. Whole grain pasta, brown rice, and oatmeal are higher in K+ and PHO counts, but their nutritional value is worth the few extra points. There are endless amounts of rice and pasta dishes from around the world so these elements will never get boring.
Eat all the berries. Most berries are on the low K+ and PHO lists and it’s really easy to slip in a ½ cup serving. Frozen is as good as fresh so we have access to them all year long. I use berries in salads, in hot cereal, with rice mixed with honey and pecans and as my TV snack. Pre-wash your berries and store them in lidded plastic containers. If you have a few left over at the end of the week, pop them in a plastic bag and freeze them. Think of these little baggies of numminess as future pies…or crumbles…or bread puddings.
And lastly,
Keep some boiled eggs and boiled chicken handy. Boiled eggs are a fast, hearty, and versatile protein source and so is boiled chicken. More importantly, boiling chicken leaves you homemade chicken broth/stock which you can use in EVERYTHING. Here’s my recipe:
2 or 3 chicken thighs, bone in, skin on
1 tablespoon of Olive oil
5 or 6 baby carrots
2 ribs of celery cut or ripped into 4 pieces each
½ onion, skin on - just cut it in half, maybe trim the little beard hairs off the bottom, and toss it in the pot
At least 2 garlic cloves, skin on…don’t peel them, just crush them a little with the flat of your knife, but keep the hulls intact
A handful of parsley if you have it. Don’t trim it, the stems are as edible as the leaves. Just wash it and toss it in the pot.
A quick dash of cinnamon
Salt and pepper
Optional: a bay leaf, fresh or dried: oregano, basil, marjoram, thyme, fennel, chili powder (for me, that’s not optional)
Heat a large pot over medium heat for a minute or so, then coat the bottom with the olive oil. Let the oil warm for a minute or two, then place the chicken thighs in, skin side down. Let these brown for a few minutes - not too dark, you just want to get a little color on the skin and render some of its fat out. Flip the thighs over and toss in all of the vegetables and spices. Don’t mix them immediately. Just let them flavor-meld for a minute or two, then you can satisfy your need to stir. Add water to the pot to about ¾ to the top and bring this to a boil. Once at the boil, turn the heat down to low, cover and let it simmer for about an hour - you don’t even have to stir it. After the hour has turned, remove the pot from the heat and let it cool for about half an hour. Then remove the chicken and veggies. Discard the veggies, but pull the chicken off the bone and store that in its own container - cooked plain chicken ready to be made into something wonderful, like a curry! Put your broth into a sealable container and pop it in the fridge. Once cooled, it should be a little gelatinous - this is a good thing. You now have broth that can be a soup base, a sauce base, a liquid to boil rice in…so many options. More importantly, you made it, so it’s a thousand times better for you than the store-bought - which is technically contraban.
So, these are the hacks I use to keep myself on track, but that afford me some planned spontaneity in my daily menu planning. I hope these ideas help you build your base. Remember, you should plan yourself some treats, and it’s okay to have an occasional cheat - forgive yourself and get right back on plan. It gets easier over time, and we can always find something fun and interesting to make together. That’s what I’m here for!
hank you so much for the read. Be good and keep bein’ groovy!
-Sparks
My First Ever Video Dropped Today!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jb2rpJIkpVU
29 March 2026
Thank you for watching my first ever video…that I edited myself…for the first time…ever!
Before I bore you with a solid list of staples for your pantry and fridge, here’s some groovy info for our newly diagnosed CKD buddies.
The American Kidney Fund is a good place to obtain a solid Potassium Food Guide and Phosphorous Food Guide. Having these guides will help you shop for groceries - and you will be surprised at all of the wonderful things you can have! Here are the links for these guides:
https://kitchen.kidneyfund.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Potassium-Guide.pdf
https://kitchen.kidneyfund.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Phosphorus_Guide_090419.pdf
Another great resource (for everybody) is the site Eat This Much. This site can help you meal plan and you can also input individual items and filter it by cooked vs raw, or by the measurement…you can even get a nutritional breakdown of most commercially prepared foods. Here’s the link: https://www.eatthismuch.com
This is a quick listing of the staples I keep in my pantry and fridge. Adventurous (but CKD appropriate) eating has made my stocks and stores vast and voluminous, but it’s actually still pretty basic.
Cereals and grains: Steel cut old fashioned oats, Original Malto-Meal, Cream of Rice, Grits, plain corn meal, non-microwave popcorn, whole wheat thin bagels, raw unsalted pecan pieces and pecan halves, unsalted macadamia nuts, brown rice, white rice, whole wheat pastas, enriched white pastas. If you find pasta/ noodles on sale and the ingredient and nutritional listings meet your dietary needs, pick it up and let’s make something with it!
Baking Items: AP flour, whole wheat flour, self-rising flour, corn starch, baking powder, baking soda, vegan sugar, powdered sugar, brown sugar, molasses, honey, cinnamon, salt, and pepper…I have a lot of spices, but that’s a me thing. You spice you.
Canned Goods: Olive oil mayo, plain ol’ general olive oil, red wine vinegar, apple cider vinegar, rice vinegar, really cheap balsamic vinegar (because it’s a flavor, not an event), canned (in juice) peaches, pears, and mandarin oranges, canned peas, canned garbanzo and pinto beans, canned artichoke hearts (canned in water), canned beets, and light soy sauce. Oh, coffee and teas for brewing.
Fridge Items: Note: Yours will vary here. CKD folks have to limit our milk/dairy intake because it is so high in potassium and phosphorus. We scramble a little to find options because nutritionally, we still need to have 2 servings per day. I had a heck of a time finding an option that met my nutritional needs and that did not contain sea salt. So, my fridge standards are:
Silk unsweetened cashew milk, plant based butter, a block of cheddar cheese, parmesan, low-fat cream cheese, low-fat feta cheese, eggs, tofu, chicken thighs, and ground turkey.
Produce: This is what I keep as standard, but I also buy in-season produce: one-pound tubs of 50/50 salad mix and baby spinach, a bag of collard greens, green onions - lots, parsley, cilantro, celery, baby carrots but not real ones - the kind that are cut with a water saw, onions (white, yellow, red, and shallots), whole clove garlic, bell peppers (but not green ones) SO MANY CUCUMBERS, cabbage, cauliflour, blueberries, strawberries, raspberries and blackberries, a few apples, a few tangerines, lemons, and grapes. Remember, I have food allergies, so my fruit and veggie options are limited. Yeah, I know. Breathing does cause aging, but it’s so fun and has so many other benefits.
I hope you find this helpful! Next video we COOK!!
Before We Dive Into Cooking…
This is me and the very handsome Scooch - one year ago today.
18 March 2026
This is a picture of me one year ago today – it was the day I was diagnosed with hypertension, high cholesterol, being pre-diabetic, and my Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD) was discovered. I was told in no uncertain terms that my weight was not helping and was probably the most major contributing factor. As of today, the 1-year benchmark, I have lost 54 pounds, got my cholesterol, A1C, and blood pressure levels into the safe zone, and my CKD has lowered from level 3B to level 2 – where I intend on keeping it. During this year, one of the things I’ve discovered is that it’s not fear that motivates me to keep on; it’s the quest to find new recipes from all over the world that I can adapt to meet my fresh eating needs – and most are so simple…they’ve gotta be shared!
It’s not a matter of when we start, or where we start; we start now, here in my kitchen. The biggest boon you will give yourself is HOW we start – and that is by going through your fridge, freezer, and cabinets to get a fair assessment of what you have, what you really need to get rid of (whether it’s from age or it’s just an unhealthy item), and to create a list of staples you will need to have on hand.
The second biggest boon you can give yourself is to utilize as few prepared foods as possible.
“Wait a sec, Sparks. What, exactly, is a “prepared” food?
Prepared foods are anything that comes in a bag, bottle, can, carton, canister, wrapper, or box. Basically, if all you have to do is heat-n-eat, it should probably be avoided – but not everything. Some prepared foods that you will utilize almost daily are noodles, canned and frozen fruits and veggies, grains and cereals, bread, coffee, popcorn kernels…you get the gist. Read the labels on EVERYTHING. Label reading is so very important. We are looking for low sodium and with as few ingredients as possible; we want only ingredients that are actual food products and not better living through chemistry. I guarantee that when you look up some of the ingredients put in foods, it will put you off those foods.
Next, we go to the store – and read some more labels! By going to the store, I mean I am taking a video at the store so you can see what I’m shopping for, how I plan on using whatever I find and, of course, show off my mad label reading skills. I’m not asking you to spend a lot of money. I don’t want you to as I most certainly have a worker-bee’s budget. Most of the recipes I will be presenting are very cost sensitive. However, it really can cost a lot to eat healthy, but it shouldn’t and if we do it correctly, it won’t.
A quick reminder: if you are joining me because you have placed on a medically required eating plan, I, myself, follow the DASH (Dietary Approach to Stopping Hypertension) Diet and most of my recipes adhere to the DASH guidelines. I will never say I’m not gonna bake, make candy, or prepare holiday foods, because I will – but I will always specify that those recipes or techniques are a treat and not a daily! Besides, a leg of lamb is usually a treat, right?
Then, after all that, we will start cooking!!!
I will be posting a video about reading labels, auditing your cabinets, and taking a field trip to the grocery store very soon. I just have to figure out how to edit it.
Meanwhile, thank you for the read and keep bein’ groovy!
- Sparks