brewer's yeast

my mom tried her darndest to keep her kids healthy. i didn't really realize this until the other day i found myself wandering a health food store searching for brewer's yeast, the flaky kind. i wanted it to sprinkle over my popcorn. when i told brett i was going to the store to buy yeast for our popcorn, his nose crinkled up. he had recently made his first homemade pizza crust and the yeast he had used for that did not smell all that great. he couldn't imagine putting it on popcorn. i couldn't really imagine it either, its just that i had this memory of yeast always being on my popcorn when i was little. and i remembered that it wasn't half bad! i reassured my worried husband that i wouldn't make him eat yeast if it was going to taste bad. i told him that my mom used to sprinkle it on our popcorn and we would gobble it up. he still looked worried.

turns out, brewer's yeast not only has a delicious "nut-like" flavor, but it is very nutritional. it's got all this good stuff in it that my body needs. i figured my mom was smarter than i had first thought so i wandered around the store looking for other things that looked familiar, things my mom would have bought. i came home with a sack of yeast, a sack of sunflower seeds, soymilk, and a sack of oatmeal, the kind you have to slowly cook on the stove. my friend shannon had to teach me how to cook it as i am used to the quaker variety that you stick in the microwave. thank you shannon.

now my popcorn tastes like the kind my mom used to make. comfort food. and my salads now look like something my mom would eat, complete with sunflower seeds, craisins, and no dressing, just vinegar. i even sprinkle a little brewer's yeast on there, for good measure.

the older i get the more i have come to understand the importance of taking care of myself. i can already feel that the ol' limbs aren't as limber as they once were. it is not as easy to go out and run a quick mile. not that i'm some old lady or anything, it's just that i'm realizing more and more that i will be an old lady sooner rather than later if i do not take care of myself, exercise, and eat well. i'm just glad i had a mom who understood that right from the get-go. she planted the seeds...and now i am eating them on my salads. -sn