Health statistics are scarier than a horror novel, and while no one gets out of life alive, we can try to live whatever moments we do have in wellness and vitality.

Health begins in the kitchen, and I'll help you find your way as we go Back to the Cutting Board today, on Christina Cooks.

(uplifting theme music) ♪ (female announcer) Underwriting for Christina Cooks is provided by Suzanne's Specialties, offering a full line of alternative vegan and organic sweeteners and toppings.

Suzanne's Specialties.

Sweetness the way Mother Nature intended.

Additional funding is also provided by Old Yankee Cutting Boards.

Designed for durability and custom crafted by hand with Yankee pride and craftsmanship.

Jonathan's Spoons, individually handcrafted from cherry wood, each designed with your hand and purpose in mind.

Additional funding is also provided by: ♪ Hi, I'm Christina Pirello, and this is Christina Cooks, where each week, we take fresh, seasonal ingredients and whip them into amazing dishes.

Will it all be plant-based?

Yup.

Will it all be delicious?

You bet.

We have to talk.

We have to talk about how sick we are as a country.

In a country of more than 350 million people, more of us are sick than not sick.

We have to really start paying attention to what's happening to us, and it all starts in the kitchen.

So today we're gonna talk about how we boost our immune system and boost our immune function.

And we hear this all the time, "let's boost your immune system."

Most of us wouldn't know our immune system from a sewer system.

So let me tell you what your immune system actually is.

It's composed of five parts.

The first part is your tonsils and thymus, which produce antibodies which protect you from illness.

The second part is your lymph nodes, which is like your fresh water system.

Third part is bone marrow, where you produce your red blood cells.

The fourth part is the spleen, which filters blood and fixes damaged red blood cells, and finally, there's your white blood cells, which fight disease.

So, if you're not paying attention to your lymph, your thymus, your tonsils, your bone marrow, your spleen, and your white blood cells, your immune system can't function.

So now you're thinking, "Great, this sounds complicated."

But it's not.

What's really easy is cooking to boost immune function.

All these five parts, all they need is really good fuel because that creates the quality of the cells that produce health.

So we're gonna start with a really simple soup, and every ingredient plays a role.

We're going to start by sautéing some onions in some extra virgin olive oil.

Extra virgin olive oil is oleic acid, it's a monounsaturated fat, meaning that it is easy to digest, stable under heat.

So we're gonna add some onions and then turn on the heat to preserve the olive oil flavor.

The only thing that changes about olive oil if you heat it without an ingredient in the pan is the flavor.

But you can cook it to over 450 degrees Fahrenheit, if that's what floats your boat.

So while the onions are beginning to sweat with a pinch of salt, we're gonna take some cremini mushrooms.

Now, all mushrooms are designed to help the body to relax.

Right, mushrooms are not something that make you feel like you want to get up and go out dancing.

So mushrooms are not food that we eat every single day.

Mushrooms are foods that we use a little more judiciously, because you can go from feeling really relaxed to feeling bloody tired and thinking, "I eat really well, why do I feel so exhausted?"

You have to look at what you're choosing.

If you're always eating mushrooms, maybe you want to pay attention to that.

Creminis are a step above button mushrooms.

So they're not super, super nutrient dense but they do help the body to relax.

So the onions become translucent and now we'll add the mushrooms.

The first mushroom.

And next, we're gonna add something that's absolutely optional.

A touch a white wine, you may use anything you like, just some broth, you can use water.

You can use mirin which is a Japanese cooking condiment, you can use a tiny bit of apple juice.

What I want to have happen in the pan is the mushrooms start to release their juices and brown a little bit.

Mushrooms don't have a lot of flavor, they need a little bit of a boost here or there.

Okay, now we're gonna pull out the big guns.

First our shiitake mushrooms.

Now, these are fresh so they're kind of like the littlest of the big guns.

Shiitake mushrooms help to lower cholesterol, blood pressure, help to remove plaque from the veins and arteries.

They balance blood sugar, they control cholesterol.

Pretty much anything that your body needs done, they break down fat, they metabolize fat.

They're an amazing ingredient.

As fresh mushrooms, they do that at a kindergarten level.

When they're dried, they do it at postgraduate level.

Just so you can kind of gauge the strength of them.

So these are going to go into the pan along with our creminis, a tiny pinch of salt so they really start to bleed their juices.

Also, remember when you're cooking with mushrooms, don't wash them, please don't wash them.

If you are into gadgets, get one of those cute little mushrooms brushes to brush the dirt off or get a damp sponge or a towel.

Shiitakes you don't have to wash at all because they don't grow in dirt, they grow on logs.

So just do that.

The really big guns of this soup are maitake mushrooms.

And these are dried so they're super powerful.

Maitake mushrooms are being studied by the NIH and other organizations to see their effectiveness at helping tumors to die when you have cancer.

So, preventing cancer, they're brilliant.

But they're really being studied as a treatment to make tumors basically commit suicide.

So these are the dried ones, we're gonna break them.

They look like little dried flowers almost and you break them up into the pot.

You don't need to soak them first, I use them dried, they're very delicate.

Like when you use dried shiitakes you want to soak them first, but maitakes, just break them right into your pan.

Now we're gonna take a combination of whatever non-dairy milk you like, almond, oat, soy, rice.

And just enough to cover the mushrooms.

And then the balance of the liquid in the soup will be water.

You can use, uh, straight plant milk, you can use straight water, whatever.

Straight plant milk I find is too rich and water's too watery, and the combination is like Goldilocks, just right.

So this is gonna cook for about 15 to 20 minutes until the maitake are soft and then we'll go back and season it and have like a perfect immune boosting soup.

♪ Today, I'm gonna show you how to julienne a carrot, it's very easy.

Take your carrot, hold it at the bigger end and using a sharp knife, you just slide your knife through it.

If your knife is sharp and well cared for, your pieces will fall on top of each other, almost like fallen dominoes.

Some people call this the domino cut.

And you work all the way up the carrot, keeping your fingers out of the way.

And then you kind of arrange your pieces so that they're a little bit flatter, but keep your overlap, don't lose the overlap, that's key.

So now you take your pieces and you kind of slide them open like this, hold your knife and now you have to move.

You just run your knife through all these little pieces that you're holding down.

And what you see happening on your cutting board is really fine, beautiful, graceful julienne pieces.

And this is a great cut to use for salads, stir-fries, or any kind of a quick cooking dish.

♪ So before we work on our next dish I want to season the soup.

I want you to see how this works out.

We're gonna use miso, now miso is one of the greatest prebiotic probiotics in the world.

It's an ancient Japanese product that was said to be given to us by the gods for enlightenment.

I don't know about that, but it's really good for digestion.

Matt, I want you to come stay with me on here because I'm gonna put miso in the soup and I want the people to see how it works.

So you take a little bit of hot broth from your soup, and you can put it into a bowl, you can also do this with a strainer if you don't want to do the little bowl thing, but I kind of really like the little bowl thing.

Because then I know the miso's dissolved, and you want to use about a teaspoon of miso for every cup of liquid in your soup.

And then you just dissolve it until all the miso is sort of melted, and you only do this--this isn't a special digestive thing or some sort of vegan magic.

It's because you don't want anybody to bite down on a salty lump of miso, like if there was a piece of a bouillon cube in the middle of your soup.

And so, we're using white miso so the soup doesn't turn too dark, and then this is going to go back in.

And then it stirs into the soup and you just let the soup simmer for 30 seconds to a minute, just long enough to activate the enzymes.

Work really hard not to boil the miso.

If you boil it then you've destroyed the reason that you're eating it, it will still taste good but you'll destroy the reason you're eating miso.

So, what we're gonna do now is let that simmer for a second and get our garnish ready.

Right, remember garnish, we have to put something fresh on the soup so that it lifts the energy and makes us feel relaxed and happy.

So we have some scallion ready, now we'll go back, take a little bit of our soup, make sure you get lots of mushrooms in the bowl.

This is a really nice first course and it's a really simple soup, so you know that when you have a simple soup like this, the rest of your meal can be a feast because you have this great soup to start off with that will relax digestion.

So there's our mushroom soup.

♪ So, now it's time to move to greens.

You knew you would not escape an immune system show without talking about leafy greens, right?

And we are gonna use kale.

Now, kale, I love kale.

When I first started eating this way, my husband took me shopping at a natural foods co-op in Philadelphia to, um, discover new foods.

I'm not really good with new foods.

So we pick up kale, and I was a chef and I'm thinking, "Oh, we're gonna eat this, that's the garnish on the salad bar, I didn't think people ate it."

So--but we eat it and it has really good properties for you, it has really good PR, everyone loves it, people eat it now, celebrities eat it to get their thigh gap.

But really, you want to eat kale for the calcium, the minerals, the fiber, the protein, every single thing you possibly could ever need is in kale and other leafy greens.

If you want your immune system boosted, this is how you do it, eating greens.

I have a generous amount of olive oil in a skillet, I'm gonna turn on the heat and add some--a tiny bit of sliced smashed garlic.

We just want to flavor the oil a little bit.

And we're gonna add to that right away some bread crumbs.

And what we're gonna do is cook the dressing that's gonna go on the raw kale if that makes sense.

Then, just sauté the breadcrumbs with a tiny pinch of salt.

You may also use black pepper if you want to.

I'm just not a fan, I know black pepper's good for us, it's good for digestion, people really like it, I can't think of a flavor that I like less.

So, black pepper should be in this dish if you like it, but since I'm cooking it, it's out.

So you're gonna sauté the breadcrumbs until they're sort of soaked up the oil and are slightly beginning to golden up, get a nice color.

Then we add sundried tomatoes, I'm using sundried tomatoes soaked in oil, so that the lycopene and the vitamin C is 60 percent better absorbed by the body to boost immune function and create reproductive health, you're welcome.

And chickpeas, you want to use cooked or canned organic chickpeas, about a cup go in.

Sauté those.

Now if you buy salted bread crumbs, whole wheat bread crumbs, then be careful on the salt that you add, I tend to buy unsalted bread crumbs so that I can freely season on my own.

You can make this salad spicy if you want, which would stimulate circulation, it's up to you.

And while this simmers in that little bit of oil, then we're gonna come back here and shred the kale.

Now you want to shred the kale pretty finely.

This is called dinosaur or lacinato kale, which is sort of an Italian kale, it's also known as black horse kale, I don't know why but that's what they call it Italy, cavolo nero, which means the black horse.

But it's a really hearty kale, you can also use regular curly kale if you can't find it, but I tend to find this one sweeter because the leaves are a little bit smaller.

A lot of people complain that kale is bitter, so if you can find this kale, it will make a really nice salad for ya.

And we're just gonna sauté this until the kale slightly wilts, we're not cooking it, I just want to coat it with these ingredients, and as soon as the kale is shiny with oil, turn off your heat.

This is a quickie.

And it's a really good main course salad.

Then we're just gonna slice lemon.

Do this when the heat is off, right, the citric acid in lemon not only wilts the kale, lifts the flavor, helps with digestion of the oil and protein, but that lovely sour flavor if you cook it for more than a minute over heat, will turn to a bitter, metallic aftertaste.

So don't do it.

Turn your heat off then add your lemon.

So now we'll just take this out of the pan, this is one of those dishes that you can't cook and leave in the pan, it has to come out so that it stops cooking.

So you can see the kale has a really beautiful color still, sundried tomatoes are nice and rich, you've got the bread crumbs.

You can use gluten free bread crumbs if that's an issue for you, so go ahead have a ball.

You'll get the same result.

And then we have this lovely kale salad that if you serve this alongside the soup, you have the perfect meal for boosting you immune system.

♪ -Can a vegetable be a fruit?

-A fruit can be a vegetable.

-What, it can be both?

-I think if you swallow -the seeds.

-And it stays a fruit?

-I don't get it.

-I am so confused.

(Christina) So, this is the part of the show where I try to unconfuse you.

I get so many questions over email and whatever, so I'm with my friend, Tremayne, who wants to ask me something.

-Hi, honey.

-Hi, how are you?

-Well, how are you?

-Good.

My question is, when cooking with olive oil, do you heat the pan and then pour in the oil or do you pour the oil in the pan and then heat the pan with oil in it?

Well, it's a great question because there's a lot of debate about whether or not you can cook with olive oil, or whether you can only use it in salads, and according to the Olive Oil Federation, whoever they are, they say that olive oil can heat to the same high heat as any other high heat oil.

But what compromises quickly is the flavor.

So let's say you spend good money on really good oil, you kind of want to taste olive oil when ya taste that finished dish.

So, the kind of the rule is you start with a room temperature pan, room temperature oil and then you turn on the heat when you add your first, whatever, aromatics or whatever.

You don't get that lovely dramatic sizzle, but what you get is people thinking you cooked with really, really good olive oil.

So that's how I do it at home.

Okay, that sounds good.

That's always confused me and thank you for clearing that up for me.

-Thank you, nice to have you.

-Thank you.

All right, try not to be so confused.

♪ So you might be thinking, boosting immune system, no dessert, right?

Well, you would be wrong-- it's me, after all.

There isn't a day that doesn't go by that I don't need something a little bit sweet.

But you can have dessert and boost immune function at the same time.

We're gonna make pumpkin bars.

It's easier than pumpkin pie, everyone panics when they hear "crust," but stay with me.

In this pan we have canned pumpkin.

You can roast a butternut squash or a pumpkin and pull the flesh out yourself, or you can buy a can of unsweetened pumpkin and make your life easy, that's what I do.

We're adding to it some, um, plant milk.

You may use almond, soy, oat, rice, whatever floats your boat.

And then we're gonna turn on the heat to medium.

Just make sure it's unsweetened, 'cause you don't want any added sugar.

And we're gonna add to this some brown rice syrup, which is a glucose based sweetener.

It's a complex sugar, it's not an insulin trigger, so there you go.

Again, immune booster, it's like having your cake and eating it too.

We're gonna add to it some agar flakes.

Agar are sea vegetables and it's a tasteless, odorless flake, you can see it's almost clear.

And what this will do is set the pumpkin up like Jell-O.

Okay, now we add a touch of nutmeg, really err to the lighter side of nutmeg 'cause it can really overpower a dish.

So when I say a pinch, I mean a pinch.

Then some cinnamon, because it's pumpkin.

Which also helps to balance blood sugar, so you have that lovely flavor and balances blood sugar.

And we have some powered ginger, which helps to stimulate circulation.

Touch of salt to make it sweet.

A little vanilla extract, really good vanilla extract, the stuff that you want to dab behind your ears and smell like a bakery.

Then we're gonna give this a stir and this is gonna cook and you're gonna stir it occasionally for about 15 minutes, you need the agar flakes to melt.

And once they melt, the setting will happen in the filling.

Right, you want this to set up so you can slice them into bars.

And we'll also add one other thickener that will make them creamy, but first it has to cook.

So you want to get your heat to low, once you get a little bit of a boil happening so that this can just simmer and the flakes of the agar just dissolve.

You really won't see them dissolve in this so give it like 15 minutes.

Okay, now we're gonna make the crust.

Really easy, first we're gonna oil our baking dish.

You want to oil the dish so that the squares' crust doesn't stick.

Just a tiny bit of olive oil, and then take a brush, or you can use a paper towel or a tissue and just make sure that the surface of the pan is covered.

All this is gonna do is help the little squares to release, otherwise they'll stick and break and you'll have to serve them and call them rustic.

So, into our mixing bowl goes a cup and a half of flour.

And our pumpkin's turning into Mount Vesuvius over here.

Remember when you're using whole grain flours, measure from the container or bag or whatever into your measuring cup and don't smooth the top, right, don't do it that way.

Just measure a little more loosely so you keep the air in the flour, and you need the air in the flour otherwise your crust will get heavy, your cakes will get heavy, your cookies will get heavy.

So you gotta kind of remember to do that, or not do that, depending on how you look at it.

A little bit of salt, some coconut sugar, which is a low glycemic index granular sugar made from coconut sap but tastes like brown sugar, and it's gonna make our crust more like a shortbread.

And a little bit of plant milk, you can also use water.

You want to cut calories, use water.

You want more of a shortbread, use plant milk.

I tend to go for oat or almond, they're the ones that I really like the best.

But you may use what you like.

And we're gonna add enough liquid, with oil, to create a soft crust.

And now you're thinking, "But I don't roll crust, Christina."

You don't have to, we're gonna press it.

So once your crust comes together, and with the adding of the liquid to the crust, you can add the oil first, the oat milk first, the--whatever, it's a crust, it's not rocket science.

Then you clean off your spoon.

Your crust should just come together.

Don't touch it too much and have it start to, you know, get the oils of your hands and have it be heavy.

So you just want it to come together like this.

Now you're gonna take it and using wet hands so you don't stick to it, you're gonna press the crust evenly into bottom of your pan, your oiled pan.

And again, don't need a measuring ruler here, just press the crust and try to get it even.

You don't want like a really thin part and a really thick part.

First of all, it won't bake evenly, the really thin crust will burn and it'll be dry.

So just kind of get it even, you can feel it.

Just--I mean that took me, I don't know, two seconds.

There we go.

Now we're gonna check our pumpkin.

(stirring) And now we're gonna take and candy some pecans, and this is a really easy process.

I know this seems like a lot of steps, stay with me, it's such an easy and satisfying dessert.

I have pecan pieces in this saucepan and I'm adding some brown rice syrup, which is gonna give it a nice, caramel kind of finish.

So we're just gonna let that warm up while we thicken, for the second time, our pumpkin filling.

So now we're gonna take some arrowroot, you may use kuzu, but arrowroot works more like cornstarch, but it's more alkalizing to digestion so it's not the same as using cornstarch.

So don't just sub it out because you can, get some arrowroot.

And you just pour a little cold water in it.

And I usually, because I don't like to dirty more things than I have to when I'm cooking, I'm telling you I'm lazy.

I use the same spoon from the pumpkin, dissolve the arrowroot.

So there's no lumps, pour it right into your simmering pumpkin, stir it in just until it blends.

What you'll see at first is that this gets really cloudy and sort of-- it doesn't look that great.

But as soon as the arrowroot is blended in and the pumpkin is a nice bright orange again, now you're gonna take it right over to the crust.

Now you have an option, you can blind bake your crust for seven minutes, if you want something that's crunchier, or if you want it cakier, like I prefer, you just put your cooked pumpkin right on top of the raw crust.

Smooth it out so it's even.

Again, so it bakes evenly and so you don't have like a pumpkin square that's that thick and that thick, right?

Then, we take--go over here and check on our pecans.

Just stir them long enough for the rice syrup to coat them so they're shiny.

These get spooned on top of your pumpkin.

Make sure you preheat your oven to 350.

These won't cover the pumpkin completely, but you don't want them to.

You want to have a little bit of that orange pumpkin peeking out.

And these are going to go into the oven and bake until the outer edge is set and the inside still jiggles.

It'll set as it cools.

I'll show you in a second.

(lively music) ♪ So, there you have it.

Cooled pumpkin squares, they're perfectly set, no jiggle, they'll cut with nice, clean edges.

So what are you waiting for?

Let's boost our immune systems together and get Back to the Cutting Board.

See you next time on Christina Cooks.

♪ ♪ (female announcer) Underwriting for Christina Cooks is provided by Susanne's Specialties.

Offering a full line of alternative vegan and organic sweeteners and toppings.

Suzanne's Specialties.

Sweetness the way Mother Nature intended.

Additional funding is also provided by Old Yankee Cutting Boards.

Designed for durability and custom crafted by hand with Yankee pride and craftsmanship.

Jonathan's Spoons.

Individually handcrafted from cherry wood.

Each designed with your hand and purpose in mind.

Additional funding is also provided by: ♪ You can find today's recipes and learn more by visiting our website at christinacooks.com, and by following Christina on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest.

The companion cookbook, Back to the Cutting Board, takes you on a journey to reengage with the soul of cooking.

With more than 100 plant-based recipes, finding the joy in cooking has never been simpler.

To order your copy for $20 plus handling, call 800-266-5815.

Add Christina's iconic book, Cooking the Whole Foods Way, with 500 delicious plant-based recipes.

To order both books for $39.95 plus handling, call 800-266-5815.

♪ ♪