Cooking With POMEGRANATES ~

    Pomegranates become available to us in America around the Holiday season. They look wonderful--sometimes they are a beat up, but no one seems to know what to do with them. The great thing is...you dont have to do much to get good taste and health benefits....

     POMEGRANATES are rich in anti-oxidents and Vit. C. All types of health claims are being attributed to them and it seems many products slip in some "POM" to ,make it more marketable. What Israeli studies have shown, is that no matter what form you eat it in, Pomegranate will confer the same benefits--that includes medicinal dosages. So, drinking the juice or eating the seeds once a day is as powerful a medicine as a tincture or pill.

Buying enough pomegranates to make a reasonable amount of juice would be prohibitive--so buy the juice (which is available EVERYWHERE) and stick to eating the seeds. Cut a pomegranate in half and either use a fork to scoop out the seeds from all their cavities--or  slam the half down in a bowl and let the seeds fall out--whichever method you use will depend more on your temperment than on efficiency!

 Just add these seeds to a nice tossed salad with feta cheese--or a gorgonzola, raisins or currants.

The red color is so unexpected and the seeds look like corn kernals and are crunchy, adding a sweet/tart and bitey contrast to the rest of the salad.

You can use them in a fruit salsa

Use them as one fruit in a compote along with cranberries, raisns, orange juice.

I like them added to an omelet--that is delightful.

If you have a dehydrator, dry the seeds partially and use them in making chocolate truffles or cookies

They are good in pancakes-fresh

My youngest daughter just like to eat the seeds and would sit down with a fork and get them out one by one--it would take forever--but that is the essence of slowing down and savoring your food--she always looked blissful

   The Pomegranate season is SHORT, enjoy it!!!