Speaker 1: 2:09

So you know how we're always talking about keeping it real, because Jared and I value authenticity and being true to who you are, and it's not going to get any more real than this Today. Just a few minutes ago, we were sitting here, we had just finished taping a podcast and one of our children has come up with the most awesome chocolate popsicle recipe. It's a fudgesicle. I've never in my life had a fudgesicle any better than the one this child has come up with. As a matter of fact, the recipe is probably coming out at some point, but this episode is not about the recipe for the chocolate fudgesicle. This episode is about the lessons that can be learned from a chocolate popsicle. Hey sister, welcome to the Power on Plants podcast.

Speaker 1: 2:55

Are you tired of staring into the fridge wondering what to eat so you can just feel better? Do you want to avoid spending hours in the kitchen making complicated meals in the name of health? Would you love to leave fatigue behind and finally have the energy to do all the things you want to do? Hi, we're Jared and Anita Roussel, christ followers, healthcare professionals, parents of four and big fans of great tasting food. We, too, tried exercising more, eating natural and clean foods, but we still found ourselves struggling with what we thought were changes that come with age or bad genes, and we weren't finding answers to traditional routes. So we dug into the research and created our secret nutritional weapon sustainable plant-based living. The truth is, you can eat more whole plant foods and it's not hard. You just need the way that's realistic and delicious so you never feel deprived. If you're ready to enjoy your meals, no longer be held back by your health struggles and actively live your life, then you're in the right place. So grab your favorite plant-based cup of happy pop in those earbuds and let's get started.

Speaker 1: 4:03

Hey, sunshine, welcome to this episode. If you are new around here, this is a fun one to start on, because we've never done an episode quite like this. Jared and I both want you to have a genuine sense of what it's like hanging out with us, and this is what it's like. We were literally sitting here eating these chocolate fudgesicles. They're so good they rival any Mayfield one I had when I was growing up. That's what I grew up on, mayfield in Northwest Georgia. That was what we ate. Jared would have had Bluebell in Louisiana, I'm sure.

Speaker 2: 4:30

Bluebell, or there was actually Kleinpeter Dairy Farms.

Speaker 1: 4:34

Okay so.

Speaker 2: 4:35

Kleinpeter was like your Mayfield.

Speaker 1: 4:37

Okay, well, that makes perfect sense. And then, since we went plant-based, we might have had a good pop or something like that back in the day, but they don't taste like these. These are incredible. And so we're sitting here and we're just oohing and aahing and freaking out, talking to each other back and forth. And I looked at him and I held up my popsicle and I said I know there are some lessons here. And we just started dying laughing. We challenged each other to come up with some lessons Probably not all of the lessons we could have come up with.

Speaker 2: 5:09

We probably could have come up with some more, but I like the ones that we got. These were our initial reactions. I just want you to jump in. What was the first thing you said? The first one is don't wait too long to eat it or it will melt and disappear.

Speaker 2: 5:23

That is the truth. There are a number of different ways that can be applied. So if you have something good in your life right now, don't wait on it for too long or it may. It may not melt, but it may disappear, so go and enjoy it now. It's kind of like you say get good dish towels, don't use just nasty ones and pull them out for guests.

Speaker 1: 5:47

Get the nice dish towels or the nice hand towels or the china. Don't let the china sit in your cabinet. Get it out. Put your yummy plant based dishes on there and enjoy the journey with your children, with your spouse. Make every day special. You don't want those moments to melt away. This is your life. Today is the day that you have.

Speaker 2: 6:06

Don't wait for special moments to come. Make the moment special.

Speaker 1: 6:10

And I would say, just thinking about whole food plant-based, don't wait a moment special. And I would say, just thinking about whole food plant-based, don't wait, just don't wait, because when you start today and you don't let those days pass you by, you're going to reap the rewards so much sooner. You're not going to stay stuck in your health struggles. When you learn how to eat plant-based the enjoyable way, which is exactly what we specialize in, you're going to feel so much better, so much faster, and you won't miss those important moments. You won't watch them melt away like I used to feel, like I was doing. I felt like I was sitting on the sidelines watching those moments just pass me by. It'd be like having a great popsicle in your hand and it's just melting away and you really couldn't do anything about it. Now I get to enjoy these things, and I still get to have my chocolate popsicles too, which brings me to a point that I want to bring up before we go to our next life lesson that can be learned from a chocolate veg-sicle, and that is that desserts are not the problem. Please do not believe this lie of the enemy. I don't know why that is with us, but it seems like, every time we're talking to somebody, they always end up asking us about health and wanting to know about healthy plant base. And it's a joy, we love it, but it's just what happens. It's the reality of our lives.

Speaker 1: 7:20

So we're out and about and multiple times we've been having talks with women and they say to us somewhere very early on in the conversation my husband's problem is, or my problem is, we just won't give up sweets. Sweets are our problem. It's the sugar, and people always think it's the sugar. So they relate that to carbs. So then they relate that to plant foods or fruits or things like that. And it's just such a lie. And not only that.

Speaker 1: 7:48

You can mix those foods up in a way that you get this delicious tasting dessert that is so much better for you than anything else you could ever eat and actually has a lot of healthy ingredients in it. So it's not just that it's healthier, it actually can be healthy when you know how to make these things with the whole plant foods in the way that they still actually taste good. Light you up, they're quick, they're easy, they're delicious. And the way that they still actually taste good. Light you up, they're quick, they're easy, they're delicious. You've got the winning combination to feeling better, to not only preventing but also reversing the most common diseases of our time. And that's what we see happens time and again with whole plant foods, according to the research and according to our own lives and according to the lives of our clients and friends. We see it all the time. It's the beauty of eating this way.

Speaker 2: 8:34

And those foods aren't just healthier, they're healthiest when you're getting the whole plants that God created for us. Specifically, they are the healthiest foods and I would say the Power on Plants way is the tastiest way as well so you're getting the two combined, and that is a winning formula. Now, all this brings me to point number two that we came up with. This was actually my life is too short for crappy food.

Speaker 1: 9:03

Just cannot even y'all. This one is my favorite. Life is too short for crappy food.

Speaker 2: 9:08

I said that and I didn't think it would get voted up, but it did. And he said oh yeah, we got to say that one and it's true, life is too short for nasty tasting food, because it doesn't have to be. If you had to have bland I don't even want to say nasty food, but uninspiring food for optimal health, that would be one thing. But the good news is you do not have to have bland, tasteless food for optimal health. You can have some of the tastiest foods on the planet for optimal health. And if you look at a lot of the artificial foods, they mimic the plant foods, so, like blueberry muffins, they have the little whatever those blue particles are that kind of taste like blueberries.

Speaker 1: 9:49

There's a name for those. It's like blueberry bits or something. They're actually. If you look it up, there is a name for those things. They've named or something. They're actually. If you look it up, there is a name for those things. They've named them. They're not blueberries in the fake blueberry muffins, they are not. They're like blueberry bits, blueberry. If y'all know what it is, email me at anita power and plants, because I cannot remember what they're called.

Speaker 2: 10:04

But they actually have a name it's a knockoff on the original and when you have an amazing blueberry, you know you grew up with woods around you where they had wild blueberries. Pick them. Those taste amazing. Yes, I lived on them.

Speaker 1: 10:17

I grew up on those. It's amazing Running in the wild blueberry patches pulling the blueberries off by the cup full, by the bowl full. Sometimes I got chiggers. That part wasn't so fun. But I'm telling you best tasting blueberries ever, and you can still get them, though there are best tasting blueberries ever and you can still get them, though there are still people growing them wild. You can get them tame. Eat the blueberries, just eat them. They are so good. But when you said that about and I hate to keep using the word, but really truly crappy food, you said life's too short for crappy food.

Speaker 1: 10:48

Okay, so here's the thing you were thinking taste, bland, taste things like that I'm thinking it doesn't have to mean bad tasting to me, poor quality yes it's too short to eat poor quality food, the stuff that is put out there as food and really it's a food like product I was thinking that exact term food like, like product. Why does it not surprise me when we constantly do that.

Speaker 2: 11:11

You're naggy.

Speaker 1: 11:13

Ever since we've been married, it's like we can finish each other's sentences. It didn't happen 30 years later. It actually happened from the moment we met. We've always been able to finish each other's sentences. I know, I know, it's a little bit over the top, but it's true. So we're just sharing the truth here. But it doesn't have to mean bad tasting. It could mean life is too short for poor quality food, and I would say it's too short for bad tasting and poor quality food.

Speaker 2: 11:37

Yes.

Speaker 1: 11:37

Just don't eat that stuff. Eat the real thing, the whole thing, the thing that God put here for you to eat according to Genesis 129, from the very beginning, that fuels our bodies.

Speaker 2: 11:47

Well, right, it shouldn't surprise us that these are the things we thrive on our bodies well right, it shouldn't surprise us that these are the things we thrive on, and probably not, ironically, poor quality food makes for short life. Life's too short for crappy food, but crappy food makes life short.

Speaker 1: 12:01

So then there's that aspect too. There is that aspect. That was a truth bomb, right there.

Speaker 2: 12:06

Dropping gold nuggets.

Speaker 1: 12:08

You are Mining for nuggets.

Speaker 2: 12:10

Life. Lesson number three was if it doesn't come out right the first time, don't give up Now. How does this apply to the fudgesickles? Well, Andrew started creating these fudgesickles. A few weeks ago, I believe, we bought a Zoku, which is one of these devices that you freeze ahead of time.

Speaker 1: 12:28

So good. We'll put a link below for you if you want to check them out, they are so good because they'll freeze it almost immediately. You have to get it really cold, probably for a couple of days. When you first buy it, it has to be in a super cold freezer, but it will freeze them within 10 minutes maybe less. I'd say realistically 7 to 15, just depending on your freezer temp, and you can pretty much almost immediately get yourself a popsicle. You don't have to wait for hours for them to freeze.

Speaker 2: 12:54

And it keeps them from separating as well, so you can come up with so many different creations. Well, he's been working on the fudgesicle Now, the first one. It wasn't bad, but it didn't have that fudginess like it has now. I mean, he went through a few different trials a few more nuts, a few less nuts, things like that through a few different trials, a few more nuts, a few less nuts, things like that but he now has it perfected. Well, we love the recipe. But if we stopped with that very first iteration of it, it would have been that's okay, I like it, and then probably wouldn't love it like we do now, especially at this time of year. It's 90 plus degrees outside. So to have something like that that has that fudginess and it's cool, cool and it's refreshing, oh, we absolutely love it.

Speaker 1: 13:34

I feel like you've just described what happens so many times with whole food, plant-based, where people try it, and they try the first iteration of some recipe and they think, well, this is terrible, I mean, this is just not good at all, I don't like this and they just quit or they at least quit on that dish and just think, well, I won't be able to have that anymore, because that lasagna recipe was awful or that chili recipe was bad. Like I want my old chili back. You just haven't found the right version yet. Keep trying, don't give up. It's kind of like that, though I think a lot of people give up too early because they don't have the right recipes or the right strategies, or they don't know how to make it work with their schedule in their real life and how to make it taste good so good that they would miss it if they didn't have it that way now.

Speaker 2: 14:20

And initially you may not realize how easy it is. But once you try something and you think, wow, that didn't take long, wasn't hard, and now it tastes amazing. Well, now you know, and it just becomes what you do. And the next time you go to do it it's like oh, I'll knock that out in 10 minutes. I can do that, no problem. Hey, anybody want popsicles? All right, everybody, we'll have them done in about 15 minutes, and that's including freezing time, I might add. Absolutely.

Speaker 1: 14:44

Delicious. That's including making and freezing them and they are just amazing. But I love that you can learn life lessons from something as simple as a plant-based popsicle.

Speaker 2: 14:56

And what else I love? I love podcasting, because we can take just about any subject and make an episode from it and we can share it. I love, love, love this platform, all right Life. Lesson number four make extras and share with others. Oh wow, our Zoku. We actually had to buy two of them, because each makes three popsicles or fudgesicles at a time and there's six of us, so we make six. Well, andrew makes six of them at a time and make extras.

Speaker 1: 15:26

You know what else I love is this is one of those times where I get to be the taste tester. I don't get to do that very often, but sometimes I do, and when I do I'm going to tell you once they know that recipe. I love it and honestly, I don't mind trying the iterations because they all start out pretty good. They've been around us long enough so they kind of know those simple techniques. It's like I talked about in our last episode how my dad was a chef in the Merchant Marines and I grew up with my mom baking around me and I don't want anybody to think, oh well, I don't have that and I don't have culinary experience and I didn't have that, so I won't ever be able to do this.

Speaker 1: 16:02

It's just not true. I take what I learned and I've made it so very simple that I can show you how to do these things in less steps, less time, easier than the traditional way that most people cook. We have never quote cooked in a way that was this easy and enjoyable. Never Our old way did not hold a candle to the power on plants way of plant-based eating. It did not, and that's why we're able to help so many people get these sustainable results and why we still do this day after day and why we never think of going back.

Speaker 2: 16:38

In addition to this, too, I would say don't be afraid to make mistakes. They're not necessarily mistakes when you're cooking, but if it doesn't turn out exactly the way that you want, don't be afraid for that to happen, because that is going to paralyze you from having fun. And that's also why I need to create the cookbooks, a foundation to be able to have something that we know works and that'll work for you every time. And then you can take those techniques and apply them to other recipes. But don't be afraid to experiment, to venture. Have fun with it. Don't be afraid of that process, because that's the process that we did to discover a lot of these recipes. We got them close. Maybe they weren't quite up to muster. A little bit of this, a little less of that, and then now we have a perfect recipe.

Speaker 1: 17:24

Go through that process, enjoy it and by doing that and learning the skills that I'm going to show you inside the academy, what's going to start to happen is you'll learn skills. It's not just going to be now. I have some recipes. That's great for a while. It's really important to have those in the beginning. That is super important because you can start to see how certain ingredients are substituted, how certain things are put together. I think it's a crucial first step.

Speaker 1: 17:51

But people come into plant-based eating and they think all they need is a recipe. But you need those skills and the strategies that make it realistic and sustainable for you. You've got to have those things and have somebody show you how to walk this out over time so that you can do like our friend Carrie says I want to shop from my pantry, I want to be able to shop from my fridge, and she told me that a while back and now I see her doing that. She says, oh, I put this together and I might put that together. I'll add this thing or that thing, because you start learning what flavor profiles go together and you start learning how to substitute this for that.

Speaker 1: 18:32

That's one thing that's featured in the academy and that is how do I make these substitutions. If I had creamer, then how do I have creamer now? If I ate sour cream, then, which I did I was a huge sour cream eater, or a cheese eater how do I get those things into the dishes that I love? You've got to have these substitutions that just light you up. They're not just acceptable, you love them.

Speaker 2: 18:55

They're not acceptable, they're exceptional. But one example, though, just recently is in the past we've used buttermilk in some recipes. We made plant-based buttermilk and it tastes almost exactly like the real thing, very, very similar, and for recipes it's identical.

Speaker 1: 19:12

It's no different in the recipe. You get that zing, that bite, that flavor that only buttermilk can bring to something like a biscuit. Okay, so the light Southern biscuits and the pan gravy that we just enjoyed recently, well, we enjoy them quite a bit, they're so good. They are in the brand new Thrive Cookbook. You're not going to want to miss those I like. Personally, I don't eat a ton of bread, but on occasion I do, and I do like those biscuits, and I'll just take like a piece of one and just break it up with a whole bowl full of tomatoes. Now, I don't know if tomatoes and gravy is just a Southern thing, but it is a Southern thing from the area of the South that I grew up in. Putting pan gravy, thick, delicious, peppery on top of fresh tomatoes and mixing in a little bit of whole grain toast, like Ezekiel or these light, fluffy biscuits. It is so, so good. Honestly, I could leave the bread out, though, too, and just do the pan gravy and the tomatoes. It's that good. Honestly, I could leave the bread out, though, too, and just do the pan gravy and the tomatoes. It's that good. If you haven't tried it, you've got to try it and let me know what you think when you come inside.

Speaker 1: 20:17

Pie, our free group at powerandplantscom forward slash pie P-I-E. You've got to come in there and let me know what you think about that If you haven't tried it before. I'm excited to hear because it is one of my favorites. But we've got to bring it back to don't keep the good stuff all to yourself. I want to talk about what exactly does that mean?

Speaker 1: 20:38

You know, think about it as a believer. This is God's way we're meant to enjoy him, to come into close, intimate fellowship with him, and I believe he made creation for man to enjoy, and women too. When I say men, I mean women as well. Right, he made things for us to enjoy, and that includes the beautiful, delicious whole plant foods. But when we have something good and we discover something amazing that he's given us, like our relationship with him or like this wonderful food that can fuel our bodies, well, he doesn't ever mean for you to keep that all to yourself. He does those things and wants you to enjoy them so that then you can go out and share them with others.

Speaker 1: 21:20

You were never meant to be an island. You were never meant to keep these things quiet and secret and to yourself. That's not why you were put here, so be sure that you're not keeping the best stuff all for yourself, and that's why we had to come and share with you today about the chocolate fudgesicle. These are just a couple of the life lessons that we've learned. If you've enjoyed this episode and you want to hear more of these, let us know all about it inside pie. We'll put the links below how you can join us there, how you can get your cookbook as well, and we'll put the link for the Zoku Popsicle Makers if you want to grab one of those.

Speaker 2: 21:58

And if you've come up with a few life lessons of your own from a chocolate fudgesicle, come into pie, post them in there, share them with us. We'd love to see it.

Speaker 1: 22:06

I seriously cannot wait to hear those. Post them please. It will be hilarious, we can laugh and have some more fun together. Have a great week, sunshine, and we'll see you again soon. Thank you.