Recipe: Sweet Potato Chowder, Earth Element

We had a lot of fun in last night's 5-Element Nutrition class on Balancing Your Earth Element.  One aspect of the Earth Element is that if you eat too much of the "sweet" flavor it becomes heavy and damp, so it's important to try and consciously incorporate some of the other flavors to balance it.  These are: salty, sour, bitter, and pungent.

Note that the energetic "sweet" flavor is not just sugar. Sugar is an extreme sweet, so less extreme examples are whole grains, fresh fruits, and veggies like carrots, peas, sweet potatoes, and others that have a natural farm-fresh type sweetness to them.  This category also includes simple carbohydrates that break down into sugar.

As promised, here is the recipe for the Earth Element food we tried. This recipe uses sweet potatoes which are energetically "sweet" and balances them out with celery and green peppers which are both "bitter".  It's super easy to make.  Enjoy!

Sweet Potato Chowder

Place the following ingredients in a crock pot, then turn on for 4-6 hours OR cook in a large pot on the stove top for about 45 minutes.  This makes about 6-8 servings, and yes - you can freeze it and take some to work for lunch here and there :-)

1-28oz can chopped, peeled tomatoes
1-15oz can garbanzo beans (chick peas) drained & rinsed
3 medium sweet potatoes, peeled & chopped
5 celery stalks chopped
1 beautiful green pepper chopped
2 Tbsp millet (I used millet grits)
2 cups broth (vegetable or chicken)
Top off with water to cover vegetables
small spoonful quality sea salt
Spices: 1 tsp Turmeric, 1 Tbsp Cumin, 1 Tbsp Garam Masala (or to taste)