James Fishman | Sunstone Online

Tools and Tips for the Aspiring Cook

Tools and Tips for the Aspiring Cook

Are you looking to up your cooking game in 2024? According to the New York Times, some kitchen essentials are an important first step. Simply purchasing a larger cutting board will streamline your cooking prep, help you organize your ingredients, and minimize cleanup. A sharp knife pairs nicely with your larger cutting board, and there is no need lay out a sizeable sum for professional knives. Find an affordable options with a sharpener and start slicing and dicing!

If you are to invest in anything, a heavy skillet will guarantee you an impeccable sear and will cook your food evenly. Look for a skillet made from cast iron, stainless steel, or enameled cast iron to ensure incredible high-temperature cooking. Another welcome addition is a versatile sheet tray, preferably one with rolled edges that prevents warping over time. Sheet trays are perfect for everything from baking and roasting to dry-brining proteins.

The cooking process begins with carefully reviewing the recipe. As you work through the recipe, focus on visual, auditory and olfactory cues rather than timing. While swapping ingredients can impede baking results, savory cooking can accommodate substitutions, such as switching root vegetables or hearty greens.

Finally, make sure to taste your food at each stage! This is the optimal way to make sure your food is seasoned well, and will enable you to correct mishaps and save your dish.

Best of luck with your cooking journey! Remember to be patient and kind to yourself, and to share your delectable dishes with loved ones.

Strava Releases 2023 “Year in Sport: The Trend Report,” Revealing Workout Motivation in Different Generations

Strava, a digital platform with a community of over 120 million athletes, released its, “Year In Sport: The Trend Report.” The report surveyed 6,990 individuals, both in and out of Strava’s community, and provided insights into the exercise habits of people across different generations as well as observations on the evolving workout trends for the year 2024. Gen Z was found to stand out with differing habits, motivators, obstacles and interests when approaching physical activity.

One prominent takeaway from the report is the importance of social connection as a primary motivator for exercise. This appeared as a cross-generational response, but was particularly notable for Gen Z with 77% responding that they a stronger bond to seeing friends and family’s activities on Strava. Gen Z is also 29% more likely than Millennials to exercise with another person.

The report highlights Gen Z’s distinct exercise behaviors; they are 31% less likely than Millenials or Gen X to work out because of health concerns and more likely to pursue athletic performance. While 39% of Gen Z Strava users started a new job and 30% relocated in 2023, they were still 32% more likely than other generations to say they’re in better shape than last year.

Zipporah Allen, Chief Business Officer at Strava, notes the impact of Gen Z’s values of community, activism, and connection in an increasingly digital world: “Over the past year, we’ve seen Gen Z as the primary source of community growth through new clubs on Strava. They’ve also contributed to the increase in sports, like running, despite having the most barriers to staying consistent. This shows exercise will be a central value for this generation, which is why they’re already turning to Strava as the key platform to stay motivated and connected.”

Reading Recommendations for 2024

Book lovers are always looking for more recommendations – and there are certainly many places to get those ideas. If you’re resolved to enjoy more literature in 2024 than you might have in 2023, here are some ideas.

Goodreads: Goodreads is a great resource where people share their favorite book titles and write reviews of books that they have read. They have a yearly contest as well for their collective favorite books, and this list could be a nice place to start for 2024. The contest is broken into many categories including fiction, historical fiction, romance, best new writer, etc.
CNN book list recommendation: This is a fun list that includes a smattering of suggestions from musicians, authors, photographers, film directors and even a Miss Universe. It’s worth a peek.
Social media: There are many accounts across social media platforms that people have exclusively dedicated to their love of reading. TikTok has a section called BookTok where people post short videos about their love of books. Instagram has Bookstagram and other social channels have similar locations for book lovers to talk and share.

Whatever type of reading you enjoy, and however you want to learn more about reading, you’ll find great suggestions for the coming year. Expand your horizons with a book and get reading now!

Talking About Death in New Ways

Two recent books have been published that allow readers to rethink their association with death and dying. A new book by J. Servon and L. Delany-Ullman called Saved: Objects of the Dead explores the idea of what we keep after someone has died. The book has been created by North Carolina-based artist Jody Servon and California-based poet Lorene Delany-Ullman. It features forty photographs and prose poems based on interviews they did with people and the objects they cherished after a loved-one died. Bringing the idea to social media, they also have a very interesting Instragram page where people can see saved objects and hear about why these particular objects were saved.

Another unusual book worth exploring was recently written by Hadley Vlahos. Hadley is a young hospice nurse with a large social media following on Instagram, Tik Tok and other channels. She shares interesting stories from her experience as a hospice nurse, offering play acting the various parts of an encounter. She offers inspiration and hope for the experience of grieving for family members and helping a dying family member.

While death is typically addressed as a depressing topic, these books explore unchartered aspects of the process and ways that family members might address and think about death in new and unusual ways.

Retire in Style…On The Water

We all have different ideas about what our retirement should look like. Here is one you might not have considered. Life at Sea Cruises is offering an opportunity for a three year cruise, and will even offer you the opportunity to jump aboard at a stop that suits your needs.

The cruise is supposed to depart from Istanbul on November 1 and continue for three years of onboard bliss. The company goal is to sell only 85% of capacity to make it comfortable for everyone on board. As they travel, people will be able to get scuba certifications (and scuba dive of course), to take part in ocean clean-up efforts and take part in coral propagation projects.

Pricing is actually not as shocking as one might expect with starting pricing at $38,513 per person for a full year. Everything is included in this price including healthcare.

Sail your worries away and enjoy a very different type of retirement option!

A Pen and PTSD

A recent JAMA Psychiatry-published study is revisiting the adage, “a picture is worth a thousand words.” Written exposure therapy, a new treatment for PTSD, has been discovered to be remarkably effective. The treatment consists of five supervised half-hour sessions, in which the patient writes down his/her thoughts and feelings that took place during a trauma. The patient then speaks about the writing process with a therapist and, in later sessions, writes about how the trauma affected their lives.

The effectiveness of this treatment is based in the writing process, according to Dr. Denise Sloan, a psychologist who worked on developing the treatment and is one of the authors of the JAMA Psychiatry study. Sloan explains that writing removes the client from the shame or embarrassment that may accompany talking about an event aloud. Writing also slows down the process, enabling patients to have greater engagement with memory and thinking through the episode.

This form of therapy was inspired by a 1980s study conducted by a psychologist in Texas, James Pennebaker. He found that people who used “expressive writing,” or routine journaling of difficult life experiences had stronger immune systems and visited their doctor less frequently.

Pennebaker’s findings reveal that writing can help cope with a myriad of emotions, and is not just for someone suffering from PTSD. In all circumstances, both severe and mild, penning a thousand words may have both mental and physical health benefits!