GOOD MORNING!!!!

If that title seems a little loud it’s because I’ve had a good old energy drink this morning.  Gotta love how my body processes natural sugars now.  I don’t need caffeine.  Caffeine probably wouldn’t work as well as a good old drink with some melons or oranges.  This morning my drink consisted of half a cantaloupe and a quarter of a water melon broken up in the blender.  It was beautiful.  

That drink fueled me on high speed in the garden for about an hour and a half before the rain started.  I think this is why us raw vegans feel so great.  There was no way before I started this that half a cantaloupe and a quarter of a watermelon would have done anything nice for my body.  It probably would have made me sick and sent me straight to the bathroom.  Why does it affect me so differently now?  I’m pretty sure it’s because I haven’t had refined sugar since I started this journey.  I also haven’t had caffeine for just as long except for two cups of coffee that were offered in a social setting but I drank them black and really didn’t enjoy them lol.  All of my food is natural and easily digestible.  I don’t have anything stuck that would move as soon as a large amount of fiber is introduced.  (I know, ewwww) 
The nutrients of the food that I eat are absorbed more effectively.  I don’t heat my food over 115 degrees Fahrenheit (46 degrees Celsius).  Cooking food above that temperature kills the natural enzymes in the food that help you digest it.  That’s why I say that my food is living.  When you cook something your body has to put energy into breaking down the food that you eat.  When you eat it raw it takes less energy which gives you more energy to do other things.  Like enjoy life…

What’s in our food?!?!?…

This blog post might be a little controversial to some of you, my friends and family.  However, it’s a topic that is very important to me, so that’s why I’m writing about it today.  I bet everyone who reads this has known someone whose life has been affected by cancer.  I know my life has been.  Cancer took my Dad from me way too early.  

This is a picture of my Dad the day that Andrew and I got married in my parent's hallway so that he could be there.  He died on week later.  He was 55 yrs old.  


When Dad got sick, we heard of about five other families who were dealing with a loved one who either just recently died or were dying of cancer.  People would hear that my Dad was sick with it and relate their story about someone they knew who had it.  Cancer is on the rise.  I started looking at why.  I read on the internet about how pesticide use on vegetable crops is more prevalent in order to have larger crops that don’t have spots on them.  Preservatives in our food are common practice.  Pop consumption is huge.  Cola contains caramel that has been produced in a way that makes it cancer causing.  The animal product food that people eat, that is sold at grocery stores, is pumped full of antibiotics and growth hormones.  We are poisoning ourselves in the attempt to nourish our bodies.  Most people don’t even know what the preservatives or pesticides do to us.  Some people do, but because of their busy lifestyle, have accepted it as how it has to be as they purchase premade products. 
How many people do you know that make their own jam with handpicked fruit and berries anymore? Not many.  It’s very easy to do.  But the culture and knowledge of doing that for your family has been lost over the generations.  Do people can their own spaghetti sauce or salsa or make their own pickles?  I know more people who do that, but many of us just go to the grocery store and grab a bottle because they have made them in some cases more affordable than making your own.  I’m not worried about saving money.  I’m worried about something else.  My family’s lives. 
The old arts are dying.  We don’t make our own soap anymore… or lotion.  I was told the other day from a girl who sells products to salons that the most organic a lotion could be is 70%... They have to put some preservatives in it or it will rot.  WOW!!  Are you kidding me?  It’s advertised as organic.  I trust that there are no harmful preservatives in it.  And yet, there are.  Why bother?  So we have a lesser of two evils. 
Why has society gone this way?  When we go to the grocery store to spend our hard earned cash to feed our family, we look for the best.  We only grab the best.  The rest is left to either be thrown away (much to my dismay when I heard that about a large Canadian company) or sold at a discount. 
The dairy farmer pumps the cows with antibiotics and hormones to keep up with his/her quota.  The beef farmer gives his/her cattle growth hormone in the food…. Or they get corn to eat.   

This is what http://preventdisease.com/home/tips24.shtml has to say about the cattle industry of today….

“Biting into a juicy burger or slicing a filet mignon, few people realize that beef isn’t what it used to be. Before World War II, beef cattle were raised on grass. It could take four years to fatten a steer. But then the industry switched to corn, a sort of time machine for a steer. Today calves start out on milk and grass but then, when six months old, they’re sent to a feedlot. By the time they are about 14 months old, corn-fed steers weigh enough to be slaughtered. "Corn-fed" may sound wholesome, as normal as Kansas in August and blueberry pie, but in fact corn is not healthy for cattle.

Cattle are ruminants. Their digestive systems are designed for grass, not grain. Fed on corn, they fatten in a hurry—it’s similar to force-feeding a goose to make its liver fat. A corn diet makes cattle sick, sometimes fatally. The animals must have antibiotics to stave off illness and infection until they weigh enough to be slaughtered, as well as hormones to promote quick growth. All this saves money for the growers and keeps the price of beef low.

Corn is a problematic crop, too. It’s heavily subsidized by the government and thus overproduced. It demands vast doses of pesticides and fertilizers, requiring huge quantities of natural gas and oil to produce. Toxic runoff from feedlots has become an environmental hazard, polluting ground water and land.

In addition, corn-fed beef is not good for people, particularly the people who regularly eat fatty steaks and burgers. Corn-fed beef is tender, with the marbling consumers have come to expect—and thus is high in fat, especially saturated fat. A four-ounce serving of grass-fed beef typically has 7 to 10 grams of total fat, compared with 14 to 16 grams in the same cut of corn-fed beef. Grass-fed beef, besides being lower in saturated fat, also contains more of the beneficial unsaturated fatty acids called omega-3s (similar to those in fish), as well as more vitamin E. Grass-fed beef also supplies more conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), another type of fat that has potential health benefits.

Hormones and antibiotics

And then there’s the matter of the hormones in corn-fed cattle. By the time the meat gets to your plate, residues are very small—not enough to worry about from a health standpoint. What is worrying is not the effect on consumers, but on the environment. Hormones from cattle (and other sources) end up polluting water. And not all scientists are comfortable with the idea of residues in meat: the European Union has refused to import American beef raised with hormones.

Another problem is the antibiotics used in corn-fed animals to prevent or treat disease. Again, residues in meat are not likely to hurt people, but use of antibiotics leads to resistant strains of bacteria in animals and in the environment. (Thus, if you get sick from Salmonella, for example, the strain may be resistant to many antibiotics.) Meat from corn-fed cattle is also far more contaminated with E coli bacteria, partly because corn interferes with ruminant digestion, and partly because the animals are crowded together in filthy conditions. E. coli levels are much lower in grass-fed cattle.”

Why are people even promoting this industry?  Why do I hear throughout my day so much “I can never give up steak”?  Or “I looovvveee my beef.  I couldn’t do what you do.  Good for you for having such strength”?  Really?  I really do not miss meat.  I don’t miss eggs.  I don’t miss milk. 

I love the fact that I can nourish my body without harming any animals.  Do I judge you if you eat meat? NO.  I would rather not judge anyone for their choices.  The choices that you make in your life are based on the information and beliefs that you have.  Maybe one day, you’ll try and live off of a plant based diet.  It’s a lot of change.  You lived your life eating certain things believing that they are good for you. 

The days of the small farmer raising their own beef steer and chickens in the yard are over.  Unfortunately, our beliefs that a chicken breast is good for you have not changed.  There is change happening everywhere.  However, our unhealthy and cruel food system is left unchanged for the better.  It is controlled by major corporations.  They control what you eat and how healthy you can be.  Some people will argue that people getting sick and dying young is a way for the planet to prevent itself from being over populated.  Tell that to the family that has lost their loved one from a horrible painful disease that can be prevented. 

I know that my little blog wouldn’t change the world, but maybe, it might help someone to make a healthier choice.  It might be as simple as making your family a fresh batch of jam with local fruit or vowing to buy organic veggies.  But hey, good for you!! 

If you EVER want to talk to me about doing a seven day raw vegan challenge, I’d be happy to help you free of charge.  How about we help change the world by making one healthier choice at a time!!

Nori Rolls!!!!

I love sushi!!  I love seaweed, really.  My daughter, Kristian loves sushi even more than me.  For our children’s birthday, we always make a meal for them that they enjoy.  This year, Kristian requested Sushi.  Kristian is also a raw vegan.  So, I had to get a little creative to give her what she wanted.  I had no idea how to get away with the rice.  I had heard of people who substituted the rice with Kamut.  I can’t find it in the stores in Saskatoon.  If you know where to get it, please let me know.  Also, she sprung it on me at almost the last moment.  So, ordering it online was out of the question.  I went to my local organic market and purchased the dried raw Nori sheets (not the toasted kind) and I also picked up some veggies to put in the sushi.  

 I asked a couple of friends of mine for advice on how to mimic the rice.  Beate came to my rescue again!!  She suggested that I use a bland seed cheese.  What a smarty pants she is!  I soaked some sunflower seeds for half a day and rinsed them and stuck them in the blender with a dash of sea salt.  I added a little bit of water to make it grind nice.  I spread the seed cheese thick on about 1/3 of the nori sheet.  Then I placed the sliced veggies on the seed cheese.  I put in cucumber, radish, carrot, pepper, and some avocado.  I rolled the nori sheet up tight and cut it into four parts.  Now comes the taste test….. Oh WOW!!  It is so good.  I almost prefer it to the old fashioned sushi.  Because it isn’t rolled with rice, I call these little gems Nori Rolls.  

Is Nori good for you?  WOW!  I started looking into some information about it.  I knew it was good for you, but I didn’t know how good for you it is.  I went online and did some research for myself.  

http://www.sacfoodcoop.com/PDFs/seaveggies.pdf States:

  Nori

(Sea Lettuce, Green Laver) Nori has a mild, nutty, salty-sweet taste. Best when

roasted before using (pre-toasted nori is sold as “sushi nori”), wild nori is

excellent crumbled into soups, grains, salads, pasta, and popcorn. Nori is also

great as a table condiment either alone or with ginger. Nori, when sold in paperthin

flat sheets, is used for wrapping sushi rolls or for cutting into strips to use

in soup. Sea lettuce, “green nori” that resembles lettuce, is excellent in soups,

salads, and in rice and noodle dishes.

Health Benefits: Nori is 28% protein, more than sunflower seeds, lentils or wheat

germ. It is also an excellent source of calcium, iron, manganese, fluoride, copper,

and zinc. Of the sea vegetables, nori is one of the highest in vitamins B1, B2, B3,

B6, B12 as well as vitamins A, C and E.

B12 is a big issue in the raw vegan community.  B12 is highly prevalent in meat and very scarce in veggies.  I get tested for B12 and I’m fine so, I must be doing something right.  Maybe it’s all the Nori I eat lol.  

http://www.eismas.com/the-countless-health-benefits-of-nori-seaweed States:

The ingredients in seaweed contain components that allow it to treat irritation, bacterial infections and viruses. The high concentration of polysaccharides affords a number of advantages such as the prevention of cardiovascular ailments such as diabetes. They have been found to increase the function of the liver, stabilize blood sugar as well as improve the level of endorphins at work inside the brain.

Nori is also very good for cleansing your internal organs and can work as an anti inflammatory.  It is also good at removing cancer causing free radicals. 

People can eat it in Nori rolls, drink it in a tea, or cut them up as chips. 

What can’t you do with Nori?  OK, Nori doesn’t do windows, but it does a lot of other great stuff for you.  :)

My fight to keep my garden organic…

We just moved our family to a new homestead late last fall.  Before we moved in, everything around us was buckbrush, quackgrass, and rocks... 

We have little rocks, medium sized rocks, and very large rocks.  The problem is, you can’t dig one hole in our yard without hitting at least one rock.  When it came time to plan a garden, the rock issue came up again.  I could have a raised garden, but the expense and labour that it would take to get the size of garden that I wanted would have been immense.  That was out of the question.  So, when we brought in the nice gentleman to rototill for us, we left it up to him where it would go.  He walked around… Bent over a bunch of times… Poked the ground… He eventually looked at us, exasperated and said, “You have a lot of rocks”.  LOL!  Yes we do… Ok, where can we put the garden?  “Well, over in that corner looks like the best place”, as he pointed to the most shrubby, grassy, and furthest from the house area of our yard.  *sigh*  Ok, if we must.  A lot of people at this point would have sprayed that area with some serious Roundup.  Nope, I’m sticking to my guns!!!  This is going to be an organic garden!!  He looked amazed when I told him that I wouldn’t be spraying the area first, all we would be doing was using a bobcat to clear away most of the grass and brush.  He came by to rototill the ground within a few days of our first meeting. 
He still hit a good amount of rocks but luckily, he never bent his machinery.  To me, my new 7000 sq ft garden looked amazing. 

I immediately started pulling out the big clumps of grass and any turned over shrubs that I could find.  It was thick with it.  I started by planting my little herb garden... Heavenly!!! Something was finally planted!!! 

 When I planted the herbs, I was a little nervous.  I had planted the poor things in dry sandy soil in the middle of the prairie, where they would have to contend with scortching heat and gale force winds... They actually haven't done too badly. :)  
After a few days, I wanted to plant the rest of my garden.   The grass had started coming back already, so I asked my husband to rototill again with the small tiller that we own.  He tilled half of the garden then.  I followed behind him picking out even more shrubberies.  I knew then, that I was in trouble.  Every time he went over it with the rototiller, we would have more sticks coming up.  Oh, I hope they don’t all grow. 
I planted half my garden.  I still had to plant my pumpkins and cucumbers.  I had no irrigation system set up so I had to hand water the whole garden.  This took up most of the couple of hours a day that I had set aside to work in my garden.  Needless to say, it’s a slow go.  My husband, Andrew, works six days a week and late nights, and it seems that whenever he has a day off it's either raining or it had just rained.  So, it took him a while to get to rototilling.  Well, actually he started it one night after work and my son took over so Andrew could go eat something.  

Yay, that’s done.  I have 36 tomato plants and 36 pepper plants in my garden that haven’t grown at all in the last month.  I think that the soil is maybe pretty weak.  We live on rocks, with some sand and clay. Lol  I have to add some manure to it.  I’ll get to that soon too lol.  We also have alot of these little shiny beetles that sit on them.  I don’t know if they’re harmful or helpful.  Oh well, live and let live. 
Yesterday, I spent the full two hours out in my garden, weeding one row.  The kids came home from school and two of them helped me do four more.  Yay!!! Today, I will do another row. 

It’s a lot of work just to keep my little patch of food natural and organic, but it’s well worth it.  In later years, it wouldn’t be as tough.  So, for now we just tough it out.  Hey, the pioneers that settled this land did it, so can we. :)
 Last night, my husband got  my irrigation system set up, and I wouldn’t have to worry about that so much. 

 
I just have to add some parts to the tops and get the soaker hoses figured out.  Hey, maybe I can make some llama tea in the irrigation barrels.  That’ll fix two of my problems.  :P  We’re down to only one llama now, so he’s got a lot of work to do. :)

My dirty helper, Kristian!

What is with me and sprouts these days…

I am loving sprouts lately!  I just can’t get enough of them.  I love mung bean sprouts, alfalfa sprouts, and soaked/sprouted wild rice.  Yes, there are controversies about wild rice.  But, I’ve never had a problem digesting it.  I have never lost energy when I ate it.  The way I look at it, it’s better than white rice.  I make all my own sprouts.  It takes a little preplanning.  However, they do keep in the fridge for a while if you take care of them.  Shortly after I started this, I bought a little cheap sprouting set up.  It consists of a solid base tray to catch water, two clear plastic slotted trays to hold the sprouts and a top cover with slots to allow air circulation.  I love it.  I’ve used it for buckwheat, mung beans, sunflowers, the bigger seeds.  I always wanted to make my own alfalfa sprouts.  I thought, how am I going to put my alfalfa seeds in those trays that have such large slots.  They’ll just wash through the first time I rinse them.  I need a better system.  I thought and thought.  I thought of my 80 something year old Grandma.  She is not a raw foodist, per se, (she does eat a lot of fresh fruits and veggies throughout the summer and up until my visit with her last year she could run circles around my kids.), but she does have a lot of old school interesting ideas.  She’s like a MacGyver.  She has a solution for everything.  So, I start looking around… What so I have?...  Canning jars…. OOOOO!!!  I have this netting here… and this canning jar… and these elastics… Grandma would be proud.  I soaked my alfalfa sprouts over night.  

 Drained them… Rinsed them again twice (this set up is so slick).  What do I put them on?  I can’t just stick them on a plate because the remaining water can’t drain out.  Hmmmm… A bowl!!  So I got a bowl out.  Ugh, it’s still creating a seal.  What do I have?  I looked around for something.  I have this unopened baggie of drywall anchors that came with something that we’ll never use.  Well, let’s save the landfill and put them to use.  I set them out in the bowl in such a way that the jar was going to be supported by them on four parts.  It works great!!!  

 View from the top!!

 Sprout jar hanging out :)

I’m kind of anal about rinsing my sprouts (fear or bad germs), so I rinsed them every three hours or so through the day and just left them over night.   

After a couple of days, I had beautiful sprouts that I put on sandwiches, put in salad, I even came up with this cool recipe.  I love it anyway.  Give me anything with cut up tomatoes, peppers, and garlic and I’ll love you forever lol.  

Alfalfa Sprout Salad
2 tomatoes, cut up (you can remove the seeds or keep them in for some fluid at the bottom of the bowl you can drink after… ok maybe you don’t understand my obsession with tomatoes lol)
1c alfalfa sprouts
Half a red, yellow, or orange pepper cut in chunks(not a green one, they aren’t ripe yet and contain toxins)
2 green onions, cut
½ tsp minced garlic
1 tbs cold pressed olive oil
1 tsb chopped jalapeño or less if you don’t like spice, more if you want it spicier, I use more ;)
Salt to taste. 
This recipe is good either right away or even better if all the veggies marinate in their own juices together in the fridge for a while. 
You can also use wild rice or mung beans, quinoa, or whatever sprout you want in it…. Raw food freedom!!
Enjoy :)

From soup to smoothie…

Shortly after I started this raw food journey, I noticed that everything was cold.  I’d make spaghetti sauce and it was cold.  Salad… cold.  Bread… warmish if it was fresh.  I really craved a nice warm bowl of soup.  I actually came down with a little cold at one time and I would have given Andrew’s left leg for a bowl of warm soup.  There is something very comforting in it.  I looked up recipes online.  They all said to warm soup in the Excalibur Dehydrator.  Yeah right… I don’t have an Excalibur Dehydrator… They are pretty cool, but very expensive.  If you get a big one, you can take all the trays out and stick big bowls of food in it to warm.  Once again, stuck with cold soup.  
One day, I went over to Beate’s house.  She said she was making a warm soup and I was welcome to join them.  I JUMPED on that chance!!!!  She changed my raw food life right then. She used a technique so simple and logical to warm the soup.  Why hadn’t I run across this on any web sites?  OMG!!! I feel so silly for not figuring this out on my own.  Ready for it?....
Use warm water in the recipe….. Let’s say it together…. DUH!!
I felt so stupid.  I had heard that if you put hot liquid in a blender the top blows off… OK, I had seen it happen.  I was always leery about putting anything warm in a blender.  The top of her blender did not pop off.  She used warm water.  You can use warm water.  Still, stick your hand over the top to hold it on, just in case. 
So, how do you make this delectable delight? 
Recipe for green soup… (I got this recipe from Beate Epp, as you might have guessed)
You soak about 1c of cashews.  Throw them in the blender.  Stuff a bunch of spinach in the blender.  Till you get to almost the top of it.  Put in some salt, some spices (maybe jalapeño) , and half an avocado if you have it.  Add warm water until you reach almost the top of the spinach.  Blend it on liquefy until it is a beautiful warm green smooth soup.  Pour it in a bowl over some marinated veggies or just some mushrooms.   Garnish with more spice.  

Enjoy your soup…mmmm.  A friend of mine told me once that it looked like the Grinch threw up in a bowl.  OK… I’ll give her that.  But, it tastes soooo good.  It’s also very good for you.  You get a concentrated about of leafy green nutrition. 
That’s a lot of soup to eat though… What happens when you have more soup that you can eat?  That’s when you get creative.
After you’re done your soup, store it in the fridge in a glass container.  I use canning jars for this purpose.  

Put it in the blender again the next morning…

Add some bananas…

Strawberries….

Blend it up with some agave nectar or honey (about 1 tbs) or dates... to taste, some like it sweeter uh hum...Beate lol

Throw in some carob (to taste)... some like it more chocolatey... uh hum... Beate lol
Blend it again

Enjoy :)