Going Raw when you're 4. . .

A BIG challenge has been how to get my kids to eat more RAW. Well, the teenagers I've given up on! NOT! But they are much more resistant to change. It will just take longer to brain-wash them.... I have asked them to keep their bad sugar habits outside of our home. Occasionally they'll have friends over and make a batch of cookies, but for the most part I've asked them to set a good example for their 4 year old brother who can be influenced in a better direction as long as he doesn't have a bad example right in front of him. The Teens have even learned to fake an Mmmm when I have them try a new RAW food treat. It's not perfect but it helps.

It's interesting that several of my Teens friends have asked about my diet and new healthy eating and have even tried some of the RAW snacks I've made and liked them. Which in turn helps to influence my Teens and help them, possibly, think that maybe mom isn't such a nutso....

One of my Twenties is actually stealing Almond Milk from my pantry to take back to his apartment to use. . . Now that's a BIG step for the kid who loves Moo milk on his cereal!!! Slowly but surely. . . I usually have a big bag of apples and oranges in the pantry and I gladly let them take as many home with them as they want.

The 4 year old came home from Halloween with his bucket of candy and I let him eat as much of it as he wanted, but the next morning it was gone (not thrown away...just out of sight) and he never asked for it! He did have a sugar hangover the next day and took a 4 hour nap. I figured that was better than a weeks worth of crankiness and fighting over how much candy he could have. Why ration it out? Just get it overwith in one day!! If it makes them sick, they'll just learn not to like candy! Which by the way he found his bucket of leftovers in the laundry room about 3 weeks later. He ate a little bag of M&M's, and then told me I could throw the rest of his candy away.

He was pretty resistant to the morning smush in the beginning. But I was determined not to give up easily. I tried to figure out how to make it fun. So, I got him involved in making the smush. He would put the cut up apples and bananas into the blender and dump the teaspoon of cinnamon in and then push the button on the blender to smush it all up. I quiz him on what goes into our smush and he knows the 4 ingredients. It's not hard, but he likes knowing. Then I let him choose what color bowl he eats it in, and what color spoon he eats it with, and if he wants any chopped apples or bananas on top of it. In the beginning I even let him sit in my lap, and I'd feed it to him. He likes that. And NOW. . . he eats it all by himself! Woot!

Bananas

I've made a goal for myself to try new recipes every week. But I've also been trying to get back to my life. It seems like Raw Life has consumed my life over the summer. Quilting and other areas of my life have kinda taken a backseat and since I quilt for customers, I need to get back to work!!

But here is somethings I've been doing with the simple little banana. I'm sure you know how wonderful the banana is and has some awesome nutrition. It's amazing how my attitude about browning bananas has changed since I started going raw. I bought bananas occasionally before, but now I buy them every time I hit the grocery store. I don't just buy one bunch, I at least buy 4 - 6 bunches in varying states of ripeness. I was a wimp before. If the skin of the banana was a little bit brown, no way would I eat it. I'd probably save it and make banana bread out of it, but I wouldn't eat it. Now, I eat them. Bruises on the banana, well I still don't eat them but the whole banana isn't ruined just cuz of a little bruise.

What do I do with all those bananas? I dehydrate them, and freeze them, and never have a smoothie without them! YUM! So to dehydrate I try to use bananas that are a tad bit green, cuz I'm trying to prevent as much brown-ness in the finished product. I then slice them about 1/4" - 1/3" thick and spread them out on the mesh sheet on the dehydrator tray. I tried soaking them in Fruit Fresh to prevent browning, but it didn't make any difference and it was just more time. So no more soaking. Then I put them in the dehydrator at about 113 degrees. Then someone gave me a tip and said give them a little sprinkle of cinnamon. YUM!!! Don't dry them till they are hard as poker chips! They should actually be a little pliable and chewy, so much better than the ones you buy in the store.

I also freeze bananas. When the bananas start getting a bit brown and I have too many to use before they go really brown, I pull out a cooling rack and peel the bananas and break them in half and place on the rack, and put them in the freezer. Once frozen I put them in a ziploc bag. So if I run out of fresh bananas for smoothies, then I can throw in a couple frozen 1/2 bananas. I've used them in our morning smush. Also if you love milkshakes, then use the frozen bananas for milkshakes. YUM!!! or put in a food processor and process until smooth and you have banana ice cream. MMMmmmmmm If you checked out the website in the the last post you'll find a recipe for pumpkin ice cream using frozen bananas.

I'll have to post the Chocolate Milkshake Recipe when I get home. . . So check back!

Wow!

Talk about raw Halloween Ideas! OK, so like usual I'm a Day late and a Dollar short!! But you have to check out this blog. I just found it today and I'm in LOVE!!

The Happy Raw Kitchen

Catching up! AGAIN!

Sorry, life is crazy and I don't get to sit still and write about my Raw Adventures as often as I'd like to. So, I will probably be having a few posts close together here to get caught up a bit. Sorry, if it overwhelms you! JK

So I went with Hubby, Oldest daughter, grand-daughter and our 4 yo son to Colorado Springs and while we were driving there I started reading a book to hubby. It's my sneaky way to get him to hear the info I've been learning about without his complaining because he has no choice but to stay buckled in and hang on for the ride!

The book I read to him was The China Study. Now I had read many quotes from this book in many of the Raw Food/Whole Food lifestyle books that I've been reading for the last several months. Since I believe what I've been reading, studying, learning I didn't feel like I need to get The China Study and read it. . . just one more book to have to read. But then I ran into a friend at pre-school registration and she asked about my weight loss etc. . . I started telling her and she said, "So you've read The China Study then." I told her nope and she said she had the book so I asked to borrow it. And thus the reading on the trip.

In my study of Raw Food I've read on blogs/books, heard via youtube videos etc. . . people talking about healing themselves from cancer, MS, depression, anxiety, etc. . . and I thought wow that's great, but I was so convinced that if I was diagnosed with cancer or something that I would truly believe that I could heal myself from it with Raw food. But after reading The China Study. I'm a BELIEVER!!! You really need to check it out for yourself. There are excerpts from the book here on Google Books.

Daily Eats

So I just thought I'd share this from Kristen's Blog. I follow her blog and she quite often lists what she's eaten or plans to eat for the day. I'm not as sophisticated as she is yet, but I'm working on being more creative. So check out her blog for daily eating plans.

Also, we made banana ice cream with chocolate sauce tonight. Bob, Hudson, and I enjoyed it. The rest of the family wasn't brave enough to try it.

We smooshed up about 4 frozen bananas broken into chunks in the food processor. I had to add just a swish of water to get it to smoosh up properly. But it ended up being a nice creamy soft serve consistency.

Then I made a raw chocolate sauce by whirling in the blender.

1/2 c soaked pitted dates
1 - 1 1/2 c water
1 - 3 TBS raw Cacao powder
1/2 tsp of vanilla extract
and a pinch of salt.

I got this recipe from RawDawg Rory. Check out his raw recipe videos!

Really Quick

First, I'm so sorry to all the people that have stopped me and asked me about my weight-loss and what I've been doing. Why? Because it usually turns into at least a 45 minute discussion and my mouth going a mile a minute and trying to expunge all the information I've crammed into my brain in the last 3 months. So I apologize if it's more than you want to know. I'm trying to learn to send people to the blog so that they can accept or reject and not worry about having to get a word in edgewise to tell me that they're not interested.

Before I get interrupted again. . . don't ask what I got interrupted for. . . I'm going to try and answer a couple of questions I've gotten lately.

#1 - Why Green Smoothies? Can't you just eat it in a salad.

Answer - Generally you will consume way more greens in a smoothie than in a salad. I figure that I'm putting in enough greens for 4 good sized salads. Then what do you put on top of that salad so that you can eat it? DRESSING - full of fat and oils.

Also, we don't chew our food as well as we should to aid in our digestive process. How many times have you tried to chew your food 32 times?? We won't go into my hubby's description of his attempt to do this. We really should spend more time at the table and not in dinner conversation, but chewing our food. I'll leave this discussion by saying, when it goes down our throat it should be the consistency of applesauce. So, after all of that, when you drink a green smoothie the Blender has done the hard part of digestion for you!! So it's easier for your stomach to break it down into the easiest digestible particles and the nutrition can get out into your bloodstream faster than if you were to eat 4 salads.

#2 - What do you eat through out the day?

Answer - Well, I'm still new to all this Raw food thing and YES it is a MAJOR Paradigm shift!! Let's just say that for anyone who was raised making bread, cookies, pies, cakes, casseroles, etc. . . . It is a BIG deal trying to wrap your mind about NOT cooking anything!

First I just drank lots of green smoothie, sometimes 2 quarts a day. Then BIG salads. With homemade dressings, or just olive oil and balsamic vinegar and a sprinkle of herbs. Celery, carrots, homemade guacamole on cucumber chips, or hummus.

Now I have a breakfast of Smush with my 4 year old in the morning. . . He's learning to like it and Hubby thinks it tastes great. I just have to tell you . . Yesterday we were eating our Smush and 4YO said he didn't want to call it smush anymore. So he named it Malea! and tomorrow he said we'll call it Peter.

We soak 1 TBS golden flax seeds in water (overnight or at least 1 hour)then rinse it. This is kinda difficult cuz it gets really slippery/slimy. But try
We dump this in the blender with:
1 apple cut into chunks
1 banana broken in chunks
1 tsp cinnamon.

Whirl it all together and pour into a bowl. Top with small apple chunks, chopped bananas or raisins.

This makes enough for a small bowl for Hudson and a portion for me, but Hubby could eat the whole thing himself.

Lunch is either a salad or just a piece of fruit or handful of nuts. Green smoothie if I haven't drank my full quart for the day.

Dinner more salad or a raw entree. We've tried raw spaghetti and marinara and a few other things, but mostly I make some sort of whole food recipe for the kids from Green Smoothie Girl, or the The Original Fast Food Book. But my poor kids are going dairy-free and meat-free for the most part. Oh, Hubby now loves Lentil Tacos. He wasn't too happy for them when he was still eating meat, but now he's LOVING them!

OK, so that didn't end up being too quick, but hope that helps.

Lauri!

For Beginners

Well, DH just happened to mention in a talk at church that I'm doing something new with my diet. Thanks Dear! No pressure now to keep up with this new lifestyle.

Seriously, I have NO desire to go back to the Standard American Diet (SAD) because I feel so terrific now, I NEVER want to go back!!!

So for all those who are asking questions I'm going to start posting some beginner's help.

#1 - Cut out Sodas, caffeine. . .
#2 - Drink 1/2 - 1 Quart of Green Smoothie a day

What is a green Smoothie - it's probably the healthiest drink you'll ever have and it's so easy to make, this is how I do mine.

In my blender (Blend Tec) I put 2 cups of water and I smash in as much baby spinach into that 2 cups as I can just by hand. I blend that up. Then I add 2 TBS honey, 2 handfuls of frozen peaches, 1 handful of frozen strawberries, 1 banana. Set my BlendTec to XL Smoothie and let it whirl! I then pour this into 2 Quart size glass jars evenly and add enough water to bring both up to full. Now there's a quart for DH and a quart for me. And seriously our bodies appreciate the nourishment! When we're out of town we don't get these at all. We got home and made and drank our first GSmoothies and our bodies went AAHHHHH! That's is so good!

I know you're probably thinking I'm crazy. But it's true. Think about trying to eat all that spinach in just one meal. It would take forever for you to chew through all the spinach and eat like 2 peaches and a handful of strawberries! But the blender just did the biggest part of digestion for you! It's all liquified and all you have to do is drink the nutrition down!

So this is just a basic beginning. There is no hard fast rule for GSmoothies. Except that it needs some green stuff and fruit in it. So as a beginner start off with not so much green stuff. Spinach is good because it's a really mild flavored green, but you can substitute any leafy green, kale, chard, romaine, arugula, etc. . . Granted some are stronger tasting than others. So start with spinach and add others as you want to experiment. As for the fruit, Go for it! Apples, bananas, cherries, apricots, blueberries. One of my favorites is Apricots with blackberries! And your GSmoothie doesn't turn out green!! You don't need the honey in there either, but it helps sweeten it up a bit. Just DON'T put in White Sugar or an artificial sweetener. Go with RAW honey, or Grade B Maple Syrup. Just the sweetness from the fruit is best, but adding just a touch of a more natural sweetner is OK.

Hope that helps!! Feel free to post comments, suggestions, or questions.

Raw Chocolate Pudding

Hubby and I just had the yummiest pudding!!! Way better than Sugar Free Jello Pudding. Which is what I used to let us have as a snack. ICK!!!!

Don't freak out when I tell you that it was made with an Avocado!!! Seriously! The texture was so smooth!

I found the recipe by searching online for Avocado Chocolate Pudding. But this is how I did mine, because I didn't have all the "right" or enough ingredients.

Raw Chocolate Pudding

1 Avocado
1/3 c Agave Nectar recipe called for 1/2 c. That would have been too sweet for me.
1/4 c raw cacao powder
1 TBS Vanilla Extract
1/4 tsp sea salt
1 - 2 TBS Almond Milk

Put all the ingredients in the blender and blend, add the Almond milk slowly to add to the creaminess. It only makes maybe 1 1/2 cups. But I couldn't even eat all mine it was so chocolatey. I might even cut back just a smidge on the cacao powder.

Now you need to keep in mind that I haven't eaten any processed dessert in several months. OK, I did have a couple bites of a cheesecake when we were in Boston and Colorado Springs. But seriously that is it. So this might have something to do with my tastebuds being overwhelmed with the creamy goodness. However, Hubby thought it was downright yummy too! He said I could make it again for him, and he's a pretty picky critic.

Sorry I didn't take a picture. I wasn't planning on blogging about it until it was all gone!!

Insights. . .

With all the learning about eating RAW food, I've become so much more aware of my health and my body and more aware of. . . It's really hard to put into words how I feel about what's been happening to me because of this way of eating.

A little History. . .
I have never been a big dieter, never trying this or that to lose weight. I have been 15 - 20 or so pounds overweight most of my pregnant/post pregnant life. In trying to have children I learned that I have PCOS, and that my body doesn't agree/use Carbohydrates correctly. A Dr told me that when we were trying to have our first child, but it wasn't until after our 5th child that I realized I should be doing something about how I ate. From that time on, I've been on a "Trying to eat Healthy" crusade. Don't even talk to my children about it! They SO have a "Oh no here she goes AGAIN!" attitude. In fact, I'm pretty sure they are thinking this about my new RAW food phase. However, I feel totally different now, than I ever did in all the other tries.

I have done Atkins several times and been successful in losing weight, but never sustaining it. Plus, I never could feel good about it because it never leveled up with the Word of Wisdom and so I just couldn't ever come to terms with it. I totally feel that the RAW food way of life does line up with the Word of Wisdom, if it's studied, and we're honest with what it actually says about eating meat and grains. That's another thing I struggled with. . . Food Storage. Because of my issues with carbs, it was hard for me to think of how Un-good all that grain in my basement is for me. But now, I know that I can sprout that grain and make it wonderfully healthy GREEN stuff for me and my family!

So. . . GARDENING! Yep, I've actually become excited about growing my own GREEN food! We have pretty much always had a garden all of our married life, and it's been mainly my responsibility to keep it going. In fact, I have to point out to DH, that's a plant and that's a weed. . . I think I've kept my growing up years attitude about a garden. ICK! Weeds! WORK!! Now I've learned the difference between a Farmer - who puts seeds in the ground and watches them grow, and a Gardener - who tends, nurturers, prunes, watches, anticipates.

I'm even trying a winter garden. Did you know that you can grow your own greens over the winter in a covered (not a greenhouse) box? Two books that have changed my Gardening experience are The All New Square Foot Garden and The Four Season Harvest. If I had my camera (which has spent a semester down at BYU being used by the future photographer), I would love to post pictures of the tiny arugula leaves that are coming up in my back porch SQF Garden! And the amazing 6 foot tall pruned tomato plants in the back garden! Or of the yummy "Cheesy Kale Chips" that I dehydrated from the kale we picked out of our garden.

OK so I think that's enough for tonight, but I have more insights and thoughts to share. Aren't you Lucky?!?!?!?

What's really RAW?

Lara keeps asking me if I really mean I'm totally RAW. When you say you're RAW doesn't mean you have to be 100%. In my reading and research if you're eating 60% - 75% RAW and adding wholesome whole foods to that, then you're Raw. Yes, I've had a few days that I've eaten totally 100% Raw. Which I don't think is that hard. Drink a Green Smoothie for Breakfast and eat Salads for lunch and dinner. If my family weren't insisting on something else besides fruits and veggies, it would be easier for me to eat 100%. But I'll pop something in my mouth occasionally that isn't raw. My family generally wants something that's cooked for dinner and we always have a big salad. So I'll eat a bit of the whole foods cooked meal, but I try mainly to just eat a nice big salad for dinner. But the cool thing is that I'm not addicted to food anymore, so I don't obsess and eat TONS of something that isn't good for me. . . .

What's up with me???

I got totally overwhelmed with Blogging and haven't done it in a LONG time. But I thought I'd just quickly list some changes happening since I started Raw Food.

♥ More Energy
♥ No more Brain Fog
♥ no more itchies just out of the shower (sensitive skin)
♥ need to shave legs less often
♥ no more food cravings!! Yea!
♥ Lost 15 pounds
♥ feeling GREAT. . .

There are probably more, but I have to get going with my day. I'll update as I remember more.

Ahhhh!

What am I thinking????

I follow an Awesome blog by the Lazy Organizer. Let's just say she makes me think. . . Maybe too much and definitely way more than my family would like me to be thinking. I've always been into self improvement books and working on myself and family. Much to their chagrin. But I'm nuthin compared to Lara. So when she went RAW (that's an eating terminology for eating only RAW foods)about 6 - 9 months ago. I was thinking. . . "What is she thinking? She's nuts!" Now here I am, maybe I'm just nuts for following her lead. However, research on the internet (seriously the internet is AWESOME) has lead me to make my own conclusion that my health and that of my family will be exponentially benefited by adopting this lifestyle. So family start your engines . . . and GO!

I have 3 teenagers in this house and an almost 4 year old. He's actually the whole cause of this. . . He's our surprise baby. Since DH and I were in our 40s when he was born, we decided that we need to take better care of ourselves so we have the energy to keep up with him, and hopefully that we'll still be alive and kicking when he makes it to manhood!! Let's say the teens think I'm nuts, and aren't too thrilled to have to deal with my new course. I might mention that I also have 3 kids that are out of the house; Daughter 24 married and has a 1 year old, 2 boys in college 22 & 20. They are WAY glad that they are out of the house before their mom went whacko!!

Journaling is apart of starting this new lifestyle and I'm actually blogging because one of the online sources actually suggested it. That source would be Kristen Suzanne. She encouraged to make the journal a blog because one can get feedback from a blog, and there is much more commitment when you let people know what you're doing. I was a bit apprehensive to blog, mainly cuz I have 3 other blogs that I should be paying attention to, but this has consumed my life for the moment, and I feel the need to go with it.