No Sugar No Fruit Cookbook + Yesterday's Food (Gabriel Cousens Day 7)

I've gotten a hang on this no sugar, no fruit raw lifestyle and have so many recipe ideas that I want to share. I want to be a little professional this time and release a cookbook with the very best recipes that I have created. Stay tuned as I will be releasing pictures of some of the dishes that I will create. In the meantime I plan to do more you tube videos and showcase the results of some other Rainbow Green recipes on this blog.

Today is day 7 of my new lifestyle of cutting out fruit and sugar. I'm actually doing fine. I was really tired the first day I started doing this but everything is great now. I eat vegetables, nuts, and seeds daily and make small desserts at times with stevia. I am enjoying this process and know it is temporary. I am going abroad in December for 2 months and will start phase 1.5 then and I think I will have done phase 1 long enough. The reason for the switch is due to the cold climate where to I am going and there will be less quality fresh foods available so I will have to rely partly on frozen berries and root vegetables. 

For those that are interested, here is what I ate yesterday.

- Kale Salad at lunchtime along with a sun-dried tomato cracker I made
- Cashews for snacking
- Coconut Flakes with Coconut Aminos (I have the Aminos rarely and there is less than a gram of sugar per teaspoon and I do not use that much).
- More cashews

This was not a typical day for me and I didn't explain my portions clearly but you get the gist of yesterday's food. Plus it was the day after the liver flush!

Garam Masala Gobi and Liver Flush (Gabriel Cousens Day 6)

Hello. First off the list of things to share is a great recipe I found in Dr. Cousens's Rainbow Cuisine book: Garam Masala Gobi. This is basically cauliflower tossed with a creamy garam masala sauce and dehydrated to warm it up. It was delicious! I found it to be great however eating too much at once may cause problems for some (cauliflower seems to cause problems for some if eaten in large quantity). I was fine though! Here is how it turned out:

Next I will discuss my fourth liver flush. I had 2 vegetable juices in the morning, then ate a bunch of coconut ice cream (with stevia of course) in the evening which made me really nauseous followed by the regular olive oil and grapefruit juice cocktail. Oh and epsom salts to go with that day as well as coffee enemas. I feel great today though and had no problems except for nausea after the ice cream and hopefully will heal myself of the ailments I have. Already, the dyshidrosis on my finger is going away and hopefully it will not return. The ringworm is also fading. I will keep you updated on my health breakthroughs!

Eggplant Casserole and Liver Flush #4 (Gabriel Cousens Day 5)

Here is a picture of an "Eggplant Casserole" I made a few days ago from the book Rainbow Green Live-Food Cuisine:





It was really delicious! I omitted the tomato sauce from the recipe as I only like sun dried tomatoes in dehydrated bread... Eggplant is a great meat substitute and tastes great raw when properly prepared.

Anyways, today is another liver flush day! I am following a mix of Dr. Kelley's and Hulda Clark's protocol for it so that I can eat some coconut ice cream (with stevia) in the evening. I only had some vegetable juices so far and I have to admit: I can't imagine doing a vegetable juice fast with NO fruit. Cousen's recommends vegetable juices with 80% celery or cucumber and 20% leafy greens. I guess you just have to get used to it... I may attempt a few days on this but will probably be bored quickly.

Hopefully I will get rid of candida from the coconut ice cream I will eat later today and cleanse my liver as well. I will be breaking my no sugar diet by drinking grapefruit juice with olive oil but it will not be much and the olive oil is really fatty so it will slow down the sugar absorption. Grapefruit juice is on the Phase 1.5 diet so I am fine :)

First YouTube Video (Kale Salad)

I just made a YouTube video of the kale salad I make almost every day. It is in Russian but I added English subtitles:

Hope you enjoy it!

Classic Neatballs with Sour Cream Sauce (Gabriel Cousens Phase I Day 3)

Oh wow was I tired yesterday. I think it must have been the sugar detox. I barely managed to take a walk that is usually super easy for me around where I live. I feel pretty good but I am still not digesting food as well after the fast so I need to take it slowly and take digestive enzymes with my food. Otherwise I love the food I am making and the recipes I found in Cousen's book are great. Here is how the neatballs came out with the sour cream sauce (made from almonds which turned out delicious!):

I need to drink more water because I need to balance out the food with water as well as because my diet is fairly low-carb and my body is losing water as a result. I want to do a liver flush this week followed by a few days of vegetable juice fasting. We will see how this goes!

I found an updated version of the foods I can eat now here: http://tolcus.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/3+-+Green+Phase+and+Juice+Charts+3-291.pdf

It turns out that some foods I thought were not allowed due to the book's chart are actually OK in the updated version (like ACV for example).

Bok Choy Paneer and Chennai Curry (Gabriel Cousens Phase I Day 2)

Hello!

Today is a good day and I am really enjoying eating. I will attempt a vegetable juice fast in a few weeks but probably for something like 3 days at first. I really enjoyed juice fasting you know, I just have to tweak my diet and do another one that will benefit me even more. For now, I have been following Gabriel Cousen's advice on how to solve many health problems and eliminate fungal infections. I am on phase I of the diet outlined in his book, Rainbow Green Live-Food Cuisine, and the recipes are so delicious.

I made the Bok Choy Paneer and Chennai Curry. Both were so delicious and I actually made another serving of the latter dish (I cut the recipe by about a half each time though) because I was still hungry. These are great, filling dishes that are low in sugar. I also had some coconut flakes with coconut aminos which tasted amazing! But I probably can't have that since it is a fermented food and has sugar and that is not allowed until Phase 1.5. Come to think of it, I still put ACV in my kale salads as well and that is not allowed either. I need to substitute lemon juice for these things. Little things like this can go unnoticed which is bad for healing. Anyways, here are pictures of how the food came out:

Bok Choy Paneer (I used cashews instead of pine nuts):

Chennai Curry (I used coconut flakes instead of fresh coconut pulp):

Day after breaking the fast + Day 1 of Dr. Cousen's Live-Food Cuisine

Why did I break my fast earlier?

I broke the fast yesterday, but not for the reasons you might expect. I did give into a craving for a kale salad I made, but I could have resisted it easily had it not been for one other reason. No, it's not because of my slow weight loss (I fit into my clothes better actually and know that I have lost weight) which didn't stop me from breaking my fast. It wasn't that I got bored with my juices or had immense hunger. And it wasn't that my body was ready to stop fasting. It's a long story but bear with me...

In short, I know that I am allergic to many if not all fruits. Allergies do not show up internally in me (they do but I do not know any internal symptoms) but they show up horribly externally. If I avoid sugars my skin is super clean and soft and looks awesome. Give me an apple and I have little red dots on my cheeks when looking up close. Give me citrus fruits and I get horrible cystic like pimples that don't pop and are huge and horrible. Give me all kinds of fruits in great quantity like on a juice fast and I look more horrible every passing day. These are NOT detox symptoms. I know this because I have noticed this pattern for many years. The point is to know your own body and to do what is necessary to make things better.

The Decision: 

I had two options: continue the juice fast but omit all fruits and do a pure vegetable juice fast (this is what I should have done since the beginning) or break the fast and clean my liver and change my diet and then attempt a vegetable juice fast. I chose the latter because it was stressful to change things around during my juice fast and I got used to so much sugar in my juices. It was a less stressful option to eat a kale salad instead. So I did and I felt great, kind of. I put nutritional yeast in my salad and got a headache which was a bad idea but now I know better. My body felt great otherwise though. I did not have too much but I did eat quite a bit of fat compared to no fat when juicing. I still felt great from eating something. 

I broke my fast and slept for 11 hours!! I had some herbal tea in the morning and closer to noon (right now actually) made a juice from red cabbage, garlic, jalapeno, and kale stems. It tastes spicy and good! These are the kind of juices that I should have been making. I will probably have a small portion of a kale salad for lunch, maybe a juice before dinner, and Bok Choy Paneer for dinner. Let me explain the food choices.

New Diet:

I know that there is something going on in my body that I need to fix. I have this book by Dr. Gabriel Cousens called Rainbow Green Live-Food Cuisine that I owned for 5 years already. Somehow I have never fully followed the diet outlined in the book but I know I need to for my health. Basically the plan is to do a restricted diet short term to eliminate candida and other fungi from my system by making my body more resilient and then transition into a more or less regular raw food diet with a limit on high sugar foods. Actually there are 3 stages with the first one lasting at least one month (Phase 1), the second one at least 6 months (Phase 1.5), and the third one as maintenance (Phase 2).

There are lots of fun recipes in the book that I will try to make and post pictures of everyday. I will post tomorrow the food I will make this afternoon.

But the food I will limit myself to the next 2 months (Phase 1) is:

nuts and seeds, coconut, greens and vegetables (except high glycemic ones like carrots and beets and other roots and gourds),  seaweeds, vegetable fruits, oils, lemons/lmes, and stevia leaf.

This doesn't sound like much or sounds hard to do but it is actually my ideal diet. I used to follow this more or less for shorter periods and that is when I felt the best. I really want my body to heal from fungi and other problems so I am committed to following this for as long as it takes. As I mentioned, the recipes in the book are fabulous and I would like to create all of them at one point.

I would like to mention that there are some things I am not completely following to the book. Cousens believes that cashews are something to avoid because of their mycotoxic content but I will not do this because I have a big bag of them (I will not eat them in great quantities however). Also, I have some wild jungle peanut butter that is completely healthy and mycotoxin free that is also something I will eat (rarely though).

So this is what I will do and I know many will disagree with this plan but I know this is how I will feel best (and I need to get sugar cravings under control again). See you tomorrow!

Juice Fast Day 13 plus Handling Cravings

Today is Day 13 and I weigh the same as yesterday, 134.2. I have lost 1.6 pounds total in 13 days. As you can tell it can be discouraging not losing much weight when people lose at least 5 pounds by this time. This happens to me all the time though when I eat healthier/exercise/etc so this time it is not discouraging me it is just the way my body is. If I were to do this solely for weight purposes this would have made me think about quitting. I wrote some pros and cons of my experiences so far.

Pros:

• PMS seems to be better but unsure of this.
• Undereye circles seem to be a little better but not much (this may just be a genetic thing)
• I seem to look smaller (although the scale says otherwise)
• I am already at day 13! I need to try this fully at least once in my life.
• Mood seems to be better.
• Juicing is easy and delicious.
• Sleeping is good, I mostly don't feel tired in the morning.
• I am probably detoxing so I am healing my body doing this.
• I have material to write in my blog.

Cons: 

• Craving kale salads :) This is a big one.
• Pimples all over face (I usually get this when eating fruit as I veer away from it). I love fruit but it doesn't love my face or body as I get pimples everywhere when I eat it. This could be a liver thing so I was doing the liver flushes but I guess it hasn't helped yet. Maybe I could do a pure green juice fast with no sugar at all but I am not sure that I am ready to do that. Maybe I need to for more results. I think I will first do this fast and if it results poorly then I will do a green juice fast albeit with less days at first. I feel like doing a green juice fast is great but it won't mean that I will be able to eat delicious fruit again without getting skin problems. This is the part that worries me.
• Slow weight loss. I was expecting to lose a little bit of weight at least. Not losing practically anything has me thinking... But if nothing works for weight loss then quitting won't help this at all.
• Cooking for others. When smells are overpowering it gets very difficult.
• Money. This isn't really a problem as produce isn't that expensive but it can be annoying to go to the store every other day.
• No detox symptoms or real changes experienced yet. Perhaps this is a reason why I need to continue this fast but it seems strange not to have experienced a whole lot by now.

 The thing with juicing is that you don't know what to expect or how your body will react. So it is bad for me to say that this doesn't work and I need to break the fast. I will definitely continue and I am used to juicing already so it won't be so hard to power though. I don't know how long I will go but I will check in periodically and think about continuing. I am not juicing too many fruits but it may be enough for my body to not be able to handle them. I will think of doing a green juice fast... Maybe once all my fruits are gone I will attempt a one day green juice fast and see how hungry I get. It's just so hard limiting yourself over and over again without seeing any results. There is a limit to how much a person is OK with limiting his or her food choices. Which leads me to the next point:

Handling Cravings:

I think I figured this one out at least to combat the first con in the list: my craving for kale salads. This is all a mental issue by the way. A person who has no limits to what he or she eats simply eats whatever he or she is craving. These may not be the healthiest cravings and go away on a healthier diet. When I eat raw I almost don't crave any cooked food because of how I can recreate a raw version of it. Also I find that eating enough wards away many cravings as well. So the trick to cravings when eating raw is to focus on what you can eat and make a raw version of the dish as well as to make sure you are eating enough.

With juicing this gets even more complex because you can't recreate a kale salad with a juice. But you can use the same thinking and shift your focus from what you can't have to what you can have. Instead of spending my time thinking of delicious raw foods I have to spend my time thinking of delicious raw juices. Then I will start coming up with juices I should try and how delicious they will be. This may be what I need to do if I do a green juice fast with no fruits as the only juice I like this way is gazpacho and I can't imagine only drinking that all of my fast. Nevertheless I may need to do that because I can't stand it when my face has little red dots all over it.

So the point is to always keep your mind on what you CAN have and just dream about those foods and come up with new recipes rather than salivating over what you CANT have but will have soon, in a while, or never again.

Juice Fast Day 12

Today is day 12 of my juice fast and it is going well so far. I still weigh about the same as I started, 134.2 today, but definitely look smaller. I feel like I have lost more than 1.6 pounds but I guess this is just how my body works. Sometimes the scale doesn't really mean anything. Anyways, it doesn't really matter how much I weigh as long as I feel better.

My PMS symptoms weren't that bad this time but I would like to see them lessen for the next time. Juicing is going well. I seem to have fallen in the routine of drinking 3 big juices a day and a small glass of kombucha. Once you get used to it, juicing isn't so bad. I can go on forever if it weren't for some food cravings I have and how much waste there is from the pulp. I unfortunately do not have a compost so I have to throw everything in the trash :( Otherwise it really isn't that bad. It is interesting to see the subtle changes in my body.

Juice Fast Day 11

I weighed the same today at 134.0 so a total loss of 1.8 pounds. I also got my period today which is why my weight loss may have been slow. I woke up really tired today too. We will see if my period symptoms lessen during juicing.

Yesterday was alright; I am just cruising along. I feel like the first 10 days are pretty easy, but continuing is really just willpower and wanting health problems to go away. I got some skin breakouts recently that are unusual for me but otherwise my skin is looking nicer. I don't feel too great today but this is because of my period. Hopefully tomorrow will be better.

Juice Fast Day 10 + Cravings on a Juice Fast

Today I weighed in at 134.0 so I am going down .2 pounds every day consistently for a total of 1.8 pound loss. Maybe my TOM is near and my weight isn't reflecting the changes in my body. We will see what happens to it in the next 30 days.

Yesterday night was pretty difficult again. I made a kale salad (not for myself) but the smells were so great and it is my favorite food ever so it wouldn't leave my head the whole evening. If kale salad did not exist then I think this juice fast would have been extremely easy haha. I guess this is how other people feel when they are confronted with their favorite food during their fast. Drinking more juice didn't really help that much with regard to that craving so I just stuck it through until today, reminding myself that I will just postpone eating it for a month. Hey, at least my craving is a healthy one!

I stopped eating honey because I think I have skin problems on my face from it. It's not extreme but enough for me to stop eating it for a while. I can live without it! I replaced it with coconut sugar. I know what you are thinking, straight up sugar on a juice fast?! It really helps me continue on this journey and there are benefits to it: coconut sugar has a lower glycemic index and has less fructose then honey, I do not seem to be allergic to it, and I eat A LOT less of it than I would have if I had eaten the honey. It doesn't taste that bad and the taste is really strong so I can't eat a bunch of it but it helps me curb my cravings and take my mind off of food. Do what works for you and not what other people say you need to do. I am not ready to give this up on my fast yet and I do not care what other people think of me doing it this way. I still count that I am juice fasting and have success so far.

My skin looks better, I am gradually getting better sleep I think, my body is changing (even though the scale is slow), and my health problems are slowly going away. I think doing 40 days will be enough but we will see what happens closer to that time.

Juice Fast Day 8 and Day 9

On day 8 I weighed in at 134.4 which is down .2 pounds from the day before and on day 9, today, I weight 134.2 so 1.6 pounds overall. It's interesting to see my weight go down so slowly even though I see results in the mirror and in my clothes pretty significantly. Anyways, I'm not doing this for weight reasons as that is a bonus side effect for me but nevertheless, interesting to see the pattern.

Yesterday was pretty hard in the evening for some reason. I wasn't too hungry or tired or anything but my mind was thinking about why I am doing this. Perhaps its my subconscious mind reminding me of the slow weight loss even though that is not the most important thing for me. It was purely a mental thing; maybe from wanting to eat the salads I have been eating before or from the smells I endure from cooking food for my family. I told myself I wasn't going to have honey yesterday but at that moment I didn't feel like making juice and was a little hungry so I had the honey with and felt better immediately. So I won't give up my honey yet as it is what keeps me going on the fast. I don't think I would last long drinking only non sweet juices and nothing else. Perhaps I will be ready later in my fast but I am not counting on it.

I slept for 9 hours on the previous days and I would say I got worse sleep on both nights then before. Yesterday morning, I woke up earlier for an event and people were drunk outside out apartment and loud at about 3 in the morning so I was pretty tired later in the day. Yesterday night for some reason my mind wouldn't stop racing even when I was asleep. I don't know why but I got poor sleep.

Today will be a great day because tomorrow is day 10 and I can't believe how fast this is going. I think I will make it 40 days or more but we will see. I can definitely do these 10 days 3 more times. Its not as hard as I thought.

Juice Fast Day 7 + Dandelion Grapefruit Juice

I slept alright, probably for about 8 hours. I had 4 juices yesterday and some honey towards the end of the day. My weight today is 134.6 which is up .2 pounds from yesterday and a total loss of 1.2 pounds. This is OK, I am not worrying. When I began to lose weight last year I would lose it extremely slow like 5 pounds a month and sometimes 0 pounds a month. I know I will eventually lose weight on this fast but I will just have to wait until my body is ready. I already feel a difference to how I look and feel though so the scale just doesn't represent my change yet.

I think my eczema on my finger has gotten better and the ringworm rashes have been fading. I mix thyme and oregano essential oils in coconut oil and rub it on the fungal rashes whenever I remember. I also visit a health food store by walking there everyday as exercise (about an hour walk) and rub frankincense essential oil (really expensive and good for skin) from a tester tube on my eczema :) I think the people that work there know me already haha! To be fair, I buy produce from there quite often.

 So I ran out of grapefruits and decided to juice a whole bunch of dandelions with apples and cucumbers instead: big mistake! Here is a delicious way to get your bitter dandelion greens in:

 Dandelion Grapefruit Juice:

• 1 or 2 apples
• 1 grapefruit
• 1 piece of ginger of your preferred size
• 1 bunch of dandelion greens

I don't have a picture, but it looks like a regular green juice :) The grapefruit balances out the bitter greens so well that I had this juice every day up until 2 days ago because I ran out of grapefruits. It tastes too bitter without the grapefruit unless you like bitter juices.

Juice Fast Day 6

Yesterday was OK but I was hungry towards the end of the day. I only had 3 juices so I probably need to make more. I notice that I want less sweet juices as I go along. When I added an extra apple to my juice out of habit it became a little too sweet for me. So I will cut back on that and add more cucumbers/celery/lettuce to my juice. In the beginning this was fine though so anyone who does a juice fast can start out with sweeter juices and decrease the fruits as they go along as their body adjusts. I will also start limiting my honey consumption to only before sleep.

I slept for 10 hours again although it was good restful sleep; I guess my body needs more sleep.

I started taking the anti parasite essential oil mix I wrote about using 1 drop each of pure clove, thyme, oregano and fennel oil. I will probably split this up into 2 capsules a day, each with either 1 drop of clove and fennel oil or thyme and oregano oil. I am doing this because the oils are hot and 1 drop goes a long way. So I may save even more money on this parasite cleanse.

I weighed in today at 134.4 so a total loss of 1.4 pounds. I do coffee enemas every other day and I notice a lower weight the day after. Yesterday I didn't do one and my weight bounced up 1.6 pounds. It's good to average the weight loss in this case. So yesterday was 132.8 and today 134.4 so on average I am 133.6. I haven't seen this weight in a few years.

I still would like to continue the fast for a long time as it has been going well for me so far. Although I have been wanting a kale salad, the craving is not strong enough for me to break the fast.

Juice Fast Day 5

Yesterday went well. I had 3 or 4 juices (can't really remember the exact number for some reason). Towards the end of the day I got a strong chlorine or metallic taste in my mouth for some reason. I read that this was a sign of ketosis but I am eating a lot of sugary fruits and honey so this is unusual. 

I weight today at 132.8 so its a total loss of 3 pounds now. I slept for 9 hours today; this is better than yesterday.  Everything is going great and I think I can keep going forever!

Juice Fast Day 4 + Honey during Juice Fast

I slept for 10 hours again! And I still feel a little sleepy and tired. This has been going on for about a month already, so it can't be just the juice fast. Hopefully this will go away and I can wake up earlier again.

My weight today is 135.2 so I am down .6 pounds overall but up 2.2 pounds from yesterday. This doesn't really mean anything as I just started so we will see what happens.

Yesterday was pretty easy again. I had 4 juices and honey with tea in between. People's ideas of what juice fasting should be differs but I think you should do it the way it feels right to you unless you have a medical problem (like you can't have any fruits). I have honey even though it is plain sugar because that is what makes my juice fast super easy. The honey has crystallized and I can chew it as a dessert and it is pretty filling and warming with tea. The honey is what makes me feel like I can keep doing this fast for a long time whereas without it I would feel compelled to quit. I don't know why but this works for me. Find what works for you!

Essential Oil Experiences so Far

I have only tried Oregano, Lavender, Lemon, and Peppermint oil so far.

Oregano:
 
I started with the oregano a long time ago to slow down the process of being sick. I haven't been sick for a few years I believe. Sometimes every half a year to a year I get cold like symptoms that last for a day maximum and I am back to normal the next day. So here is one benefit of the oil:

• I do not use oil of oregano unless I have a sore throat. I read that it is good to gargle with by placing a drop (increasing the amount if you are used to this hot oil) into a carrier oil like olive oil, then placing that in the back of the mouth with a sip of water. Gargle for as long as you can and then swallow the mixture. I think it truly helps if used often. I have heard of people who do this when they feel they are getting sick and this stops the sickness from progressing further.
• Fungal infections. I am using it now by mixing the oregano in coconut oil along with tea tree oil and rubbing that where I have fungal infections on my skin. Hopefully this will take care of them.
• Warts. I have used oregano on warts with little success. But maybe I wasn't consistent enough. It is worth a shot though.
• Parasites. I haven't tried this yet but I will mix a drop of oregano, clove, fennel, and thyme essential oils into a capsule to take twice daily for 5 weeks (stopping for a week in between) as a parasite cleanse.

Lavender:

This oil smells great! I will talk about a few written benefits of using lavender oil but I personally have not been using it long enough to notice a big difference.

• Peaceful Sleep. I have tried to rub lavender on my feet before bed and I seem to be more relaxed when falling asleep than when not using it.
• Skin issues. I have read that undiluted lavender oil is great to use for many skin problems including burns and eczema. I used it for an insignificant burn and it seemed to help straight away. I am using it for dyshidrosis on my finger which is a type of eczema and I have not seen it get worse but it isn't really healing completely.
• Hair Loss. I am using this on my husband every night in a mixture of jojoba, lemon, and peppermint oil. We will see if this helps with his baldness that is beginning to show.
• Hair Oil Treatment. I do oil treatments for my hair sometimes and I add lavender because it seems to be great for hair. 

Lemon:

This is another great smelling oil. I love using it and just smelling it sometimes.

• Lifting Mood. The oil does smell good maybe that is why it is a great mood lifter! I don't have a diffuser yet but it will probably be great with the lemon oil.
• Controlling Appetite and Water Flavoring. I'm not sure if controlling appetite works but it flavors water really nicely. I get mouth ulcers if I have lemon or lime citrus juice but putting this in a glass of water does nothing but great things for me! Even placing it in herbal tea makes you feel like you are drinking black lemon tea.
• Cellulite Reduction. I have only just started using it for these purposes so can't really report on the difference. I apply the lemon oil to my skin nightly because of its photo-toxicity. The first time I used it though, I applied 4 drops to my "back-side" and legs and immediately afterwards I felt nauseous. This went away pretty soon and I don't think this is an allergy as I drink the oil with water feeling completely fine. Maybe this is how the oil works and maybe I applied too much. I will test it again.
• Lightening Hair. I am adding this oil to my hair oil treatment that I noted above as well as applying it before I go outside into the sunlight. I will do this consistently and see how well it works. Doing this has not made my hair dryer in any way yet so I will continue to use it.

Peppermint:

This oil is great too! I like to breathe it in from my hands after using it for something and it clears the lungs remarkably well.

• Breathing Problems. A great way to clear your lungs is to rub one drop of this oil between your palms and breathe your palms in. A little oil goes a long way.
• Stomach Problems. Rubbing some oil on your stomach if you have a stomach ache helps a lot. Drinking a glass of water with a drop of peppermint oil also helps. It is really strong in water though, unlike the lemon oil!
• Getting rid of odors.  If there is an unwanted odor in the room you can use a diffuser or if you don't have one like me, place a drop on tissue paper and wave it across the room for a few minutes. The odor is usually unnoticeable after this!

I will be looking into other uses and see if these work until the next time I get more information and experience.

Juice Fast Day 3

I am writing this morning of my 3rd day of juice fasting. My weight today is 133 so that is a loss of 2.8 pounds from yesterday (probably just water weight). I do see a difference in the mirror already though but we will see how fast this goes.

Yesterday was really easy for some reason and I got full pretty quickly from the juices. I try to drink water for every juice I drink as well as drinking water with lemon essential oil in it. Maybe that is helping me with being full as I remember last time I juice fasted I got pretty hungry.

So I will keep doing this until my weight and body looks like I want it to and a little less to take into account water weight but in the meantime focus on the health benefits I am getting.

So far I got pretty decent sleep but probably because it is getting colder and I sleep horribly when its hot. I am still sleeping too much, about 9-10 hours per night, and waking up tired. Maybe I am detoxing or making up for so many years of little sleep but I hope one day I will need to sleep less and wake up refreshed. Come to think of it, there was one day last week where I felt in an instant that my brain fog completely went away and my energy went through the roof. It felt like people feel when they first start the raw food diet so maybe I am still detoxing and it was my body's reminder to keep going. I do coffee enemas once in a while and I had 2 in a row yesterday which greatly lifted my energy and I plan to do them every other day while on the fast.

I will see how today goes but I think it will be easy and I still have plenty of free produce left over from the day before yesterday including green apples, grapefruits, oranges, and a pineapple.

Skin Update: The dyshidrosis on my index finger seems to either get better or worse each day. The other rashes on my body are disappearing. However, I found a ringworm rash in my armpit with a regular bigger rash beside it. I don't know why these things are appearing. I never had any skin problems before, except for when I broke a toe nail and it has turned slightly yellow and remained that way today (probably a fungal infection). I will treat the new rashes with oil of oregano and tea tree oil. Maybe when I get my essential oils to do the parasite cleanse these things will go away. 

Juice Fast Day 2 + Weight Theory

I finished yesterday with a juice and honey with tea. So technically yesterday was the first day of my juice fast and not a water fast. I got so much free produce including 25$ worth of produce at a supermarket as well as free pears that fell from a local pear tree so I am guessing about 30$ worth of food. So I decided that it was time for juicing :)

I haven't tracked my weight in a while but today it is 135.8 pounds. I will see how low it goes as I continue the fast.

Personal Weight Theory:

This theory applies to my own personal weight. I can't really lose weight counting calories as that has never worked out. What has worked are fasting regiments. There were times in my life that I lost weight unhealthily as well which consisted of fasting too. But back to the weight theory, I believe that it takes a fasting regimen to get me to a new set point at which I will remain if I eat reasonably until I try to fast again. Let me explain.

I was once around 120 pounds at about 5'5". I got there through intermittent fasting which I stopped doing and remained close to that weight until my eating derailed with experiments of unhealthy eating which I only now realize. I got to an average weight of 150 pounds with periods of being even higher by at most 5-8 pounds. From there I did a kind of alternate day eating lifestyle for about 5 months and got down to 137 pounds and could not get any lower. I got into raw food again and remained around this weight until today; so even though I did not do any consistent fasting or dieting other than eating raw food I still remained this weight. My theory is that with this juice fast I hope to get down to around 120 pounds with which I feel the most comfortable at and remain there with a sensible lifestyle and maintenance fasting one day a week.

So with my weight as my motivator, I will fast until I am at a comfortable weight and hopefully remain there as per my weight theory.

Again, my body is unlike most peoples and I would have remained 120 pounds if calorie counting worked or if eating less food worked. Do what works best for you! If you are like me then try juice fasting until your goal and try to maintain it.

Note: I am not fasting primarily for weight loss, as it is only my motivator. I am doing this to be healthier and to experience new things :)

Water Fast Day 1

So I ate my last food last night and today I start my fast. It's noon and so far I had some water with lemon essential oil and tea made out of oregano flowers and twigs and eyebright herb.

 I'm not hungry yet as I have adjusted to fasting and I ate pretty well last night. I think today will be pretty easy; I just have to make myself busy with other things. Coincidentally, I got a discount of basically $20 to buy anything at a local supermarket so I will stock up on free greens and fruits :)

I'm not sure if I will continue to do a "water" fast tomorrow or jump into juice fasting. I remember how expensive juicing was... if I can handle it I will water fast for the next few days as well and have the cost of food be my motivator!

I think the benefits I will get from fasting are clearer skin, clearer eyes, weight loss, and mental clarity and overall lightness. Whoever reads this blog, have you ever done an extended fast before? How did it go and what were your results?

Liver Flush Results + Essential Oils

The liver flush went well. I always sleep deep and wake up in a fog after doing it for some reason. Hopefully my body is undergoing healing because of it. This is my 3rd flush this year and these past 2 months.

I want to try doing a parasite cleanse based on essential oils and here is my plan:

I will mix this in a capsule and take twice a day for 5 weeks with a 1 week break in between:

• 1 drop of oregano oil
• 1 drop of thyme oil
• 1 drop of clove bud oil
• 1 drop of fennel seed oil

I bought the 3 latter oils today at Native American Nutritionals which seems to be one of the better essential oils companies online due to the research of many bloggers. It is expensive but will last me for 4 parasite cleanses at the cost of 2 parasite cleanses using tinctures and may be more effective. I will update as I receive the oils and start using them.

Long time since last post

I haven't blogged in a while due to other things that I was busy with. I am still raw and am trying to figure out the best lifestyle for me. As a matter of fact, I am going to embark on another juice fast in a couple of days which is where I left off of on my previous post.

It has been a long time since the juice fast from May but I would say that it was a success! I admit to adding too much fruit to my juices though and plan to only use green apples sparingly during this fast. I experienced great benefits from it like clear skin and some weight loss and an overall good feeling.

Since that time I developed some weird skin problems like dyshidrosis on my index finger and some small rashes in other places on my body. I have no idea what caused this as I do not have stress in my life nor do I touch toxic chemicals regularly. I began on a health kick because of this and am experimenting with things such as liver flushing (which I have experience with in the past), fasting, and essential oils. Hopefully these things will help my husband with pet allergies too; he got rid of his hay fever this year completely because of similar experiments and supplements that I will talk about in another post.

I am on a liver flush today per Hulda Clark's recipe and that will hopefully help my liver cope with my skin problems. I also drank diatomaceous earth in water every morning for about a month prior to this and have stopped recently. I got Lavender, Lemon, and Peppermint pure therapeutic grade essential oils and those will hopefully help as well. I am using the lavender on my finger in hopes of it healing as the skin problem comes and goes. It got severe at one point in early August but I applied ACV and soaked my finger in epsom salt solution daily until it got better. I didn't touch the other rashes on my body and they seem to be fading.

I am also using the essential oils and some honey to try and give my hair highlights but that is for another post.

In the meantime, check out some of the pretty raw foods I made since my last post:

Beet and Zucchini Pasta with Basil Walnut Pesto (This is so good and so much better than zucchini pasta and I will have to put up a recipe for this) :

Tiramisu Cake (From NouveauRaw, it turned out great!) :

Layered Cake (Another recipe worthy food because it tastes really good) :

Blueberry Chocolate Cake (This was delicious as well) :

Lettuce with Guacamole (Great Simple Dinner) :

Basic Kale Salad (A staple food) :

Vegetable Juice Fast - Day 6 - Total Fast Day 7

Day 7:

Morning: Woke up after sleeping for 11 hours but had to rush to be somewhere so I had no time to jot down the juices I made for the day.
,
Afternoon:
Made these juices throughout the day:

• 11am - apple cilantro type juice
• 1pm - gazpacho type juice
• 3pm - kombucha
• 5pm - apple orange celery type juice
• 7pm -  cantaloupe juice
• 830pm - tea with honey

Evening:  Feeling better but tired after a long day.

Night: Slept well and didn't sleep as long as yesterday.

Overall: This is going well and I am not hungry that much anymore. But I think I will break my fast tomorrow with green smoothies and call it done for this trial just because it was my first time doing it for this long and I want to savor all of the new fruit and vegetables in season now. Also, I am finding myself to be tired of the juices now; I think sticking to water would have been much easier. But I do think juices are great to get in more green vegetables in your diet as well as vital nutrients and water for those who have electrolyte imbalances and blood pressure issues and to use everything in your fridge before traveling somewhere.

Vegetable Juice Fast - Day 5 - Total Fast Day 6

Day 6:

Morning: Not tired in the morning anymore! Maybe this is because I slept for 10 hours; thank goodness I go to bed by 10 to still wake up pretty early.
,
Afternoon:
Made these juices throughout the day:

• 11:30am - kale, apple, pineapple, ginger, celery, lemon, cucumber -  very good!
• 1pm - tomatoes, red cabbage, celery, orange, garlic, parsley, turmeric, wild greens, lemon, red onion - very good tomatoey soup.
• 4pm - pineapple, lemon, cilantro, ginger, cucumber, apple, kale
• 5:00pm - carrot, orange, apple, celery, ginger, lemon, red cabbage 
• 6pm -  apples, oranges, wild carrots, wild greens, celery, ginger, lemon - very good
• 7:30pm - orange, apple, basil, kale, ginger

Evening:  Feeling better and more energetic.

Night: Slept for 11 hours and still tired when I woke up at 9!

Overall: OK, but wanting to stop soon.

Vegetable Juice Fast - Day 4 - Total Fast Day 5

Day 5:

Morning: Really tired this morning again.
,
Afternoon:
Made these juices throughout the day:

• 11:30am - kale, apple, orange, ginger, celery, lemon, cucumber -  very good!
• 1pm - tomatoes, cabbage, celery, orange, garlic, arugula, cucumber, parsley, turmeric, wild greens, lemon, red onion - very good tomatoey soup.
• 3pm - pineapple, spinach, lemon, cilantro, ginger, cucumber, apple, kale
• 4:30pm - carrot, orange, apple, kale, ginger, lemon, red cabbage 
• 6pm -  apples, oranges, wild carrots, wild greens, celery, ginger, lemon - very good
• 7:30pm - orange, apple, basil, kale, ginger

Evening:  Feeling better and more energetic.

Night: Slept really well and woke up refreshed the next day.

Overall: I can't believe it's day 5 already and I think I'm used to this. I felt pretty tired and worn down in the morning but maybe it's just a detox symptom. Although juice fasting isn't too hard by now, I still want to go back to real food soon... I will wait at least another week before breaking the fast though. My eyes are brighter and my skin looks better so that's a plus.

Vegetable Juice Fast - Day 3 - Total Fast Day 4

Day 4:

Morning: Really tired this morning although I slept well. Still hungry although manageable. Perhaps the hunger will go away tomorrow? We will see... I had some wheatgrass juice made from powder again and I always liked it for its milky taste but today I've noticed that it is sweet, like actual sweet milk. I don't know why, not everyone agrees with me but I find this so interesting.
,
Afternoon:

Not tired anymore by noon and not too hungry which is great.
Made these juices throughout the day:

• 11am - kale, apple, ginger, celery, lemon, cucumber - repeat from yesterday, very good!
• 12pm tea
• 2pm - tomatoes, apple, garlic, arugula, spinach, celery, parsley, turmeric, lemon, red onion - Kind of like yesterday but had no peppers left. Still very good!
• 4pm - carrot, beet, apple, swiss chard,  cilantro, ginger, lemon -
• 4:30pm - water kefir
• 5:00pm - carrot, orange, ginger, wheatgrass - a little too sweet
• 7pm -  spinach, apples, cucumber, carrots, wild greens, celery, ginger, lemon - very good
• 8pm - orange, basil, spinach

Evening:  Went to the gym at 5 and had lots of energy after drinking the carrot, orange, ginger juice.

Night: OK

Overall:This was a good day and I felt good overall.

Vegetable Juice Fast - Day 2 - Total Fast Day 3

Day 3:

Morning: So far so good, got my lemon and ACV water in and waiting to take in some wheat grass juice and then start juicing delicious things. I have way more energy  now and my skin seems to be clearer and more vibrant. I also see some weight loss on my body.

Afternoon:

Today I felt way better and alive, although hungry and craving food at times. This, however, was not as severe as in day 1.

Made these juices throughout the day:

• 11am - kale, apple, ginger, celery, lemon, cucumber - this was very good, kale is really great with green apple.
• 12:30pm coconut water 
• 1:30pm - tomatoes, garlic, peppers, arugula, spinach, celery, parsley, turmeric, lemon, red onion - I made this yesterday and it was delicious, so I made it again!
• 2:00pm kombucha
• 3pm - celery, apple, ginger, cilantro, lemon - also very good, getting hungrier as well. 
• 5pm - carrots, beets, apple, swiss chard,  ginger, lemon - very tasty
• 5:30pm - coconut water
• 7:30pm -  spinach, apples, carrots, celery, ginger, lemon - this is one of my favorite!!
• 8:00pm - water kefir

Evening:  I am learning to appreciate the freedom I have in eating the food I want and the importance of savoring every bite that there is rather than eating really quickly. I am starting to miss actually eating solid food but besides that I like my skin and how the juices taste. The only other thing that bothers me is how much produce costs and how I long to live somewhere where I can gather wild greens without driving and not breaking the law for foraging.

Night: I slept fine and had vivid dreams again.

Overall: Hungrier today than yesterday.. otherwise everything is great. A little bit tired in the legs but otherwise fine

Vegetable Juice Fast - Day 1 - Total Fast Day 2

After yesterday's water fast I feel OK but still have no energy to move around and do stuff.

Day 2:

Morning: Some lemon in water and ACV in water in the morning, along with green and herbal tea. A surprising burst of energy about 2 hours after waking up! Going to the grocery store to stock up on veggies for the fast and hopefully I will have this energy to make it to the store. Here is my work in progress grocery list and will get more stuff at the store probably. I usually get organic everything but will probably but conventional green apples as organic ones are out of season now and impossible to find; if I get the conventional ones I will just peel them before juicing.

• coconut water
• kombucha (maybe)
• lots of celery
• carrots
• ginger
• green apples
• beets
• cucumbers
• spinach
• kale
• lemons
• more greens
• parsley/cilantro

After my trip to the store and drinking the coconut water, I felt super great. I drank some wheat grass juice after as well. I can't believe it's still morning and I've already done so much!

Afternoon:

I felt fine generally and waves of tiredness came and went. 
Made juices of all kinds including:

• 11am celery, cucumber, apple, ginger, parsley, turmeric, lemon - this was so delicious!
• 12am carrots, beets, celery, ginger, turmeric, cilantro, lemon - this was OK, filling and good but not amazing.
• 2:30pm tomatoes, garlic, peppers, arugula, spinach, celery, parsley, turmeric, lemon, red onion - Now this was paradise!! Like a nice cold gazpacho soup :)
• 4pm - Some bilberry kombucha.
• 5:30pm celery, apple, cucumber, ginger, lemon - simple yet delicious.

Evening: Wow, I may need to run to the store in a few days with how much produce we are consuming. Water fasts are definitely way cheaper... I went to the gym after the last juice and surprisingly felt pretty good and went to a dry sauna as well. I had this juice afterward

• celery, kale, pineapple, ginger, tangerine

Night: Slept well, had way more energy than last night and got around 9 hours of sleep.

Overall: This was a good day and I felt great. Getting exercise also felt very good today so I will keep it up when I feel like it.

Water Fast - Day 1

So I am doing a 2 day water fast, then 3 weeks of a vegetable juice fast as per the idea in Markus Rothkranz's book Heal Yourself 101. I am doing this with my husband in order to detox, cleanse, hopefully heal some ailments, and improve overall well being. I am expecting this to be hard but worthwhile and it is summertime so this should be easier to do now.

Day 1:

Morning: Feeling OK, a little bit tired, and a little bit hungry but making myself busy with other things so that time passes by. I am drinking tea, a little lemon juice and ACV in water in the morning and in the evening.

Afternoon: Hungrier now but still manageable. I am drinking more tea and water which helps with the fast. I also noticed getting colder, sleepier, and a subtle headache. Getting some time out in the sun helped a lot but I just really wanted to sleep at this point. I find water fasts pretty easy to a degree because you don't have to do a lot of preparation and a lot of free time opens up in the day. 

Evening: Really tired and hungry by the evening and thinking of switching tomorrow's water fast with a juice fast. Starting to crave some food now.

Night: Extremely tired as if every muscle of my body was malfunctioning. A hot shower helped temporarily but I became really tired again 5 minutes after it. Even so, I could not relax and fall asleep easily and still had the headache. But I went to bed by 9 and fell asleep by 10 and slept relatively well with vivid dreams as usual and woke up at 7.

Overall: I did one day water fasts before and handled them really well with lots of energy but for some reason this fast made me so weak and unable to focus or do anything useful.. Perhaps tomorrow will be a better day and will probably do the first day of the vegetable juice fast instead of another water fast.

Kidney Cleanse - Celery Seed Tea

I am doing a kidney cleanse at the moment for a few weeks by steeping celery seeds in boiling water and drinking 1-2 cups a day 3-4 times a week. I haven't tried this before but it seems like an easy and  natural way to cleanse the kidneys. To get all the benefits of longer steeping, don't discard the used seeds and simply add another tablespoon the next time you steep.

Celery Seed Tea:

• 1 tablespoon of celery seeds
• 8 oz of boiling water

1. Pour the boiling water over the seeds and steep until cooled. Drink up!

I dug up some facts on celery seeds and using this method as a cleanse. These are one of the more important things I found:

• Lowers Blood Pressure: This is very important to know for people suffering from high blood pressure. However, this doesn't solve the cause of the elevated blood pressure so use it as a medicine until the cause is taken care of. 
• Calcium: I'm not sure how much calcium you will get from the tea, I guess you can eat the seeds as well after drinking the tea to get the calcium. 
• Relieving Joint Pains: Some reported studies on this.
• Diuretic: Good for reducing swelling before important events :)
• Assists in Liver Cleansing: This is good to take in conjunction with a liver cleanse.

The key is to take this tea in moderation as it has other properties to it that can worsen certain conditions but is excellent as a short term cleanser. I will try it out as a kidney cleanser these next few weeks and see what has improved. 

Raw Chocolate Truffles

• 1/4 cup of walnuts
• 1/4 cup of pine nuts
• 1/4 cup of sesame seeds
• 5 medjool dates
• 1/4 cup of cacao nibs
• 1 tbsp cacao powder for filling, 1 tbsp for dusting (optional)
• 1 tbsp maca powder
• 1-2 tablespoons of coconut nectar

1. Process all of the ingredients until they start to clump together, adding coconut nectar to help the process.  

Raw Zucchini Hummus

This is a very easy recipe that tastes very similar to hummus!

• 2 zucchini (can be peeled beforehand for a yellow hummus)
• salt to taste (1 tsp is a good amount)
• 1/4 cup of lemon juice
• 1 tsp cumin
• pinch of cayenne pepper
• 3 cloves of garlic
• 3/4 cup of sesame seeds or tahini (black sesame seeds will make a dark hummus)
• 1/2 tsp turmeric
• 3 tablespoons of olive oil

1. Blend the above until smooth! 

Raw Chocolate Halvah

 This tastes very similar to halvah and is quick to make and very delicious. 

• 4 medjool dates
• 5 small prunes
• 3/4 cup sesame seeds for filling, additional for coating
• 1 tablespoon of cacao powder
• 2 tablespoons maca, optional
• 1 tablespoon of coconut oil
• 2 tablespoons of coconut nectar

1. Process the above ingredients and store in the refrigerator. You can also grind the sesame seeds before hand or use tahini.

Feeling Good on the Raw Diet, Low-Fat/High-Fat, and Fasting

This is my first "health" post but it won't be long and I figured it might help some people with things like stomach issues and fasting.

To begin, it's oftentimes hard to figure out what type of raw food diet to eat. Should I eat low-fat, high-carb? high-fat, low-sugar? lots of calories? very little calories? fasting? juicing? gourmet? wild plants? food combining? So many questions arise; it's so funny that you choose to live a healthier lifestyle and all of a sudden eating gourmet raw is the unhealthiest thing you can do or food combining suddenly becomes so important.

I say it's best to first find the raw foods that work for you. This means analyzing your exercise routine, caloric needs, food allergies, other health issues and most importantly, experiment. I think that once you decide to follow this lifestyle it takes months and even years to figure out the way that works for you. Some really active people need lots of energy throughout the day so they may be better off eating more fruit and some fat in the evenings. Others may be fine digesting fat and feeling great while needing less sugary fruit. And this might vary for everyone on a day to day basis. So this gets even more complicated. I say: listen to your body every single day.

Try Different Routines! And see what makes you feel best, changing routines day to day:

• Low-fat in the morning: Low fat raw food usually digests quickly making you feel light during workouts and throughout the day. I've personally noticed that eating something fatty slows me down which is why I save my fats for dinner usually (but not all the time because sometimes I want fats earlier!)
• Low-fat all day: I feel really good the next day after doing this but find myself craving fats so I don't do this often. However this gives the digestive system a nice run through.
• Liquid Fasting until Lunch: I find myself doing this quite often because I feel really light doing this and because I'm usually not hungry in the morning. I have lemon water and ACV water in the morning as well as a wheat grass powder drink and wait till lunch to eat which feels really good.
• Exercise: If you are getting a good amount of activity daily you may feel great doing any food routine. 
• Liquid Fasting until Dinner: Sometimes I do this when I want to fast but fail by dinnertime, yet this still gives the digestive system a nice rest.
• Having a very light to no dinner: It's not good to eat a lot close to bedtime because you can get stomach cramps at night this way. Some people thrive on not eating dinner but just eating it relatively far away from bedtime should be good for digestion as well. 
• Normal, gourmet meals all day: Some people do just fine eating normal and gourmet raw meals at normal meal times, as much as they want. Some people have trouble with digestion but many do not. If you are fine eating normal meals then do so as long as you listen to your body.
• Basic meals all day: Many in the raw food world like to eat basic meals of fruit and greens and that is fine too!
• Green Juices: If you don't like greens or don't have time to chew them, green vegetable juices are a fantastic way to get in all of the great stuff nature has provided us with.
• Fruit Juices: Fruit juices are good sometimes but can be high in sugar.
• Different types of fats and soaking: Some people can digest certain types of fats and not others, experiment! Try to soak nuts and seeds, they might improve your digestion of them.
• Different types of fruits: There are many different types of fruits to be aware of: dense, sugary, acidic, watery, non-sweet, fatty, etc.
• Smoothies: Smoothies are another great way to have a quick and digestive meal.
• Greens: Greens are so important to health that they should be eaten no matter what the type of diet is. There are so many different types of greens out there do some research and find something you like.Wild greens are even better.
• Supplements: Vegans need special supplements like B-12 for optimal health so make sure you get them. Eat a variety of foods to meet all of your nutritional needs and if you can't then supplement with natural and high-quality supplements.
• New Recipes: Try new recipes once in a while to keep up your interest in the lifestyle.
• Juice Fasting: I will be doing this in a few weeks as a detox program for a month and will keep you updated on how it makes me feel.
• Water Fasting: This is more extreme than juice fasting but very good once in a while even if its just one day long.
• Smoothie Fasting: This is a very easy fast to do and very quick for a busy person. One can even make this his or her daily routine of just smoothies.
• Enemas: Do enemas if you are not going to the bathroom at least once a day. Ideally you should go 2-3 times a day; take Cayenne pepper in water to help this problem.
• Satisfying Cravings: OK if you crave something really badly to the point of always thinking about it, just eat what you are craving. Otherwise, make a raw version of the food you are craving and it should go away. Oftentimes cravings are just a symptom of under-eating so make sure you eat enough.
• Cooked Food: Also OK sometimes if it is an unprocessed and whole food and is easier when traveling. It's your life so don't stress about minor things like wanting rice and having it, it may actually do you more good than harm.

Blessed Thistle Tea

I found some wild blessed thistle yesterday and decided to make tea out of it. It has numerous health benefits including:

• Increasing Breast Milk Supply: Supposedly you get more benefits by combining it with fenugreek, alfalfa, or some other herbs.
• Stimulating Digestion
• Detoxing Liver and Kidneys

 It's quite bitter so you can mix it with other things but it's free, it's wild, and it's really healthy :)

I put a few stems with leaves in a tea pot and brewed them with hot water, as I'm not sure the correct dosage for it when its fresh. It didn't really taste like anything so I think I will use more next time. It's also really good for menstrual problems so I will probably only use it during those times as I don't have a lot of it.

Basic Raw Cashew Cheese

This recipe is really basic that you will find in many variations of "cheese". The recipe is a very smooth and creamy cheese to dip vegetables in, use on kale chips, or on top of salads or crackers. Do not use the recipe as it is, you can make adjustments to the amounts but these ingredients are the basics you need for the standard gooey cheese. Any combination of these ingredients is very delicious and you cannot go wrong!

Basic Raw Bell Pepper Cashew Cheese:

• Cashews: at least a cup for blending ease
• Lemon Juice or ACV: depends on how acidic you want it but probably at least 1/2 oz.
• Nutritional Yeast: not required but at least a tablespoon adds a nice cheesy flavor
• Salt: 1/2-1 tsp usually works
• Garlic: this is optional but adds in a nice taste.
• Main Flavor: here is where you can get creative and make any flavor you want. I commonly use bell pepper, spinach, tomato, chives (do not need to add garlic if using chives), dill, spices.

1. Blend everything until smooth and creamy and serve! 

Here is a chive one that I made today (it tastes just like sour cream and onion, adding onion would have made this taste even more like that):

Raw Halvah Crackers/Rolls (Sweet)

 Halvah can also be made with sunflower seeds, not sesame seeds. It has its own distinct flavor and this is the halvah I grew up on, although it was very sweet and unhealthy.

Raw Halvah Crackers (Sweet):

• 1 cup of soaked sunflower seeds (you can use sesame seeds)
• 4 tbsp coconut nectar or 10 small dates or other sweetener (can add more if you want it sweeter)
• 1/3 cup of chia seeds
• 2/3 cup of water

1. Mix the chia seeds with water and allow to sit for 10 minutes.
2. Blend the sunflower seeds and the sweetener in a high speed blender until smooth (I couldn't get it totally smooth because of the small volume but that is OK).
3. Add the chia mix to the sunflower seed mix and spread out on teflex sheets and dehydrate for about 6-7 hours, flipping halfway for a pliable mix that you can roll up or 10-12 hours for a cracker like texture. 
4. To serve, make some dessert dip or roll them up in cacao nibs. 

Basic Raw Cheesecake with Chocolate glaze

This is simple to make and tastes amazing even with substitutions. This should be done in a cake pan for presentation but I couldn't find mine so I used a glass container.

Crust:

• 1/2 cup of almonds or other nuts
• 1 cup of prunes or other dried fruit
• 1 cup of shredded coconut
• 1/4 cup of melted coconut oil
• 1 tablespoon of coconut nectar

Filling:

• 2 cups of cashews
• juice from one lemon
• 2 tsp vanilla beans or extract
• 15 dates or other sweetener
• 1 cup of water
• about 120 grams of melted cacao butter/coconut oil mix
• cacao nibs mixed in after blending (optional)

Glaze:

• about 80 grams of melted cacao butter/ coconut oil mix
• 5 tablespoons of cacao powder
• coconut sugar to taste (optional)

1. Process the crust ingredients and press into a pan. Place in freezer.
2. Blend the Filling ingredients until smooth and pour onto crust. Place in freezer.
3. Blend the Glaze ingredients in the same blender without washing it from the filling until smooth.

5 Minute Raw Vegan Fish Cakes

I had no time to soak the nuts and seeds but once in a while this is fine. 

5 Minute Raw Vegan Fish Cakes:

• 1/2 cup sunflower seeds
• 1/2 cup cashews
• 1/4 red bell pepper
• 1 tsp of nutritional yeast
• 2 tbsp of dulse
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 oz lemon juice
• dill to taste
• 1/4 cup of water

1. Blend the above until smooth 
2. Serve immediately as a spread or dehydrate for 4-5 hours, flipping halfway. I served it on portabella mushrooms.

Raw Wild Greens Salad and Raw Cashew Spinach Dressing

Wild greens are so healthy and easy to find anywhere. I picked dandelions, clovers, plantains, chives in great abundance. Being outside is really healthy as well, it's the perfect time of the year to pick wild greens. I make a salad by chopping these up, adding regular salad vegetables (tomatoes, radishes, arugula, cucumbers) and use a dressing such as this:

Raw Cashew Spinach Dressing:

• 1 cup of spinach
• 1/2 cup of cashews
• 1.5 cups of water
• 1 tablespoon of miso
• 3 chives (There are lots of wild chives around where I live in forests and meadows)
• 1 oz of lemon juice
• 1 tsp chia seeds
• 1 tablespoon of hemp seeds

1. Blend the above and serve over a salad, I topped it with dulse after I took the picture and it was delicious.  

Raw Dulse Almond Burgers

These are very filling and a little heavy but good with a simple salad. You can add less dulse but since dulse is so healthy and I love it, this is a good place to use it up.  

Raw Dulse Almond Burgers:

• 1.5 cups of soaked almonds
• 1 date
• 1 tsp nutritional yeast
• 1/4 red bell pepper
• 1 oz of lemon juice
• 2 tablespoons of dulse
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp of turmeric
• chopped dill, parsley, cilantro to taste
• 1/2 cup of shredded carrot, optional

1. Blend everything but the carrot and herbs, adding a little water if necessary.
2. Add the carrot and herbs to the mix, shape into burgers and place on dehydrator tray.
3. Dehydrate for 5-6 hours flipping halfway and serve on crackers, portabella mushrooms, or salad leaves with some tomatoes, peppers, and anything else on top.  

Raw Nut-Date Cacao Nib Balls

These are so tasty and remind me of halvah although there are no sesame seeds here! The pine nuts give this a very sesamy taste and the coconut nectar rounds out the flavor. So quick to make for a sweet, filling snack.

Raw Nut-Date Cacao Nib Balls:

• 1/2 cup of walnut/pine nut mix
• 1/2 cup of dates
• 1/3 cup of cacao nibs
• 1.5 tsp of coconut nectar
• spices like vanilla, cinnamon, cayenne pepper, salt, to up the flavor (I didn't add anything)

1. In a processor, process the dates and nuts, mix with the rest of the ingredients and form into balls :)

Vanilla Date Cacao Nib Smoothie

This tastes very good, nothing else needs to be said :)

Vanilla Date Cacao Nib Smoothie:

• 1-2 frozen bananas
• 7 dates
• 1.5 cups of water
• 1 tsp of vanilla bean seeds or extract
• 1 tbsp of cacao nibs

1. Blend everything but the cacao nibs until smooth, add the nibs at the end and blend for a few seconds to mix well.  

Raw Garlicy Cheese Stuffed Tomatoes on Greens

This reminds me of a dish my mom used to make of a shredded cheese and garlic spread on top of slices tomatoes; I will probably improve on this as mom's was cold and this was warm but it is close enough for now. This feels way better on the stomach when ingested than actual cheese though and is very yummy on top of a salad or greens such as arugula!

Raw Cheese Stuffed Garlicy Tomatoes on Greens:

• 4-5 tomatoes, depending on the size (I used smaller, Roma tomatoes)
• 1/2 cup of soaked cashews
• 1/2 cup of soaked pine nuts
• 1/4 of a red bell pepper
• 1/4 tsp of turmeric
• 1 tablespoon of nutritional yeast
• 1 tsp salt
• 2-3 cloves of garlic
• greens or a salad to eat with

1. Cut the tomatoes in half, hollow them out and put the insides into a blender.
2. In the blender, place the soaked cashews, half of the pine nuts, and the rest of the ingredients. 
3. Blend until smooth.
4. Mix with the rest of the pine nuts and spoon into the tomato halves.
5. Dehydrate the stuffed tomatoes for 5-6 hours or more until warm and slightly dried on the edges.
6. Place the tomatoes on a bed of greens like arugula or with a salad.