Getting the Nuts Outta my Life

No, I'm not leaving my boyfriend! lol

I'm talkin' nut-dense recipes.

I'm going back to leaves and simpler times, back when raw worked for me.

In showing myself and my friends what raw can be like (ie. a taste explosion) I've left out how raw can FEEL. And how raw can FEEL is not something that works by explaining a description; rather how raw can FEEL is an experience, and one that just doesn't come by eating dense, heavy, dehydrated foods all the time. I've learned this go-round that this is NOT how the vibrancy and buoyancy happen.

When I first started raw in 2007, I was astounded at the benefits: I felt lighter than air, any ailment that had troubled me vanished, I had the energy of a child, my outlook improved to the point where depression and anxiety became a distant memory. Yet it wasn't just the absence of these states, it was the creation of a whole new level of being; of joy. The weight fell off me as my face just kept looking younger and more supple by the week.

This time, having taken raw courses to keep me motivated and on track and accountable on raw, I am have a very different experience of raw. The benefits are dim, actually. I hover around the same weight, gaining a couple pounds, losing a couple pounds, my energy is lagging and well, need I say more? This is not the vibrancy of raw!

I still love the idea of preparing raw food for others, and I do think that gourmet raw meals have a fabulous place in showing the far-reaching scope of what raw foods can be like, and in helping someone transitioning from S.A.D. to raw, but I think that once someone has transitioned, that this way of eating should dwindle down to 'treats' status...once in a while at a raw pot luck or something like that. I also think that their body will tell them that, just like mine is telling me this.

I'm going back to leaves: smoothies and salads, and avocado sandwiches on flax bread. I did better when I ate raw until dinner then ate a steamed meal! Now, nearly 100% raw, it's the dinner that is dragging me down. Delicious, but too dense.

My weekly dinner friends are going to experience lighter fare as I turn my own eating around. I wouldn't be doing anyone a favor by introducing them to raw if I ignored the real nuts and bolts of raw, nature's bounty. I don't know how to make simple, fancy recipes that would thrill the palette of a mainstream eater, but I'll figure it out. Simple meaning few ingredients, and fancy meaning delicious. I know they're out there!

Is it Doug Graham who doesn't like to eat anything with more than 5 ingredients or that cost more than 5 bucks to make? While I find that admirable, it makes me scratch my head now and wonder how good that could be? Yet I used to eat that way and my health soared beyond my wildest expectations for a woman of 45.

So that's where I'm heading back to. I'm going to re-read my own archives, back when I was thrilled and excited and vibrant, and I'm gonna get me some of that back!

It's a new day around here!

Join me, Rawkers?

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Update:

Found a recipe for Nut-Less Bread ala Russell James. That is one solid dude, man. His recipes are divine! He's responsible for that perfect zucchini (falafel) tortilla.

Anyway, it calls for soaked buckwheat groats, something I've never tried. Apparently I wanted to, almost 2 years ago, since I found some in an unopened package on my nuts n' seeds shelf. Go figure.

It says the shelf life is 2 years so I soaked the lil' buggers.

They're in my biosta sprouter as I type this. I read that they sprout quickly, but that you need to soak the hell outta them and that the soak water is starchy and slimy.

So I'll do that and get back to ya!

Then in a couple days, I'll make that Nut-less bread, which is, by all accounts, delicious! I digest flax bread beautifully, but it's great to have an alternative!

Besides, I've kinda had buckwheat phobia, you know the kind...you might have it with thai coconuts or something...it's when you get all interested in a recipe and go down the ingredients list, then see THAT WHICH IS BEYOND YOU and you flip the page and move onto another recipe. We all have some little glitch that stops us from making recipes. Mine used to be thai coconuts but I healed that by learning to crack one open in a clean way at a chef workshop.

And now, to climb my buckwheat wall!

Here are my little soaks now, after their first bath:

this is a three-tiered sprouter, and the water you pour over the top 'floor' drains down that little red button onto the floor below, and so on, into a catch-all reservoir tray on the bottom. I love this thing! It makes sprouting kind of a no-brainer. I hope it does the same for these! (The other two levels contain buckwheat as well.) I'll keep ya posted!