As a student, I have been amused to see school lunches on everybody’s mind this week. As you probably heard, last Monday, Congress overruled a proposal to turn down the nation’s school lunch program, in which tomato sauce on pizza is counted as a vegetable. The new rules would also have cut sodium in school meals and reduced the overwhelming number of potatoes that are served to kid (white potatoes, no doubt, and I’m guessing quite a few end up in the “fry” form).

It’s grim stuff, but no matter how incensed I’d like to get about it, I’ve decided to channel my frustration into hopeful imagining. What if more lunchroom sandwiches looked like this?

That’s avocado, lettuce, tomato, and tahini dressing on flax and chia bread, served with an apple (and some un-pictured butternut squash and apple soup).

OK, so that’s an extreme example of vegetable infatuation. I realize that few kids will gobble down the stuff I eat with utter abandon (though I’m sure there are some kids out there, raised on veggies, who would!). Even so, imagine: rather than white flour in white bread that would raise the kids’ glycemic index after eating, and lunchmeats packed with nitrates, sodium, and the shadow of factory farming, and sodas packed either with corn syrup or with aspartame, kids could enjoy the following nutrients:

From the raw chia and flax bread: Omega 3 and 6 fatty acids, calcium, protein, fiber, and what’s leftover from numerous veggies

From the avocado: Heart-healthy polyunsaturated fats, which have the added bonus of helping to signal satiety and prevent overeating

From the lettuce and tomato: Vitamins A and C; lycopene, alpha-tomatine, and powerful antioxidants.

From the tahini dressing: Traces of calcium and minerals, as well as a lot of taste.

What a world that would be.

Here at school, I’ve noticed a lot of unhealthy eating—diet soda and nibbling at soy crisps among some of the young women (it’s strange, by the way, to be exposed to college age eating disorders again at this point in my life) and Taco Bell, Subway, and lots of white bread and potato chips for many others. Both approaches are pretty void of nutrients, which is the main source of my concern. In spite of how people always say doctors have poor eating habits themselves, however, my fellow post-baccs are a pretty healthy bunch: lots of awareness about good eating habits, and a tremendous collective zeal for exercise (those who suffer through Orgo together, sweat together). I like to hope I bring a little inspiration to the group through the daily experience of bringing “weird food” to campus: chia puddings, raw bars, and salads that take up more room in my bag than do my textbooks. I’ve even got some of my peers hooked on kale chips.

So for now, while I can’t do much to change the stubborn, bottom-line driven thinking among the powers that be here in the nation’s capitol, I can at least share my passion for veggies with the world. Starting now.

Gena’s Favorite Raw Sandwich (raw, vegan, gluten and soy free)

Serves 1

2 squares Chia Flax Sandwich Bread (follow my instructions for chia juice pulp crackers, adding 1/4 cup flax and using 1/2 cup water. Score and cut into sandwich size pieces rather than crackers!)

Veggies:

• Avocado
• Cucumber
• Tomato
• Beet
• Lettuce
• etc.

Drizzle of my tangy tahini dressing

1) Pile bread high with veggies.

Close it all up:

And enjoy with fresh fruit, as well as some raw or cooked soup, some salad, or some whole grains/beans.

Delicious. With fingers crossed, maybe vegan—or even high raw—lunches will be more commonplace in twenty or fifty years. Maybe they’ll even be in school lunchrooms.

A girl can hope.

Before I sign off tonight: more Thanksgiving ideas!

Vegan Colcannon with Kale

Black Bean and Sweet Potato Enchiladas

Raw Stuffing!

Roasted Cauliflower and Parsnip Soup

Back here tomorrow, in the midst of cooking…

xo

Happy Monday, folks. I’m glad you enjoyed my recap of Elizabeth’s Gone Raw!

Switching from raw food to cooked, I thought I would share one of my favorite ingredients today: date paste, and the fabulous vegan banana caramel bread pudding I recently used it in.

There’s so much to-do about sweeteners these days: first came the allegation that agave is identical to high fructose corn syrup (which I responded to over at Whole Living magazine). Nowadays, it seems as though many health experts are claiming that any type of sugar—regardless of the source—is akin to heroin.

I’m the first to say that most Americans consume sugar in a gross excess, and I agree with the basic claims (too much sugar cause blood sugar highs and lows that compel people to overeat, shift moods, lose energy, and so on). Additionally, I realize that some people have health conditions that demand a low-glycemic diet (ranging from diabetes to candida to cancer), and that some people find sugar so appetite-stimulating that it’s best to avoid it for the most part. But I think alarmist to say that all sugar is devilish for all people. For many folks—athletes in particular—simple sugars from fruit, dates, and coconut water are vital “first source” of energy. And for nearly all of us, life is richer and fuller with the occasional sweet treat.

Naturally, if you eat enormous amounts of sugar without performing the activities that it is designed to fuel, you’ll run into a problem. But no one’s claiming that eating sugar immoderately and in the absence of movement is a good idea. Moderation matters. So, too, does the source of sugar. From a biological standpoint, there are good arguments to be made that a sugar is a sugar is a sugar—in other words, most sweeteners will have broadly similar effects on the bloodstream—but there are also legitimate nuances. Some studies indicate that glucose and fructose are metabolized differently, and that the latter has a higher impact on diabetes.

Beyond that, the simple fact of the matter is that white sugar (which isn’t vegan) tends to pop up in foods that are problematic for a host of other reasons, such as the presence of highly refined flours and processed ingredients. And most of the processed snacks and drinks that contain white sugar and HFCS happen to contain them in staggeringly high quantities. Using agave syrup, maple syrup, and palm sugar (also known as coconut sugar, this stuff is a favorite of mine) will probably afford you at least some glycemic benefits, and more importantly, if you’re eating a cereal, snack, or beverage that contains agave nectar instead of white sugar, chances are it’s at least marginally healthier than the alternative. So, take heart: you needn’t suddenly abandon the healthier sugars you’ve come to rely on. You simply have to remember that they’re still sugars.

If you are particularly sensitive to sugar that has undergone any processing, I might have a solution for you. Date paste—a fairly standard ingredient in raw recipes—has long been one of my favorite ways to sweeten dressings, baked goods, smoothies, and other treats. I rarely post recipes with it, because it’s a little more time-intensive than, say, agave and maple syrup. But the benefits are really worth it. What is troubling about so many sweeteners is that they offer blood sugar rises without any attendant nutritional benefits. Dates are rich in fiber (which can slow blood sugar spikes down), and they’re also good sources of potassium, iron, numerous antioxidants, and Vitamin-A. Date paste is therefore not an “empty” sweetener: it’s sweet, but it contains a lot of good stuff along with the sugar.

To make date paste, you simply have to pour 2/3 cup hot water over a cup of pitted medjool dates. Let them soak for about an hour, and then blend them well using a Vitamix or food processor. You’ll end up with a thick, dark paste that’s ready to be used in smoothies, snacks, and baking adventures of all kinds. The flavor will be distinctly “caramel-like,” and so will the taste. You can store it in the fridge for at least a week.

So what better use for it than a banana caramel bread pudding—the healthier way?

Banana Caramel Bread Pudding (vegan, can be GF, soy free)

Serves 4

2 large, ripe bananas (or 3 small)
1/2 cup date paste, packed
3/4 cup nut milk or law fat coconut milk
2 tsp cinnamon
8 slices Ezekiel cinnamon raisin bread, cubed
1/2 cup FULL fat coconut milk

4 ramekins for baking

1) Preheat oven to 375. Place bread cubes in large mixing bowl.

2) Blend bananas, date paste, milk, and cinnamon till smooth. Pour over bread and mix well.

3) Divide the soaked bread evenly into four ramekins. Pour 2 tbsp of the full fat coconut milk over the top of each.

Bake for 30 minutes, or until the bread looks golden and caramelized. Like so.

These make for a fantastic dessert, of course, but the Ezekiel bread is so packed with protein and fiber that I’d say you can turn them into breakfast on a very special occasion, too.

They are exceptionally delicious no matter what.

A word here about Ezekiel (aka Food for Life) breads: these are made only with sprouted whole grains—no refined flour—and they are therefore my wholesome bread of choice. (They also happen to taste fantastic, and come in tons of different flavors and shapes.) Feel free, though, to use a bread of your choosing—I’ll try to help you all out with a GF version soon!

I hope this post is inspiration to try date paste as a sweetening alternative, and motivation to upgrade your bread pudding. I love making sweet things just a little more wholesome, and recipes like this showcase that love.

xo

Happy Easter! As usual, a great discussion yesterday.

Once in a while, I get to work on a recipe that I just know for a fact is going to be great. It’s not often that I feel this way: I’m actually a pretty insecure cook, and I spend about 80% of my cooking (or uncooking) time doubting whether or not the dish I’ve created is any good. When I do feel certain that a recipe is bound to succeed, the cooking process is all the more exciting. And excited is precisely how I felt as I created my curried kabocha squash flatbread, spread it onto a tray, and smelled its sweet and nutty aroma seep into my living room as it baked.

It’s not really surprising that I love this new “bread” recipe. I love all bread, but flatbreads are particularly fun because they’re so versatile. With a little hummus or nut pate, they make a rich and filling snack; with some sliced cucumber or tomato, they make a light one. They also invite open faced sandwiches—”tartines,” as the French would say—and open faced sandwiches have always seemed more fun to me than regular ones (I think it’s because they take longer to eat, and they’re a little prettier than the norm).

And I think it goes without saying that I love kabocha anything; years ago, before I tasted kabocha, I remember reading about other bloggers’ obsessions with it and thinking “how could could squash possibly be?” The answer is really, really, really good. So good that I’ll endure the process of halving it with my cleaver, removing the seeds, cutting it into slices, and roasting it on a weekly basis: that’s a level of work that I extend to few foods!

When this recipe first occurred to me, I hoped to try both a raw and cooked version (sort of like my raw tomato bread, which has an easy oven option). As it turns out, I haven’t quite perfected the raw version (not for lack of trying), but the cooked version is already up to snuff. This is fun news for all of my readers who don’t have dehydrators, and don’t want to feel bad about making bread without one (which they shouldn’t, anyway). I actually loved the crispy, slightly browned taste and texture that cooking gave this flatbread, so I suspect I’ll always alternate between the cooked and raw versions, even when the raw one has been perfected.

No matter what, I know that this recipe is an instant keeper. Any recipe that gets polished off in my single person home within a matter of days is here to stay.

Curried Kabocha Squash and Flax Flatbread (vegan, gluten free, soy free)

Yields 8-10 pieces

1/2 of a small to medium kabocha squash, cut into pieces and roasted or steamed (this should be about 4 even cups — the recipe should work with a bit more or less)
1/3 cup buckwheat flour (I made my own by grinding my buckwheat cereal in a food processor, but you can purchase it, too)
1/3 cup ground flaxseed
1/2 cup water
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp curry powder
1/2 tsp cinnamon

1) First, remove skins from the kabocha. I find this much easier to do when the squash is cooked, which is why I did it after I’d roasted the squash (at 350 degrees for 25 minutes). I used a simple paring knife to remove the skin.

2) Place cooked and peeled kabocha pieces in a food processor with the flour, flax, salt, and spices. Pulse a few times to get it incorporated.

3) With the motor running, add the water. You may need a bit more or less; I find that working with flax makes moisture variable, and it’ll also depend on how dry or moist your squash pieces are. In the end, you want a mixture that’s spreadable but feels dense.

4) Spread the "dough" onto a baking sheet lined with parchment, and score it into 8-10 pices (I did 8).

5) Bake at 325 degrees for about 25-30 minutes, or until browning. Remove the bread from the oven, and flip it by cutting it into pieces and flipping them one by one; alternately, if it’s too delicate, you can place another sheet of parchment on top and flip the bread over, so that its underside is now face up on the other parchment sheet.

6) Keep baking till flatbread is crispy on the edges but still soft — about another 10-15 min.

Readers often ask me if my raw breads are more like crackers. The answer is yup, they usually are. But what I love about this sweet and spicy flatbread is that it’s crispy on the ends, but still pliable and soft in the center.

I immediately set about eating my flatbread with some homemade sun-dried hummus – recipe to come in a few days! – and kale salad on top, alongside, and basically everywhere:

Kabocha, hummus, avocado, kale…these are a few of my favorite things.

OK readers, no dehydrator required means no excuses with this flatbread! Give it a try soon. Raw readers, I assure you that I’m putting the finishing touches on my raw spin, so just stay tuned. And if this simply doesn’t appeal at all, why not give my avocado and kabocha sammie a try?

With another batch of this stuff in the oven, my week is already off to a promising start.

xo

Breaking news: I broke out my dehydrator today! Oh yes I did. With a bag of sundried tomatoes in my pantry, and a container of organic plum tomatoes in my fridge, I took to making my own version of raw tomato bread, and the results were fabulous.

Before I get to all of that, though, I wanted to call some attention to a recent article in Vegan Mainstream’s excellent and provocative “Vegan Uncensored” series. The article, entitled “The Problem with Veganism for Weight Loss,” addresses some of the difficulties that can arise from treating veganism as a weight loss plan, and it’s written by my very thoughtful, intelligent, and tough-minded friend, Sarah E. Brown. (To offer a full disclosure, Sarah mentions Choosing Raw in the article, but I didn’t know she intended to!)

When I recently wrote on the ethics of veganism for my friend JL, I touched on the fact that people explore veganism for all sorts of reasons. “A lot of you are reading because you’ve gotten interested in veganism for its health benefits,” I said. “That’s great. All paths into the vegan lifestyle lead to good things: if you’re exclusively interested in health—in optimizing your own life—you’ll still save countless other lives, too. Not to mention the life of our planet. Going vegan is a win-win decision.”

I stand by that sentiment: plant based diets save lives, no matter what the impetus. But if there’s any motive for eating vegan that concerns me, it’s the pursuit of weight loss. First of all, it’s important for new vegans to remember that, while it’s likely that eating a plant-based diet will result in weight loss (when weight loss is needed), it’s not a guarantee. Veganism, like any way of eating, varies with the habits of the person eating. Any vegan can eat vegan cookies, pies, cakes, and ice cream to an excess and gain weight (just as an omnivore would by eating those foods to excess). And there are more subtle reasons why a new vegan may retain or even gain a few pounds—too many refined carbs, too many fats or desserts, too much sugar. In any of these cases, veganism isn’t to blame: rather, the new vegan simply needs to refine how they approach the diet.

I worry that, when people try and fail to lose weight with veganism, they may think that something is “wrong” with them, or blame veganism for the failure. Sarah, however, brings up an even more urgent concern, which is that treating veganism like a diet is highly problematic from an animal rights perspective. I’m sympathetic to those who opt to eat vegan for health reasons, since the health advantages are clear, but approaching veganism like a “diet plan” seems—at least to me–to unfairly limit what veganism is capable of offering. Not all vegans are animal rights sympathizers, but most vegans see veganism as a lifestyle, rather than a diet. And as someone who originally explored veganism for health reasons only, I can attest that, when the light of compassion is flipped on, the world is illuminated in new and wonderful ways.

If veganism is to be treated like a diet, what happens after the weight is lost? Most people, as Sarah points out, see diets as a set of food “rules,” and are happy to bend the rules when the diet’s over. So after a weight loss goal is reached, does the person eating vegan go back to dairy, fish, or meat?

Of course veganism can yield weight loss. But at its core, veganism is a lifestyle that’s animated by a sense of respect for life. It seems like a shame to frame veganism solely as a “diet,” because most diets are temporary. If people can improve their lives and sense of self confidence through vegan weight loss, great: I’m thrilled to see anyone’s life enriched through plant-based eating! But it’s not so great if animals suffer once again when a personal goal is reached. (Of course, we can be grateful that animals were saved, even for a month or a two.) If you’re interested, check Sarah’s article out. I’d love to know what my readers—vegan and non—think.

And now, food!!

It’s always a big day here at CR when I decided to dust off my dehydrator. But when my semester started, I vowed to start using the darn thing more often, and I am dutifully making good on that vow. What better way than with raw bread, which is delicious, versatile, and a wonderful option for GF or grain adverse diners. Or for people like me, who get really bored of the same Ezekiel bread week in and week out.

I really enjoy raw bread—I went through a big raw bread bonanza last summer, as you may recall:

…but it’s very rare that I make it myself, either because I’m lazy, or because I’m afraid of messing it up (and since we’re all about honest food failures lately, let me tell you: I have had some tremendous flops with raw bread!). That’s why I’m so happy that I put my tomatoes to use this week, and made this bread, which is as easy as it is tasty.

Raw Tomato Bread (raw, vegan, gluten and soy free)

Makes 8 large pieces

5 plum tomatoes, chopped
1 cup sundried tomatoes, soaked in warm water for 30 minutes
3/4 cup flax meal
1 tbsp tamari or nama shoyu (substitute sea salt to taste if you’re allergic to soy)
1 tsp oregano (dried)
2 tsps basil (dried
1 clove garlic
Black pepper to taste
1/4 cup sunflower seeds

1) Blend all ingredients but sunflower seeds together in a high speed blender till thick. Add sunflower seeds and blend till mixture is thick and uniform, but the seeds lend a tiny bit of texture.

2) Turn mixture out onto a teflex dehydrator sheet and use a spatula or inverted knife to spread it out evenly on the sheet:

3) Dehydrate at 115 degrees for 8 hours. Flip the bread, score it into 8 pieces on the wet side, and dehydrate for another 4-6 hours, till totally dry.

Delicious!

I served mine with some of my hemp hummus, tomato, avocado, and cucumber. I also purposefully cut the bread into larger slices: typically I make my raw bread slices too tiny, which makes for sandwiches that fail to quell the Gena appetite

Not this guy. With kale salad, it was an awesome and filling, high-raw dinner.

If you don’t own a food dehydrator:

Don’t fret. I almost never use mine. I tend to find that baking at 175 with the oven door ajar is wasteful and takes too long, so I suggest baking raw breads at 300 or 325 degrees (depending on how hot your oven is) for about 25-30 minutes on each side. You will not destroy all of the health properties of the bread! Far better to enjoy than avoid for lack of a dehydrator.

Hope you’re inspired to give this bread—which is really a cross between flatbread and giant cracker—a try. For another option, you can use this as raw, vegan pizza crust by leaving your sandwich open-faced or cutting the dough into a large circle.

Back tomorrow with a special CR business profile and interview!

xo

On Friday night, I made a simple supper for my friend Tom.

Tom and I pretty different eaters. He’s an enthusiastic carnivore, and I’m an outspoken vegan. But we see eye to eye on a few foodie matters. Tom’s father is a farmer and, by Tom’s account, a “hippie.” Each fall, Tom brings back bushels of the most delicious Macoun apples and giant carrots from his dad’s place, and, when I’m lucky, he shares them with me. I’ve never seen Tom put a bit of processed food into his mouth—not a thing. He makes the best saffron risotto on earth, and he’s willing to veganize it for special guests. And most importantly, we have a couple of mutual foodie obsessions: hummus and raw veggies, perfectly cooked brown rice, roast veggies with vinaigrette, and anything that calls for cumin, coriander, saffron, or cinnamon. Tom spent some time in the peace corps working in Madagascar, and perhaps these spices remind him of his time there.

One spice we haven’t discussed yet is ginger. But it’s one of my favorite spices, and so I suspect—I hope—that it might be one of Tom’s favorites, too. I didn’t need to think very hard about what to make for me and Tom on Friday: roast veggies and couscous, hummus and babaganoush, and raw veggies for crunch are our custom. But I did want to throw something new into the rotation. And since Tom and I are equally keen on carrots, I thought I’d make a soup from one of the food world’s most divine pairings: carrot and ginger.

Perhaps some of you have tried my carrot avocado bisque. If you haven’t, do: it’s the delicious, sixty second version of what you’re about to see here. But if you want a cooked version of carrot ginger soup that’s easy as pie to prepare and easier still to devour, try this recipe on for size. It’s fast, flavorful, crowd-pleasing, and easy to modify, too. I always add a bit of coconut milk at the end for richness. But you could lower the fat by using rice, almond, or soy milk, and you could also leave out the milk altogether. It adds a lovely creaminess, but the soup will be wonderful without it, too.

Carrot Ginger and Coconut Soup (makes 7-8 cups)

1 tbsp coconut oil
1/2 cup onion
1/2 cup celery
2 inch piece of ginger, peeled and chopped
4 cups veggie stock
1 small potato, white or sweet, coarsely chopped
1.25 lb carrots, coarsely chopped
1/2-1 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp curry powder
1/3 cup coconut milk

1) Sautee the onions, celery, and ginger in 1 tbsp coconut oil in a medium sized pot until the onions are translucent (about ten minutes).

2) Add the veggie stock, carrots, potato, curry powder, and salt to the pot.

3) Bring the liquid to a boil, and then lower it to a simmer. Let the mix simmer for about twenty-five minutes, or until all of the carrots are nice and tender.

4) When the carrots are tender, turn off the flame. It’s time to blend! You can either use an immersion blender, or you can transfer the soup to a blender and blend it all at once, or, if your blender is smaller, in batches. Remember that hot soup will create pressure in your blender as you work, so remove lids carefully.

5) Transfer the blended soup back to your pot, and warm through. Now the magic happens. If you’re not using coconut milk, go ahead and serve. But if you are—as well you should be—you add the milk now. I recommend full fat coconut milk for sure: after all, the fats in coconut have been proven to aid tissue repair and have antibacterial properties. More importantly, it’s divine, and a very little bit goes a long way:

See the beautiful swirl it creates?

6) Stir to combine it all well, and serve hot, with a dash of cinnamon if you like.

True to form, I was too busy focusing on dinner to take photos–sorry! Fortunately for you guys, I had plenty of this soup leftover.

Whenever I make more than 4 cups of soup, I immediately freeze half; I’ll never gobble up the leftovers quickly enough, and I love having frozen soup for dinner in a pinch. I had two full cups of soup left after dinner with Tom, and so I enjoyed a heaping cup for lunch on Sunday. In a moment of true culinary inspiration, I topped it with a dollop of leftover cashew alfredo sauce–another perfect soup swirl!

Co-starring in the meal was a giant spinach salad and two slices of raw carrot raisin bread–an appropriate side!

Delicious.

Now that carrots are in season, it’s the perfect time to add this soup to your recipe queue. Of course, making this soup only has me fantasizing about my other fall favorites: butternut squash and apple, Kristen’s harvest soup, and anything that involves sweet potatoes!

Have a lovely evening, and before you go, tell me, what soups are you guys looking forward to this fall? 

xo

Isn’t The Wilderness Downtown amazing? I challenge even the most hard-hearted among you not to feel a tender pang of nostalgia when you watch it. And thanks to those of you who shared ideas about what you might say to your younger self—they were all very sweet.

On Friday, I promised you more homemade raw breads and crackers in the coming weeks. I made good on that promise this weekend. I have plenty of bread recipes now percolating in my uncooking noggin, but this is the first: buckwheat sesame bread with an Italian twist.

And by “Italian,” I mean that I added some sundried tomatoes and oregano.

This was, as all raw bread tends to be, incredibly easy. The most demanding part of the recipe, really, is to have buckwheat cereal on hand to make the buckwheat flour. Otherwise, it’s a cinch, as long as you have a food processor to do the heavy mixing for you! Here’s the recipe:

Italian Buckwheat Sesame Bread (yields 12 pieces)

1 cup buckwheat, soaked and dehydrated (a la my buckwheat cereal procedure)
1/2 cup sesame seeds
1/2 cup celery
1/2 cup flax meal
2/3 cup water (more or less)
3/4 tsp salt
1 tsp herbamare
1.5 tsp oregano
1/4 cup sundried tomatoes

1) Place buckwheat in your food processor and process till it’s a fine powder. Add the sesame seeds, and pulse until the mix is almost uniform, but still has some texture. In other words, you want the buckwheat to be pulverized into flour, but you just want to process the sesame seeds really finely–don’t let them turn into flour, unless you want a totally uniform bread.

2) Add the celery and flax seed, and pulse until the celery is broken down well.

3) Add the water, salt, Herbamare, oregano, and sundried tomatoes, and keep pulsing until you have a dough. You might need to add some water, but don’t add too much, or else you’ll have a watery dough on your hands that will take forever to dehydrate! You want this dough to be moist enough to spread out on a dehydrator sheet, but there should be some effort involved. Also, you should taste the dough right before turning it out onto your Teflex sheet, and add any herbs and spices you need. I like plain food, don’t forget, so you may want more oregano or salt in here.

4) Turn the dough out onto a Teflex lined dehydrator sheet (I managed to use a single sheet for the whole recipe) and spread till the dough is about 1/4 inch thick and even.

5) Dehydrate at 115 degrees Farenheit for about 6-8 hours. Flip the dough, and score the size that’s moist into 12 uniform pieces. Keep dehydrating for another 6-8 hours, till crispy.

6) Serve as a bread in any raw sammie recipe, or keep breaking it down into raw crackers!

I continued on my raw flatbread kick, and served it up with hummus, cucumber, and tomato. All homemade, and all farmer’s market produce. I am determined to eat tomatoes right until the moment when they disappear!

The meal was rounded out with massaged kale salad with carrots and black beans.

What a perfect dinner for a Saturday night at home!

I’m lovin this raw bread kick, so you can expect more to come (though I do promise that my next post will not be raw bread–I don’t want to try the limits of your interest here). If you have any special requests, let me know – I’m trying to get outside of my comfort zone. I’m even planning on raw onion (!!!) bread – I figure that if I love the twins’ onion bread, I must be able to come up with one of my own that’s edible.

And now, it’s time to get away from my computer and back to work. Enjoy these last few hours of the weekend!

xo

Great responses yesterday! Talking about skincare turned out to be not a snoozefest at all. We all agree on one thing: it’s important to care for skin “from the inside out,” to quote Bitt. Nourishing foods, avoiding synthetics and toxins, and having healthy habits: this is all a big part of the skincare picture.

A few weeks ago, I created a very bad habit when I went on a raw picnic dinner with my friend Nelly. That day, I had discovered some raw flatbreads from Chocolatree, and I made a couple of open faced raw sammies with them:

The problem is that I’m now totally addicted to raw flatbread sandwiches! I’ve been on a kick for the last two weeks, loading them up with all sorts of toppings (like my dilly sunflower cheese, hummus, nut butter, etc.) and veggies. I’ve also made some “deconstructed” flatbread sandwiches with Lydia’s crackers when I didn’t actually have a full piece of flatbread on hand. Like so:

Is this basically the same as raw crackers and dip? Yes. But it’s fun to say “deconstructed flatbread sandwich.”

Naturally, this isn’t a bad habit for my tastebuds or belly. But it is a very bad habit for my wallet, since I’ve been purchasing all of the crackers and flatbreads. About a year ago, I started getting adept at making dehydrator food (like my lucky hemp bread or my carrot raisin bread), and found that it can be easy, fun, and economical to make one’s own raw breads and crackers, rather than relying on store bought. I’ve simply fallen out of the good habit, and allowed the stresses of work to prevent me from staying organized with my kitchen prep and planning.

Well, no more ‘scuses, Lucy. It’s a new season, and I’ve sworn that this will be a carefully budgeted autumn. And that means getting friendly once again with the ‘ole Excalibur. This week, I kicked off what I hope will be a nice little marathon of homemade raw flatbread making, starting with a sweet, rather than a savory, recipe.

Ages ago, HEAB posted this recipe for raw cinnamon raisin bread. Cinnamon and raisin lover that I am, I’ve had it bookmarked ever since. A few nights ago, I decided to put my own spin on the bread, following Heather’s instructions pretty closely. The result is a crispy, tasty, bread/cracker hybrid. It’s sweet, so it works nicely with fruit or as a breakfast bread, but it’s definitely not too sweet, so you could also very easily eat this with lunch or dinner. Versatile, tasty, and simple to make? My kind of recipe.

Raw Cinnamon Raisin Bread (Inspired by HEAB)
Yields about 22 slices

2 cups almonds
1/2 cup sunflower seeds
1/2 cup pumpkin seeds
1/4 tsp salt
2 heaping tsp cinnamon
1/2 cup flax meal
1 zucchini
2 carrot
1 apple
1/2 cup water
4 tbsp agave nectar
1 cup raisins

1) Grind almonds, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, salt, and cinnamon in a food processor fitted with the S blade. Dump the contents into a large mixing bowl, add the flax meal, and set aside.

2) Using the shredder attachment of your food processor, process the carrot, ‘zuke, and apple. Alternately, you could grind the nuts/seeds with a Vitamix, and then use a box grater for the veggies, but this recipe will work best with a food processor.

3) Add all the shredded veggies to the mixing bowl with the spices and the ground nuts/seeds. Add the 1/2 cup water and agave, and mix well with your hands. It should be pretty moist. Add carrots and mix again.

4) Return everything to your food processor, and pulse it till the veggies are a little more broken down and the raisins are all chopped up. You certainly don’t have to do this last step–you could leave the mix much coarser–but I liked the relative smoothness and even texture that re-processing gave the bread.

5) Spread the mix onto two dehydrator sheets fitted with Teflex sheets. It should be just shy of 1/4 inch thick, and very even.

6) Dehydrate at 115 degrees Farenheit for about 4-5 hours or so. Flip the dough, score it into squares or rectangles, and dehydrate on the other side for another 4-5 hours. Depending on the temperature of your home and the moistness of your dough, this may take more or less time. I pulled mine out of the dehydrator when it was nice and crispy, but you can also easily choose to leave it a little more flexible.

7) Break into pieces, and enjoy!

So far, I’ve most enjoyed this bread topped with some crispy slices of my favorite fall apples!

Or today, at work, topped with some fresh farmer’s market apple butter and Fuji slices:

Delicious! A light, crispy, and nicely autumnal breakfast.

From this moment on, I want you all to hold me to my promise to get better about using my dehydrator for breads and snacks. I certainly don’t want to deny myself the occasional fun raw foods purchase: I love Lydia’s foods and other raw brands, and on top of that I think that raw food companies deserve my support. But there’s a reason I have a dehydrator, and it’s so that I can save money when I do crave these kinds of goodies.

On that note, I wish you all a lovely start to the weekend. What kind of food do you plan on prepping–and eating?

xo

Last night, my favorite movie was playing outdoors, in Central Park:

Needless to say, I had to be there.

My friend Nelly and I planned a hot date—including a picnic dinner—to see the movie together. When we arrived at Sheep’s Meadow, I was delighted to run into Hadley, who was there with a group of friends.

Nelly and I found a little patch of spare grass, and, as we waited for the movie to begin, we got down to the real business of the hour: dinner!!! We attacked our picnic bags with gusto. Nelly, who’s a passionate athlete and runner, had been playing in an Ultimate Frisbee tournament all day. And me? I was just really hungry

Nel and I shared a little chuckle over the fact that we’d had at least some of the same picnic ideas: hummus and raw veggies were in both of our picnic bags. Nelly’s a vegetarian, so I can usually count upon our enjoying some of the same things, but we also share a lot of the same tastes. Nelly had with her a container of whole wheat pita, some Sabra hummus, veggies, and a delicious homemade cocktail made with ginger beer, cucumber, and fresh peaches. On my menu was (obviously) a giant kale salad, marinated earlier in the day:

I’d also discovered this brand at my local health food store earlier in the week:

It’s Chocolatree, which is the prepared food made by the staff at Chocolatree Cafe in Arizona. I picked up the pizza crackers (made with buckwheat and sunflower seeds) and the onion flatbread (made with sunflower seeds and chia seeds). Interesting fact: I have learned, thanks to Lori and Michelle, that while I do not like raw onions (or cooked onions, for that matter), I really like raw onion flatbread. Go figure.

My verdict? Two thumbs up! I really liked both breads. The pizza flatbread is heartier, and more “bread” like; it reminds me of Lydia’s breads and crackers, which I truly adore. The onion bread is nice and thin, and I imagine it would make a great raw “wrap.” While I’m still a loyal devotee of the Twins’ flatbreads and crackers, the Chocolatree brand is a nice second choice. I love that my local store takes care to stock these lesser known raw food brands!

I made two little open faced raw sandwiches. One was onion flatbread, roast red pepper hummus, tomato, avocado, and cucumber:

And the other was pizza flatbread with a simple topping of tomato and avocado:

Both were delicious! Between these, kale salad, and raw veggies+hummus, I was a very, very happy camper. And a very full one.

Of course, what made me really happy was the joy of seeing my favorite movie on a big screen. And what could be more appropriate than watching this one in the middle of Central Park, surrounded by skyline?

I got a little misty when we got to this scene:

Forget Love is a Many Splendored Thing. Forget Casablanca. Forget Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Gone With the Wind, and even An Affair to Remember. Those movies are all great, but in my world, there is no single movie still that’s more romantic than this one. I could list the reasons why I think so, but instead I’ll just let the image speak for itself.

Dinner last night was so extraordinarily good that, today, still basking in the haze of cinematic joy, I repeated it. Using only the pizza crackers this time (I’m saving the onion flatbread for later this week), I made one flatbread with avocado and tomato:

And another with cucumber and my dilly sunflower seed cheese.

How’d I made the “cheese?” This is just a simple sunflower seed pate, made all the more delicious with the addition of dill. Observe:

Dilly Sunflower Cheese (yields 1 1/2 cups, or 6-8 servings)

1 cup sunflower seeds, soaked at least one hour
2 tbsp lemon juice
3/4-1 tsp sea salt
1/2 cup water
8-10 small sprigs fresh dill, coarsely chopped

1) Place soaked seeds, salt, and lemon into the bowl of a food processor and let it run till they’re broken down. Scrape the sides of the bowl.

2) With the motor running, drizzle 1/2 cup water into the food processor, so that the sunflower seed cheese becomes light and creamy. If it starts to get at all watery, stop adding water! I usually use anywhere from 1/4-2/3 cup water; it totally depends on how much water the seeds have absorbed, so use your judgment.

3) Add the dill to the processor and pulse a few times to distribute it into the cheese. What you’ll have left looks like this:

…and it tastes tart, salty, and fresh!

Along with some salad and raw veg action, it was a perfect midday meal:

Sometimes I find that raw flatbreads and crackers leave me totally empty only a few moments after mealtime; I’m really impressed with how nicely the Chocolatree products fill me up. A good reason to make these a semi-regular “splurge.”

And now, I’m procrastinating with Mad Men diligently working in preparation for the week ahead. I hope you all had great weekends. Were any of you with me in the park last night?

xo

Hi guys!

Thanks for celebrating IWD with me, and for your responses to Tasha’s great post. One reader mentioned that she actually hadn’t considered herself a feminist before reading the post, but that she was reconsidering that position. This made me so, so happy: in my experience, many women hew to feminist ideals, but fear the word feminism because its detractors have managed to tarnish it with inaccurate stereotypes. It’s time for women of this generation to change all that, and to reclaim the word for their own set of purposes.

I’ve promised you a week of posts that pertain to womens’ issues. Today’s post isn’t exactly what you might expect from that promise, but if you bear with me I think you’ll see why I thought it was kinda relevant. A few weeks ago, I posted some zucchini wraps I’d made and enjoyed as a part of my lunch. Aletheia had this to say about the post:

While I think your zucchini wraps looks absolutely delicious – as do most of your other foods – I have noticed recently that a larger proportion of the recipes you post necessitate the use of a dehydrator.

Which kinda makes me sad!

I’m just thinking that if I had come across your blog today, and it was my first time discovering the world of raw, I might be a wee bit intimidated!

I thought about this, and then I wrote back:

Fair point, Aletheia…keep in mind that my work…ha[s] kept me away from my kitchen for the last month. I’m not complaining, but coming home at 9, sometimes 10 PM, and leaving my apartment at 8 AM knowing I won’t be back till late quashes my cooking routine. Which means 99% of my meals right now are things I take to work in tupperware or eat on the go — nothing worthy of recipe sharing. The stuff I make on weekends to last for the week tends to be either soups, cooked foods, or dehydrated raw foods. The rest is stuff I throw together raw, and don’t usually have time (or inclination) to document for you.

Later, as we were exchanging emails, Aletheia reminded me:

…one thing I really appreciate about your blog is that, in addition to being a great raw food-related resource, it’s also a glimpse into the life of a beautiful person…After all, it’s not just about “doing the food”.  It’s about how you do the food when you’re busy living, too.

This was a great point! I love sharing with you recipes that I consider presentable and “blogworthy,” and I try to insist on making my posts as polished and thoughtful as possible. I’ll never write about a nutrition topic, for instance, without calling upon my past studies, or doing some new research. But blogging is a personal act, too; even bloggers like me, who consider their blogs public forums, rather than personal diaries, must remember that many people read blogs because they find it inspiring to peer into a person’s life. This needn’t mean, as so many critics claim, that all blogs are purely narcissistic. Readers have always been fascinated by letters, diaries, and memoirs, because we like to feel empathy and kinship with other people. Reading memoir is moving because it reminds us that so much of human experience is shared.

So even though it’s not my own “blogging style” to post all of my eats, or to say too much about what’s going on in my private life, I do realize that you, my readers, like to be reminded that I’m a real person living a real life, as well as a nutrition writer. Which means that I needn’t post only the most inspired or creative dishes and recipes; I can also show you some of my more slapdash TV dinners, my work lunches, my recipe failures. In fact, it might be practically useful for you all to see what I eat and how I handle my food prep during weeks when time is short.

On that note, I wanted to share a bunch of my recent desk lunches. I’ve written about my desk lunches before, mentioning that I, unlike many people, don’t hate eating at the office, but I don’t typically take note of my midday meals, or share them with you. For the last week or so, I decided to snap photos of my lunches, so that you could all see what a busy working lady eats when she’s got about thirty minutes between meetings, or a manuscript that’s waiting for her attention. What follows is a roundup of my meals–and proof, Aletheia, that eating vegan and semi-raw is entirely possible in a pinch!

Leftover Bowl of Lindsay’s African Kale and Yam Soup, to which I added chickpeas, with a salad:

Large salad with pumpkin seeds, raisins, and my tomato curry dressing:

Salad with my Asian dressing and two slices of my carrot raisin bread:

Salad + Ezekiel wrap with avocado and mixed veggies:

Salad with beet dressing and a pumpkin seed pate (stay tuned for that recipe!!)

Salad with two slices of Love Force raw bread (the raisin flavor–I liked this very much!)

Simple spinach salad with butternut squash dressing (I was craving spinach like crazy that day!)

Salad with butternut squash dressing and leftover digestive-friendly hummus:

And, finally, one of my weekend lunch faves: my Saturday leftover quesadilla (recipe follows).

Get the idea? I keep it simple, keep it easy to pack, and, though the varieties change, greens of some sort are a constant. Now, for that recipe…

Gena’s Saturday Leftovers Quesadilla

This is one of my fave weekend lunches. I do grocery shopping on Saturday AMs, so I’m always eager to round up all of the old produce and leftovers I’ve got and put them to use in my Saturday lunch. You can use any combo of ingredients, but I find that a green+cooked veggies+creamy avocado/guac is great; hummus or mashed beans are also terrific additions!

Step one

Warm up one Ezekiel tortilla in a dehydrator or low temperature oven. Top it with some leftover greens–in this case, I used leftover massaged kale salad:

Step Two

Top it with some avocado slices. This is a GREAT way to use up any stray halves or quarters of avocados that you have leftover from making guac or other dishes:

Step Three

Add a layer of leftover roasted root veggies. I love yams, turnips, mashed butternut squash, or carrots. In this wrap, I used Kabocha squash that I’d taken home in a doggie bag from dinner at Peacefood Cafe:

Step Four

Pour some leftover dressing on top — I used my zucchini dressing here:

Step Five

Top with another tortilla, and serve with a salad. YUM!

These dishes won’t win any vegan or raw culinary awards. But they are nourishing, healthy, and tasty, and they’ve all given me pleasure on days when I’m caught in the hustle and bustle of work life. Today, let’s all vow to treat our bodies to nutritious and quality foods even when we’re pulled hither and yon by our obligations. We women balance work, life, and (often) motherhood, not to mention the responsibilities of being caretakers of friends and family. We deserve nothing less than power food to make us run. And nothing can give us more nutritional bang for our buck than veggie-centric meals. Happy lunching!

xo

Happy Raw Wednesday!

How’d it go, guys? My day, though raw, was stressful and utterly unworthy of documentation. But in honor of the day, I do have a very special post to share with you. It is a chronicle of my journey into a brave new world of raw food. Yes, friends. Today, I share my first ever food dehydrating experience.

Food dehydrating. The final frontier. After six months of assuring you that you don’t need a dehydrator to be raw, and proving the claim myself, I have been gifted with a dehydrator. Which means a whole new world of breads, crackers, cookies, cakes, pizza crust, pie crust, and more.

Before I give you the detail of my first dehydrating adventure, I want to make something very clear. Having a dehydrator will in no way change the ethos of my blog. Sure, it’ll be fun to show you guys some of the fun things one can do with a dehydrator, and to make recipes that are a little more elaborate than the usual raw soups and salads. But I started this blog to prove that anyone—even someone equipped with nothing more than some kitchen knives and an imagination—can enjoy the raw lifestyle. The appliances help, but my kind of raw lifestyle (simple foods, simple combinations) doesn’t necessitate them. As I’ve stated before, I began my raw journey with nothing more than a food processor, a box grater, and some knives, and I managed nicely for a long, long while.

But every now and then, we welcome change into our lives. So get ready. A few times each month, I’ll try to make something really fun in the ‘ole Excalibur. I’ve already got some recipes bookmarked to try, and I hope you’ll love them. Rest assured, though, that Choosing Raw will remain a place where raw foodists come to relax, not show off; a place where prepping a meal takes fifteen minutes, not five days. And with the exception of today’s post, I’ll always try to give you a low-temp oven option on the recipe.

On that note, let me begin my first dehydrating adventure with a little tour of my kitchen. Welcome.

The first time I brought my ex-boyfriend (who was, shall we say, a meat and potatoes man) into this sacred room, he grinned and said, “So. This is where the magic happens.”

Yes. This is where the magic happens. This room is where it’s at. It’s where I come to unwind, to create, to shake off a bad day. Merely walking in here gives me a sense of calm. And well it should: by New York City renter’s standards, I have a pretty incredible kitchen (my old kitchen, which I shared with a roommate, was virtually so tiny that two people could not stand in it at the same time).

Here’s my countertop:

My appliances, all lined up like ducks in a row:

A still life from my Mom (she’s a painter):

Pantry items – healthy grains:

Coconut butter, nut butters, and raw honey:

And sea veggies/spices:

Here is my vegan cookbook collection (and this ain’t the half of it—just the VIPs!):

My tea kettle:

And no kitchen of mine is complete without some yams.

Hoping for a fridge tour? Not yet! I’m saving that one for a special organizational post. Soon.

Of course, having a dehydrator in an already full NYC kitchen brings up one crucial issue: space. Where to put? For now, I think a laborious tradeoff will have to happen each time the machine is in action. Other appliances get to sit on the floor:

While it gets the counter:

The rest of the time, you’ll find this guy here:

Whatever works.

In contemplating what to make for my first dehydrating jaunt, I thought (as I often do) of my clients’ food requests. Many of my clients ask me for raw bread recipes, and I’ve yet to provide them with one. I’ve also always hoped to put juice pulp to good use in a bread. So last weekend, I vowed that if I could find an easy, hassle free bread recipe, I’d christen the dehydrator with it.

Fortunately, I did. My friend Blaq Berry’s Carrocumber bread was the perfect template. And since I happened to have a ton of carrot pulp on hand, I figured it was time to take the plunge. I followed her recipe closely, making a few modifications (raisins in place of dates, celery/kale pulp in place of cucumber). And voila, Miss “I’ll never use my dehydrator” had herself some raw bread.

Here’s how:

Raw Carrot-Raisin Bread (Inspired by Hi-Rawkus; makes about five slices)

Ingredients:

1 cup carrot juice pulp
1/3 cup green pulp (celery or cucumber would be ideal)
½ cup ground flaxseed
½ tsp salt
1 tsp flax oil
¼ cup raisins, packed
1/3 cup water (if needed)

Begin by blending the first five ingredients in a food processor until well mixed. Add the raisins and pulse until they’re well incorporated.

Next, drizzle in water until the mix is clumping together – just as you would make any bread in a processor. Don’t use it all if you don’t need it – you don’t want an overly sticky consistency. (You could also do this by hand, it’ll just take some extra time.)

Roll the “dough” out onto a wooden board. You’ll probably need to oil the roller and board for this. Cut it into rectangles (mine yielded five sizeable ones).

Turn on your dehydrator, and set it to 115 degrees. Put the bread onto a Paraflexx-lined dehydrator tray, and place the bread in the machine. Dehydrate for about one hour, and flip the bread. Dehydrate for another hour and a half. Then, flip the bread again, and dehydrate for thirty-forty minutes, or until the bread has reached a consistency you like. I was aiming for a soft, yet sturdy texture, and it’s exactly what I got!

Remove the bread from the dehydrator. If you’re not eating it right away, but it in an airtight container and store in the fridge (should keep a few days). Or, go ahead and whip up a raw sandwich!

Since I had this baby on hand:

I decided to make a hearty MLT sandwich: mushroom, heirloom tomato, and lettuce. I spread some of my raw almondaise on the bread:

Stacked Portobello mushroom and thick tomato slices on it, topped with some lettuce, and voila:

A comforting, diner-worthy lunch.

Alongside a big salad, this hit the spot.

I was especially impressed with the bread’s texture: it was soft and pliable, unlike most raw bread, which usually resembles a giant, crumbly cracker.

It was new territory, but I found the whole dehydrating process ridiculously easy. It’s true, what they say about dehydrators: all you have to do is walk away and come back a few hours later. Unlike ovens or boiling pots, they require no vigilance. And the results are, well, pretty cool.

I hope you all had an awesome raw Wednesday! And I want to hear about it! Please chime into the comments section and let me know how you fared. And keep sending photos; I got a few (you guys know who you are, and thanks!) but I’d love to be able to post a whole bunch next week.

On that note, I leave you to five days sans Gena. I’m off to Crescent City to visit Chloe, my best friend, who lives there. I look forward to some hot weather, some girl time, some strolling by beautiful old homes, and some pleasure reading (fingers crossed!). In the meantime, I have three awesome guest posts lined up for you guys. Expect the first tomorrow evening!

xo