Another more recent Big Screen Green Drink Alert…

I just saw Queen Latifa in her role as Leslie Wright in Just Wright.  She is a  physical therapist working with an NBA All-Star Scott McKnight. During his recovery she hands him what looks just like a green smoothie. (I’ll post a green smoothie scene pic when I can – this photo is just clipped from the preview).

 Have you seen a green drink on the big screen?

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Found the Holy Grail in raw food. The 80/10/10 low fat raw vegan information from Dr. Doug Graham.

Every page I read I wanted to bookmark.  Its informative and backed with tons of research. It’s all about the natural way we are meant to nourish our bodies… and you can find it all at your grocery produce department. You don’t have to order exotic supplements and powders and other fancy raw crap that is being peddled online — know I know why that peddled crap and the way it was marketed always bothered me. It’s because it’s just not natural. It’s not needed. (And OMG someone is actually selling “raw water” now).

When I read that the medical industry has published studies that say diabetics need to eat fruit and stay off the fat – it blew my mind. There are doctors out there telling people to not eat fruit because of the sugar content! When you eat fruit, the body sucks up that awesome juicy nutrition and uses the glucose for energy and the insulin receptors do their job and attach to the sugar and use it and move it out of the system. BUT when you have fat in your system taking forever to digest and get out of the system, the poor little receptors can’t do their job because the fat is blocking them. They are like little fat bouncers standing out front of a tough biker bar shaking their head no. So the sugar floats around wondering what to do. If diabetics stayed off fat, they could get off their meds.

The unusual title of the book refers to getting 80% of calories from carbs (fruit) 10% of our calories from protein (greens) and 10% of our calorie from fat (nuts, avo, seed). See NutritionData.com and NutriDiary.com to check the nutrients from your food. For example here is the nutrient data from my usual green papaya smoothie: 

Papaya Green Smoothie
200 grams papaya (a good full cup cubed)
100 grams banana (one medium about 7″ long)
100 grams romaine (5 or 6 leaves)
2 cups water

Nutrition Data:
Calories – 253
Fat – 1 g
Sodium – 15 mg
Carbs – 65 g
Fiber – 10 g
Sugars – 42 g
Protein – 4 g

Here is the nutrition data on the individual ingredients:

I think this is the way our bodies were biologically designed to eat. Perhaps it’s not for everyone – but if you are a raw foodist that is having difficulty sticking to raw because of cooked food cravings – try low fat raw vegan, read the book. You will see that just eating more fruit obliterates the cooked food craving. And if you are eating 811 and still craving – you aren’t eating enough fruit, get those calories in! When you’re used to always trying to eat low cal, 2000 plus calories a day is hard to wrap your head around.

With all the calories you need to increase your activity – but the cool thing is…you are so full of energy that you just get up and move! You’re body wants to move. And have a total blast when you are consuming so much fruit, people are going to notice. When they see that and say the typical “where do you get your protein?” You can be straight and say “from fruits and vegetables.” Or you can have fun with them and say “How much protein do we need?” They never know. Never once has someone who has asked me that ever has an answer. There is 4 grams of protein in that green smoothie  – and that’s just one meal or a snack. Well, the issue of protein is one for another post another time.

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If you compare to the first post of my Burger Museum  you’ll see the cheese now looks a little darker – otherwise, pretty much the same. I dusted this jar for the photo – the grime you see is on the inside. The burger fell about the jar when I took it down from its “show place” (okay, it’s on top of the frige) so I opened it to reposition it and took a whiff to see if it had any odor. It had a slight odd chemical scent.

I got the idea of making my own Burger Museum from watching Morgan Spurlocks movie “Super Size Me.” A thought provoking and a bit scary movie. Watch it and don’t miss the bonus material. Start you’re own burger museum. Check out others by searching on Google for “burger museum” and join the club!

I suggest wearing a disguise to go to your local fast food joint (you know, so your raw food friends won’t see you and point and call the raw food police).

The whole point is to illustrate that this IS NOT FOOD!

Please remember this the next time you’re having some fast food cravings. Drink some water, eat lots of fruit and run, RUN, RUN AWAY – it’s only the drug of junk food wanting it’s fix – don’t feed that fix.

Live raw, live well, eat fresh fruit and dance full of vibrant health.

love,

Julie

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Sometimes, when I’m paying attention, I am mesmerized when I slice open some beautiful raw fruits or vegetables. It is all so amazing. I wanted to write about how beautiful it was but the word beautiful just wasn’t enough. I found the word “resplendent” in my Thesauraus: shining brightly; full of splendor; dazzling; splendid. It’s a good word.

There is no question in my mind that fruits, vegetables and greens were created to be resplendent so that we would be attracted to it and and want to eat our fill. It couldn’t be any simpler! Resplendent colors – (open a papaya!); incredible designs -(check out a cauliflower up close); amazing aroma (the list is too long!)

What about nuts and seeds? Look at the regal sunflower with its bright yellow petals. Almond shells hanging on a tree are covered by a thin layer of bright green meat that tastes like a Granny Smith apple. Look at dark green beautifully curly kale, so rich. Now think about that which we shouldn’t be eating… (I started to write some examples, but they weren’t resplendent and I didn’t feel resplendent writing the words.)

Mother Nature gave us a big clue what to eat: it will be resplendent! It can be so simple.

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My papaya tree is full of papaya that have yet to ripen. But the temps have been falling and I think I’ve got all the fruit I’ll get from it this season. Then this week we had snow and a hard freeze and so in preparation I covered some of my more tropical plants with plant blankets. I cut 3 of the largest green papaya from the tree to see if they would ripen indoors.

I really don’t think they were old enough to ripen indoors so I thought I’d see what I could make with the green papaya. There are other fruits that have “2 lives.” Green mangos are used as a relish and in salsas. Green plantain are used to make several cooked side dishes (patacones, chips…).  

When you cut a green papaya it has a sticky sap that oozes and when dry it is waxy. (The papayas that were left on the tree were covered in dots of the waxy substance the next morning after the freeze.) I cut open the papaya, cut off the peeling, used a mandoline to make a pile of julianne strips. I soaked the strips in a bowl of water, salt and juice of one lime.

Soak for at least 30 minutes. Drain and then toss with sliced purple cabbage, julianned cucumber, chopped or julianned apple, chopped cilantro, chopped pistachios and orange zest. Drizzle cranberry dressing over the salad and top with a couple of sliced soaked dates per serving.

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But raw food, for example raw soups you can dehydrate, or add more raw ingredients and dehydrate into a raw cracker. Raw food never needs to go to waste.

I made a few special recipes to take to Thanksgiving with my family, (they were eating cooked). I made a green salad to share that turned out really good.
Chopped romain with pecans, diced tomatoes, diced yellow bell pepper, soaked goji berries, strawberries, cucumbers. With a light balsamic vinegar/olive oil/honey/cinnamon cranberry dressing.

My side dish was Bartlet Pears with Cinnamon Cranberry Sauce and Spiced Ginger Cream. Found the recipe on Gliving.com – this sauce had an amazing flavor!

 I also had a slice of carnival squash topped with raw dressing. Just a few bites of that and I was stuffed! Guess all those nuts fill you up. I soaked the squash in salt water, drained it, dehydrated it for a couple hours which softened it a bit. Then I rubbed it with cumin. The dressing was a handful each of pecans, walnuts, almonds. Processed with a little squash, celery, sage, onion, parsley, salt, pepper. Pretty tasty!

For dessert I had a Mango Cream Tart (also from GLiving.com)

What to do with the leftovers? The squash and stuffing I turned into a savory raw bread! I ran the squash and nut stuffing through my Omega auger juicer to turn it into a paste, adding some left over red and yellow bell pepper. Then I stirred in fresh ground flax seed, the leftover cinnamon cranberry sauce, dulse, kelp, chopped raw olives, sunflower seeds and a little coconut oil. Spread out on 2 teflex sheets and dried at 110 for a few hours.

 I cut it into little squares that remind me of those little “coctail rye” bread loaves. Probably high in calories with all the nuts. So I’ll make them last! Should be good with lettuce and tomato!

The mango tart was only a 6″ tart, but was so filling I only had a sliver. And everyone else was chowing down on 3 different kinds of cooked pies and didn’t try mine…so I had lots left over.

I put the entire tart in a food processor with 2 bananas, a little fresh ground flax seed, vanilla and cinnamon. Spread it on one teflex sheet about 1/2 in thick or less. Dried it at 110 for a few hours. When it was dried enough to handle, I cut it in small squares – spreading honey on some and adding coconut just for fun, (then dried some more).

These turned out good. Probably could have added something to sweeten it more – but I think they will be good as a side to a green salad with pears I think!

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I’ve been wanting to try a glass straw for a while. I typically don’t use straws, but I love the fact that glass straws are an environmental alternative to adding more plastic to the land fills and water ways. And of course the less plastic touching your food the better.

So I finally got around to ordering some and found the COOLEST glass straws on the internet!

They are handcrafted by California glass artist Mark Black from GlassParadise.com They are the only ones on the internet I found that are these wonderful solid colors. You can buy one or a set (great pricing, fast shipping).

And if you think that a glass straw is something that will break the first time you use it, don’t worry – glass straws are made of the same Pyrex glass that sturdy cookware is made with. These are their standard 9″ straw – you can see that they are plenty long enough for my quart jar for juice and smoothies. And they will also make longer ones and fatter ones. The fatter ones are called “Smoothie Straws” though I found these to be fine for smoothies – but my smoothies aren’t chunky.  And they even have very inexpensive little straw brushes to clean the straws! (for those times when you forget to rinse when you finish using them)

As an artist I love that buying from Glass Paradise supports other artists – independant glass blowing artists! Check it out!

(Okay, so I wrote a whole entire post about straws…but I just get excited when I find such a great deal for such a cool thing)

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Using my Vitamix I pureed up some soup – kept it on high for a little longer to warm it up a bit. Being a high speed blender you can do that!

This was adapted from an Elaina Love  recipe – I blended up a red bell pepper, half an avocado I had left in the frige, one small organic carrot, handful of cilantro, dash salt (I use Real Salt available from WholeFoods), dash of cumin. It made way too much for one serving so I refrigerated the rest.

Taking a tip from Ann Wigmore I dehydrated the leftover soup. I added a half cup of sprouted buckwheat (which I turned into “nut butter” by running it though the auger juicer).

I also added 2 chopped green onions, minced about 4″ of fresh rosemary, added more salt and cumin.

I poured this mixture out on a teflex dehydrator sheet and dried it at 105 degrees for about 2 or 3 hours.

I used a spatula to spread it around evenly and even shook the tray to even it out. It dried really fast, I flipped it over onto the screen in about an hour. It was too thin to actually be crackers. I broke them up and put them in a jar. If I can keep out of them, I will use them to sprinkle over salads! Really tasty, made the house smell great!
  

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Our pet cats and dogs should eat a raw animal based diet because they do have sharp teeth and the short digestive tracts. And like humans, when they live a mostly raw diet, our pets become amazingly healthy and vibrant and shiny.

One of my fantail goldfish died and it prompted me to move the remaining fish from the small outdoor bog pond to an indoor aquarium. The aquarium set up came with water treatment filter, heater, light and tropical fish flake food. I wondered if it was okay to feed tropical fish food to my gold fish – so I asked online. 

 And I learned a lot.

Where do I find biologically appropriate food for my gold fish? It’s not in the flake food sold at pet stores.

I started reading the labels of the fish food I had on hand.

TetraFin Goldfish Flakes lable: fish meal, ground brown rice, yeast shrimp meal, oatmeal, wheat gluten, soybean oil, fish oil, corn gluten, algae meal, sorbitol, lecithin, potato protein, ascorbic acid, yeast extract, inositol…and then about 20 more words of things I can’t pronounce as well as red, yellow and blue dyes.

Hai Feng Fast Color Gold Fish Food label: (pellets) wheat flour, fish meal, wheat germ, shrimp meal, spirulina, corn meal, soybean meal, L-lysine hydrochloride, algae meal, lecithin, choline, BHT, citric acid, calcium, phosphate monobasic, minerals, 16 vitamins.

Aqueon Tropical Flakes:Whole fish meal (salmon, herring & other mixed fishes), whole wheat flour, soybean meal, whole dried krill, wheat gluten meal, dried yeast, squid meal, wheat germ, corn gluten meal, kelp meal, fish oil, spirulina, garlic, natural astaxanthin, marigold powder, chili powder, spinach … and about 18 more words that are unpronounceable. 

Fish were not created to swim up the plowed rows of a farmers field trying to get at the potato and wheat, rice and soy. I’m on the hunt for awesome food for my little fantail friend. I had some floating anacharis (a water plant) in the bog pond, so I put that in the aquarium. I had it because they produce oxygen – but I’ve since read that goldfish like to eat them. So at least the little guy is getting his greens.

Some may say that worrying about biologically appropriate food for a simple goldfish is taking things too far. Well, people that have fish as pets and love them would disagree. And it’s also the principle of the thing – I’m sick of how manufactures use dyes, wheat, rice, potato, soy and sorbital in everything on the shelf.

It’s not all their fault – the public contantantly demands cheaper prices, so manufactures have to use cheap fillers and cheap lab made ingredients to bring the price down.

If you don’t want that – vote with your dollars.

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Hopefully by now you know that you need to filter your city water. You can spend several thousand dollars if you get carried away or you can at the very least a pitcher like Brita or Pur. I recently purchased a Zero Water  pitcher filter system. It advertises that its the only filtered water that meets FDA definition for purified bottled water. So if you are used to purchasing bottled water in plastic, this is the thing for you. I filter it and put it in glass bottles.

The Zero pitcher comes with a TDS meter to stick in your water and digitally read how pure it is. My tap water read 280, my distilled read 001, my Brita read 199.  I had a bottle of Culligan Purified Water and it read 022, and of course – the Zero Pitcher - read zero.

Update: More readings: PUR Water filter pitcher – 075,  Ozarka bottled spring water – 022

From their brochure: ” The TDS (total dissolved solids) meter measures the electrical conductivity of the water and converts it to a value of total dissolved solids. The meter can detect things such as nitrates, chloride, sulfide, aluminum and other contaminant with a positive or negative charge. It does not text for uncharged particles, such as nitrogen or chlorine; organic compounds such as herbicides or microbiological contaminants such as bacteria. The filter cartridge removes inorganic, organic and radiological contaminants. The meter measures inorganic contaminants which are removed by the weakest part of the system. “

I have been drinking distilled water lately, preferring the taste over filtered water. But the first glass of water out of my Zero tasted really good to me! And I could drink the first glass – not like my Brita which I have to filter several pitchers before it’s right. (charcoal filters coloring the water)

In an effort to quit using plastic (leaches chemicals into your water) I filter the water and put it in glass bottles at home and on the road I use a stainless drinking bottle. I wish it could be glass, but of course glass is heavy and breaks.

And shameless plug here … I just uploaded a whole bunch of new designs to my Cafe Press store – including a Sigg Water Bottle with a graphic of high vibration words! On the left is one of my new designs. See more at the RawCityLife Cafe Press store! Brand new aprons too!

 Update: Here is proof my new Zero Water pitcher has really pure water…I’m using it for ice cubes – took out my ice maker (well, the huge tray thingy) because my frige filter tested bad. Ice spikes usually form with pure water, like distilled water. Was happy to see this fella, so I took a photo.
There were several in other trays, but this one was real pointy and pretty.

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