All Things Raw & Sweet!!

One of the things that I do love about raw sweets is that often after tasting a raw dessert many people love it and want to try more raw foods. So if you know someone who is skeptical about raw foods, I suggest offering a dessert. In today's post you will find a yummy pink smoothie and my favourite Chocolate Blyss Treats.




First up...This lovely Pink Smoothie

Frozen Raspberries
Banana
Sunwarrior Chocolate Protein Powder
Hemp Seeds
Water

Blend well and top with some raspberries. Enjoy.



Next onto one of the staples in my home. Chocolate Blyss Treats. These are great, healthy for you and perfect for a little snack. You can't make this wrong. I posted these before but without a recipe. So here they are again. I have to be honest each time I make them a little bit different depending on my mood and what's in my pantry, however they are always a BIG HIT.

Ingredients for batch #1
1/4 Cup Sunflower Seeds
1/4 Cup Raw Cacao Powder
1/4 Cup Organic Nut Butter
Vanilla Bean or Vanilla Powder
1/4 Shredded coconut (unsweetened)
1 Tbs Agave(or you could use honey, maple syrup, yacon)
2 Tbs Ground Flax Seed
2Tbs Coconut Oil

Hemp seeds and shredded coconut needed for decorating.

Mix together in a large bowl. If the nut butter is clumpy mash with a fork. If the mixture is dry add more coconut oil. If it is too wet add more seeds or flax powder. I ended up adding a little more flax and then one more tbs of nut butter.


Roll into balls. Use your hands and roll in your choice of shredded coconut or hemp seeds Put in the freezer and take out just before eating. I love eating them frozen and so does my family. They will look like this. You can substitute chia seeds, cacao nibs, carob or tahini.





My second batch has the following added ingredients. They are the dark ones that are not rolled in seeds or coconut.

Ingredients for batch # 2:
bee pollen
blue green algae
pinch of Himalayan Salt



These are by no means sweet in the traditional understanding. They are slightly sweet so you can adapt them to the level of sweetness that you prefer.

Next.....Just joking. I will save my raw chocolate making experience for a future post. But here is a sneak peak.



Don't forget to check out my guest post over at Healthy Heyday this Friday.

Enjoy!

Wonderful Kale Smoothies

I am not going to lie, I am in love with kale. I never knew that I would have such a personal relationship with kale, but it just happened. It seems to be my go to vegetable these days. I am so looking forward to growing some this year as I keep consuming tons of it, mostly in my smoothies and for kale chips. I usually tend to lean towards my favourite green smoothie mix of kale, lemon and green apples. However since we have two huge watermelons rolling around on the table and consuming a huge amount of space, I thought that I better switch it up.

I am going to nickname this as my "welcome to green smoothies" drink. I made two versions and the first is just perfect to share with someone who is new to the green smoothie movement.( where you combine fruit and green vegetables into one healthy smoothie). It is so mild tasting and would be great with a frilly little umbrella on it and you can pretend you are at the beach.

Here is the first batch I made today.

You will need
2 cups of cubed watermelon
1 frozen banana (can use more if you want it sweeter or less)
1/3 cup of water
1/3 cup raspberries
1 cup spinach

Put everything in a blender and serve. I love the fresh light green shade and taste. It is perfect for those that have never had a green smoothie.


My daughter and hubby loved it.


If you have been drinking green smoothies for a while you could do this version. It is still light and fluffy and would work in a nice summer setting or really anytime of year. I added this to the recipe ingredients listed above:

6 kale leaves
1 capsule of blue green algae or E3Live

I blended in the kale and then poured out the mixture. To that I added the algae and mixed it around. This turned it a shade darker. You could also half the amount of banana if you don't need your smoothies to be sweet. I have also been in love with blue green algae. If you don't have it you could use spirulina or chlorella.



Followed the smoothie with a quick salad. Messy, but yummy.



Enjoy!!

What vegetable are you in love with these days? Are you having a green smoothie everyday? I would love to hear if you have tried blue green algae and what you think of it?

Asian Chickpea Salad & Curry Chickpea

On any given day I am making a whole lot of food. Raw food and cooked food. My family is very willing to eat raw foods, but they don't eat as much as me. They try a lot of the things that I make, but they still have a vegan style meal a lot of the time. Their food is healthy and contains some of the best ingredient, so I thought that I would share a typical night for us. I make my raw meal and their cooked meal often by using the same theme.

I made myself this chickpeas dish which is not all raw, but still very good.


Salad Ingredients
Chickpeas
1/8 Cup Dulse
1/4 Cup Scallions
1/2 Cup Celery
Few Raisins (yes this is a weird idea with the dulse but it worked well)

Dressing
miso
apple cider vinegar
olive and algae oil
salt (this will depend on what type of seaweed you use-you made not need any)


For mine I scooped some onto some mixed greens and added a few sprouts. My daughter actually really liked this and took it to school for her lunch the next day.

Then....

I made a Curry Chickpea dish for my husband. This is a really tasty vegan dish that you can make for your family. It is so quick that I can make it in about 30 minutes and it is healthy for you. There is barely any oil, and the oil we use is good for you.


You will need:
Chickpeas (soaked and boiled or or canned)
I tbs curry powder
I medium sized onion
1tbs coconut oil ( Organic Extra Virgin Coconut Oil by Nutiva)
3 cloves of garlic, minced
1 bay leaf & 1 sprig of thyme
1/4-1/2 Cup shredded cabbage
1 carrot slice or shredded
1/2 Cup Coconut Milk (Organic)
1/2 cup water
hot pepper to your liking ( I used about 1/4 green chili)
pinch of Himalayan salt or sea salt

Heat the coconut oil and lightly saute the curry, onion, bay leaf, thyme and garlic. Add in chickpeas, carrot, cabbage and stir to get all veggies coated with the curry powder. Add your water and coconut milk. Allow to come to a slight boil and then simmer for about 10 minutes. Add hot pepper, salt and pepper to your liking. If it is too thick add water, if it is too runny mash a couple of the chick peas and the curry will get thicker. Enjoy.

I like it when the vegetables are just slightly cooked and still crunchy. I have made this many ways and you can change the vegetables that you use. You can use kale or spinach and add it to the mixture just before serving.




You can serve this over steamed brown rice. Or even quinoa or millet. This is so quick that it a great meal to have in your recipe file. There is usually lots left over for lunch.

Now my favourite part. Use the left over coconut milk for a treat for all of your hard work in the kitchen. I use mine in my Matcha Green Tea.

I hope you ENJOY!. Does you family require different meals? How do you incorporate new foods into your family meals? I would love to hear from you on what works for your family.

Green Smoothies and Victoria Boutenko

Last week when I was detoxing from my computer I watched a raw food video that I bought many years ago. This video is of Victoria Boutenko doing a food preparation class. I haven't watched this video in a while. They don't sell it any more but there are a lot of other dvd's for sale. I was extremely fortunate to meet her and the family and hear them speak. At the time I was just getting into raw food and she shared a wealth of information and research. My sister and I sat in the front rows and soaked up all of the information she was talking about. I immediately lined up after the workshop and purchased a couple of books and a video.

The thing I liked most about watching the video this week was that it brought raw food back to it's basics. I love the ease and simplicity of her recipes. I feel the focus is not on gourmet raw, but functional daily raw. So after watching her video last week I found out that she was doing a free talk on Omega 3 this week. Not sure if any of you had a chance to listen to this call? I would love to know what you thought of it?

I found this talk to be very so interesting. The focus was on omega 3 and omega 6 and how our bodies are craving omega 3 fatty acid and how we have an abundance of omega 6 fatty acid in our food. She touched upon a lot of points that she has been researching. She brings up the topic that many raw food diets have too much focus on nuts and seeds which are more abundant in omega 6 fatty acids. She believes that we should be focusing more on the green smoothies and therefore getting more omega 3's which help with inflammation, brain development, vision and flexibility. The only seeds and nuts that she is consuming right now is flax seeds, chia seeds and walnuts. After she switched her diet and removed most nuts she began to feel better and loose weight.

She also touched upon being 100% raw vs high raw. ( Wow can I tell you that seems to be a big topic lately, but that's a whole other post). She also brought up the topic of how there is negative energy sometimes between different diets. For example raw food vs vegan vs non vegan. I do love all of her research but also her honesty. She is sharing a chart with all of her information on the percentage of omega 3 vs omega 6 in seeds and nuts. It is on the Green Smoothie Queen Blog

If you can try to listen to this call it is very interesting and challenges a lot of beliefs raw food. I am not sure how long this link will be available.

Also check some of the products that Victoria and the raw family offer. I did make a few things from her family books including a yummy raw soup and some cookies that I will post about later. In the meantime....drink your green smoothie and get your omega 3's.


My favorite is kale, lemon, apple and sprouts. Sometime a small piece of date is added for my daughter. However after a few smoothies, she doesn't need it anymore.



Love to hear what you thing about reducing the nuts and seeds in your diet? Omega 3's in the raw food diet? 100% raw vs high raw?

Radiation..What are you doing?

Over the last couple of weeks I have been reading a lot of articles relating to radioactive material leaking from Fukushima plant and thinking about what I should add to my daily routine. Around the same time that the leak started in Japan there was also a leak in Ontario Canada at the Pickering Plant. I live in Canada about an hour away from the leak. If you are interested in eating healthy food, now it a great time to start incorporating more super foods into your diet to help offset all of this toxic matter.

I have included a few articles from some of the top health experts in my opinion. I read most of these articles and then made a list of what I want to purchase and incorporate into my diet or just simply increase. For example the soup above has some dulse flake in it. I also love adding my things to my smoothies such as algae, bee pollen, camu camu and more. So this is the perfect place for me to incorporate some of their suggestion. If you want a more detailed protocol they provide it for you.

In the articles you will notice that there a lot of common recommendations such as adding kelp and other sea vegetables into your diet by supplement or as food. Boosting your immune system with vitamins and herbs. Some other points touched upon correcting our nutritional deficiencies and eating chelating herbs. I think there is some great information here on how to support and protect our bodies at this time. I am not in a panic by any means, but I do want to be aware of what I can do to support my body in the best way and that's why I looked to these experts on what to do.

A summary of some of the supplements that are mentioned in the articles are:
Vitamin C
Kelp and
Sea Vegetables
Chlorella
Spirulina
Vitamin/Mineral Supplements
Ginseng
Ashwagandha
Fulvic Acid
Medicinal Mushrooms
Iodine
E3Live/Blue Green Algae
MegaHydrate

Natural News
Has up to date information on the current situation in Japan. Shares information on test they are doing in the US to see how much radioactive material has spread and is found in our food supply.

Body Ecology
Article talks about radioactive Iodine 131 and how it effects our bodies and why we need to make sure our iodine levels are not deficient.

Dr. Mercola
If you scroll down to the section on what to take there is a nice chart of herbs, vitamins and supplements that are listed.

David Wolfe
Amazingly detailed information on products that he recommends and what protocol to take. Very eye opening information on how radiation effects us and what to do to protect ourselves.

Dr. Gabriel Cousens
In depth look at radiation we face everyday and what to do in light of the situation in Japan.

This is my smoothie with an extra dose of blue green algae, vitamin c and bee pollen.


What are you doing to help your body deal with radioactive material? Love to hear if you are doing anything? Go ahead and post your link in the comments section sharing one of your kelp or seaweed recipe below for others to try. We might as well help each other out and swap some of the good stuff. I am sure you have lots.

Thanks to one of my fellow blogger's Kelli She has been posting some great recipes with kelp in them and information on radiation as well. Go take a peak.